Niru's Arena

मला मकर संक्रांत हा सण आवडत नाही.

2012-01-17T21:49:00.002+05:30

मला मकर संक्रांत हा सण आवडत नाही.

आता हे वाचून तुम्हाला वाटलं असेल, आला... आणखी एक पर्यावरणवादी आला. आता हा पतंग, मांजा, त्या पतंगांसाठी होणारी वृक्षतोड आणि पतंगांचा कचरा यावर छान लांबलचक भाषण देणार आणि महा बोर करणार.... नाही!!! काळजी करू नका. माझा तसला कसलाही उद्देश नाही. माझा विरोध त्या पतंगांना किंवा त्या वृक्षतोडीला किंवा खरं सांगायचं तर मकर संक्रांतीच्या निमित्ताने होणाऱ्या अपेयपानाच्या (दारू पिणे याला सभ्य मराठी भाषेत 'अपेयपान' म्हणतात) पार्ट्यांनाही माझा विरोध नाही. माझा विरोध आहे तो मकर संक्रांतीच्या निमित्ताने आपले पाककला नैपुण्य दाखवणाऱ्या स्त्रियांना... (या वर्गात शाळेत शिकणाऱ्या चिमुरड्यांपासून कवळी वापरणाऱ्या शि. सा. न. आज्जींपर्यंत सगळा महिलावर्ग मोडतो). अजून मुद्दा लक्षात आला नाही वाटतं... थांबा. माझ्यावर ओढवलेला एक (बाका) प्रसंग सांगतो. (इथे अति-प्रसंग असं म्हणायची माझी फार इच्छा होती.. अहो तो प्रसंगच होता तसा... पण असो.)

दिवस: मकर संक्रांत

वर्ष: तितकंसं महत्वाचं नाहीये ते.

वेळ: सणासुदीचं काहीतरी छान छान खायच्या इच्छेने पोटात कावळे कोकलतात ती.

स्थळ: (कृपया या शब्दाचा अर्थ 'ठिकाण' असा घ्यावा. लग्नाळू व्यक्तींनी अर्थाचा अनर्थ करू नये) पुण्यातील असेच एक (बहुदा सदाशिव पेठी ) जोशी - कुलकर्णी घर.

माझं त्या घरातल्या काकांकडे काम होतं आणि ते मात्र नेहेमीप्रमाणे "अरे फक्त दहा मिनिटांत आलो" असं म्हणून साधारण एक तासभर त्यांच्या सोसायटीच्या मीटिंग मध्ये भांडत बसले होते. त्यांची वाट बघत बघत मी आपला टीव्हीवर चाललेला " क्या मंगलवासी अभिषेक-ऐश्वर्या कि बेटी का अपहरण करना चाहते है" हा अतिशय अभ्यासपूर्ण कार्यक्रम बघत होतो. मंगळावरचे लोक प्रचंड निरुद्योगी असावेत असं काहीतरी त्या कार्यक्रमामधून वाटत होतं. राखी सावंत या गोष्टीवर आपलं बहुमोल मत मांडायला टीव्हीवर आली आणि नेमकी तेव्हाच स्वयंपाकघरातून हाक आली, "अरे हे येतीलच हं इतक्यात.. मीटिंग जरा लांबलेली दिसतेय. एकटाच बाहेर बसून कंटाळला असशील ना... आत ये की. माझ्याशी जरा गप्पा मारल्यास तर चालेल की..." मनापासून सांगतो... मला त्या राखी सावंत आणि मंगळवाले लोक यांना सोडून जायचं जीवावर आलेलं, पण काकुंशी गप्पा मारताना काहीतरी खायला मिळण्याची शक्यता होती, त्यामुळे आमची स्वारी थेट स्वयंपाकघरात...

या काकूंची 'पियू' (शारीरिक वय अंदाजे १७ वर्षे आणि बौद्धिक वय अंदाजे ५ वर्षे.. अर्थात हे आमचं वैयक्तिक मत. शाळेत दरवर्षी पहिला नंबर येत असल्यामुळे या बाईसाहेब लौकिकार्थाने हुशार आहेत पण तशा डोक्याने ‘मठ्ठंच’ आहेत)... तर या बाईसाहेब स्वयंपाकघरातंच ग्यासवर काहीतरी करत होत्या. माझी धडकी भरली. ‘खायला नको पण या पियूच्या स्वयंपाकाला आवर’ अशी तिची पंचक्रोशीत ख्याती होती. कोल्हापुरी मिसळीपासून नागपूरच्या वडाभातापर्यंत सगळे पदार्थ या बाईसाहेबांनी करून समस्त घरच्या आणि फुकटचं खायला म्हणून आलेल्या पाहुणे मंडळींची पोटं पार बिघडवली होती. पियू तयार करत असलेली ती स्पेशल 'डीश' तयार व्हायच्या आत काका यावेत अशी मी मनोमन प्रार्थना चालू केली. काका येईपर्यंत खिंड लढवणे आणि काहीही झालं तरी पियूच्या स्वयंपाकाचा विषय टाळणे हा एकमेव मार्ग मला दिसत होता. तेवढ्यात काकूंनी गुगली टाकला,"काय रे वधूसंशोधन कसं चाललंय? अरे त्या भावेंच्या चुलतबहिणीच्या मावसनणंदेच्या चुलत सासऱ्यांच्या नातीचं स्थळ आलेलं ना तुला सांगून... काय झालं रे त्या स्थळाचं?" अतिशय अवघड प्रश्न. आता ही भावेंची नातेवाईक मुलगी माझा 'अतिसुंदर' फोटो बघून मला थंड नकार देऊन गेली. आता मला त्या पोरीने रीजेक्ट केलं, हे मला सांगायचं नव्हतं; काही झालं तरी माझ्या इमेजचा प्रश्न होता. आता अजूनही मी हातात लग्नाची पत्रिका किंवा साखरपुड्याचं आमंत्रण घेऊन उभा नाहीये ह्याचा अर्थ काहीतरी बोम्बल्लेलं आहे असा होत नाही का; मग असे अवघड प्रश्न कशाला विचारतात देव जाणे...असो.

"बापरे... अहो काकू मुंबईमध्ये जाळपोळ झाली म्हणे कुठेतरी..." मी माझ्या मोबाईलची स्क्रीन बघत एक एसएमएस वाचायचं नाटक केलं. आता ह्याला अफवा पसरवणे म्हणत नाहीत. फक्त आपल्या आयुष्यातील एका खाजगी विषयावर होऊ घातलेली जाहीर चर्चा टाळण्याचा हा एक प्रामाणिक उपाय होता... आता मुंबईमध्ये रोज कुठे ना कुठे मोर्चा, मारामाऱ्या, जाळपोळ हे प्रकार होताच असतात त्यामुळे काकूंना ते खरं वाटलं असावं कारण त्यांनी पण लगेच "आजकाल काही खरं नाही हो या लोकांचं... उठतात आणि मारामाऱ्या करत सुटतात.. बघ ई टीव्ही वर बातम्या लागल्या असतील. त्यात सांगतील” असं म्हणत 'आजकालची बिघडलेली तरुण पिढी' हा महाबोर असा 'प्रवीण दवणे फेव्हरेट' विषय चालू केला. मी शांतपणे टीव्हीवर परत एकदा राखी सावंतची मुलाखत चालू केली. नको तो विषय संपवल्याचा आनंद माझ्या चेहऱ्यावरून ओसंडून वाहायला लागलाच होता.... पण खरं सांगतो नियतीला आमच्या आयुष्यात सुख बघवत नाही हो..

पियू शांतपणे गजगामिनीसारखी पदन्यास करत (म्हणजे आपला ८० किलोचा अवाढव्य देह सांभाळत हत्तीणीसारखी झुलत झुलत) माझ्या समोर उभी राहिली. तिच्या हातात एक ताटली आणि त्यात ४-५ काळेकुट्ट छोटे गोळे होते. "दादा, अरे मी ना आज संक्रांत म्हणून तीळगुळाचे लाडू केलेत. चव घेऊन बघ की कसे झालेत ते." आली का पंचाईत!!! मी अविवाहित असल्यामुळे 'फुकट ते पौष्टिक' हा माझा ध्येयवाद होता पण फुकट असलं तरी पियूच्या हातचं काहीही खायचं नाही हा आमच्या गल्लीतल्या मंडळींनी (अर्थात गुपचूप) पास केलेला ठराव मोडण्याचं धाडस मला काही होईना. आमचा देव पण ना असा नको तिथे परीक्षा पाहण्यात एक नंबर! फाशी जाणाऱ्या कैद्याने आपली शेवटच्या जेवणाची थाळी हातात घ्यावी त्या उत्साहाने मी ती ताटली हातात घेतली आणि समोर राखीच्या मुलाखतीत लक्ष केंद्रित केलं. पियू आतल्या खोलीत गेली की ते लाडू गुपचूप खिशात घालायचे आणि बाहेर पडल्यावर त्याची योग्य ती वासलात लावायची असा माझा बेत होता. पण ठरवलेलं होईल तर ते आमचं नशीब कसलं... पियू समोरच उभी राहिली. "अरे दादा खा ना. चव कशी आहे ते सांग म्हणजे जर काही बिघडलं असेल तर मला दुरुस्त्या करायला बरं!!!"

"गधडे, कार्टे मी काय प्रयोगशाळेतला उंदीर आहे माझ्यावर हे असे प्रयोग करायला?" असा म्हणायची खर्रच खूप इच्छा झाली होती हो... पण काय 'दादा-धर्माला' जागणं आलं आणि मी शांतपणे एक काळा गोळा तोंडात घातला. तो चक्क कडू होता. ‘संक्रांतीला गोड गोड तिळगुळ घ्या आणि गोड बोला असा संदेश देताना हा कडूजार तिळगुळ या बयेने मला का द्यावा? मी कडू बोलावं अशी हिची अपेक्षा आहे का?’, असा विचार मी करत होतो आणि पियू म्हणाली, "अरे दादा, बाबांना डायबिटीस आहे ना म्हणून लाडवांमध्ये गुळापेक्षा जास्त मेथी घातलीये म्हणजे त्यांनापण खाता येतील." "अगं मंद झम्पे... डायबिटीस तुझ्या बापाला आहे मला नाही.. हे जीभेपर्यंत आलेले शब्द मी शांतपणे गिळून टाकले." पण तोवर त्या कडू चवीमुळे माझ्या डोक्यात तिचा 'बाप' काढण्याइतपत राग निर्माण झालेला होता.

मग मी तो लाडू चावायचा निष्फळ प्रयत्न केला. माझ्या रूट कॅनल केलेल्या एक-एक दातातून अतिशय जीवघेणी कळ गेली, १-२ दात त्या गोळ्याला आपटले ( कदाचित आपटून फुटले पण असतील ) पण तो गोळा काही तुटेना. "थोडेसे कडक झालेत लाडू. तेवढाच दातांना जरा व्यायाम", असं म्हणून ती मूर्खीण हसली. "थांब तुझ्यासाठी पाणी आणते", असं म्हणून आत गेली. "पाणी नको. हे गोळे खायच्या ऐवजी विष आण" असं म्हणायचं माझ्या अगदी जिभेवर आलं होतं... पण शेवटी १-१०० आकडे मोजले आणि थांबलो. ती आत जाऊन येईपर्यंत शांतपणे तोंडातला गोळा बाहेर काढला आणि खिडकीतून बाहेर भिरकावून दिला. मग मी ताटलीतले बाकीचे ४ गोळे पण असेच बाहेर भिरकावून दिले आणि रिकाम्या तोंडाने काहीतरी चघळत असल्याची अक्टिंग करत बसलो.

"काकू, छानच झालेत हं लाडू... काही म्हणा पण पियूच्या हाताला (वाईट्ट कडू) चव आहे बुवा. या वयात एवढं एक्सपरटाईज म्हणजे कमाल झाली हो", मी तोंडातली ती घाणेरडी कडू चव विसरत आपलं कसं बसं बोललो. "छे रे दादा, तुझा आपलं काहीतरीच!!!", "हो. खरंच. माझा आपलं काहीतरीच", हे अर्थात मी मनाशी! पियू आत लाजली असावी कारण बाहेर येताना ती आणखी एक छोटा डबा घेऊन आली आणि म्हणाली,"तुला एवढे आवडतील असं वाटलं नव्हतं रे. हे घे. डब्यात आणखी दिलेत. तालिबानी अतिरेक्यांना बॉम्ब हातात देताना जसं वाटेल ना तसं काहीतरी मला वाटलं. तेवढ्यात "हरामखोर लेकाचे. अक्कल नाही इथे कुणाला. सुशिक्षित म्हणवतात स्वतःला पण एकही लेकाचा सुसंस्कारित नाही. घरातून दगड धोंडे फेकले माझ्यावर.. अर्रे बघून घेईन एकेकाला...", असं म्हणत काकांनी एन्ट्री घेतली.

"काय झालं काका? असे चिडलात का हो एकदम?", मी विचारलं.

"अरे मी आत्ता खालून येत होतो आणि कोणीतरी माझ्यावर दगड फेकले रे... अर्रे मर्द मराठ्याची औलाद असेल तर समोर ये म्हणावं...लपून छपून कसले वार करता... हे बघ चांगले ४ दगड मारले रे..." काकांनी मूठ उघडून त्यांना लागलेले ते ४ 'दगड-धोंडे' दाखवले... "एकाचा नेम चुकला..." मी मनाशी हिशोब लावत स्वगत म्हटलं...

"आलात का... अहो किती वेळ. हा बिचारा तुमची वाट बघून बघून कंटाळला अगदी. अरे.. हे काय अहो ते लाडू याच्यासाठी दिले होते पियूनं... तुम्ही काय उचललेत सगळेच्या सगळे... अधाशीच बाई मुलखाचे तुम्ही. हादडा आता. तू थांब रे. तुझ्यासाठी आतून आणून देते लाडू." काकूंनी जवळपास हिरोशिमा नागासाकीवाला बॉम्बच टाकला.

काका अजूनही टीव्हीवरच्या संस्कृत बातम्या बघताना होतो तसा चेहेरा करून एकदा माझ्याकडे, एकदा काकूंकडे आणि एकदा त्या हातातल्या ४ लाडू कम दगडांकडे बघत होते. त्यांचं ते प्रश्नचिन्ह आणखी गडद होण्याआधी मी तिथून चक्क पळून गेलो. आजतागायत त्या घराचे दरवाजे माझ्यासाठी बंद आहेत. पियू मला बघितलं की नाक फेंदारून निघून जाते आणि काकू त्यांच्या ओळखीतल्या कोणालाही माझं स्थळ सुचवत नाहीत. सुदैवाने काका मला अजून दिसलेले नाहीत. आता मला सांगा या पूर्ण प्रकरणात माझी काहीतरी चूक होती का? पण भोगतोय कोण? असो.

असो. तर त्या दिवसापासून मला मकर संक्रांत आवडत नाही...

जाता जाता सहज सुचलं म्हणून विचारतो ... या पियू सारख्या लोकांचा निषेध करायला म्हणून संक्रांतीला काळे कपडे घालतात का हो?

-निरंजन खांडेकर

The muddy water

2009-07-27T13:36:00.000+05:30

The muddy water

He stood on the bridge. The river down flew slowly... it had no hurry to reach to the sea. For a moment he kept on looking at the water. A small pink rose came flowing along... he just gazed once at the flower. Being on a high bridge it was not possible for him to pick it up but then he would have hardly picked it up even if he would have got a chance to... it was the thing he now detested the most. The flower lover’s bouquet of love had now got converted into a bin of hatred... The flowers had probably wilted...

He still remembered the day when she had given him the pink rose on the rose day. It was the first rose he had ever got. She was a nice girl and in looks, she could be classified as pretty. He had never even dreamt that a girl would be giving a rose to him and when a girl like her gave him a pink rose, he was about to get a heart attack... but again he had controlled himself. He had felt it to be a prank and had denied the rose. He was probably the only guy who had actually denied the first ever pink rose of his life.... but then probably it was worth rather than being laughed at later because of a prank... Later she had convinced him that she really had some feelings for him and then he had accepted the rose was a different thing altogether but he still believed his denial for the rose was indeed one of the wisest things he had ever done...

A girl offering a hand of friendship, a rose, asking out for a date.... all this was very much new for him. He had never dealt with things like love or affair or to say in better words, something known as relationship or so; but this feeling had been amazing. Waiting for someone to call, waiting for some special sms, and special pings on the messengers.... it all felt nice to him. Somehow slowly he had started liking this experience. His life was transformed completely. His lifestyle had changed. He had started spending time on makeup to look better. He had started buying gifts. He had started to daydream... all this had happened in just a few months...

He now remembered every day... it was so clear as if some movie was being played in front of him. He still remembered the day when they had gone out for their first date... a romantic dinner in a restaurant on a beach. He had never experienced the magic of the candle light dinner before. The cool sea breeze flew past them making her hair float momentarily, making her look like a princess. But he somehow had not been able to tell her all that that day... It was her who had asked him out and he had felt really awkward while dining with her, while dancing with her and even sharing a single ice cream.... Gradually he had got accustomed to all those things... They had started going to such dates regularly and he had actually started feeling something special for her...

But somehow things hadn’t been so smooth recently as they were in past... probably she had started liking someone else more and that’s what he couldn’t stand... he had called her for a small meeting and had opened up his heart and that’s where everything had gone wrong... a shocking truth had got revealed and it had looked as if he had made a fool of himself...

Apparently she had no feelings for him and whatever she had done with him was just to keep a drunkard guy away from her by showing him a bodyguard around her. All those dates, the roses, the gifts were just to enjoy the free evenings and to keep the unwanted guys away. She had just portrayed everything.... it was all fake... she hadn’t felt anything the way he had. It was just an acting... brilliant acting that had fooled almost the whole college. And now, he was being neglected or to say left alone to his own fate just because she had got a new guy.

He had always preferred study as his best friend. He had preferred staying away from girls and then he had changed; thanks to her... and now she preferred to stay away from him. It was bad...no it was unfortunate for him... the cocoon had evolved into a butterfly; just to realize the flower that he had longed for and got converted from the cocoon, was no more his...

All those memories surfaced as he kept on looking at the slow river water. It looked nice but again the very next moment he felt as if the muddy water of the river was hiding something beneath. The colour of the mud didn’t allow him to see anything below the surface. Who knew what all things the seemingly slow muddy water had hid beneath it? And he hated it... he hated all that, he hated all those who hid something and portrayed something else. He wondered why people could not remain honest. He went off to see what the river had hid beneath it...

Her cell kept ringing as the police redialled the last number to identify the body... but the noise in the disc was too high for her to make out the ringing of her cell... it kept on ringing for a while; probably she was so busy in the new guy that she didn’t have any time to spend even for her old friend’s or convenience-crush’s dead body’s identification....

-Niru

The best b’day!

2009-05-29T00:07:00.001+05:30

The best b’day!

Oh ... it was 6^th June... My b’day ... I didn’t even realise. I had actually lost the notion of time, days and dates after coming here... not that life was hectic or I was not getting time to have a look at the calendar but then there were not many incidents when I actually looked into the calendar to ponder upon the dates and probably I avoided the same for the very reason that it reminded me of some days...

Today was different altogether... When I opened my eyes in the morning, the whole room was decorated with colour papers, shining plastics, balloons and what not. It felt like a year old baby’s b’day getting celebrated. It was so nice and on the top of that, all of them stood encircling me, smiling and waiting for me to crack some joke or so. It was such a nice surprise! I had not even dreamt about this... All of my friends; they had come to celebrate my b’day taking out time from their busy schedules... It felt nice... I remembered our college days and b’day celebrations there... all those amazing memories of my life got freshened up... They all were there.... my roommate with whom I shared my feelings, studied hard... all my friends in my group with whom I enjoyed the best days of my life... and even she was there.... my crush... somehow things had not turned in my favour and I had preferred keeping my feelings to myself... now I realised the game of the luck... it turned out to be in her favour afterall she would get a life-long partner for her...

Someone kept a laptop on my lap and then started a video – my b’day video... it was our tradition in college to make a b’day video for the b’day boy or the b’day girl using whatever wackiest pics clicked and using some simple movie maker software or so. Probably that was the only thing where everyone employed the maximum of their creativity. The video was really nice; right from my friends in school, they had put in every other girl’s pic in it portraying me as a complete flirt guy. The songs in the background actually made the effect even worse. It was actually embarrassing to see that in front of my mom n dad but again the way niru was portrayed in it was not important but the love and the affection my friends showed towards me in making the video...

The next event we used to do was to hold the b’day boy and spank him like anything. Whatever anger, frustration anyone had that day would take it down over the b’day boy’s backside. Today somehow they were not in mood of spanking me.... they just brought a cake... a big chocolate cake with the liquid chocolate all over it... I felt like finishing it off all by alone the way it was tempting... Then there were usual fights over putting the number of candles when some of my useless friends persisted on lighting only single candle representing my true brain age.... We had to listen to him... afterall it was simpler to blow single candle on the cake... I had to make some wish before blowing the candles and I did. Just wanted to check whether such wishes come true...

The cake was really sweet whether it felt so because of the chocolate all over it or the love my friends showed towards me... I really don’t know. Chatting with dear friends after so many days and that too for so much time was so amazing. It was Sunday that’s what they told me later, and probably that’s why no one as such was in a hurry to leave for the office or so... What else a person wants in his life? My friends had made that day special... they had coloured and energized those white and green walls of the hospital...

In the evening when they all left, I felt like thanking them by hugging them tight for making my b’day so special... But cancer had made my body so weak that it wasn’t possible for me to even get up from the bed...

That was my last day... I didn’t even see the midnight... My death was not unexpected; in fact it was very much expected or to put it into right words I was waiting for the once for all freedom from the sufferings but what mattered there was the way all my friends made my last day special... when they celebrated my b’day much before 6^th June and when even the day was not a Sunday.... they all portrayed it so... Afterall spending a day with your close sweetheart friends is nowhere lesser than a real b’day isn’t it? While blowing the candles on my cake, the only wish I had made to god was to keep the memories of that special day fresh forever... My death made it sure they remain like that before any new incidents overwrite them... In my case at least, the wishes on the b’day candles had come true!

-Niru

An Amazing viva....

2009-03-25T20:46:00.003+05:30

Some day.... just like that... a cool viva.....

Day: Some day in summer....
Time: The time when people prefer sleep....
Place: an A/c Cabin

Panel: 3 very much experienced people... ready to take my case.... [V, M and R]

Myself: Niranjan Khandekar
(V opens the door and asks me to come in. The other two with a very friendly(!) smile ask me to sit down..... I forget to wish them good afternoon or so....)
[Henceforth N = Myself]

M: So, Niranjan what you liked the most in the course?
N: (as usual confused) As in any particular subject?
M: No; anything in the course.
N: I liked our first 2 assignments of MIS; they involved coding a bit on excel and since me from xxxx I like that... [Honest and sincere attempts to pull them away from mkting to MIS...]
M: You have a work ex?
N: Yes.. xxxxxxx....
M: Ok. Any other thing you liked?
N: (Thinking hard.... actually i didn’t like anything much here except for a few gals... newez..) HRM..
M: Why?
N: The cases were good as in we could relate them..... (cool globaaal)
M: (turning to R) He’s your student..... (wanted to say ‘screw him’ but he didn’t say so explicitly...)
V: Any particular case you could relate to any incidence?
N: (Shittt I had heard V has been quiet today.. even he seems to be on a killing spree... deaththth....) Yes sir... we had a case of marginal performer. He worked pretty well but then got promoted n his performance went down...... In xxxx...they had appointed an experienced guy from xxxxx... he didn’t do much... he was appointed as our project manager.... prolly his job description was not clear or so..... but as our project manager he didn’t perform well
M: Probably he got bad subordinated to work with (and then a cunning smile....)
N: No, our previous project manager was good and very much fine with us...
M: Was she a lady? (All 3 panelists sharing cool smile)
N: No... guy only (keeping face as serious as poss)
M: Ok... see we won’t ask you about HR now cause that’s your area... We will ask you about sales...
N: (I am dead )
M: Suppose you are a salesman of XXX in Goa... North or south whatever.. or whole Goa.... What will you do to increase sales?
N: Salesman ?
M: Ok... Sales manager.... no asst sales manager... what will you do to get the higher sales of HUL?
N: [Gave cool global gyaaan about market research..... ads promotions etc.]
M&R: As a asst sales manager you have that much budget or authority to change ads n all?
N: No, but.... [Again some global]
M: So what will you do?
N: [Again globaaal... ]
M: So, you will give target to sales force and ask management for more funds?
N: [No answer... confused face]
M: That’s a problem you are not doing anything... you are just sitting in an A/C cabin... and talking to salesforce or begging for money to management.... y would ne1 hire you?
R: This is genuine problem... seriously if they hire you they will throw you out...
M: Yes... if they hire pipsqueak like you they are going to kick you out within 2 days...
N: [I almost now begging..... enough of insult... please lemme go....]
R: Ok.. now consider you are a project manager in an IT company. There are some people under you. They are not meeting ne deadlines... what could be the reasons?
N: They might not be knowing the coding and all [started global...]
R: [stopping in between].... they know that much.. I don’t think any s/w firm would employ such useless people They obviously know basic stuff.
N: [Ma’m you are not aware of some IT companies.....] probably the client is changing req.
R: ok [Calm face... finally i made a non-bullshit point it seems]
N: Probably they are not much ok in working with me
R: Why?
N: If I treat them in an improper manner... If I have gender bias.... So they are not much happy with me
R: So what you do?
N: Face to face meetings... one-one meetings...[ globaaal again....]
M: Will they speak up before you if you are the problem?
N: No but I would develop trust among......
R: (cutting me) I really doubt they will ever speak up....
N: Yes that’s true...
M:So what ways you can have to get something from them?
N: hear from them when they don’t know.. prolly surveillance when they are having coffee breaks or so taking care that they don’t notice... it’s not ethically right but...
M: hehhehe this ethics and all don’t matter ....
N: or else also can be done as have a person who likes you or follows you or has no wrong things about you and then try changing others’ opinions...
M: (suddenly) What’s this economic problem going on around? What’s its effect on Indian economy?
N: [Some global gyaan on no much effect cause of parallel economy n all]
M: So our economy won’t be affected ?
N: No, just that it’s taking time... afterall economy can’t depend only on black market money as the other household biz earnings is too less as compared to the black market economy size...
M: hah!! It’s good.. ask our Netaas they want the most out of the black market only.
N: But if you want to live ethically, you wouldn’t get into it.
M: ethics and all don’t matter.... if you want to have most out of life... you have to go for it...
V: outsourcing is good option na? So the US companies will come here now due to cost cutting.... so our economy will grow better...
N: but nowadays they r finding problems with sponsoring even that so they can’t even afford that...
R: but outsourcing or overall IT in any business is for cost cutting only right? Now if you say its expensive basic purpose of IT is defied .. isn’t it?
N: No... [globaaal]
R: then why don’t you improve the biz by applying more newer IT processes n ur biz? Isn’t it investment?
N: this is not the time for trial or so... no enough funds to try out things... use old methods... better... because if u invest in IT.... prolly the cost would go so up that your biz won’t be existing tomorrow... whats the use of tht IT then?

[Then they asked me to leave...... ] ......& I wake up from the sleep.... what a horrible dream anyone could have.... But I missed one thing.... the result.... waiting for tomorrow for the same probably the dream would continue... wish me luck
-Niru :)

Sayonara!

2009-03-12T01:36:00.000+05:30

Sayonara!

(I wrote this post as a goodbye article for the seniors leaving after the completion of their course at GIM... It was really nice to be with them... but again the sadness I saw on their faces while leaving the college... it gave me an inspiration to write this article... Although this article is applicable to almost all places we leave in our lives, there are a couple of places mentioned therein which have some local references viz. the actual college campus, the hotels around etc. Readers are requested to please bear with those...)

He heard something; probably someone was calling him. He left packing and ran to the door as if he was really expecting someone to call him for some work however stupid... He heard voices as if someone was calling him for Brandmaps meeting, for HRM submissions or for just a coffee at Jaggu’s. He looked out of the door... there was no one, yet the voices kept coming in. From where did they come? Was someone there playing a prank on him? He was really doubtful because a very few had left in the hostel after the convocation ceremony. Then who was that? Was it his own mind or something else? Were those noises of winning the CS matches, the calls for the meetings, songs after the bucket parties that he heard were real or just a part of some really freaking mind games?

He kept thinking for a minute... He could actually witness all the happenings. There was his roommate talking to his girlfriend on cell and trying to be as low on voice as possible. He stood between the two groups who were taunting each other for the Cricket matches the other day. He could see his best friend riding a bike to some hotel, Fidalgo probably, for a usual midnight coffee with his not-yet-official girlfriend. Then there was the seven pointer topper of the class returning with his thick specs from the library with a serious notion on the face and the grief that the library was not open 24x7.

He witnessed all this again in a flash. He was back in his past experiencing one of those fun-filled nights at the hostel. Someone then bumped onto him. It was his neighbour... he was again in some trouble with his laptop just a night before some important submissions. He felt like laughing and mocking him that he had done almost everyday but then he suddenly saw a group of guys moving to a room; he followed. They all were discussing about someone... a gossiping session was ‘on’ probably. He felt like joining them, laughing, smiling and discussing some special news in a very low voice. But then he heard someone yelling at the top of his voice... he went there... one of the sincere guys was there standing taking out all his frustrations on some free riders in his team who were simply not concerned about his reaction and were in fact laughing at him. He felt pity for the scholar... Others were around him enjoying the fun but no one cared to come ahead and calm down the scholar, probably they wanted him to discharge his anger first or they just wanted to watch the fun; most probably both.

He left them to join the carom group. They all seemed to be professionals except for the language they used on losing a chance to score a point. The four players were actually surrounded by around 10 people, everyone acting and advising as if he were an old professional carom coach. The card players were busy in their own game and didn’t bother to even look at the others. Then there were some rooms which were closed... some scholars were actually studying hard at that hour too... The sincere guys... they always kept studying irrespective of any event or so, he felt. He always felt jealous over their power of concentration.

Suddenly he was back into reality.... he came from his past back to present... the once house-full corridor now looked deserted. All that fun, all those movements, all those activities, all those people were simply missing and he stood alone in that corridor. Living in memories was easy and the present, because of the same, seemed depressing... He probably was going to miss something. He had lived a great life here but had never realised that until this date. All those study meetings, all those counter strike matches, all those bucket parties, all those carom and card games went past his eyes as if they were happening live before his eyes. He couldn’t stand there. He moved on to the classrooms... Even there, every bench had some or the other story to tell... right from the presentations to dozing off in between the sessions...Right from the negotiations with the professors to extend the assignment deadlines, fights for the class participation marks to simple uncaught and at times caught attempts of copying in the surprise quizzes.

He bumped with someone... she was running fast from mess to the class, probably she was late and didn’t want the professor to shut the door denying her entry to latecomers. He smiled at her but she was too busy to reply... He preferred joining another group of students who had just headed for mess after the session. The mess was as usual full, his classmates had created a good crowd at the counter and were yelling at the top of their voices to get the food at the earliest... Some were running to the dining area with plates, others were just chatting around. He went on... to the quad to witness again all those birthdays, all that birthday spanking that happened there of birthday boys as well as their friends... He looked at the ladies hostel... a building so much near the quad yet remained so much distant because of the fine for boys entering in... He smiled... he remembered the days he kept on looking at her room window, the time he spent in playing basketball, cricket in the quad just to have a glimpse of her and then the Valentines’ day when his good old college friend and she announced about their affair...

He moved on now out of the college... to the ferry point where he had spent hours with friends chatting, at times gossiping or resolving quarrels. He remembered all those incidents... it was like a dream that went by or a movie that was being played in front of his eyes. Suddenly he realised, he had to pack. He started returning... the fish special hotel Annapurna, tea shop of Casa, the restaurant Gene’s all that had been so dear to him, all somehow seemed so distant to him... For the first time he felt he was not a part of that... he was somewhere away and looking at those just like that and not as a part of that scene. He started feeling lonely. He hurried to his room to see whether there was anyone to give him company for a moment or so, but there was none. He returned to his room and started packing. He had to leave soon...

His cab was at the door. The luggage had been loaded. He was about to sit into the cab when he just turned around to have a last look at the place where he had spent probably the best times of his life. His gaze seemed to roll over each and every object around as if it wanted to store everything in the memories for the last time... A tear rolled over his cheek; he himself couldn’t understand why, but again somehow he didn’t feel awkward crying in public even after being a guy.

A couple of moments later his cab kept travelling to the airport with him and his luggage but his mind still lost in that place, was it just because he was leaving a place where he had spent some the most amazing times of his life or because of some unknown bonding he had developed there, even he himself didn’t know... He just felt like saying ‘dasvidaniya’ rather than ‘alvida’ because as they say “saying ‘alvida’ kills all hopes of meeting again”...

That's Life....

2008-05-04T00:20:00.000+05:30

That's life

That’s life

“Niru, I know you are a very good friend of mine. We are very much close friends but something more than just friendship? Ummmmm… Sorry.”
‘Aha… complete end of everything……’, I thought.
“Actually I have always found a very good, cute and sweet friend within you…”
‘Really??? Then why the hell I can’t be your boyfriend? ’, I thought again but obviously just thought without uttering a single word.
Meanwhile she continued, “…but just a good friend nothing more than that and may I tell you one thing about girls?”
‘You are asking as if; if I say no, you are not going to utter even a single word after that…’, again… again in mind nothing explicitly at all.
“Girls… When they consider someone as their good friend then they never ever think about anything else I mean related to affair or thing like that about him…. ”, she was explaining me those so-called theories as if I was going to write my PhD thesis on this subject. Actually the situation was simple - I asked her, she said NO... a big damn NO… that’s it! Why the hell to put forward your theories and all and that too, at the most inappropriate place and time? But no... some girls have no sense about these things (and I think I like them for the same reason…). The conversation about what girls think, what boys think, why boys always take it wrong and blah blah blah…it all continued for a while after that… The conversation, truly speaking a complete monologue except for sometimes me saying just ‘Hmmmm’ or ‘ya’ or at the max ‘no it’s not that…’ continued for around half an hour. Then suddenly she said, “Niru, I know it will be difficult for you to get through all this, but I’ll help you out. After all we are friends. Let our sweet friendship start again in a fresh manner. You should give me a party for our new friendship. What say?”
‘Hahaha… as if I have a say here…’, again not openly. Poor boy-myself could not even express a complete disapproval over the idea of celebrating my loser. I had to spend 50 bucks on a girl who was just a friend with no chance of her becoming anything other than a sister.
Somehow I managed to convince her that my last bus was at 8 and literally ran away from the place. I think she was imagining as me going mad after hearing her answer and that’s why she was trying to console me or diverting my mind to some better things even when I didn’t need that. In fact I was getting irritated because of the same. I just left her and went to the bus, for the first time blessing the transport committee for not plying the buses for Chinchwad after 8.
I was the first one to get into the bus. Others who had stayed late because of the real work reasons were yet to arrive there. I got a window seat but somehow I was not at all in a mood to watch out of the window. The Bus driver had switched on the FM radio which was playing damn romantic songs for the Valentine’s Day which happened to be the next day itself. Not much surprisingly those songs actually irritated me. All my plans for the Valentine’s were now in vain. I felt like crying. But no… Boys don’t cry right? At least not openly…. I went straight to home and resumed daily routines such as going to mess, watching TV with roomies just pretending as if everything was just as normal. Even the damn cable was showing Valentine day special movies that day. I wished I could just hunt for that cable provider and wring his neck, nothing else.
Somehow I could not manage this pretending much when I went for sleeping. I felt like anything to cry out loud and give way to my feelings but I cried softly trying my best not to be audible. I didn’t want to reveal my loser even when my pillow cover was completely wet with tears. It was not a new happening as such; in fact I was a bit used to it, but still; every time you lose something or to frame it better, you somehow can’t manage to turn things the way you want them, you feel hurt, up to whatever extent you might be used to them.
Somehow, I felt like going back to my Mysore days. Those were quite a lot better than these. Not that I was successful in case of love or so there, but at least there was someone with me to help me in everything, to share all my sorrows and to support me as and when needed… Now also, I wanted someone to help me out of the loser, someone who could share my feelings, someone who could understand me, someone who would listen to me patiently… Sadly there was no one…I had lost her and it was my mistake…. but even memories of those old days gave me condolence… they assured of someone present with me whenever required… even though not physically, but just in memories.… I was soon lost in the loveliest days of my life…
***
After having a small 20 days’ vacation after my final semester B.E. exams, I was there in Mysore to join a very well reputed software company for training, before the actual start of my job. It was amazing... I mean after striving hard for 4 years of engineering, we even didn’t get proper time to relax and enjoy life. We were soon at the training institute to get trained…. To get trained for the corporate life… the training was going to be hectic and busy as if the four years of engineering were not sufficient for the harassment but probably the price was worth to become the professionals in the corporate world.
I still remember that day… 25th June 2006… time around 4.30 p.m. We were standing in front of a big entrance gate obviously closed for allowing the security personnel to complete their work. “Hey do they really think we are terrorists and we have brought some hand grenades and rocket launchers with us to attack this place?”, It was Jango, who else would have guts to crack such jokes in front of the security men especially when they were checking our luggage for presence of any prohibited things. I feared how the security man will reply to this so-called joke because usually these people completely lack even a trace of humor, but he seemed to be just too busy in searching for the weapons to reply and he simply neglected the comments.
It was a long time when the security cleared us to get inside the campus. I think if the airports in our country would be employing such strict security, then we would never have a flight hijack. Soon we were transported by cool small golf carts to our respective hostel rooms. Searching for the room was not a difficult task. All the markers were easy to understand and I was soon in front of my room. Thankfully Jango was in another building itself.
The room was good. I mean I had expected the room to be a typical hostel room with all those typical color-faded walls, anytime ready to fall ceiling, etc. But no…. This was something different… The moment I opened the door of the room…I felt as if I had checked in a 5-star hotels’ private suite. I just marveled at the neatness and the posh furniture inside.
“Hello sir, Good Evening. Welcome to the trainee accommodation facility….”
‘Who’s this? Calling me SIR??? And on the top of that the voice seems to belong to a lady’, I was really startled and turned around to see who was calling me sir.
“Sir, I am Tanuja. I am the Hostel co-ordinator. If you have any problem just approach me. I’ll look into the matter.”
‘Oho… that’s why she was calling me SIR… now I should do something that should impress her, obviously first impression is the last one... I should find some cool problem asap now… what could it be?’ I thought for a second or two. Time was running out.. I had to speak something good sooner.
“Oh hi Tanuja, good evening.”, Somehow I proceeded with whatever knowledge of English I had. “Tanuja, thanks for the help you offered, I hope I won’t need any such help.” She simply smiled over that.
Smile on the face of a hostel co-ordinator? This was very much shocking thing for me. I had never seen people at such post smiling. ‘Good. I hope this smile remains like this and you welcome me for any problem I take it to you…’ I wished like telling this openly but again who has the guts here?
“Tanuja, can you please tell me where this amphitheatre is? We have been instructed to gather there at 6.00 p.m.”, I asked. I would have got answer to this question even by asking a security guard or any fellow joinee but no. It was the world’s most silly doubt, but I had to put forward some problem for her. After all it was the matter of the first impression.
“Sir, very simple sir. It’s behind Food court 1.”
‘Food Court??? What kind of place is this? And she was telling me as if I used to be in food court everyday with my friends for time pass.’
“Pardon, where is this court?”
“The food court 1 sir, just go straight when you get out of this building. It’s behind the ECC.”
‘ECC??? Aha, now what’s that? Amphitheatre, Food Court, ECC what kind of places are these? Am I on earth or some place on mars?’
“Pardon .. but now what’s ECC and where is that?” I said.
“Sir, ECC is Employee Care Center, where you have library, swimming pool, washing machines sir. Behind that there’s FC1 i.e. food Court 1.”
“Do you have a map?” I think this would have been the dumbest question anyone could have ever asked but I was simply too confused with the names of those places to think twice before speaking anything. I could even read the same feelings on her face.
“Sir, just a minute. Someone is calling me … I will be back in a moment.” And she fled away. Definitely she was very much irritated by my hopeless questions… I just hoped the first impression would not be the last one.
***
Anyways somehow after asking 1-2 security people and following the large crowd going in the same direction, I made it to ECC then Food Court 1 and finally to the Amphitheatre. The place was looking cool. I had never seen such a structure before. To my left was one magnificent glass wall building…I was simply stunned to see the architecture. The glass walls, people working inside, the reflection of the cool blue sky in the glass, and of course, the reflection of sun rays over the fountain water to the glass… everything was just beautiful. I was just standing in the dim evening light witnessing the beauty that emerged from the combination of the natural and artificial wonders…
I had almost got lost in the splendid view before me when suddenly my head was struck with a big pat. “What the h…. Ohh hi… when did you reach?” The pat hitter was Jessica- my best friend. “Sometime around 2… what about you? And what’s your hostel building number?”. “5”, I replied.
‘Aha, since Jess is here, that means Vidhi has to be somewhere around.’ I thought. Vidhi was our college queen. Although we never talked to each other except for silly things like ‘excuse me, can I take this chair’ or ‘may I borrow your pen please....’ for the whole four years, I had a secret ambition of being her ‘someone special’. Somehow my fate didn’t turn out to be so lucky is a different question altogether but I never killed my feelings about her and which seemed to have some hope here.
When in college, she was consistently in the other division making it difficult for me even to catch a glimpse of her, but one thing was good that my chances of being her special were still very much alive… she was not committed yet. This time at least I could meet her regularly, talk to her and even try to improve friendship. I was lost in these thoughts…. When Jess spoke again, “She is there near the CCD, buying coffee. She should be here any minute. Don’t worry. I’ll introduce her to you formally in case you need that but the rest completely depends on you only. Plan your strategy accordingly. You have ample time.”
Jessica was damn brilliant. I don’t know how but somehow she could just read my mind. How she came to know that I was thinking about Vidhi, was beyond my imagination. But at that time I had no plan other than just to concentrate on my strategy. “Don’t worry. I’ll help you.” it was Jessica again. She was such a sweet girl always helping me in such difficult cases. I thought each and every person in the world should get at least one friend like Jessica.
“Hi there, you are Niranjan right?” Vidhi…. What a cute voice she had got. Moreover she already knew my name… Now this was good…. She at least knew me….“Hi, I am Vidhi...”
“I know. COMPS B right?” I don’t know why but I preferred to recognize her by the division name rather than her pet name- college queen. I think that was my strategy as to denote that I don’t give a damn to her looks and all… one of the typical strategies to impress a girl … At least typical of me…
“Ya. When did you…”, but she couldn’t complete her sentence. There was a lady in the middle of the amphitheatre making some announcement.
“A warm welcome to all of you. I as the head of HR – trainee section welcome you all at the grand campus of…” she went ahead with much more things depicting about the company, it’s progress, our role, vision and lots and lots more. I was not at all interested. I was now completely lost in planning my strategy for a definitely important work during my training. I had a great desire of looking at Vidhi but somehow that would have directly given her a hint of me getting completely mad for her and that’s what I wanted to avoid because, I was damn sure that once she would know that I liked her even more than Diya Mirza or Emma Watson then definitely she would have behaved like a typical good looking girl trying to prove many boys were just ready to die for her and what not... I just wanted to avoid that. That’s why I controlled myself like anything and didn’t see anywhere else than the speaker at the center of the amphitheatre and pretended as if I was listening to her with all my heart in ears and had some really serious expressions on face showing as if I really enjoyed the lecture. It was really a very hard time concentrating at the old lady rather than looking at the babe on my side but somehow I managed it. Thank god the lecture got over just in around 20 minutes. As the lady asked us to disperse, it was Vidhi who spoke the first word, “Hey, you were listening to her as if a follower will listen to the teachings by his teacher. Were you really interested in the lecture or it was just acting?”
‘Bingo!!! That means she was looking at me throughout the lecture. Aha that means I am not so avoidable. Cool. Niru, you seem to be in a very good advantageous position here… Keep it up…’, I thought.
Now there was a problem. I couldn’t tell her that I was not concentrating on the lecture, because then she would have asked what all things that lady said …an obvious question, answer for which was definitely not there with me, whereas, if I would have said no; I was not concentrating, but was trying to look at the girl in the first row, then all my hopes with Vidhi would have been just washed off; but my luck seemed to have been in a very good mood that day. My brain worked correctly for the first time and I just plainly said, “Hey I was not at all listening to her. I was watching in her direction but was almost on the verge of sleeping. If she wouldn’t have finished her speech in 2 more minutes I would have definitely dozed off in front of this whole crowd.”
Vidhi just smiled over this and gave me a pat on my head and said, “Poor boy, feeling sleepy? Might be because of the travel tiredness. Let’s have dinner early today so we can sleep early. Tomorrow is our first day at job and we shouldn’t be late for it.”
I would never ever forget that pat. Truly speaking I was simply confused. ‘A girl whom you have never spoken to in your college days, speaks to you on her own, smiles at you and on the top of everything gives a cute sweet pat on your head; ohh Niru cumm’on you must be dreaming. These happenings are just too good for your luck to be real.’ I pinched myself. It wasn’t a dream. I was about to die because of the happiness. I knew about Vidhi that she was kinda’ free girl, would go, introduce herself and talk to strangers, kinda’ open and a free natured girl, but there have been lots of such girls around me, till now no one had bothered to say even a ‘hi’ to me… a pat was miles away….
“No way”, I replied. Till then Jessica was busy in chatting with Jango, Sudeep and Dinesh. Good that she was trying to keep that Jango away from my Vidhi. If Jango would have got a chance to get to Vidhi, my chances of having Vidhi with me were almost nil. Jango was very much infamous for that.
“Vidhi, let’s have a round in the campus. You have come here in the morning right? You must have seen all the canteens here, and that ECC and all those things. Will you take me to all these?”
“Why not? It’s just 7.00 p.m. we have at least a couple of hours or so for dinner. Let’s go.”
“Let’s inform Jessica about it.”, I said and was about to turn and get to Jessica when Vidhi held my hand…. Her touch... I felt like freezing the moment and experiencing the magic of that touch forever…forget the pat on head… this one was the master stroke to stun anyone in the universe. I was about to get mad now… I was stunned but somehow I recovered myself pretty early… “What happened?” I asked, keeping my face indifferent and trying my best not to show even a line happiness on it.
“You see that Jango there? I don’t like him. He is a big flirt. I just hate him. I don’t want him to join us…” Vidhi said.
My happiness knew no bounds…I felt like jumping in air with joy. ‘Vidhi hates Jango, the only possible obstruction to my plan of action. I hope I am not dreaming.’ My luck had never been so kind on me. Actually I also liked the idea of ditching Jango but I didn’t want to show that on my face. I tried my best to remain calm and kept my face expressions as indifferent as possible. We left the place as secretly as possible.
***
That one hour was the best and the most memorable one in my life. We, I mean Vidhi and I went to the parking lot, took two bicycles and moved around the campus. She was sincerely telling me info about each building and I was pretending listening to her and having a chance of staring at her cute face. I think either she didn’t notice that or she wanted me to stare at her like that and that’s why she talked continuously at times not giving me even a chance to express my opinion. It was very much ok with me, the more she talked the more chances I would get to look at her. Even her voice was a cool one. Once she would start, you would just feel like listening to her intently till the eternity.
“This is Food Court 3, here you can get good paav-bhaji just like the one from our Mumbai; will try someday if we are bored with the South Indian food in FC1.” Vidhi said. “Why we can’t come here just as such? Why is it that the nausea for South-Indian food can only bring us here?” I asked one more of my silly questions.
“I don’t think so. The training gonna be very much hectic for us and FC1 is definitely nearer to our training building than this one and that’s why I think we’ll prefer FC1 over this and FC1 has only South-Indian food which is ought to create nausea in our mind after eating there for around 4-5 days. Let’s see.”, Vidhi put forward one of her very much stupid theories but I listened to it as if it was theory of relativity.
We were speeding on a slope when I felt some cute feeling in my chest. I was so involved in Vidhi’s thoughts that I thought it as the signal of love given by my heart. Yes… I was lucky.. A girl whom I admired the most was with me and my chances seemed bright… on the top of that my heart also was giving good signals…. I was very much involved in thinking about her when she cried, “Niru, I think your cell is ringing.”
‘Ohh, so that cute feeling was nothing but vibrations of my cell phone…Damn…’ I cursed it and stopped my cycle. “Who’s calling me now? I am already on roaming. Even an incoming costs me lot maan... Oho... it’s Jessica. She must be very much angry that we ditched her.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll tell her that we fled away because of Jango. She must be assuming that.” I sighed; thank god Vidhi didn’t hear that.
“Hello, hi Jessica, where are you?”
“You damn brat, I am not talking to you. You ditched me- your best friend for that girl today when she is just your friend what will you do if she becomes your gf?”
“Jessica, ….Jessica, Calm down. We’ll explain you everything. Just tell me where you are. We are coming there. Don’t waste your energy in shouting especially when my cell is on roaming.”
“You… I gonna kill you both. Anyways, come to FC1. I am here waiting for you. Let’s have dinner early today. We have early morning office tomorrow.”
“Ok. Babes. We are reaching fc1 in 5 minutes.” I said and just turned my cycle towards FC1.
I am not sure whether the dinner was good or I felt so because of the tiredness because of cycling and travel or because of the cute company I had, but overall it was nice.
Later at around 9.30 when we said ‘Good night’ to each other and parted to our rooms, I was willing to talk to her the whole night, just under the black skies with lots and lots of stars just twinkling and smiling to us… but no. I had to be satisfied without that only. My luck had given me today a lot more than what I had expected. So for the day I should have been happy. But as it’s rightly said that the human mind is never contempt, I also wished to have something more. What destiny had left before me was completely unknown to any of us…
***
26th June… my first day at work! I was so amazed just by the idea of working instead of the boring lectures, studies and colleges and all such hopeless things, that I didn’t sleep for the whole night in spite of the travel tiredness. My room partner –Tushar .. he seemed to be a good fellow. He was merrily snoring for the whole night while I was getting excited by the work ideas. It was around 6 in the morning when I got up, finished all my chores by 7 and had just left with tying the knot of the tie and that’s where it all went wrong. We all had to reach the GTI i.e. Global Training Institute by around 8.30. The actual program was scheduled at 9 but taking care of all the late comers, they had suggested us to be present there at around 8.30 itself. Jessica, Vidhi and I had decided to meet at around 7.30 in FC2 which was nearer to all of us from our respective rooms, have the breakfast and then leave for GTI. It took around 20 minutes for me to tie the tie-knot itself. The more time it took the more I was getting frustrated and even more time it wasted.
At around 7.30 the girls started giving me miss calls which interrupted my concentration and I literally left the tries to tie the knot. I decided to take someone’s help at GTI itself. Till then Tushar had gone into bathroom and didn’t seem to come out before 8 which would have caused me just too late to take his help. ‘There must be someone cleverer than me as to know, how to tie a knot’,I thought and left with the tie in my hand and almost ran to FC.
“Where have you been? What took you so long? You boys never understand the value of time. This is your first day at work and you gonna be late for it.”, I was amazed to see Vidhi almost bossing on me… I kinda liked it… Meanwhile she continued, “Hey, why didn’t you wear the tie? It’s a part of the dress code for you guys today, isn’t it?”
“Please ask anything but that. That’s the reason I am late…” I explained.
“Ok people, chill. Tell me what you’ll have for breakfast; I’ll get it for you today. Ok?”
“Thanks, Jess, you are so sweet. Get me Idli Sambar.”, I said.
“Very bad. Gentlemen don’t let the ladies work. You should instead get up and get breakfast for us…” it was Vidhi. Fortunately Jessica just ignored the comment and went straight to the counter leaving me and my Vidhi just in each other’s company.
“Then, I am not a gentleman… and by the way why so bossing in the morning itself?”
Vidhi didn’t say a word over this but just kept mum. She must have felt awkward but I couldn’t help it. It was ok in liking her or so but the way she was bossing…. She was getting on my nerves. While Jess hadn’t arrived with the breakfast plate I again tried my hand at tying the knot of tie. Suddenly Vidhi broke into laughter, “Hey you duffer, have you ever tied a knot?”
“Honestly speaking, never. That’s why this is my condition today.”, I replied trying my best not to show the embarrassment clearly on my face.
“Ok. Lemme help ya.” And she started tying the knot taking the tie in her hands. I was just staring at her soft hands, rather than studying how to tie a knot. I wished I would be the tie… We both were so engrossed in that tie I mean Vidhi in tying the knot and me watching her doing so that we didn’t even realize that Jess was there at the table with my breakfast.
“Here you have sir, hey you don’t even know how to tie a knot do you?” I just smiled at her and started having my idli.
“Hey, this Idli is good yaar. Seems to be very much fresh.”
“Take this. I hope you at least know how to tighten it.”, Vidhi said giving me back my tie.
“Oh ya… I know only that much. Thanks anyways. Have your breakfast now. Then we’ll leave for GTI.” I said.
***
GTI has a grand building. It’s a spectacular building to house hundreds of the trainees. The whole building is built in a sort of mountain. It looks like an ancient temple carved into a big rock. The greenery around the building was giving a very cool natural look to the artificial wonder built in it. The structure of the building was such that it was impossible for one to have the whole view of the building in a single eyeshot and whenever you tried to stare at one marvel in the construction; some other was always ready there inviting your looks to fall on it. All the trainees from various parts of India in fact the whole world were going to get the most professional training here, that was going to be very much helpful in their professional life while working for the company.
We had been told to go to the 3rd floor to some hall… The hall, I think its name was ‘Edison room’ named after the great scientist ‘Thomas Alva Edison’. I was just amazed to see the name. It’s usually a protocol to assign the numbers to classrooms; even it becomes easier to locate them in case you are new to the area. Just imagine searching for room no. 3 or Edison room, which one will you be able to locate quicker without any external help? Although I didn’t get the logic behind changing the naming protocol, I think even the name of the scientist had some magic attached to it. Probably it somehow gave some inspiration to the reader. I was relieved that at least they didn’t use any politicians’ names there.
Soon we were inside the hall, there was no specific seating arrangement, I mean anything relating to our employee ids or anything like that. We just got seated in some middle row. Of course neither last nor first, to keep safe in case we felt like dozing off. It was the college habit afterall… Jess sat between me and Vidhi. Actually even she realized the mistake she had done of becoming a barrier between us, but then it would have been just too embarrassing to exchange her seat with Vidhi just to let us sit together, so we just dropped the plan.
It was around 5 minutes past 9 when a person came in with a big artificial smile on his face. I was sure he belonged to HR department. Usually these are the people who are really important from the point of view of company as well as the employee welfare but somehow let it be college or school or perhaps any other institution which I have come in contact with in my life, the HR person has never been very much friendly. I hoped I would be wrong this time.
He then introduced himself and started telling about what all challenges we would be facing in the corporate world, what we were expected to do and what not…. Sometime later I felt as if someone was kicking my left leg. It was irritating. I mean just imagine you are listening to some lecture or so and someone starts poking or kicking your leg...in between, how would you feel? I looked at Jess…. She and Vidhi were looking at me and smiling…
“Now what happened? Let me listen to his lecture… don’t disturb me now”, I said… on which both of them literally burst into laughter… I couldn’t understand what the hell was going on there… It was Jess who somehow controlled her laughter, “Ok.. sorry mister.. continue listening to the lecture. But will you please let me know who is delivering lecture here?” “Obviously that HR guy yaar… that…”, and I looked at the podium… there was no one there.. “Hey where did he go?”, I asked, puzzled; upon which both of them again went into laughing attacks… I was simply confused.. “He completed his lecture 5 minutes ago and went away…You duffer you were sleeping happily. This isn’t college lecture yaar.. you should stay awake…”
‘My first day on job… and I slept for the very first lecture…’ what was gonna happen next… I was lost in these thoughts when suddenly two people made a dashing entry into the hall. ‘Dashing’ in the sense the first person stumbled upon the carpet and fell down and the other one who was behind him religiously followed his friend. The whole hall burst into laughter. One thing was good, because of this laughter my sleep ran away… someone has said ‘whatever happens happens for good only’…. It seemed to be true in this case…
It was around 1.50 …10 minutes still to go for the lecture to start for the post lunch session. Suddenly Vidhi got a call. She saw the caller’s number and immediately went out of the classroom. There was a very pleasant shyness on her face. It didn’t escape my notice. Jess and I looked at each other, we didn’t say anything as such but whatever was to be conveyed, was conveyed through the eyes. ‘Who was that caller? Is she committed?’ My heartbeats increased. Somehow I could sense my blood pressure shooting. ‘Were all my dreams which I saw about myself and Vidhi, all in just a single day, were they all in vain? Were we just destined to meet like this and part without anything else than just a pure friendship?’ I wanted the answers to all these questions. I decided to ask Vidhi about this. I didn’t want to bear any more suspense; I just wanted to clarify things for once and for all.
I don’t know why my luck honestly followed Murphy’s laws. Vidhi took hell lot of time in returning and I got more and more frustrated. I tried my best to stay normal and calm and not to show anything on my face but Jess could easily guess what was going on in my mind. She just held my hand assuring everything would just go fine. I didn’t know why but I kind of felt better. Jess was my best friend and was always with me. College days would have never been easy without her. Right from completing assignments to getting myself introduced to the hottest girls in my college, she had always helped me. We were so close that we could easily guess what was going on in others mind without the either uttering a single word.
Just then Vidhi returned back to her seat. Her face had a very small but a very cute smile. That smile told me everything. She came, sat down on chair. I tried my best not to look at her and tried reading the information in the booklets given to us so as to suppress the anxiety but still I couldn’t refrain myself from looking at her, Her face conveyed me everything.. I had lost something before achieving. My first day on job had brought with it lots of dreams and yes not to forget a heart break. It didn’t hurt much but it was after all a heart break. It remained memorable for some unpleasant reasons.
The remaining day was hell. There were numerous people lecturing us regarding the company, its founders, the values of the institution, and what not. I was simply not interested in all these things for one thing- I was there as a software engineer and I wanted something for coding or such interesting work rather than some really boring management things. And the second reason was Vidhi’s phone incident. I was just waiting for the clock to show the ‘day over’ time. I was getting restless. I wanted to know why Vidhi had become so happy, who was the caller, what he had said to her that had made her so joyous. My heart was filled with numerous questions… questions that demanded answers… questions that literally harassed me … and questions that made me nervous… why was I getting so restless about a girl to which I had befriended just a day before? Why was it that my heart was getting restless just because of a small feeling of losing her? Why??? My brain demanded answers to all these questions…
***
“Ok Vidhi, enough of suspense… tell us to whom were you talking to in the break? There was a pleasant smile on your face at that time. It didn’t escape our notice.”, said Jess. The question which I felt like asking her since the noon was finally going to get answered. My heart started pounding fast.
Vidhi took a pause for 2 seconds. Those were the lengthiest seconds of my life. I couldn’t wait for the suspense to open up but I couldn’t do anything else too. I felt like telling her, “Damn it Vidhi…. Tell me the reason or I gonna shoot myself… I can’t bear this suspense anymore.” But I kept cool. Good that she didn’t make me wait anymore. Finally she spoke, “Niru, Jess, actually I am kind of embarrassed to tell you this…. I am getting married next month. Actually in the noon I received call from my dad. I might quit the job now… I mean he is in US and I also will join him there so there’s no point in continuing the job here ….you see.”
My brain simply didn’t seem to respond. ‘Marriage? What about engagement? Is it done already? Who the hell is this guy? How you dare to spend time with me like that and let me get into those cool sweet dreams when you are already committed to someone else’, I felt like firing these questions to her but I kept mum with a confused look on my face… It was Jess who again came to my rescue… “Ohh Congrats Vidhi, but you didn’t tell us that you had a boyfriend and you were engaged to him? Anyways.. that’s a very good news yaar. Congrats. Now I think we deserve a treat… wassay Niru?” “Indeed yaar. So many secrets… that’s what we call ‘chhupi rustum’..” and I tried my best to show a small smile on my face. I myself could sense that the attempt was simply waste but Vidhi being in the happy mood of her wedding didn’t realize the faded color of my face.
“No yaar. You know me since engineering… I never had any boyfriend as such. Actually he is my dad’s friend’s son. Our marriage was decided in our childhood you see, typically filmy.. And now that we are grown ups, our parents asked us about marriage. Anyways I didn’t have anyone special in my life and also he seemed to be a decent guy.. So I agreed.”
I was dumbstruck. I felt like asking her that how she could spend her entire life with a person whom she didn’t know much ? How could her parents make her marry to guy based on some decision they had taken in her childhood? I felt like holding her close and asking, “Vidhi, please tell me you are joking… aren’t you?...”
I kept calm. Anyways she had taken a decision… a decision in her life for her life and of her life. I didn’t want to embarrass her by asking any stupid questions. It was better to keep quiet. I simply congratulated her and convinced myself again about how the life is and how the things go on….
The next day itself she treated me and Jess. It was really funny for me to get a treat from her for my heart breakup but afterall I had to pretend everything was just as normal. Two days later she left… She went back. She parted, never to meet again…. Leaving her memories with me never to leave…

***

“So, who’s gonna code for your team? I mean is it going to be all designers-all coders-all testers’ team or each one is going to do only one of the tasks?”, Jess asked while we were going for the lunch break. “Jess, will you please stop that encrypted language of yours? I didn’t get a single word of what you are talking about? What coding, which team?”, I replied. I seriously didn’t get anything at all. “Damn it Niru, you duffer, you were asleep again? You idiot, the lecturer was explaining about the projects we need to do for this subject as an assignment.” Thank god that Ritu came for my rescue, “Niru, don’t worry, even I had dozed off. This lecturer was damn boring yaar. I just woke up when she said she will be giving the actual explanation for project in the post-lunch session.” “Saved….”, I thought.
The post lunch session was good in the sense it involved mainly of some practical work rather than listening to all those boring sessions. We had to implement one project for some library management. A pseudo one, something similar to what we had done in engineering college for 4 years, nothing new, but this time we were expected to work as a team and use the latest technologies. It was hard; especially for people like me sleeping for almost half the time of the lectures. “Hi, I am Niranjan, you may call me Niru. I am from Mumbai.”, I introduced myself to my project team. There were total 4 people in my team. Nimesh, Nilima, Nishaa and myself – the great Niru. People around me seemed to be very much enthusiastic about the project. We were actually fighting for getting various modules for coding, afterall this was the first hands-on we were experiencing.
We had been given four days for the project. I wondered for how much of time our enthusiasm would last and I was proved correct. The next day itself all the four soldiers who had set out to conquer the world were together, returned with a sad mood and depressions because of the errors and bugs. “Niru, I have lost it dude. I can’t concentrate anymore today. I’ll leave. Will complete all that thing tomorrow surely.”, and Nimesh went away. Me and Nilima then tried inspecting each other’s codes trying our best to take out the bugs, but all that was just in vein. We soon left the office leaving the attempts for the next day.
“Hi dude, it’s 1.30 in the morning, where are you coming from?”, it was Tushar, my roommate. “Were you busy in that project work? cool man. You seem to have completed everything on the second day itself. Good work dude…”, and he simply went away talking to his gf on phone without even waiting for my response.
It was a hard day, indeed. I lied down with all those memories of bugs we had faced that day. I tried my best but still was somehow unsuccessful. I felt like all that knowledge that I had gathered for all those four years of my engineering life was in vain. I was getting a feeling of being a loser. I didn’t want to lose the job for everything depended on my performance in those assignments and the tests that followed. I didn’t know what to do. It was 2 in the night to call up anyone and share my feelings. Once again in my life I had to share my depression just with myself.
Suddenly the extension in the room rang, “Hello, Niru? Jess here.” “Yes Jess, what happened you also are still awake?” There was no response from the other side and then suddenly I heard sobs. “Jess… Jess, are you crying? I mean why are you crying?” Jess and I were together for 4 years, I had never seen her crying, infact I had not faced any crying girl before. It was a bit embarrassing. This time, my best friend was crying at 2 in the morning and it was my responsibility to console her. But there was no response to my questions; there were only sobs. I let her cry for sometime. I didn’t say a word. Not that I thought better to let her cry and clear up whatever tension she had, but the dumbest me was not getting any words to open up any conversation and my brain found it easier to stay quiet than uttering some really nonsense at that hour.
A couple of minutes later, her sobs reduced. I mean at least their intensity went down as I was not able to hear them any more now. “Jess, are you ok? What happened? Did someone say anything to you? Did you hurt yourself somewhere?”, I could easily get that whatever I was talking to Jess was good for a school going child. Do you ever speak like this to a young crying girl? I mean all that scolding-hurting part is ok for child, not a young lady but really I was not getting any words to calm her down and was actually fumbling for words at that time.
“Niru, I feel like I am a loser. Today whatever programming I tried, it all failed. We couldn’t even trace where the bugs were, then forget about fixing them. Niru, if my module fails like this, then I am sure to get less marks. I don’t want to fail Niru. I have got hell lot of depression. I have never ever failed in any exam and at this point in my life when I have got a good job in the most reputed IT company, I don’t want to lose it just because of my inability to code properly.”, she said all this in a single breath and stopped. Probably her sobs had overtaken her voice.
“Jess, I really don’t know what to say here. The minute you called me, I was having the same thoughts. Our team also started the work in full enthusiasm today, all was set properly and don’t know why but it went on failing sometime after. Nothing worked. We broke our heads over it but as soon as we fixed one bug, some other was ready. I was in depression too. I mean we never failed in any subject till now, we did all our programs and assignments in engineering on our own then why did we fail today? I thought there is something wrong with me or this corporate work culture hasn’t suited me. If I can’t handle such pressure at this training what am I going to do when I am actually going to work for a customer? Frankly speaking Jess, I felt like talking to someone but didn’t dare to speak to anyone. I mean we boys can’t even cry freely. We have to think about the world before we express any opinions… but thanks Jess, the time you called up and told me this, I got a confidence somehow. I mean see if something similar has happened to us, same is the case with others. We are still in learning phase. We aught to go wrong, just that we shouldn’t get that depression take over our capabilities. We are not losers Jess, we are still students, and we will keep learning till we become successful…”, and I kept on talking. Neither of us had the notion of time. It was a talk between two best friends. No time could stop it, no one could hinder it….
***
The life was getting harder day by day. I had never thought I would be studying so much in my life. A boy who never studied after 12 o’clock in the night even for his engineering exams, was now awake till 2.30 in the morning, solving some papers and studying some more study presentations. Everything was getting on my nerves now. I mean when I had given my last paper of engineering, I had never ever thought that I would be studying anything anymore. I felt like a free bird. No more exams just some simple coding or so for the work but I had never ever thought even in my dreams that I will be slogging like this. For days and nights I had bad dreams of those codes, the errors and the bugs in our assignments. The place of actresses in my dreams was taken up by assignments and presentations. It was bad but definitely it was for our good only. Probably the life on job was never that easy and rosy as we thought in our college days and this training was just a snapshot of what might have been there for us during the actual job.
It was again one of those days when Jess and I were returning to our rooms at around 2 in the morning when suddenly she said, “Niru…. I wanted to tell you something…” and she paused.
Now if a girl says this to you and that too at 2 a.m. then you may feel something good in your heart, actually you should… but somehow I didn’t feel anything. Of course there were reasons… first of all, Jess used to use these words often and I was very much used to them and it was 2 in the morning. After around 18 hours of slogging, studying, coding and resolving code errors or so, I didn’t have anything in my mind other than the sound sleep. I didn’t say a word but just kept looking at the bushes around us.
“Niru, I said something.”, Jess didn’t seem to like my mute response. “Ya.. go on …” “Niru, you know that girl Ritu in our class? She was there with us today for coffee break?” I very well knew her. She was there at the coffee break with us and was looking at me as if I was some famous celebrity. I could easily see that but somehow I preferred to neglect her and I didn’t wanna say this to Jess. I preferred to nod than to utter even a single word.
“She likes you. I mean I am not 100% sure but the way she keeps talking about you, the way she keeps looking at you, the way she keeps asking me about you I think I am right.” I didn’t say a word. I didn’t know how to react over this. Fortunately, we were at Jess’s building. We wished good night to each other and I returned to my room. I was surprised of my behavior. I mean it was funny. The guy who was desperate to have a girlfriend some days ago, was not even excited by the news of someone having crush on him. It was puzzling…
The very next day, somehow we could finish up our assignments early. It was just 12 o’clock when we were heading to our rooms when Jess again got onto the topic. “Niru, I said something to you yesterday. You didn’t say anything about it neither yesterday nor today.” “See Jess, first of all, I didn’t feel like saying anything. I mean it’s ok to have someone in this world who likes you or so,.. but now… and that too Ritu… nopes…” “Why? Why can’t her? When it was Vidhi, you would have loved to get along with her. What about Kritika? I could easily read your mind from your face when she told about her boyfriend. Then why not Ritu? Niru, I want the answer… now.”
“There are lots of thing there Jess.. See the schedule for this training is so harsh, so hectic, I don’t have time for myself, my parents, my friends. How can I have any commitments at such stage? I mean it’s easy to have a relation but to maintain it… that’s lot difficult and currently I am not in a position or mood to go for it. So I didn’t say much or to say it, tried to neglect the matter completely.”
Jess was wiser than me, definitely and she was sure to catch me somewhere unguarded and I pretty well knew it. “Hectic schedule? Is that the only reason Niru? When you met Riya first, what was the time? She was there in our class at 2 in the morning and the whole class was dying hard to complete the project. In fact the whole week was hectic one. Still you liked her, still you longed for just one glimpse of her, still you watched dreams of you two getting along. The schedule wasn’t hectic at that time as you are saying it is now? I know the reason is different. I know it but just that I want to hear it from you.”
“Ok then hear it Jess. Ritu is not that kind of a girl which Niru would like to have in his life as his girlfriend. My girlfriend would be good looking, smart one and definitely not like Ritu. Somehow I didn’t like her at all in the first impression itself.” Jess’s face was getting more and more harsh by my comments….“Niru, does only outer beauty matter to you? If a girl is not good looking but is good natured, good at heart, it doesn’t matter to you, in fact to all you boys out there..isn’t it? Niru, I hate you for this. I thought you were different from them. I don’t understand how you can think like this. Just good looking, smart… is this all that matters to you?”
“Jess, in fact I am being normal. This is the real world ma’m, forget about all those rosy stories where the kings or princes go for good natured girls rather than good looking ones. I am a normal boy and I want my girlfriend to be smart, good looking and just mind blowing. While talking about boys in general, all are same, agreed but even girls are not different. If the girls would have been going for good natured, good at heart boys rather than just rich ones or good looking ones, Niru would have been the person with at least 10 gfs till now. Think about it Jess. The girl in our college… Seema I don’t say she dumped me ‘cause there was never an affair or so between us but she chose Shirish over me. Can you tell me what wasn’t there with me as compared to Shirish? I belonged to middle class family, I didn’t have any good personality, what I had was just brains…. I was good at study that’s it. Whereas he was a dropout two times in engineering, had a cool record of 5 gfs till that time all of whom he had dumped in a couple of months or so…. But who cares…. Most important thing was he was damn rich, he was good looking, he had a good personality that’s it. Niru was simply a loser in front of him. She chose him over me… and you pretty well know what happened later…There are lot many examples like this Jess…. Whenever you say anything like this… think about them first. It’s always natural to search for better qualities in your girlfriend or boyfriend… I don’t blame anyone particularly for this…. It’s a bit natural… You wait for someone with all those qualities, all that perfection, all those characteristics that you have seen in dreams… At the end when you really get bored of waiting… you have to adjust somewhere… and you do that…. but for me Jess, I think the time for those ‘adjustments’ hasn’t arrived yet. Let me stay in the dreams as of now…. And I don’t want Ritu in between when I am dreaming….”, I said all this in a single breath and waited for Jess to reply something initiating some really fighting spirit.
Jess remained silent. She didn’t say a word. Her face seemed to have got confused in her own thoughts and my bombardment. We soon parted wishing each other good night. She was still silent but I was sure there was a storm of thoughts going on in her mind.
***
When I had just entered the campus, I had never even imagined that there would be so many facilities inside a company’s campus. A couple of cricket grounds, where there would be Ranji Trophy matches, dozens of tennis and badminton courts, a couple of basketball and volleyball courts, dozens of table tennis tables, a full fledged gym, a swimming pool, fountains, a mini theatre, a departmental store, a book shop, 3 storey library and what not. There were people who enjoyed everything but I wondered how they managed to pass in the exams… I wanted to concentrate fully on study… there were lots of things out there but I simply couldn’t find time to enjoy them. I used to slog from 9 in the morning till 2 in the morning of other day just to pass the tests with good marks… I didn’t want to lose on that front. I wanted to earn a good grade and better salary… that was my goal…
I remember it was Friday… we received some email from the HRD saying the movie for the weekend was ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’. “Wow… Niru, let’s go for it yaar, I really need some break out of this boring routine.” “Nopes Jess, we have Java test coming up in the next week and I haven’t even started with the preparation and anyways this is a movie for children yaar… we are grown ups… I would prefer to have a sound sleep for 2 hours rather than wasting my energy and money both in something which I don’t like much, on the top of that, I haven’t seen the first part… this one is second… me not gonna’ understand a word outta’ it.” “Niru, please at least sometimes listen to me… I want a break yaar… and I don’t have a company. I am a girl and when a girl requests you something, you should not turn down it so harshly you see. You are coming with me for the movie and that’s final.” It was not impossible to convince her but then even I needed some break from the daily boring routine.
It was 6 p.m. when I reached the reception to get the tickets. There was a huge queue for the same. It was obvious… rather than getting bored with the typical study slides or boring assignments, everyone wanted some break. I just hoped I would get a good break and a refreshed mind after the movie to start the preparations in a fresh manner…
The building for the multiplex was a sphere. A cool, grand, big sphere. In the dark background of night and the cool moon it appeared as if we were on some other planet, enjoying the space journey. The multiplex looked bright, it looked posh, it looked royal.
There were still 10 minutes for the start. The chair beside me was empty. I wished for some good looking girl to sit there, not that I wished to do anything as such during the movie but there was nothing wrong in wishing so….The movie started sooner…. During the titles… a group of girls arrived and sat beside my seat…I couldn’t see who were they exactly… but it was good to have female neighbors…. I was happy…
The movie was good. I didn’t remember much of the first part but things were conveyed quite a lot properly making me at least understand what was going on there. There were typical fighting scenes, ship battles and all, I was actually getting bored of that but soon there was a cool mountain sized octopus trying to destroy ships and killing people. Actually this was a lot creepy, but somehow I liked the thrill in that. I was so involved in that, that I didn’t understand when my neighboring girl’s palm was over mine. Probably she was scared. She tried to get hold of the chair but instead she caught my hand. I felt something really good inside me. A girl holding your hand like this…. Yes it was romantic. I felt like experiencing that touch forever. Her anxiety was getting reflected from her shaking palm. I felt like freezing the moment. I wished to let that monster keep destroying everything forever on screen and the girl beside me be holding my hand like this….
I was lost in those thoughts when it was the interval time. I looked at her… and then I was back to the real life. The girl holding my hand was none other than…. Ritu. I didn’t like her. I mean I wanted to stay away from her. She was not the girl Niru would like to give his hand to. I wanted someone else, better looking and probably smarter.
The interval lights made Ritu as well as me back to normal. Both hands were taken back as if we had experienced a severe electric shock.. Was she embarrassed or was she hurt by the expressions I showed on my face after realizing that the hand belonged to Ritu… I don’t know… but she quickly left the theatre not to return. The next half of the movie, the chair remained empty. I stayed there watching the movie, but never got involved in it. I was plainly looking at the screen. I was lost in thoughts. An animation film or a normal 70mm movie didn’t make much difference to me then. I just kept thinking about Ritu… Were I right in making a decision about Ritu?
***

It was the compre that day…. Compre… seemingly cool but in reality a harsh monster.. which stole all the fun and leisure from our lives those days. Compre was an abbreviation for comprehensive exam. This one consisted of the entire syllabus that we studied there during the training. It was hell. Every week we were busy in giving one or the other exam and now we had to study for all of them once again… the only good thing was we were going to get released after this. Everyone was studying hard. No one wanted to fail and lose a grade which would have directly affected their salaries. The studying time was now extended till 4 in the morning. Tension was getting built up and anyone could easily sense it.
9 a.m. in the morning. Everyone was inside the classroom. There was a pin-drop silence. Everyone was having a last look at the notes he or she had. Everyone behaved like it was the matter of life and death. No one wanted to lose it. No one wanted to fail in it. The environment was getting more and more tense by every second. An objective test followed by a hands-on exercise… everyone was under a load of tension… no one knew whether he/she would make it or not.
After 4 hours, finally it was over. The only sound that was heard was that of the sigh of relief. Finally after a month and half we were getting a couple of days to enjoy the life there. We were free, we were on our own. We were going back… no more studies, there was just fun now….
The two days went off like anything. Even we didn’t understand how the time flew past. We played games, we did cycling, we went for movies, we read books… we did everything, we enjoyed everything that we couldn’t in last 1½ months. We wanted to enjoy the life to the fullest… afterall these were the memories that we were going to cherish for our life time….
The next day our results were out along with our placements. Jess and I had passed with the ‘A’ grade and both had been placed in Pune. Now it was the return journey. We had curiosity as to what’s gonna be there in Pune where we were going to be the real professionals and not just trainees. It was good, it was one of the most awaited moments of our lives. But yes… along with all these good things, there was the departure from the Mysore campus. The campus where we studied for hours and days together, the campus where we got new friends, the campus where we were transformed from college students to professionals… we were going to leave that. The faces were happy and sad at the same time…
And the last day arrived. The bus was there in the campus to take us to the railway station. Everyone was sad. We didn’t want to leave the campus, we didn’t want to leave our friends… In this duration of a month or so, we got so many friends, all were going to be in different cities now. Some in Pune, some in Trivandram, some in Bangalore, some in Chennai… we had never thought of this parting. We felt like crying… what was there amongst us? This stay, the study here, the time that we had spent there, it was good.. no it was amazing… all that fighting, slogging for assignments, dozing off in between, studying for nights together… all was damn tiring but was amazing… we enjoyed every moment of our stay there. Everyone was almost in tears. There was time when we wanted the training to end for we wanted to be professionals and no more trainees but now we felt like continuing the training forever… we wished the life there could have gone like that… along with all friends together…
I got into the bus and sat at the window seat. I wanted to capture each and every glimpse of the campus while leaving. I was gonna cherish it for my lifetime. The bus was in front of GTI. The grand building of GTI stood there in front of us… it was now empty.. without all those trainees it was just a structure of walls… without any life. The fountain at the main staircase was there ready to silently welcome the new trainees… but it was all alone…. No… there was someone standing there giving it company... It was Ritu. Her eyes plainly looked at the bus and at me through the window. I could easily see the tears in her eyes. She was placed in Chandigarh… miles away from me. We couldn’t have met even by chance. I felt awkward. The girl whom I didn’t like much, at least that’s what I pretended, was there in front of me. She was sad that she was going away from me. I felt bad. I realized her feelings for me. I had felt something similar about Vidhi when she had left training. Probably Ritu felt the same. I had hurt her feelings… I had tried my best to stay away from her and I had tried my best to insult her just through the eyes. I felt like going to her and apologizing for my behaviour… but it was just too late for that. Someone touched my shoulder. It was Jess. Her assuring hand was on my shoulder. I needed it. Probably I had done the greatest mistake of my life by avoiding Ritu. They say ‘Be with someone who loves you rather than someone whom you love…’ I realized the meaning of that sentence now. I had lost something…
The bus started. Ritu couldn’t stand there… she ran inside the building. I couldn’t do anything other than watching her through the window. Some decisions had gone wrong but I had to accept the consequences. The destiny wanted them that way and I had to be ready for the same…

***
It was the compre that day…. Compre… seemingly cool but in reality a harsh monster.. which stole all the fun and leisure from our lives those days. Compre was an abbreviation for comprehensive exam. This one consisted of the entire syllabus that we studied there during the training. It was hell. Every week we were busy in giving one or the other exam and now we had to study for all of them once again… the only good thing was we were going to get released after this. Everyone was studying hard. No one wanted to fail and lose a grade which would have directly affected their salaries. The studying time was now extended till 4 in the morning. Tension was getting built up and anyone could easily sense it.
9 a.m. in the morning. Everyone was inside the classroom. There was a pin-drop silence. Everyone was having a last look at the notes he or she had. Everyone behaved like it was the matter of life and death. No one wanted to lose it. No one wanted to fail in it. The environment was getting more and more tense by every second. An objective test followed by a hands-on exercise… everyone was under a load of tension… no one knew whether he/she would make it or not.
After 4 hours, finally it was over. The only sound that was heard was that of the sigh of relief. Finally after a month and half we were getting a couple of days to enjoy the life there. We were free, we were on our own. We were going back… no more studies, there was just fun now….
The two days went off like anything. Even we didn’t understand how the time flew past. We played games, we did cycling, we went for movies, we read books… we did everything, we enjoyed everything that we couldn’t in last 1½ months. We wanted to enjoy the life to the fullest… afterall these were the memories that we were going to cherish for our life time….
The next day our results were out along with our placements. Jess and I had passed with the ‘A’ grade and both had been placed in Pune. Now it was the return journey. We had curiosity as to what’s gonna be there in Pune where we were going to be the real professionals and not just trainees. It was good, it was one of the most awaited moments of our lives. But yes… along with all these good things, there was the departure from the Mysore campus. The campus where we studied for hours and days together, the campus where we got new friends, the campus where we were transformed from college students to professionals… we were going to leave that. The faces were happy and sad at the same time…
And the last day arrived. The bus was there in the campus to take us to the railway station. Everyone was sad. We didn’t want to leave the campus, we didn’t want to leave our friends… In this duration of a month or so, we got so many friends, all were going to be in different cities now. Some in Pune, some in Trivandram, some in Bangalore, some in Chennai… we had never thought of this parting. We felt like crying… what was there amongst us? This stay, the study here, the time that we had spent there, it was good.. no it was amazing… all that fighting, slogging for assignments, dozing off in between, studying for nights together… all was damn tiring but was amazing… we enjoyed every moment of our stay there. Everyone was almost in tears. There was time when we wanted the training to end for we wanted to be professionals and no more trainees but now we felt like continuing the training forever… we wished the life there could have gone like that… along with all friends together…
I got into the bus and sat at the window seat. I wanted to capture each and every glimpse of the campus while leaving. I was gonna cherish it for my lifetime. The bus was in front of GTI. The grand building of GTI stood there in front of us… it was now empty.. without all those trainees it was just a structure of walls… without any life. The fountain at the main staircase was there ready to silently welcome the new trainees… but it was all alone…. No… there was someone standing there giving it company... It was Ritu. Her eyes plainly looked at the bus and at me through the window. I could easily see the tears in her eyes. She was placed in Chandigarh… miles away from me. We couldn’t have met even by chance. I felt awkward. The girl whom I didn’t like much, at least that’s what I pretended, was there in front of me. She was sad that she was going away from me. I felt bad. I realized her feelings for me. I had felt something similar about Vidhi when she had left training. Probably Ritu felt the same. I had hurt her feelings… I had tried my best to stay away from her and I had tried my best to insult her just through the eyes. I felt like going to her and apologizing for my behaviour… but it was just too late for that. Someone touched my shoulder. It was Jess. Her assuring hand was on my shoulder. I needed it. Probably I had done the greatest mistake of my life by avoiding Ritu. They say ‘Be with someone who loves you rather than someone whom you love…’ I realized the meaning of that sentence now. I had lost something…
The bus started. Ritu couldn’t stand there… she ran inside the building. I couldn’t do anything other than watching her through the window. Some decisions had gone wrong but I had to accept the consequences. The destiny wanted them that way and I had to be ready for the same…
***
We were in Pune the very next day. The environment was cool. The change was good. Rather than the happiness of being a professional rather than a trainee, the happiness of being nearer to Mumbai was more appealing. The project allocations were taking place but overall we had got a lot of free time to search for our lodging facilities. The other day Jess and I decided to leave early and take a break from the daily boring routine of searching for good rental homes. I was waiting for Jess who had to come down from phase-2 to phase-1 and then we were going to head for some movie or so. She took a long time to arrive… Finally I called her up…
“Hey Jess, where are you yaar, I have been waiting for you since half an hour… you girls never understand the value of time, do you?” “Niruuu…. I was caught up in some work yaar… See, I have reached.. I am talking from the other side of the road you duffer. Let me cross the road now.. Can I now cut the call please?”
I turned around. Jess was there in front of me, cautiously crossing the road. I didn’t know why but she always used to get scared by those heavy 18-wheel vehicles. I felt like mocking her. Anyone could have laughed looking at her frightened face. It was not a face of a young girl. It was a face of a small kid looking for her parents’ hand while crossing the road. She was slowly crossing the road… and suddenly she fumbled on something and fell down in the middle of the road. I could see her lying in the middle of the busy highway with a big truck speeding towards her. My brain fused out. Some really horrible feeling scratched my heart really hard.
I cried, “Jess, get up…. Turn around…. Try to get to a side…” She tried to get up but she couldn’t… she seemed to have got hurt after falling. The truck driver was honking the horn, he even seemed to have pressed his foot hard on the brake peddle but even he couldn’t stop the truck at that speed…. I closed my eyes….. When I looked again…. The truck had stopped… but a few feet ahead… making that stop simply useless. My cries went in vain with my best friend lying there in the middle of the road. Not even a couple of seconds and it was over…. Simply over ... My brain simply gave up… I went numb… How could I be so selfish… I could have dragged her to the side of the road and saved her. I couldn’t save the life of my best friend… There was no use of this repenting. Something really horrible had happened and I was responsible for it. I wished I could go back in time… That was the first time when I cried openly…
Departure from Mysore had costed me. I parted from Ritu and now Jess. I didn’t feel much sad after parting from Ritu but the absence of Jess in my life was simply unimaginable. Jess was my best friend. She was the one with whom I could share all my happiness, all my sorrows, everything. Jess was an inevitable part of my life. Even after a year of her demise I missed her everywhere. When I liked Gargi, I didn’t have anyone to share it. There was no-one to introduce me to her. There was no-one to share happiness when I decided to ask her and there was no one to share my sorrow when she turned me down. When Jess was with me, I never felt need for anything else in my life. She was always there with me. Always sharing and caring. With her in my life, I could easily accept any loser, could accept any sorrow, without her, everything seemed different… everything seemed difficult. She was the best friend; no she was the best person on this earth. I am still not able to forget her and will not forgive god or to say the destiny that snatched her away from me….
***
Yesterday I asked Gargi out and she turned me down. I wanted to share that with someone close, but there was no one. It was my Jess and her memories that again helped me to get over that grief. Somehow I felt better.
‘It’s time to wake up… the time is 6.30’… it was my cellphone alarm, indicating the time for me to get up and get ready for the office. I was simply lost in all those memories of the training days that I even didn’t realize that I didn’t sleep for the whole night… but I didn’t regret over that… afterall those memories made my mood normal. Just the feelings or memories of the nice people, incidents in your life gives you a hope to live it with a new light and enthusiasm.
Soon I was ready and was about to leave for the usual bus stop to catch up the office bus, when Paras, my roommate stopped me. “Niru, you proposed Gargi yesterday?” “Yes.”, I said… don’t know why but I didn’t feel shy or so… I even didn’t get any loser feeling while admitting that. Whether I had become a really shameless fellow or it was the effect of my Mysore memories… I really didn’t know… but one thing was sure.. I was very much ready with a fresh mind to face the new day with a new hope and enthusiasm.
“Niru, I had guessed it yesterday itself from your face. However you may attempt to hide your feelings, they show up on your face dude. Anyways, don’t worry, think of it like she was simply not destined to be in your life. Forget her, I am sure you will get someone better than her.” , it felt like Jess was talking to me… similar words… just that Paras’s eyes were not as kind and considerate as hers. The emotions that tried to come out of his words didn’t match the expressions on his face very much unlike Jess… I would have again got into Jess’s thoughts when Sanmeet brought me back to reality, “Don’t worry Niru, forget Gargi, have you thought about that crush of yours in our bus….? Yaa the secretary… what a code-name maan? Anyways… today - this valentines is a good day to have an introduction with her. Give it a try.. let’s go..”
And then we started towards our usual bus stop for the bus. Afterall my bus and my secretary in the bus were waiting for me to start one more story of my life… I was damn sure … Jess, wherever she was, must have been smiling at me… I was happy… with a new day, all that loser feeling was gone… Niru was back… There were some problems in my life just like everyone else… but I had to move on…. afterall that’s life isn’t it?

THE END

Hi Friends,

Here comes the end of my story and also as usual my disclaimer. Although this time, it’s not that serious as it was for my last story ‘Some Diary Pages.’ Anyways… first of all thanks a lot for spending your time in reading the story and sending me the feedbacks. It was really good to see all those replies. Thanks again for the same.
You all made my ‘Some Diary Pages’ a big hit. The story was forwarded across whole country. I have personally received many calls, mails asking about the story, the characters and specially the end in reality. It was really good to receive such calls, which gave me praises, comments and feedback. This was not at all possible without you all… Thanks a lot for that…
Now back to ‘That’s life’… Almost all characters in this particular story are fictitious. Let it be Ritu, Riya, Seema, Shirish or Gargi all are just fictitious and hence even the incidents linked to them are fictitious. The character Jessica, even she’s fictitious. I would like to have a good-close friend like Jessica, in fact I think everyone should get at least one friend like her who will be with you whenever you need her… Many of my friends asked me about the accident of Jessica and also expressed that it was unnecessary but if it wouldn’t have been shown that way, then Niru would have got someone to share his sorrows and grief and then it wouldn’t have been necessary for him to get into the past memories to get his mood back to normal. That’s why I had to show such a tragic incident even when I don’t wish any of such incidents to happen with anyone….
Coming back to real characters, the characters Jango [name changed], Sudeep, Dinesh, Paras and Sanmeet are all real. Tanuja-the hostel co-ordinator is a real character and also is the incident that happened between us regarding the map of Mysore DC. Last but not the least… the character of ‘secretary’ in my bus…. I don’t think I need to tell specifically about her reality….
Thanks again to all of you for reading the story…. Do send me feedbacks… If you wish, do forward the story to your friends just as you did for Some Diary Pages… :)
-Niru :)

The Fake Flower

2008-03-12T17:53:00.000+05:30

The Fake Flower

                  “Happy journey and take care of yourself. Don’t work too much. Remember you can always delegate some tasks to us - your offshore team… although we don’t wish for more work but still…”, he tried to crack a small joke but somehow stopped abruptly. He had left with no words. She was leaving for onsite. In a couple of minutes she would be in for the security check and then he could see her only after 3 months. It was hard. He very well knew it. It was anyways hard for him to be away from her on weekends, whole 3 months were beyond imagination. Both were simply looking at each other. No one said anything. Perhaps, all that was to be conveyed was being conveyed through the eyes or to say the watery eyes. Finally he accumulated all his guts, “I… I just wanted to ask you one question… Not that you don’t love me or not that I don’t trust you or so… but… You won’t forget me in these 3 months, will you?”

                  There was a long silence in between. She looked at him. His eyes were filled with tears. She had never seen him getting so much emotional. Even her condition wasn’t different… but the question he had asked her had to be answered…

                  “Take this…”, she just gave him a fake flower stitched on her decorative purse. He was puzzled… “What’s this for?”, he asked.. “This is the answer to your question… I’ll love you and won’t forget you till this flower dies…”, and she hugged him. Tears rolled over his cheeks. He felt like staying with her like this forever… but they had to move on… She soon went for her flight and he returned, with the fake flower in his hand held close to his heart. He had to preserve it… preserve it for the lifetime… for it was her souvenir …. His love’s souvenir …

Independence day

2007-08-16T11:02:00.000+05:30

Independence day

                Independence day… 15th august…. Independence for whom???? I had to wake up at 7 or so…. Waking up so early on a holiday…yes… we all just consider it as a one more holiday… still I am swatantra…. Or to say free… I come to office… why?? Because my client is non-Indian.. so he doesn’t know the value of ‘Independence day’ for us Indians….( whether we ourselves know it is a debatable topic but he doesn’t know that and that’s for sure…)… So I come to office to earn my daily bread and butter… I stay in the office for the whole day… I repent on this because by national holiday we just mean hanging out with friends… or sleep for hours or watch a movie….

                In the evening I and my roommates decide to have dinner out and we go to a nearby multiplex for dinner as well as movie… we are totally 6 + 1 and ½ people in a rickshaw which is licensed to allow only 3 + 1… the ½ person who is a child around 5-6 year old is sitting on the driver’s lap… that’s my free country… I go to McD… one more place where we pay to get insulted… we pay 4 times more than the actual value of the food there… and then we wait in a queue just like the beggars outside a party hall waiting for their number to arrive so that they can have plenty of food… We still eat there…. Because of the holiday rush, almost all items there are simply stale they taste awful rather than awesome… but we eat there… because on eves like Independence day we prefer a good looking restaurant be it a multi cuisine restaurant or a world-wide food outlet chain… we don’t give damn to our own India’s Udipi hotels or so.. that’s what we call ‘celebration’…. We are not concerned about the quality… we are concerned about the show-off and the mention of ‘international’ on the things available there….

                Then we reach the departmental store…. ‘big bazaar’ which has it’s last day of giving more than 50% discount on purchases…. My fellow countrymen are standing there in a queue… no comments for this because it was simply like the queue at McD… just that the queue there was for the stale food which you buy after paying some handsome price… whereas this queue was to get something cheaper…. People tend to waste money at times… and they go down to any level to save the same.. surprising…

                Then we go for the movie… ‘chak de India’ .. What’s there in that? a story of a person who tried to prove to his own countrymen…. That he played for his country and not for his own selfish purpose… the great tragedy of the true sportsman… but we consider just the filmy part… we clap on the dialogues.. we clap for the sports sequences… we don’t give even a little thought to the literally hopeless situation of media in creating hypes…. in the next screen we have the show of another movie named ‘Gandhi my father’ where the most unfortunate part of the life my country’s great leader is depicted… he gave us freedom… and so he couldn’t give much to his own family… but when we come out of the theatre… we say ‘see… he even couldn’t control his own son….’ When we comment like this… doesn’t the whole purpose of his fights, his sacrifices go in vain ?…. When his own countrymen can’t acknowledge his greatness… why did he fight after all? But again no comments….

                We return to our home …. Again the same intended 3 seater but now actually used as a 7 seater vehicle is ready…. We reach back… on this route we see a car parked at the side of the road…. Two guys… can be termed to be the youth or to say the future of this nation are puking…. Others are still enjoying the liquor in the car…. And these are not just the guys… even girls are accompanying them… again this is a national day… they should celebrate it… it’s their choice as to how to celebrate it…

                We return to our home… it’s the sleeping time… of course tomorrow again there is office…. We have to reach on time…. My country …The Independent India just turned senior citizen today… is it??? does it have even the enough maturity level of a 22 year old youth? When we see all that youth running for international restaurants…. Queuing for some cheap things… taking out literally insensible meaning from things when the intended meaning is miles away… assuming that celebrations only mean drinking/smoking…. Spitting/throwing garbage at the corners of roads rather than in dustbins… just one question arises in mind…. Are we the responsible citizens of the country for whom our great forefathers brought the freedom sacrificing their family life… their blood …at times their lives?

ALVIDAA

2007-07-30T09:56:00.000+05:30

ALVIDA

                One evening on my company campus, while I was returning to my cubicle from the canteen, I saw her at the gate. A small pain rose in my heart.

                Who was she? Was she my girlfriend? No… I am still single. Was she my friend? No… we never even talked to each other… then was she one of those people in my company whom I just knew by face and was completely unaware of their names or anything else about them? No… I was knowing her, I was knowing her name, I was knowing where she worked, but was she knowing me even by my face?

                I saw her first time in our company bus from Chinchwad. Her cute and a very sweet smile and simple yet beautiful face attracted me instantly. I think this is what they call ‘the love at first sight’. I was so attracted to her that I simply stood there for a moment or two rather than rushing to the back of the bus to catch an empty seat.

                This happened almost everyday. The first thing I would do after getting into the bus was to look at her. It had become my habit. It was sort of a good morning for me. I liked it and in fact I longed for it. Weekends were just tortures when there was no bus travel and hence no glimpse of her. Some very much unknown but a very sweet feeling inside me used to tease me every morning I saw her. Was it love or just infatuation… whatever… I was enjoying it…

                I wanted to get introduced to her, wanted to talk to her, wanted to have a friendship with her that would have helped me to understand her, probably get closer to her, but I simply lacked the guts for the same. I simply couldn’t gather that courage to talk to her. My feelings remained unuttered and simply unconveyed.

                And one day, my friend who was her colleague got that bad news. She was leaving the company in the next week. I was shocked. I couldn’t even imagine my travel by the company bus without her. ‘Will we ever meet or at least see each other in future? Should I go to her and talk to her at least once before she leaves?’ Such questions simply rocked my mind for days and nights together. I was lost in them.

                And today she was there at the gate leaving me forever. The harsh reality of parting from her which I was trying to avoid was in front of me now. She was there standing just 10-15 feet away from me. I felt like going to her, hugging her close and open up my mind… but again I thought… what was I going to achieve by that? She would be leaving and probably in future we would not even see each other… then why should I do that and embarrass her? I simply kept calm, killing my feelings about her forever… it hurt… but that’s life..

                Our usual bus for Chinchwad arrived soon… she got in… I also wanted to go but somehow I couldn’t dare to enter that bus. I simply stayed at the gate plainly looking at the moving bus, trying my best to control the tears that were ready to get out of my eyes the next moment… while my heart was crying like anything for her….

Travel by the Mumbai Local

2007-07-17T10:29:00.000+05:30

Travel by the Mumbai Local

                    Just imagine… Your right hand lying on someone’s shoulder which after around 10 minutes you come to realize belongs to the third person on your right, is holding your bag. Your left hand or to say complete left arm is somehow lost somewhere just like your right leg and in case you try to turn your head to track the two, the hair of the person on your left start brushing your face with the most foul smelling hair oil. You leave that attempt. Then you try to move your hands and legs .. I mean at least you give your brain the order to do so.. so that at least by the movement you might be able to guess the exact location of your organs. While doing so even your brain is so confused that it tries to move your left leg instead of right one and you come to know that the leg is simply somewhere in the air and you are currently in no direct touch to the floor below.
Welcome to Mumbai locals.. at a time around 9-10 in the morning or probably 7-8 in the evening.. The situation is the same except for the sky outside, which is black or white but again it is hardly visible from inside the compartment.
I currently Live in Chinchwad and travel by bus to office and sadly I miss that entire thrill I used to enjoy when I was in college. At that time, I used to live in Thane. My college was in Vidyavihar… at a distance of around 20-25 minutes from Thane by our beloved locals. It would be my pre-decided plan to catch usual 8:15 a.m. local to Vidyavihar. This local used to start from Thane and thus used to have lesser crowd as compared to others which would come fully packed from the stations before Thane. I traveled by that particular local for 4 years of my engineering, as I was loyal to her even she was so… never did late … never got cancelled… never made me repent to make the decision of catching her.
                    The journey used to start something like this…. I, always late for the local to catch would run on the bridge just like a male rabbit would behind a female rabbit… ( don’t ask me why of all I chose rabbit here… but the way I used to jump over the obstacles in between and maneuver my way to the platform number 3 can be compared to just a deer or rabbit.. and since rabbit is good looking one….). So finally for the 8:15 local I used to reach exactly at 8:16. Now again there was a catch here.. the digital clock on the bridge used to show the timing of 8:19 whereas the one on the platform used to show 8:16… Einstein would have congratulated me for running by the speed of light to go into the past… at the end, the local would follow none of the three timings… it used to leave by around 8:17 in my watch.
                    I used to get into the compartment… first class compartment.. although a bit expensive, I used to prefer that one for the reason that first class guaranteed of people who would have bathed at least once a week… which was not at all possible in second class compartments. Getting into the compartment was never so difficult in fact I always used get a good place to stand mostly under the fan which would provide some sort of ventilation if working that too if some air would be able to enter the compartment in spite of the crowd.
The train then used to leave Thane with the slowest speed it could gather. The first station was Mulund, where I don’t know why but people thought every local is the last local and there is no other local that will come on that route. People would run into the compartment just like the animals in the movie Jumanji… I think the director of the movie must have traveled by that local and got the idea of the it… we used to laugh everyday on that style but those Mulund people never left their habit.
                    The next stations would simply go unnoticed as there would be damn crowd already inside the compartment making us almost hugging each other, sleeping on others’ shoulders and at times simply get hair oiled by brushing them with neighbor. I would like to salute Indian Railways for the great social work they are doing of bringing people together… in today’s world where one person even doesn’t talk to other properly without any reason, co-travelers in locals are almost sleeping on each other’s shoulder.
                    Then there used to come our staion..Vidyavihar. Every person even though sure that the person next him is definitely getting down at VidyaVihar would ask, ‘ Vidyavihar?’.. Now this is not a question as such.. as per English grammar, this so-called question has no meaning at all, but the particular word would convey the purpose to the other guy and simply he would nod to it. I still remember the day when a person asked my friend from behind, ‘VidyaVihar?’ and he simply replied, ‘No.. Gaurav’.. the whole compartment burst into laughter…
We never got out of the compartment on our own will. Someone from behind used to push us out or someone on station willing to get into would simply pull us out to make some room inside.
                    This saga continued for 4 years of my engineering. Now it has almost been a year or so, that I shifted to Pune, and couldn’t get any thrill in the journey to office. Last weekend while I was traveling to Thane from Kalyan I experienced same things; it brushed up all those memories of travel… Although my whole body was paining… I felt good somewhere deep within… I was back in my old days… I enjoyed it.
                    People not at all familiar with the life in these Mumbai locals may think me as a complete mad but really try to travel by these for a week or so…you will get used to them and start liking them. This is the place where people can make friends, play cards, exchange feelings, try to catch glimpse of girls in the ladies compartment… and all that in an hour’s time or so.. salute to you Mumbai local….

SOME DIARY PAGES

2007-07-07T00:46:00.000+05:30

SOME DIARY PAGES

Some characters and incidents in this story are imaginary and any resemblance of them with any dead or living entity should be considered as coincidence.

Date: 15-Jan
HE:
I wait everyday till 8.00 in the office even if there is no work. All of my teammates ask me why; how can I tell them that I don’t wait for any personal or official work but the only reason why I wait is the ‘secretary’- a girl in my 8.00 p.m. Chinchwad bus. ‘Secretary’ is not her real name, it’s sort of a code name given to her by me and my friends. Truly speaking, I like her. She might not be one of those who look like Aishwarya Rai or Preitty Zinta, but she is cute and simple and that’s the reason I like her. For past 6 months I have been staring at her in the bus, while going to office and coming back from the office. When I get into bus, somehow my eyes search the whole bus just to have her glimpse.
I never had a girlfriend till now, not that I don’t like to have friendship with girls but somehow they usually prefer tall-dark-handsome qualities in their boyfriends, out of which I possess none. I don’t want to jump to any relationship like this with the secretary but at least just a friendship, is it possible?
I want to talk to her. I want to have friendship with her. I know her name, for I had seen her ID card one day. But I don’t have the guts to talk to her. I even don’t know whether she knows me even by face. I know, no one can help me here; no-one other than myself, but I simply have no guts. At least someone probably a common friend, might at least formally introduce us to each other.

SHE:
There is one guy in my office bus. His name is Niranjan. I think he likes me, for me and even my friends have observed him many times staring at myself. Even when he gets into the bus, rather than searching for an empty seat, his eyes search the whole bus for me. Don’t know why but I kind of like it. Sometimes the feeling of knowing that someone loves you is far better than actually loving somebody. I didn’t have any affair till today, not that I didn’t like or love anyone, there was a guy in my college, whom I liked a lot but somehow he stayed away from me, not that he didn’t like me but probably because I am not that beautiful and he wanted someone much more better than me.
This guy, Niru, that’s what his friends call him, I had heard it once in the bus; he seems to be interested in me, not sure about love as such but friendship might not be bad. At least the guy seems to be descent one. I would like to be his friend, but how can I go forward? Afterall he is the boy, he should come one step ahead …not me.

Date: 16-Jan
HE:
My roommate told me to approach her and get introduced to her all by myself. It’s not that easy; this is not a college, what if she complains about this to higher authorities? No, I can’t take this risk. Someone else better introduce her to me. God, can you help me please?

SHE:
My cousin told me to show some sign to him that I am ok in having friendship with him. I think he is afraid to come forward. I’ll give him a good friendly smile tomorrow, when he gets into the bus. I hope he understands and decrypts my signal. God, can you please help him?

GOD:
Now should I come into this picture? Both of these human beings are acting as if they are in a big problem. Although not for me, I had made life so simple for you, just added a bit of emotions there and see how complex you have made it. Now that I am the god, you must have been expecting me to intervene and have some miracle, but no; I won’t interfere here. I have created this world with some fixed rules and everything is just working as per that. Why should I just interfere and break my own rules thereby disrupting the balance of this whole system?

Date: 17-Jan
HE:
Today when I got into the bus and looked at her, she returned back a cute smile. Was she serious? I don’t know; probably she must have told her friends about me and they must have been making fun of me and that’s why when I got into the bus she started laughing and I misunderstood it for smiling. Such a fool of me. Damn, her friends must be having fun discussing things about me.

SHE:
Today when he got into the bus, I smiled at him. But he seemed to be more puzzled than pleased. Is he really interested in having friendship with me or not? I really don’t know. Why am I thinking so much about him? Have I started liking him? Or is it just like you just get used to some things as a habit, and then you unknowingly start liking them? I think it’s the latter case here. Please god please let that guy be a descent one. My sixth sense says he is a descent guy. I think he must have got puzzled because of the smile I gave him. It wasn’t my fault, for I showed him that I am interested in friendship. Now the ball lies in his court. Will he dare first to talk?

Date: 18-Jan
HE:
I am damn confused. I don’t know what to do. Every day everyone around me is bombarding me with some tactics to approach her but nothing seems to suit me well. My roommates even started taunting me that I can’t have a girlfriend or at least the guts to approach the gal. I am leaving it now on luck. I will just continue whatever is going on; let the luck take us wherever and however intended.

Date: 25-Jan
HE:
Nothing unusual or special happened in the last few days. However, today I thought something interesting might happen. The bus was about to start the back-home journey today when she and one of her friends got into the bus. They were searching for a place to sit. I was alone on a seat of three. I was thrilled that she would sit on the same seat beside me. But she just came, momentarily paused at the seat, turned to her friend and just went past; to sit on the last seat. I couldn’t see the expressions on her face clearly but what I saw was a face filled up with hate or some similar feeling that clearly showed expression such as whatever might happen, I am not going to sit beside this *****. It was really heartbreaking. It was the biggest insult I had suffered till now. Am I so hopeless?

Date: 26-Jan
HE:
Today, there was public holiday so I got lot of time to think and analyze the situation. What was my fault? I haven’t done anything wrong. I didn’t ever talk to her, I never tried to flirt, I never gossiped about her except for my close friends. I am even sure that none of my co-travelers in the bus know that I like her. Whenever I stare at her I take necessary precaution as not to be too obvious. I don’t want to embarrass her in any way. When I am trying my best for this, then why did she have such cruel expressions on the face?
I think either she knows now that I like her and stare at her and she doesn’t want to encourage me or simply, she just hates me for no reason, just like many of my classmates who hate me for no reason.
I don’t know what to do now, but either ways I think she just doesn’t want me to be anywhere around her. She just hates me. Just one more failure. Does it hurt? Yes it does, but I am very much used to it. I’ll try my best not to look at her. I don’t want to do anything that she doesn’t like. I will try to forget her as if she was just one more dream in my life which simply didn’t come true. Probably, I don’t deserve to be with her. This is fate afterall. I will have to obey it.

SHE:
Today was a holiday. So I couldn’t see him, although I wanted to. I actually wanted to apologize for whatever happened yesterday. I got into the bus and searched for the seat. He was sitting alone on the seat for 3, it was a good chance for me to sit with him and have a word or two. I was just thrilled. I was about to sit on the same seat when Kruti said something. I didn’t hear it properly so I turned to her. She said, ”See, Raghav is there, he has reserved seats for us.” I just hate that Raghav, he is always ready to flirt provided the other person is a girl. Whenever I see him, somehow I try my best to be as away from him as I can, I even show hatred to him directly on my face but this guy simply ignores this. I don’t know why Kruti likes him so much.
So the point is I went to the seat that Raghav had reserved specially for us. I felt really bad for Niru, but if I would have denied Raghav’s offer and would have sat on Niru’s seat; it would have just been too obvious. He must have felt embarrassed. Poor guy.

Date: 27-Jan
SHE:
Today he seemed to have lost in thoughts. When he got into the bus, surprisingly he didn’t search for me. He even didn’t look up. He just went straight to the last seat and started reading a novel. I tried looking at him once or twice but he didn’t lift his head at all. I think he is hurt, I am feeling sorry, but what can I do? When we got down at the office gate, I purposefully lingered a bit more at the gates to give back him a smile, but I couldn’t spot him in the crowd. Niru, I am sorry, please be normal again.

Date: 28-Jan
SHE:
Today I saw him in the food court. He was there with two girls and was chatting, laughing, cracking jokes. He seemed to enjoy the company. Is he also a typical boy who just wants to have as many girls around him as possible? Is he a typical flirt? Does he want me also to get included in that group for showcasing?
Probably the two girls were just good friends of him. At least I hope so. Please god please let those be his sisters or just friends, nothing else.

Date: 3-Feb
HE:
Since that evening thing has happened, I have left staring at her. I don’t know but some inner voice is telling me to keep away. I am not a street walking beggar to be treated like this. She might consider herself whatever she might think of. She is beautiful, indeed, but that doesn’t mean she can insult me like that. I have sward not to look at her again anymore and just to avoid her looks.
But I can’t stay like this. I just like her and want to be with her. She has committed a mistake, but wasn’t that a bit natural. She doesn’t like me and doesn’t want to encourage my feelings about her. Simple isn’t it? That’s it. A complete halt for my feelings and my dreams, but I don’t think I can manage not to have even a look at her. Will I be able to do it?
There is some saying, ‘Oh god, change the situations around me to favor me. At least give me the strength to change it. If I can’t change it, at least give me the strength to bear it.’ Oh God, please listen to me.

GOD:
You don’t remember me when you are happy or contempt, do you? When there is a problem or a really difficult situation, then you start remembering me or praising me, don’t you? I still won’t interfere here. My world is a complex entity with each and every thing or event properly planned for some specific future as well as past reason. Why should I interfere and break the balance of all these systems myself?

Date: 14-Feb
HE:
By the time I am writing this, Valentine’s Day is already over. It doesn’t matter anyways, since nothing unusual has happened today. The day had been very much like other 365 days in the year or probably last 21 valentine’s days in my life. I was hoping that I at least get to catch her glimpse but fate didn’t seem to favor me even this much. Due to this night shift, I am even deprived of her glimpses. Today, I even lingered a bit at the gates at the usual bus timing to watch her, but she didn’t turn up. I think god wants to signal me to keep away from her. My insult that day was the first one and now this was the second one. Ok god, I got it.

SHE:
Valentine’s day is over but I couldn’t manage even to see him today. I thought today he might come to me and have a talk, but he didn’t. Even he is not traveling nowadays by the usual bus. Did he change home or worst the company itself?
Today all my teammates have gone out with their valentines and I am alone back home. That’s why I left the office early and came straight back to home. If that evening thing wouldn’t have happened, probably today I would not have been alone. I think the fate doesn’t want us together. Probably so. Ok god, if this is what is intended for me, ok; I accept it, obviously I anyways don’t have any alternative, but still.

Date: 27-Feb
HE:
I was working in the night shift for the whole month so had to travel by cab rather than bus. I used to work from 4.00 p.m. to 2.30 a.m. so naturally I had lost contact with almost all people working in dayshift except for my teammates who would surrender the charge to me while leaving for the day. For the whole month I didn’t travel by bus. Obviously didn’t see her. She works in the adjacent building only, but I don’t know where her cubicle is located exactly and anyways even if I would be knowing that, I don’t think I have that much guts to approach her.
For almost a month I didn’t see her, but I didn’t feel any desperation to see her. I was unbelievably aloof in this case. Was it the effect of that evening incidence?

Date: 28-Feb
HE:
Today, the office had planned to screen a movie in the campus. I had seen it but thought of enjoying it with friends in the open air. I took the permission for an hour from my boss and went for that. The dialogues were not much audible on the lawns, but it was fun to watch the movie in an open air theatre like that. I was to leave the place to return to my cubicle and turned around when I saw her standing there just around 10 feet away from me.
I don’t know why but my heart started speeding a lot higher than even Michael Schumaker’s Ferrari. She just smiled at someone in the crowd at my back, tried her best not to look directly to me and just left the place. I stood there for a minute or two just wondering what had happened.
Why did she smile? Did she feel good that I am still in the same company only or she didn’t even take notice of my presence and really smiled at someone in the crowd at my back? But we were so close that it was practically impossible for her to just ignore me.
SHE:
I saw him today, at the movie screening. Thank god he is still working with this company only. I thought of smiling at him and greeting him. I was so happy to see him, I wanted to ask him where he was for so many days, whether he was not well, had he changed his house or was he using bike for the transport, but again I didn’t ask a single question. I stayed calm. I didn’t want to embarrass him again.
I don’t know what I feel about him, but somehow whenever I see him, I do feel better. I hope he starts travelling by bus again. Everyday we can see each other in the morning and wish each other a very good morning without any words or smile but just with a plain look.

Date: 5-march
HE:
I resumed my normal duty today. It was good to see all those familiar faces once again after so many days. Of course my eyes were searching only one face out of that but still.
Just like my normal schedule, I got into the bus. She was sitting there with the same plain look on her face, nowhere even a single line of recognition, but when she saw me, her face reflected a small smile. It couldn’t escape my notice. Was she happy to see me back in the bus? I don’t know about her, but I was definitely happy to see her.
SHE:
I was so happy, I tried my best to conceal my happiness but I felt like getting up from my seat and just sit beside him and talk, talk and just talk to him. Hey what’s this? What’s happening to me? I never felt like this for anyone. Is this just sympathy for that evening thing or is this love? No chance of it. I don’t believe in this love at first sight or so. We don’t know each other, we don’t know anything about each other, how can this be love? Probably just infatuation… whatever it may be… I am loving this feeling very much.

DATE: 7-March
HE:
Today can be called as the luckiest day of my life. I talked to her face to face for the first time. Rajesh, my friend had some work in Nigdi today and was travelling by our bus and surprisingly he knew her well. They were collegemates during the degree. He introduced us formally. I was so happy, that I just forgot that sometime back she just avoided sitting beside me. Everything in my brain, all my nervousness, and hatred for her as well as for my loser …all was just washed up.
Now I can talk to her, I hope I can turn this chance to success. Oh god, thanks a lot… Rajesh was just like an angel sent by you.

SHE:
Thanks a lottt god…. I am so happy. Even he was. I could easily make that out from his face. It was just so bright. He still has feelings for me. Thank god, I thought after that day I kinda lost him, but no. Now we can talk to each other officially. No problem of who is first … we are friends now. God you are great.

Rajesh:
Today I was travelling with Niru, my projectmate. Even my best friend in college was traveling by the same bus. It was a really pleasant surprise to see her after a couple of years or so. I think my transfer to Pune will result in some good thing. She has become more beautiful than she was in our college days. Damn.. why the hell did I neglect her in college when she had crush on me… I hope she is still single, not even committed or so. I would like simple girl like to get settled in life. Now I am well settled in job, should go forward with love matter also.
When I introduced Niru to her today, somehow her face lit up as if she was eager to have a word or two with him since many days. Niru’s condition was no different. Do they have something between them? I hope there is nothing of such sort. Oh God, thanks a lot that you made me meet her, I hope you help me once again to make her mine. Please just keep Niru out of this.
GOD:
If you get only happiness then you don’t feel its value, do you? That’s why everything is planned in such a way that whenever you get happy you should understand its true value. I haven’t done anything special here. It’s all just happening as predefined.
Date: 10-March
HE:
Since Rajesh has introduced us to each other, the days have been very good for us. I mean I didn’t talk to her or so, but at least we exchange smile regularly. Let’s see whether I can sit beside her sometime and have a word or two.

Date:12-March
HE:
I sat beside her today in the bus while returning from office. We were chatting a lot, on no specific topics as such, but I really enjoyed her company. She is really a cute, simple and sweet girl. She said she will be reserving a seat for me in the morning bus. Let’s see whether she really keeps her promise…

Date:16-March
HE:
Since last few days, she had been reserving a seat for me in the morning as well as in the evening bus. We both seem to enjoy each other’s company very well. I decided to take a step forward today. I asked her for a cup of coffee in the afternoon. I was a bit depressed about what she might reply but surprisingly, she said yes without even thinking for a moment as if she was actually waiting for such a move from my side. We decided to meet at 4 near the café inside the campus.
She didn’t turn up. I don’t have her cell number so I even couldn’t call her and ask why she did so. It was so embarrassing for me to wait there just alone. Did she do it purposefully? Why? I could make out no sensible reason.
If she would be having a meeting or some office work, she should have informed me. She didn’t call me. My extension or even cell number was available with the telephone directory. Did she do it for the only reason that she wanted to show that she doesn’t care for me and prove her importance?
SHE:
Today there happened a real disaster. The servers were down and I was so busy in recovering them, debugging the code that I almost forgot I had my first ‘date’ with Niru. I suddenly remembered it just before going to a meeting at 2 and I was sure that I can easily finish off with the meeting by 4 and meet Niru, but no. The destiny had some other plans. I had to be in meeting till 5. I even couldn’t phone Niru and inform him that I am not coming. When the meeting was over, it was already 6. He must have left for the day. He was going to Mumbai today, so he must have left early.
What can I do? I wanted to meet him and apologize face to face. Mail or phone won’t do. I hope we meet on Monday. I’ll explain him everything. He is a nice guy. He will understand me properly. I am hoping so, obviously I don’t have any other option at least till Monday.

Date:19-March
HE:
I left for the day early today at 6. I had travelled from Mumbai in the morning and so needed rest or was it just to avoid her since she travels by 8 o’clock bus? I don’t know the reason but I felt like just avoiding her.
SHE:
Where is he? He must have come from Mumbai in the morning and joined directly, that’s why he wasn’t in the morning bus, but why not in the usual evening bus at 8? Probably he was tired. Let’s hope he meets me tomorrow morning. He will listen to me and this time I will invite him for a coffee or so.

Date: 21-March
HE:
Yesterday, she explained me the whole thing. How stupid of me? I was thinking really absurd things about her. She is such a cute girl; it was not her mistake that she had to attend the meeting. I was kind of ok when she gave me the explanation. The conversation after that just went normal as it used to be earlier. Whatever that might be I am not going to ask her out anymore.

Date: 22-March
HE:
What the hell… what does she think of herself? Today she invited me for a coffee at 4. I went there on time. I didn’t want to miss it but again she didn’t turn up. Why? Is she just stressing how important she is and how unimportant I am for her? I felt like calling her there only and just ask the reason why is she playing games with me like this. I decided to ask this for full and final what the matter was, but she didn’t turn up even for 8 o’clock bus.

Date:27-March
HE:
I couldn’t see her for last 5 days. Did she come to office? Isn’t she feeling well? I hope she is alright. Oh God, please protect her.

Date: 10-April
Rajesh:
Her father was seriously ill. As a family friend I helped a lot. She couldn’t go to office for a week or so, but I helped her in conveying the matter to her seniors. I think this last week helped me a lot as in building a rapport with her and her parents. Fate has given me a good chance to get closer to her, I will do so.

Date:25-April
SHE:
Today I met Niru finally after so many days. I thought he might be still angry about the coffee thing, but to my surprise, he was a bit tensed as to why I was not coming to the office. I explained him that daddy was seriously ill. He enquired about dad’s health and then simply changed the subject to turn my attention to somewhere else. He was just trying to take me out of the tension about dad’s health. He is such a mature guy, I knew he would understand.

Date: 20-May
SHE:
Niru and I have been going out for a long time now. I have started loving him. I think even he is serious about this relationship but he is younger than me and I don’t think he is ready for any commitment at this stage of his life, but mumma and dad are pursuing me for marriage; what should I do? Should I ask him?

Date: 22-May
SHE:
Niru told me today that he is leaving the company. He has got an admission to MBA in a College in Mumbai. It’s really difficult to be away from him at least for 2 years. Should I ask him for a relationship? Will he be ready for that or he just wants to wait till the completion of his MBA? But I can’t wait that much. I think I’ll better ask him straight about the commitment let’s see what he says.

Date: 23-May
Rajesh:
Today I proposed to her. She didn’t show any expressions as such on face and asked for sometime to think about it, but I know she must have be just too happy for she had crush on me in our college life. I think she will say ‘yes’. Just that I need to confirm that Niru doesn’t come in between. Everything should go smooth otherwise. Even her and my parents would not have any problem in fact they would be happy if she and I get into the most beautiful relationship.

HE:
Today she called me up and asked to meet for a coffee at our usual place, but later suddenly she called up to cancel the meeting. I don’t know why. She sounded stressed a bit on phone so I concluded it to be the result of work pressure. But when I saw her in the evening in the bus today, she was in a bit off-mood. I don’t know why. She then just held my hand. I think she wanted to say something but she was not able to. I couldn’t even understand what she wanted to say but I kept mum. When my stop came nearer, she released my hand. I asked her whether she was alright. She didn’t reply anything else than ‘yes, just fine’.
I tried calling her in the night after dinner, but she didn’t pick up. I think she must be stressed because of the work and must have slept early. I hope nothing is wrong. Oh god, please take care of her.
SHE:
Today was the most dreadful day for me. Rajesh proposed to me. My mood was off. I loved him in college but he didn’t seem to pay any attention to me. At times he literally avoided me. Later somehow I just managed to overcome that feeling. I loved him, but he didn’t. There are no conditions in love afterall. I tried my best to forget feelings about him, at least suppress them. He never seemed to like me. Then why now? Has his feelings really changed ? or he is just playing games with me?
I was going to propose Niru today. It would have been the most crucial moment of my life and this guy, Rajesh just turned off my mood. I was literally shocked to hear from him. Not that I don’t like him but now that a couple of years have passed when we had no contact and even Niru is there in my life. Much water has flown down the bridge. I don’t know whether I still love him, and I also don’t know whether Niru is ready to have a commitment as such with me. I am just confused. Oh god, please help me. Show me some way. Why didn’t you device any automatic system to solve such problems?

GOD:
Automatic system ? Wow!!! All these software engineers think alike. They think just the computerization of every system solves most of the related problems. But real life is not so simple. The real life is much more complex thing to handle. In arithmetic you have 1+1 =2; but in real life you may have 1+1 as anything but 2. That’s life.
About the automatic system to solve the real life problems, I have given you humans one such machine. Some call it heart, some just brain. I gave you the ability to think. You can take decisions based on your prior experience, your conscience and you can very easily use it to make decisions and I am sure even she will find out a way in this ambivalence because even if she does not trust my creations, I do.

Date: 24-May
SHE:
Yesterday after so many days I cried. I cried a lot. I was completely lost in dilemma. I was not able to think properly. What should I do? I loved Rajesh a couple of years ago but he didn’t, at that time. Now he loves me but I love Niru. Rajesh wants to settle down in life and he wants me to be with him. Niru has not planned something of that sort, he is just going to complete his MBA first and then will think of getting settled. Rajesh , he is of my age, very much mature; whereas Niru is younger, a bit of immature but that suits his age. Rajesh, my family knows him very well and will be ready perhaps eager to include him in as my husband; whereas Niru, I haven’t told anything about him to mom or dad yet.
But I love Niru a lot, probably more than I used to love Rajesh in college days. How should I make a decision? Based on feeling for love or based on my future, the practical aspects for my life? Where should I go? Oh god, please help me. I need you immensely. Please please, help me make the decision.

Date: 30-May
HE:
Last few days just flew past like a stormy wind. All those processes I had to undergo in order to leave the company, just because I wanted to pursue better career in MBA rather than staying here and stagnating. A few more days and I am off to achieve my dreams.
Just the problem is, I don’t want to leave her, my love, my secretary. I really love her. Since when my infatuation turned into love was unknown even to me. I don’t want to leave her but I can’t even stay here. Even I am doing MBA in Mumbai not even here in Pune. Will she wait for me for at least 2-3 years which I will need to complete MBA and get settled?
I have said goodbye to everyone, it was not that difficult; but it’s definitely not the same with her. I don’t know whether I will be able to say her goodbye and how I am going to do that.

SHE:
I have made my decision. I don’t know how to convey it but I will have to do it. One of the two hearts is going to get broken but there is no any other way. I have made my decision and I’ll stick to it. Oh god, please give me strength to bear everything.

Date: 6-June
SHE:
Today was Niru’s birthday and also his last day in Pune as well as in this company. He left in the evening for Mumbai. It was really a heartbreaking moment to see him parting, especially when both of us were completely aware that we might not see each other in future. I had made the decision; the only problem was how to convey it to him. I chose to be practical than just blind in love. People give you cool gifts on your birthday but what I gave him was just a shock, a damn big shock. He didn’t say anything except for ‘congrats’ and ‘good luck’ but his face told me everything he wanted to convey. I cried there standing in the whole crowd of his friends who had gathered to wish him luck and goodbye. He couldn’t cry out but if possible, he could just have wept then and there.
I said him sorry that I chose Rajesh over him. What he replied was surprising. He just replied, ‘No need to say sorry. It’s your life, you have complete right to make a decision and you are mature enough to do so and you have made a wise decision. We were friends and will be, but please don’t expect me to keep a contact with you. I loved you and I really loved you from the bottom of my heart. Now whenever I will think of you I will not have anything else than love in my mind and I think same might be the case with you; and that won’t be right especially when u will be a married woman; married to someone else. So this is our last meet. Thanks for the friendship and the feeling of love that you gave me. Best luck for your future life.’ And he just went inside the bus.
Was he so aloof or he just tried to sound so as not to make me feel worse about our parting? I think for all those days that I spent with Niru, I still couldn’t understand him properly. Anyways Niru, what the truth is that I loved you. I loved you like anything but the decision I made was based on practical aspects of life. My decision will prove to be better for both of us and I am damn sure of it. I had started writing diary since when I had seen you for the first time, now since you are not there in my life, I am going to discontinue this practice. This is the last page of my diary. Best luck Niru, for your future. Love you. Bbye.

HE:
This was the worst birthday of my life when I broke up with my love. It can’t be termed as a breakup as such but we parted; we parted forever with a promise not to cross the other’s life anytime in future. I felt like crying; but boys don’t cry, do they? Yes they cry, but secretly….and that’s why I am crying now. The whole page is wet because of my tears. Anyways this is the last page. I have decided not to write this diary anymore. This diary had come into my life with secretary, and since secretary is no more with me, what’s the purpose of this diary? Secretary, just wanted to say best luck for your future. I Love you. Bye.

Rajesh:
Finally, today is that lucky day for me. She said yes. I am so happy. She is mine. Finally my dream has come true. Oh God thanks a lot. You have made my day, in fact my life. Very few people get to live with someone they love; I am one of those lucky ones. My happiness has no bounds. I am very very happy today.
Niru left the company today, I don’t know whether we will be able to meet each other in future. I had gone to say good bye and wish good luck to him. He was talking to her. When I saw her face, I again felt some pain in my heart. Are they both having something? If so, why did she say Yes to me? Are they trying to cover-up something? Or is she playing games with me? Or am I coming as an odd between the two? I could see tears in Niru’s eyes when he left her and got into the bus. Her condition was no different, in fact she literally cried. She seemed to recover after a couple of minutes but the way she was looking somewhere into the vacuum, her face clearly was clearly telling her diligent attempts to control tears. Oh god, please show me the way. I hope I didn’t do anything wrong by proposing her.
The way they both were talking to each other didn’t show any sign of quarrel or fight between them. Then why they separated? Or they shared some feeling for each other and none of them just bothered to express it? Whatever the situation might be, she has said ‘yes’ to me; must be for some reason, whatever ; she is mine now. Niru is her past and she will forget him; in fact she will have to. Whatever the case may be, I love her and that’s it.

GOD:
Ok. Here is the end of this story, not a unique; in fact a very very common one. You might be expecting me to interfere in it at the eleventh hour and change the ending so that either; before the bus starts, She runs to the bus and gets into it and goes with Niru to Mumbai or probably when the bus is about to leave, Niru jumps out and hugs her or Rajesh feels something wrong and just takes her on bike and follows the bus just to stop it and make her get into the bus for Niru and so on? Nopes. This is not a hindi film. This is a real life story and not a reel life one.
She took the decision wisely after evaluating each option she had. She had thought practically in every aspect. Won’t interference by me be just injustice to her thoughts? Won’t it be a betrayal to her trust that the option she chose is the best one? Won’t it be just a wrong deed on my side and that too just to please some others without any particularly sensible reason?
As I said, I have made this world with some predefined rules. The balance of this world totally depends on the events that are happening every now and then. No event is of more or less important than the other. Every moment, situation, event has some sort of purpose and so stands of equal importance. The purpose might not be directly related to you but it can also affect you indirectly. As said before, I had already decided not to intervene and I stuck to my word. Now you will say that it’s me only who decides everything ultimately. Yes. Indeed true but that’s what my point is. I decided her fate to be with Rajesh, that’s it. I hope you understand; in fact I am sure you will … again that’s what your fate says….

THE END

-Regards and Thanks,
Niranjan Khandekar

The Disclaimer

Hi friends,

Thanks for spending your time in reading my story. Thanks for all the feedbacks and encouragement. I had never expected that I will get so much response for the story.

Regarding the characters and the incidents in the story, the characters Niru i.e. myself and the secretary are very much real ones and even the incidents are real. At least from Niru’s point of view, I have depicted them as they have happened. Regarding Secretary’s point of view, I have tried my best to explain the things, although at times I think I had been just too optimistic. The character Rajesh is completely fictional and hence the incidents after his entry in the story are also completely imaginary. I don’t know whether Secretary has read my stories, ‘some diary pages’ as well as the one on my blog. I mean if she works in a secure zone, she might not be having access to it. The whole thing is that, my feelings are still not conveyed.

I have never spoken even a word with secretary although I wish to, at least once before she leaves the company… I would welcome some Rajesh to introduce us, no matter even if at the end he gets along with her, at least I will be able to talk to her.

At the end, it doesn’t matter whether Niru leaves the company or secretary, the end result is just the same that Niru and secretary don’t get along. Just that for me, there would be no one to travel for by the 8.15 p.m. Chinchwad bus …

Thanking you all once again. Sorry if I have hurt anybody unknowingly by my story.

-Niru 

The lucky Friday

2007-05-08T10:07:00.000+05:30

The lucky Friday

                    Curiosity kills the cat – a very old proverb. I never believed it. But some things you never believe till you experience themselves. It was last Friday that taught me the lesson once again.
It happened so that Niru – the hero of this story was working in the night shift that day. It was around 12.30 a.m. when I think he finished his work. He seemed to be relieved from the tension he was bearing since an hour or so. Although the work was over, his shift was going to be till 2.30 that day… It was Friday, since not 13th, it proved to be very much lucky for both of us.

                    Niru soon got bored with the mails. The time was very much wrong to call up someone just for the sake of time pass. I think this poor chap doesn’t even have a girlfriend to call up at any point of time.

                    That’s why he soon started looking for some other ways to pass the time. He started reading a novel. Now it was my turn to get bored. I had no other work to do. There was no one else on the floor. So I started playing my old games. I just switched on a monitor. Again switched it off, picked up a phone and called up to the neighboring extension on and so on. It was really funny to pass time like this with no one getting much curious about the things happening here. Thank god for the full moon’s night that time because of which I was getting more and more fun doing this but soon I was bored even of that. I was also not feeling much sleepy that day so I decided to start playing with the chairs. I was extreme cautious in not making even the smallest sound which would have disturbed Niru… but after all I am not GOD… mistakes were bound to happen…

                    One of the chairs I was swirling round and round suddenly went out of control and bumped on the wall beside it. A big sound… and definitely Niru was disturbed. He rose from his chair, looked at the direction of sound but found no one. He was amazed. He left his book on the table and came towards the chair I was playing with. The chair was still swirling round and round. He was puzzled and decided to inspect what had really happened there and that’s where he made a mistake of his lifetime….

                    It was full moon’s night. I prayed for him to come as near to the chair as possible. The chair could have been the medium for us. He came near to chair and even moon was just about to get behind a cloud when I used all my strength and just pushed him aside which made him to fall down. He looked lot more puzzled than before. I was constantly looking at the moon from the window. This was a golden chance for me. ‘I should make a quick move before he gets up alone just that this moon should come out of the clouds’, I thought.

                    Just duration of around 2 seconds, but it seemed to me like 2 years…When the moon was out from behind the clouds revealing a full cute circle, somehow I felt charged, a new feeling entered me. Niru was still lying there, trying desperately to get up. I think he had a major injury when he fell down. I went to him, hoping that the moon will still be out of the clouds at least for some time to help me out of this situation.

                    “Niru, take my hand and try to get up.”, I said. He looked puzzled. Someone suddenly arising from nowhere and offering help that too by calling you by your pet-name without any prior introduction would definitely scare anyone.

                    “Don’t be afraid. Just take my hand and get up.” Though reluctantly he gave me his hand to get up and Niranjan Khandekar performed probably just last mistake of his life. As soon as he accepted my help, he got up very much smoothly but that was not all. Something very very mysterious happened. I could see myself getting into his body and his soul coming out of it… obviously to make a new entry, there has to be some empty space…

                    Last expressions I could see on his face were that of getting puzzled, being afraid of something unknown but I am sure as soon as he must have understood the transformation, he must have felt definitely better. The same way I had felt around 3-4 months ago when in a very much similar situation, a strange soul had entered my body throwing me out.

                    It had felt bad, even worse at times to see your own body in someone else’s control. There were lots of people around me but none of them was able to communicate with me. It was worst especially when I could see my body with me outta it behaving very much like me. Being such a roaming soul without his own personal body and that too when the time for death for the body hadn’t yet arrived. It was boring at times because of the loneliness, but still I enjoyed it quite a lot. For temporary reasons I had achieved freedom from the boring works of coding, debugging and so on, but after all I was a soul of a software engineer and at times felt a real urge to do some programming work… but that was not possible at all.

                    Soon I had realized that in a full moon’s night especially when the moon is not covered by the clouds, I gain some powers, though temporarily, I can touch things, I can interact with them, I can take any form, I can talk to people. I tried to do so earlier, but the guys around me just fled away thinking of the tiredness making them to face the hallucinations.
Sooner I started roaming around the new buildings nearby. There were lots of friends there. Although all souls looked similar, some were completely different in appearance. These ones had some divine powers. One of such divine ones taught me the art of getting into a new body. Just the condition was that the body in which my so-called re-incarnation was to happen should have come forward to take my help in some case where in return I was allowed to take up that body.

                    God bless the brave guy Niru. He rescued me. I am happy. Now I have got a new body. I liked it. Of course I don’t have much other option now because when I entered this body somehow I just forgot the technique of making my soul free or exchanging from one body to the other. Whatever that might be… but now I have started loving this body. I was a bit tensed that how I was going cope-up with daily life of Niru, because I was not at all aware of his personal life but his brain helped me a lot. No one has yet even thought of the soul getting changed.

                    I am sure Niru can see me… I mean his real soul. He must be happy though that now he is completely free of the boring things of this mortal world. He will enjoy it for some days. As soon as he gets to know about the divine souls, he also will get the technique of re-incarnating into another body and will be back with some other body. After all it’s just a matter of a few weeks probably.

                    Really the Friday was very much lucky. I got a new body and Niru became free temporarily though from the cruel mortal world. He will soon find a new body and start his life once again. Really it’s rightly said… whatever happens… it happens for your good only.

SECRETARY IN MY OFFICE BUS

2007-05-08T10:05:00.000+05:30

SECRETARY IN MY OFFICE BUS

                    “Diya, I love you. I love you like anything. I love you from the bottom of my heart. Whatever I do I do for you. Look into my eyes and tell me, do you love me? Diya, tell me do you love me???” some typical dialogues from a Hindi movie and she definitely gonna get impressed… One or two more sentences and then she is mine… I look towards her face. Her eyes now filled with tears. Diya Mirza finally saying Yes to me…She wants to say something but somehow she is fumbling for words. Finally her lips open up to speak the best words I have ever heard in my life till today… her lips open just to say… “It’s time to wake up… the time is 6.40…”

                    Damn! Once again… This was the bullshit talking alarm of my cell… I don’t know why these cell companies can’t hire women who have a bearable voice... ok I am not demanding the wakeup voice to belong to Asha bhosle or Lata Mangeshkar (if it is so, everyone gonna keep listening to it and no one will ever wake up…) but at least a voice which is at least of kind of bearable??? But no... I think these people are just confident about “Laaton ke bhoot baton se nahi maante….” And since they can’t give us the kicks, they take revenge by hiring women with the worst voices ever for recording the alarm sound. The whole thing is that this is the way my so-called ‘good (!) morning’ starts…

                    Soon after performing some really WWF stunts to get into the bathroom and toilet each of us - me and my five roomies somehow manage to complete all the morning chores in time and set for the office ( how we manage to complete everything on time is still a puzzle and can be a subject of someone’s PHD…). We all are Software Engineers (Please don’t make any faces.. we people are not sooo bad… life is ok lets say at times quite a lot good for a software engineer like me…) and yaa… we work for a highly reputed IT company.

                    Aha... now this is the real start of our day. Walking a couple of yards , then waiting for the bus (which is always late when we are on time and vice versa), reaching office by that bus which was I think bought during the pre-independence times and now each and every part of the bus just does the work of relieving the horn. Ya ya I know not much adventurous or exciting journey as expected, right? But this was just the background. The main reason for this travel to be bearable is Secretary….. Puzzled huh? Let me explain….

                    I still remember that day…I had just shifted from our company provided accommodation to this house after finally (only those bachelor guys who spent hours in searching for a good rental house and have experienced the societies saying they want only gals or families… will know the significance of this word) getting a rental house. It was my first day in the office… as I got into the bus, a sweet girl was sitting there on first seat talking to her friend and smiling in between. Her specs were just an addition to her beauty. First cute girl I saw in Pune living near my area, working in my company and that too traveling by same bus as mine and most importantly her face uncovered… yes... these Pune girls … they cover their faces like the robbers just set to rob a national treasure. So the point is that her face was fully visible. She was not a miss universe kind of girl but was fairly cute and sweet to stare at. Good... so at least we don’t need to search for some other time-pass for spending the travel time every morning and evening.

                    As expected there was no seat available that can be said ‘near’ to her. I think she was the only angelic kind of girl there in case of looks and so I think everyone was looking at her only. I also joined the community of stare-rs. I didn’t know her name and even her ID-card was hidden beneath her dupatta so it was not possible for me to catch even a glimpse of it to get her name. This was a serious problem and had to be dealt with urgently. So in the evening when we got back from the office, we- me and 2 of my roomies who travel to phase-2 called for an emergency meeting. The main agenda was to get her name. The very next day the three agents were trying their best to catch a glimpse of her name on her ID-card. I was very much sure about the capability of all of us and was damn sure that I gonna have her name with me by the end of the day…

                    But my luck was not so easy on me. This angel was even smarter than all of my agents. Somehow she just managed to hide her Id from all of us. Even Yogendra – the most experienced person in case of love who has got a good experience of 2 years in love and is a champion in helping the people in need, couldn’t get the name. He was more frustrated than me because of the failure. I still kept cool ‘cause this was not the first time for me. Till today I have met with dozens of such so-called angels and have got nothing except a sarcastic smile. So I was a bit cool but it seems my friends were more enthusiastic than me in getting her name for me. Since everyone was committed honestly to his own girlfriend I was sure that they were doing this just for the sake of their friend. Then Sanjay a newcomer in case of love, committed happily to his girlfriend came out with a brilliant idea. “Ok Niru (That’s my nick name… all my friends think my actual name –Niranjan is too long to call by so they gave me this nick-name.) Now it’s our duty to get her name for you, but even if you get her name then in case we want to talk about her we won’t be able to do it man. So, the current solution is to give her a pseudo-name.” Yes. Sanjay is a genius. The idea was definitely a good one. If we get a name like this for her she is not going to understand anything even if we talk about her on her face. So now the current mission was to get a perfect pseudo-name. Now only two brains were available here. Not that Yogendra lacks one but now he was busy in fighting with his girlfriend on phone and from experience we were quite sure that this gonna continue at least for 3 more hours.

                    “What about Secretary???”, Sanjay again. “Whaat??? Secretary?? What makes you to get that name for my cute, sweet angel??”, I screamed, but Sanjay was adamant. Once he decides something to do he carries that out whatever might be the case. Even he had a mouthful of explanations for the same. “See, she is pretty and just think if you are chairman of a company and you have a secretary and this is her, then will you ever bunk office?” “No way!!!”, I thought. Actually the name was not that good … my angel and that too a secretary? No chance of it. She can be a PM or CEO but a secretary?” “Ok. Then you give me a better name”, said Sanjay. I thought hard but somehow no name struck my mind. “After-all Secretary is not a bad name” I said. “Not bad??? It is the best name.” So finally the name was finalized. It was Yogendra who found out her real name 2 days later and in return took a Cadbury temptation from me. But we continued using the secret name only.

                    Actually this would have been a perfect start for romantic and adventurous love story. One day I dared and went ahead to talk to her. Later we became quite a lot good and then very close friends. She started reserving seat for me just besides her in the bus. We started calling each other before leaving the office. Even we didn’t realize how our friendship slowly changed into love. Now she is my girlfriend. Yes… We are happily committed to each other and this was my short cute love story.

                    No. The last paragraph was bullshit. Yogendra gave me the real name. But what next ? I am not that kind of a person to go to a girl you like, introduce yourself and start talking to her. So the result is that I am still waiting for a person who knows both of us and introduces us to each other. Till today, me, Yogendra and Sanjay have been commenting about her, regarding her dress, her style and all, but amongst us. These two have also been teasing me for sometime now. But I have not yet dared to talk to her personally. It has been around 5 months now that I saw her for the first time, but till today neither she gave me a smile when I looked at her nor I did. Everyday when I get into bus my eyes unknowingly just search for her. I look at her, at times even she looks back at me but we don’t exchange even a smile. Then I look for an empty seat nearer to her but never next to her. The journey to and from the office begins and also ends like this everyday. Nothing has changed since the day I saw her for the first time. Everything is just same. The only thing changed that in the morning nowadays is secretary has replaced Diya Mirza. All other things continue along with the pathetic alarm voice “It’s time to wake-up……” ….

GOOD FRIDAY

2007-05-08T09:54:00.000+05:30

GOOD FRIDAY

                    “Niru, Call for you…”, this was Rahul. Truly speaking, I don’t like such interruptions when I am busy in some really important work and especially when I was chatting on messenger with my special friend regarding the Valentine’s day celebrations…but my experience says this is the time my PM calls me to discuss something about the project. So anyways I got to the phone a bit reluctantly. “Ya, Niranjan here”, “Hey Niru, What about a movie today?”. Damn…. This was Sanket, my roomie. He was interrupting me in some of my very very important works. But anyways, you have to suffer sometimes (almost always in my case) because of your friends.

                    “Which movie maan? This Fame Akurdi is showing just 3 films. I had enquired yesterday. They are showing GURU, Salaam-e-Ishq and Black Friday. I have seen the first two. So me coming only if you people going for Black Friday”. “Obviously yaar. We also have seen the other two. So we are going tonight for the 10.15 p.m. show. Done”. “Done”, I said and literally slammed the phone down. I actually didn’t like the idea to spend the 3 hours of my snoring time in watching some art film based on the Mumbai ’93 blasts rather than having some cool imaginary dreams and on the top of that discussing the plan about it leaving my chatting window unattended for whole 5 minutes. Till then she had gone offline. I cursed Sanket like anything and started for some other person available for chat.

                    It was around 9.35 p.m. when we reached the Chapekar chowk. This is the place where we could get a rickshaw to the theatre. There were 3 of us, me , Paras and Sanket. I have observed one thing always; when we have to go to Chinchwad Station, the rikshawwallas are ready to go to the theatre and when we want to go to theatre they want to go to the station. After waiting for a whole of 5 minutes there were 2 more people and a rickshaw Walla ready to go to Fame. I really don’t know how much powerful the engine of that rickshaw was but it was simply able to reach Fame with a total 7 big and heavy masses each weighing around a century. It was Thursday so the crowd was very much less. We got the tickets easily and I think we were the first ones to reach the hall and occupy the seats.

                    Watching the ads in this theatre is also a good experience. Cool ads, cool models, and cool jingles attached to these ads. And then there was the National Anthem. The theatre has to show this before each and every movie. We like it. This anthem clip consists of all super people including Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosle, Pt. Bhimsen Joshi and even A.R.Reheman. The anthem was over and now just a few moments for the actual movie to start when a large group of around 15-20 people entered the hall. They were all in white clothes and talking to each other in loud voices and at the same time, occupying the seats arbitrarily.

                    Truly speaking we didn’t like their arrival. They seemed to belong to some political party and such a group arriving for a sensitive movie like Black Friday was definitely not a welcoming thing. But anyways we didn’t have any choice so we just ignored them, the only thing the so-called white collar people would do in such a situation.

                    The movie started soon and the dialogues, music and the cinematography just made us to get so much involved in the movie that when a person yelled to the top of his voice with a bad word, first of all we thought the Police officer in the movie is yelling at the convicts. This guy had just entered the hall and bad words were coming out of his mouth just like water from some leaky tap. He again was in white shirt and we simply assumed him to be belonging to the same previous group. Again we ignored him and started watching the movie again. But this guy was not much cool like his friends as we thought. He was continuously passing some comments about the dialogues in the movie. Cursing a particular community and also yelling at their symbol of worship.

                    Everyone was getting disturbed, not because the dialogues of the movie were not audible because of this moron’s unnecessary comments but he was unnecessarily commenting on them, their lord, which would have been really hurting if anyone of them would be present there. But again we the so-called white collar people were just quiet hoping that he will shut his mouth sometime later. But he didn’t. The comments’ frequency went on increasing and that too each time using more and more cheap comments. We didn’t do anything. We now had just mastered the art of filtering out those unwanted comments and listening just to the movie.

                    There was the height of his nuisance when he started yelling at the community’s lord. He didn’t stop for around 4 minutes and the language he used was just getting worse as the seconds went by and finally a guy spoke up, “hey you please shut your mouth. And behave yourself.” “Who was that telling me to shut my mouth? Come here and try it yourself” and then there went a long Rajdhani Express of some of really worst words almost all of them were completely new to us. The brave guy who dared to speak up rose and started walking to that nuisance when one of his friends just said in a voice clear to everyone in theatre, “Wait till the interval. Just watch the movie now. We’ll tackle this later.” The guy again sat down and started watching the movie.

                    We thought this was just a threat to the nuisance guy and were sure that nothing gonna happen next, just that we will have to curse our luck that our timing for viewing the movie was bad. Soon there was the interval and we were about to move to the snacks counter to get some refreshments when we noticed the white-clothed group was moving towards the nuisance. We didn’t anticipate anything and neither he that he was sitting on his seat comfortably without bothering anything. There were 2 friends of the nuisance accompanying him there and now they were getting alerted that the whole group of 10-15 people was standing surrounding them. One guy I think the brave one went ahead and gave him simply one tight slap… I think they slap definitely softer in those saans-bahu serials since the sound of that slap was so powerful that even the maintenance persons in the theatre left work and run to the group. Then there were some questions asked to the nuisance, the questions which had no purpose and also were not intended to have any answer. People were asking him why he was delivering such bad words and why he was disturbing the others and before he could even open his mouth he would have got minimum a couple of slaps and before he could recover from that some more questions were ready with even more slaps.

                    It was around 3 minutes and around 15-20 slaps that he somehow managed to apologize and leave the hall. He straight away went to the toilet to wash his face. I think till then the whole effect of the liquor he had consumed had completely disappeared. He was there with eyes filled with tears trying to wash his face, when someone again asked, “Why the hell were you making such comments? Are you out of your mind?” “Sorry sir. I said sorry already. I am really sorry.” And this was the last time he spoke anything. The brave guys’ group was now in the toilet and now they were asking him the questions in their own style. He was now completely strengthless and was now just trying to escape from them. But people were not allowing him to let him go so easily. They were beating him just like anything. It was this group that threw him out of the theatre and then only came back to the cinema hall to watch the remaining part of the movie.

                    It was a completely memorable experience. We really liked this. Although the nuisance was punished more than he deserved, but when such sensitive matters like religious beliefs are being attacked by the people, not all of them consider them just to be the words to be ignored. Some might take it harsh and since we have a very long tradition of taking A’s revenge from B, this can result in a total chaos. There are always some people in the society who have some prejudices about the things happening around them. They view each event from that point of reference and they also try to convince the others about their views. Generally the youth is very much susceptible in such matters. If the anti-socials are able to captivate the youth’s brains then it’s really difficult to take them out of it. Especially while the movie had some really disturbing scenes and dialogues and really it meant for mature audiences only, people forgot to make sure that the maturity is not merely dependent upon the age but the mental capacity of the person. If a grown-up like the nuisance can behave in such a completely irresponsible manner then the criterion for viewing the movie should be changed from 18 and above to above normal maturity level.

                    I just wanted to congratulate all those people who showed the daring to throw that nuisance out of the theatre. I am not commenting whether India is awaking or my thinking power is not that much but whatever happened there was indeed good and showed a good sign of youth coming out against the wrong things. It’s usually normal practice for people to ignore things till they don’t become a big nuisance and physically hurt you and till then the things are turned worse at times worst as they are almost beyond correction. Timely control of these things is of utmost importance and that’s why I would like to congratulate all those who made the later part of the movie really better in the absence of those moronic comments. Really the Black Friday showed us a Good Friday.