Category: senti

He looked a lot like her. He was her dad. I shouldn’t say he looked like her. I should say she looked like her dad. I wondered when I had last seen LOLy. In May this year. And I wonder if I would get to see her again any time this year.

Uncle was in Bhubaneswar for delivering some seminar. Before we met in his hotel room day before yesterday, we had only heard about each other. And yet when we met, it never felt like it was the first time. At least, not to me. May be because I saw LOLy in him. We raised our glasses of Signature to each other and as we took the first sips, I felt I was back with LOLy.

We talked about lot of things. Chetan Bhagat. IIT. My work. His work. LOLy. Gujarat. Orissa. Ports. Ships. For a long time uncle had served as a captain in various ships. I asked him about his worst experience in sea so far.

‘I usually don’t talk about this to anyone but I would answer you. We were on this ship – your aunty and me. LOLy wasn’t born then. But we had an elder son. He was a li’l over two years old. And then he fell down from five stories and died. The next shore was nine days away and we didn’t have the heart to do a sea-burial. So we spent nine days on the ship with our dead child. This has been the worst experience in sea so far’.

My daadi had once told me that she had a son elder to dad. She lost him when he was still a kid. I had not known how to react then. I had always thought my dad had been the eldest and suddenly I was being told that he had an elder brother who had died even before dad was born. I had always though LOLy was the eldest and suddenly I was being told that she had an elder brother who had died even before she was born.

Suddenly my biggest loss so far looked so puny in front of such grave losses that I felt God has been to0 good to me so far. Life. Such a weird phenomena. Live on!

I called up many people yesterday. Yesterday was Diwali. I called up many people yesterday and wished them happy Diwali.

Ever since I joined IIT, I never spent Diwali at home. And I never really cared. There were guys around in insti all the time and there were things happening all around all the time and so I never cared if I was not in home. The soc-secs of any year always turned up at your door and offered you sweets that had been bought from the budget approved in the last GBM. And if you happened to know the soc-sec well, you could get more sweets than officially allowed per room. Moja was the soc-sec in my first year in Sarayu. Country was the soc-sec in my second year in Narmad. Anshuman was the soc-sec in the year later and though I don’t remember how many sweets I had when Anshuman was the soc-sec, I am sure I had as many as I could. Anshuman was my best friend. Even when there was no Diwali, he almost always had besan ke laddoos from Gwalior with him and only he knows how fucking crazy I was for those laddoos. I still am. Just that, there is no Anshuman around any more. So far, in life, I haven’t tasted any sweet that has tasted better than those laddoos. But I am digressing. Let me talk about the soc-secs. In my fourth year, Orchi was the soc-sec. Anshuman and I had nicked (awarded him a nick-name) him orchestra when he was a freshie because he had told us he could sing and he could play tabla and he could also play synthesizer. Once again, I don’t remember how many sweets I had but I am sure I was allowed to have as many as I wanted to. The same applied in my last year in IIT when Gali was the soc-sec.

By a crazy turn of events, I happened to be with mom and dad during last year’s Diwali. We spent Diwali in Kolkata at dad’s best friend’s place – Tiwari uncle’s place. I have fond memories of Tiwari uncle. When I was small, every time he visited us, he got Gems for me. Every single time. Even today, whenever I see Gems, I think of Tiwari uncle. And I think of his green colour Maruti 800. Today I have a best friend called Tiwari too. He works in Chennai. I wonder if he will get Gems for my child (whenever I adopt one) every time he visits the child. Heh – funny thought. Oh yes, I shall adopt a child some day when I am responsible enough. She would be a girl and I already have a name for her. But then, I am digressing once more.

So yesterday, after a long long time, I was with no one who mattered. And it hurt. There were no soc-secs to offer sweets and there was no family that could feel good about my presence amidst them. So I called up everyone I could think of. I called up my siblings in Mumbai – Subbu and Sweety. My name is Polu by the way. Subbu told me he had brought home a nariyal ka ped to celebrate Diwali and I laughed like nuts. I thought he had gone crazy. Sweety told me she was planning to move to Hyderabad because she would get a job faster there because freshers don’t get jobs in Mumbai. Sometimes, I don’t understand her. Then I called up Taploo. He is my cousin and he works in Bangalore. He told me he was planning to come to Bhubaneswar and see me some time. I told him I was waiting for him. Then I called up Babes. He works in Mumbai but he was at home – in Bilaspur. I called up Anshuman then. He works in Mumbai too and he was at home too -  in Gwalior. I realized I was calling him up for the first time after he got married. The last time I had called him up, I was in Gwalior myself. I had arrived there driving Neelabh’s bullet all the way from Delhi and I needed to find his house. This was in January this year. He got married two days later and I never called him after that. Until yesterday. Then I called up Tiwari. The fucker was sleeping in the evening. He was in Bangalore – at a friend’s place. Then I called up Pandey who said he was getting married in December in Udaypur and wanted me to attend it. I told him I would try. Pandey was a wing-mate in IIT. My wing is getting married at fast rate. Then I called up Leela and she was with her local guardians and she told me she had recently cracked some super cool score in TOEFL and I felt proud of her but didn’t tell her so. I only told her she was a loser. This is all I tell her every time we talk and I guess we both like it that way. Then I called up LOLy. She was in Chennai. Finally I found someone who was alone – like me. But she was getting ready to go out somewhere to have fun and so she wasn’t going to be alone any more and I felt good about her but bad about myself and we said bye-bye to each other. Then I called up Bullu Uncle and then Mintoo Chacha. It’s weird why I call some of my uncles uncle but some chacha. It has been like that ever since I was a kid. Bullu Uncle lives in Thane while Mintoo Chacha lives in Bangalore. I tried calling Ravi Uncle next. He lives in Hyderabad. Someone on the other side of the phone kept asking me ‘Raviaa, Raviaa, Raviaa’? May be, his number has changed. I couldn’t speak to him. Mom had already called up in the morning (and so had Neelabh btw). She didn’t like the fact that I was not at home for Diwali. I reminded her that I hadn’t been at home for Diwali since the last seven years! I called up mom again in the evening and told her I was unable to reach my grand-parents in Patna. She told me, it was the same when she tried calling them. So I did not get to speak to my grand-parents. The other people I could not reach on phone yesterday were Radha in Hyd, Richa in Mumbai and Prasun in Mumbai. And then I called up Miss Short-story. For a change, she was not busy. She is my only friend in Bhubaneswar. Both her college and home are in Bhubaneswar. She lives in her college hostel but yesterday she was at home. She narrated me stories from the last few days of her life. On one of these days, she was playing Sita maiyya in a village in Orissa, trying to do some marketing for a cell-phone service provider.

I didn’t burst any cracker yesterday. Instead I started reading a book called The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. I finished reading it today. If you have liked To Kill a Mocking Bird, you would most probably like this book. And now I would finish reading Phantoms in the Brain. And then I would clean up my bike because I haven’t touched it ever since I returned from Leh. And then I would sit down to wonder if for the rest of my life, I am going to keep reading books (alone), keep running (alone) and keep traveling (alone).

PS: my para-gliding video is up

कभी कभी मेरे दिल मैं ख्याल आता हैं
कि ज़िंदगी तेरी जुल्फों कि नर्म छांव मैं गुजरने पाती
तो शादाब हो भी सकती थी।

यह रंज-ओ-ग़म कि सियाही जो दिल पे छाई हैं
तेरी नज़र कि शुओं मैं खो भी सकती थी।

मगर यह हो न सका और अब ये आलम हैं
कि तू नहीं, तेरा ग़म तेरी जुस्तजू भी नहीं।

गुज़र रही हैं कुछ इस तरह ज़िंदगी जैसे,
इससे किसी के सहारे कि आरझु भी नहीं.

न कोई राह, न मंजिल, न रौशनी का सुराग
भटक रहीं है अंधेरों मैं ज़िंदगी मेरी.

इन्ही अंधेरों मैं रह जाऊँगा कभी खो कर
मैं जानता हूँ मेरी हम-नफस, मगर यूंही

कभी कभी मेरे दिल मैं ख्याल आता है.

The following is what i wrote on this date, last year and every word of it holds true even today.

I wonder what kind of people read posts which carry such titles!

I won’t write anything more about any of these than what is already known. But today, if you ask me, I will tell you that they are like the three legs of a tripod. What is a friendship that lacks love? And what is a life that lacks friendship?

Today is a special day. And I dedicate it to my best friend who knows who he is. I don’t know, nor do I care when the rest of the world celebrates friendship day. For me, it’s today. Happy friendship day to me.

I recently discussed how I have many best friends but no one best friend. But this one friendship referred to in the the lines above will always remain special to me. No, I am not going to talk about the reasons. Sorry.

I never knew that the Beasant Nagar beach could look like Marina Beach ever. It had everything to do with the fact that 1st of May is the Labour’s day. The beach was so fucking full of so many people day before yesterday when the waves were behaving erratically and the beach smelled of hot and spicy corn.

People. Human beings. I have learnt so many things about them. A funny thing when you think about everyone else is that you treat yourself as someone who is so separate from those who you are thinking about. And yet, you think. I think.

I have no idea when will I see them again: all these guys and girls going home, now that the semester is over. I am not coming back. I am done. Five years. Some faces will take a long time to fade. Some faces will probably never fade.

This is not a post about all the people who I got to know in these five years. This post is about them who changed everything.

My best friend

Who was he? Or probably who was she? After five years I have no idea. A best friend is a word that sounds so much like the pseudo-name of that one person who is the next best thing that happened to you apart from your family. And yet, at times, there is no one person worth this pseudo-name. After five years, all I can say is that the term best-friend is such a myth. There is no one best-friend. There are friends. And that’s all there is to it. Or so it applies in my case.

I do remember having just one best-friend, but always for certain time-intervals. Like this guy, whose door I had opened even before he had occupied his room in my first hostel in IIT. Or like this girl who would later fall for this guy. Or this guy who had made me eat food when I had decided to die out of starvation after going almost empty stomach for almost a week.

After a point I stopped making friends. They just happened. People who liked you and saw good things in you. People you liked. They become friends. Most stay. Some drift. Who is the best?

After five years, all I can say is that the term best-friend is such a myth. There is no one best-friend. There are friends.

My girl-friends

Wish I could talk about every girl who came to my life in whatever way. Average looking girls you had a crush on but you couldn’t even propose to. Girls who looked so beautiful, you couldn’t even have a crush on them. Girls you never had a crush on, and yet you proposed to. Girls who turned you on. Girls who let you hold your their hands as you walked with them on lonely nights discussing stars. Girls you had coffee with. Girls you could never have coffee with. Girls who hit on you. Girls you wanted to run away from. Girls you wanted to run to. Girls who you never looked at, as girls. Girls you drank with. Girls who worked with you. Girls you wished could work with you. Girls who asked you to kiss them. Girls who you kissed.

But yes. I have been in every kind of relationship a man can probably have with a woman.

…………………………………………….

I know myself better now. I know how others look at me, better now. I know others better now. And yet, all said and done, how little do I know about myself, others and the way they look at me. Five years! I have seen a lot. I have learnt a lot. But the best part is, I am so sure there is so much more to be seen and so much more to be learnt. I am so happy I am still alive.