My Outlandish Dream!

What is life without an outlandish dream!
Here’s the most materialistic and frenzied one of mine*yaaa...one of those days when I would wish this comes true apart from all the other days when I would shudder n pray that it would not*:

I am the Princess of a big palace of infinite wishes*I can’t do with one unit of anything in life. Yup...I am born this way...so sue me!*

Let me rise from my velvet based n laced, ancient Victorian bed to take you around:
My maid-in-waiting has kept a bowl full of milk soaked rose petals for my feet to dip in, as soon as I decide to get off my feather soft bed! I raise my arms in a sort of angdai like the Hindi film actresses, which exuberates more of nakhra of fragile bones than actual unknotting of the sleepy ones!
Passing the costing-a-bomb ottoman and custom made limited edition oriental upholstery, in an ambience straight out of a chic interior decoration magazine, I move towards my bathing arena that spreads over one floor of my huge house*huge as in I often need a car to be driven around on each floor*.



‘The Bathing Ghats’ is a big, round, colourful pebble-edged pool, dipped in milk again with flower extracts for the whole of me this time.
I throw off my robe and languish in the soft feel while five women watch me in waiting *Err...watching me is not such a good idea. I’ll tell them and you to wait outside and would clap for you when needed! So shoo!*
I then stand under the waterfall of sparkling clean water, created between mounds of man-made mountains and feel all my pores open to life! The other rituals of cleaning my teeth n emitting out last night’s edible treat off my entrails or rather the butt are equally grand, but I would spare you the gory details.

I then go through my walk-in-wardrobe on the next floor, where all the clothes on the line, from Gucci to Channel and DKNY to Burberry, move past me at the behest of a remote control...with accessories matched to precision. Did I tell you about the complete bags range that Louis Vitton made exclusively for me?
I press*the remote of course* to pick out what I like!
Adorned like a million bucks, I step out into the other chambers of my castle.



Okay, the first section*let’s get over with the scandalising bit first* is my very own cute harem. I know it sounds gross, but please, please let me have it...it is only in a dream anyways and it has been my dream like forever! I have here at the press of button...anyone and everyone who would appear before my eyes for my pleasure*visual and other senses inclusive*! There are Hugh Grant, Mathew Maccoughany*whatever is his spelling now*, Ashton Kutcher, Keanu Reeves, Johnny Depp, young Robert Redford and also Ranbir Kapoor, John Abrahim, Abhishek Bachchan, Rahul Gandhi, Zaheer Khan, Roger Frederer, etc, etc...Just to add some variety and thereby spice to my life! Needless to say all of them love me as though their life depended on it!

There is of course another button whereby Enrique Iglesias, Justin Timberlake, Ronan Keating, George Michael, Mohit Chauhan, Atif Aslam and the likes rise and come out to perform*strictly musically...unless specified otherwise by me*!

After my physical pleasures are met...I move on to the physical healing!
I go into my rejuvenating spa cubical which has magical n mysterious connotations!
Here there is one room in which my wrinkles*which would come anyways only after about 15-20 years...or maybe 30-40...acha zyaada ho gaya...20-30 years* are ironed out with my blink...
Another in which I get a *more* sparkling and smooth skin...
A third which would burn all my fat*yes, ALL of it...yiyee yiyee yiyee...look what you make me do The Weirdo Guy* in seconds by merely lying down with eyes closed for five minutes and many more of the likes!



So I become 36-24-36 and emerge!
*Alright...if wishes are coming true then why not imagine 38-22-34 here!
Butt long, cascading soft hair, 5 feet 10 inches height with toned loooooooooooong legs...
Milk white n satin soft skin, almond shaped blue eyes...perfect Angelina Jolie pout...ass to die for n rack to kill for...okay, okay...even in a dream there is a control button...so I would stop at JUST these!*

I then move on to my food section. Here there are exotic delicacies from round the world*do chocolates n chowmein, McDonald’s burger n KFC, get added in the ‘exotic’ list? Don’t bother to answer...they now do!*
About a thousand options*yes, ones which don’t even look like food or could be pronounced by the tongue* can be gulped n savoured n ‘mmmmm-ed’ with zero calories added, no matter how much butter n ghee went in their making*that should make you happy The Bald Guy*



What’s next?
There are rooms where you enter and they serve as a direct link to the place you want to go to within again a blink of an eye*I love that expression...I blink my eyelids innocently and get away often with as wondrous of things*!
Okay, Europe mein backpacking...Thailand mein scuba diving...just a door away!
So if I enter the Switzerland room...no prizes for guessing, I am now in my pure fur*sorry PETA* outfit sliding down the Swiss Alps in my Cheopard sunshades!*living in a material world and I am a material girl...you know it baby*
And then I may have entered the Australian reef beaches...would you care to rub some sun tan lotion on my back?




Another room full of books...a separate room full of music...a floor each for all my relatives on the planet*of course only those whom I can bear*...a personal home-theatre*not a music system with big speakers, like my dad fooled me with, but a proper 70mm screen room*...a floor full of cars that cost a country each...my own helipad *with helicopters naturally...duh-huh?*
A floor for my own designer, chef, beautician, photographer*yup, I’d still be fixated on clicking pictures*
Ooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhh!
Now, now...the rest I would leave for your imagination!
After all you do have a fair idea by all that’s related so far!

I know this has been the most madcap, preposterous, barmy, ludicrous, bonkers, farcical*okay the thesaurus has run out of synonyms now* ride!
This is my very own wish-cube cum magic box cum timeless zone cum material bliss all rolled into one!
Too bad Mr. Mukesh Ambani stole my idea n luck to realize even a bit of it!
Phew!



Awwwww....time to get up...wash my not so perfect face...clean my not so luscious body...do up my not so lavish room...love my not so dishy*yet awesome*husband...spend my not so full purse...please my not so flattering little list of fans...

And live my almost perfect, no-complaints life!
After all dream a little dream away!

*Mush*Letter Writing!

Did you know Jawaharlal Nehru was having a torrid affair with Lady Mountbatten, the wife to the last Viceroy of British India...and Lord Mountbatten had full knowledge of it?

And also that over a period of many years, Nehru wrote a letter everyday to his lady...a suitcase filled with which was discovered eventually from her possessions!

A letter EVERY day!
My god, that is HUGE!

Imagine the sense of the feeling of holding a sheet of paper in the hand with scribbles of someone you love, the handwriting baring a familiarity and also perhaps a not-so-moist now imprint of lips that would have touched it before sealing it in the envelope...

Mails then don’t just remain sheets of papers and envelops!
Mails then contain a beating heart! The feelings and emotions of those sending it as well as those waiting with bated breath to receive it!

How I miss receiving letters delivered by the postman*other than receipts, e-notifications n reminders now*!
Thankfully, my generation still has an inkling of how it felt.

While I was growing up, I was extremely fond of purchasing cards and sending them to people, even those whom I only remotely knew, on their birthdays and anniversaries and even on New Year’s, etc.
I would write long mails to my cousins and friends who parted ways after leaving school and went to hostels.
*Sadly those tendencies still continue...I can’t write ANYTHING short!*
I still have a stack full of mails from those times, neatly and chronologically piled! When I read them...there’s a great sense of nostalgia!

I guess my writing skills were honed from the fact that I regularly would pour out all that was happening with me in these mails!
The anticipation of checking the mail box every day also reminds me of the foolish game of watching those little black birds, teeming in the surroundings and us chanting:
1 for sorrow
2 for joy
3 for letter
4 for toy/boy*depending upon the age I guess*
5 for silver
6 for gold
7 for a secret never to be told!
And you were supposed to give flying kisses to these birds while counting them to make the rule come true! Although all of us pined to spot the adventure-dipped 7...sighting any number except 1*which was mercilessly cursed*, was enough to satiate the simple hearts!

Needless to say, when I would espy 3 birds, my urge to reach home from school would become more intense, as I would be kissing weirdly through the bus window at them*thankfully the pouts were never misconstrued by those who watched this ritual being performed by every other girl moving past in school buses*

*Psst...Let me also share here how we screwed up this poor rhyme one notorious day:
1 for a hug
2 for a kiss
3 for a boyfriend, never to be missed!
4 for a love bite
5 for a sad fight
6 for flirting with few
7 for smooches just for you!
Oh yeah...we were a completely focussed bunch of teenagers!*

Coming back,
Yes, letter writing was an art...
The frustration when you would write one word wrong, spoiling the beautiful alignment of all the others...often motivated me to crumble the entire sheet into the bin and begin all over again!
The keenness of viewing your name on the envelope and following it with the guess game of who could it be from!
Writing neatly and painstakingly every word, for the reader to feel you, while he read what you wrote!
And if the envelope was scented or heavier than usual...the lub-dub of the heart beat reaching the levels of Mt. Everest!

Being impressed by the handwriting, the lucid flow, a cartoon here and there, a smiley face, the signature...it all bore immense significance, which perhaps the generations after us would not be able to experience!
You may have computer memory full of chats saved...but no paper that you just randomly pick up from the shelf and hold it close to feel how your beloved would have held that very sheet before sending it to you! And moving your fingers over the very words!
Yes, letter writing was a symbol of much romantic concoction!

I recently overheard of a letter written by the famous Romantic poet John Keats, in a movie called Bright Star! He had fallen head over heels in love with a lady called Fanny Brown, inspiring many of his immortal poetic creations! However their togetherness was short lived as Keats died an unfortunate death, succumbing to illness and in the belief that he was a failure.
The world now marvels, reads, quote his creations to soothe the burning hearts of lovers! I have jotted down here whatever I remembered of it with a few additions of my own...for love always gets me carried away!

Dear Love,
The day today is very fine...
I would have had the pleasure of enjoying it, if the remembrance of you had not weighed upon me...

Ask yourself my love,
Was it not so cruel of you to enchant me so?
To destroy my freedom?

I don’t know how to express my emotions to so fair a woman...
Find a brighter word than bright...
A fairer word than fair!

I almost wish we were butterflies...
To live but three days!
And three such wonderful days with you,
I could feel much delight than fifty common years could ever give me!

And as I write, I kiss the softest words that mark the paper here...
You kiss them too...
So I get the feeling that your lips have been where mine were...
John



Inspired by Keats...here’s a little attempt of my own*wish there was somebody to send this to also...sigh!*

Dear beloved,
It is a cruel conspiracy of eternal forces to have brought us together, made us realize how deep and fulfilling love can be and yet keep us apart!

To make us feel what true and doubt-free feelings are!
Emote the fierce emotions, we never thought existed!
Express the words, which erupt effortlessly from the unknown cores of our desires!

Had I not known you...I would have carried on in the hum drums of life believing love to be a fabrication of good writers and an outcome of pregnant imagination!
I would have continued to think of the heart as just an organ!
I would have enjoyed moments of solitude, riches of books, reaped the joys of friendships, and gloated in the pride of ornaments...all of which hold no significance or lustre now!
For now I have not a moment that is mine alone...without you!
Moments become experiences when they are marked by your presence in my thoughts and miracles when you are actually there!

It is ironic that I desire to merge into you to understand my true identity and purpose of coming into this world!
It is unfortunate that we can visualise each other all day, but the moment we reach out a hand to touch what seems so real...you are just not there!

I pine for you, but painful how so ever it is...it is also comforting!
I burn in desire and do so willingly, to re-emerge from the ashes!

I look forward to being alone not to think about you...for I do that all the while...but so that I can smile thinking about you!

Love you more than me and more than you,
Breathing till I see you again and thereafter start to live,
Yours only!

Looking for a Reason!

They say there is a reason behind everything...
Reason why India is hostile towards Pakistan and vice versa...
Reason why a baby is cranky in the middle of the night...
Reason why some marriages work and others don’t!

But then, is a reason really that important?
Must all our actions be reactions?
Must we always know the whys and hows and what fors?
Imagine a world, where we could just shut up our brains for a while, to enjoy what is coming our way?
Like they say... ‘Aam khao...gutliyan mat gino!’

How do I find a reason for these?
The feeling for wanting to be a child again!
The need to love someone 24*7 or expect to be loved back just the same!
The void I feel within just like that in the middle of a hectic day!
The urge to call up a friend, with a sinking feeling for his/her well being!
The mind being never at rest, even when the body is!
How there is an excited gut feeling for a first time meeting with one and none what so ever even after meeting many times over with another!
The tiredness that encompasses my body even before I have kept down my first step from the bed in the morning!

Even if I do find a reason, my next quest is how to explain it to my heart, get it around to accepting it with a complete consensus and get over it?
The mind nagging continues...with or without stumbling upon reasons!

How can one explain these?
Digging for logic in the smile that curls at the corners of our mouth when we see a loved one?
Why a mother is more biased towards one child than another born out of her own womb?
Why sometimes silence speaks greater volumes than words?

What can be said about the worry gripping our heart when we see someone we love in pain?
We reflect an equal amount of pain with no making even injury!
You may say, it is love....but then what is love?
That’s the biggest reason defying phenomenon of all!

Why does it take just a few seconds for it to develop and even fewer for it to be killed?
Why is it more with someone met so fleetingly and not there at all for another, even after burning the midnight oil, day in and day out with them?

What could possibly be the reason?
Why someone wants to hear someone else’s voice each day?
Why we feel a heart-ache beyond logic or convention?
What we hate in someone we hate becomes what we love in someone we love?
Then also why we get tired of the same things that we loved once?
Why we can’t believe someone can love us so much or why and how can we love someone to the point of self forgetfulness?
Why little gestures sometimes become big and huge considerations fail to impress?
Try as you may, there would be no plausible or pragmatic explanation!

Where do I find a reason for-
The act of a mother walking down a road holding the palm of her little child, shifting herself towards the road to avoid the zooming vehicles which are still a good ten steps away!
The rationale why a rich man pulls down his Mercedes car window to watch the street urchins play in the monsoon gifted street puddle!
Why we give up on time spent together to earn more money and when earned enough, we use it to buy time?

For some questions there are no answers...
It is like me asking you why the sun is so hot or the night so dark?
It is...for it is supposed to be like that!
Has been and will be!
Beyond logic or scientific analysis!
Even if we find reasons, we can’t find alterations...even if we alter everything around us to perfection...we still find something else irking the eye or boggling the senses! Then why resist? Why not succumb?

Sometimes accepting things as they are becomes the key to solving n resolving the most complicated issues!
Sometimes not taking a decision when in a dilemma is the best decision taken!
Saying I am not closing my mind’s door...if ‘this’ happens, I welcome it with open arms...if ‘that’ does, I’ll be equally convinced that something better is in store!
Sometimes reasons kill spontaneity!
Logic defies nature!
For nature tells you to just be!

It does not give logic to the little flower why it should bloom only when spring comes or reasons why mountains must remain strong even in the face of all disasters! They just do so like following a natural law!
It does not allow clouds to fret for being uprooted and carried away like the weeds and having no base to cling to!
Nature will not let snow argue with it to justify why it should lose its identity just to make someone else fuller!
It will not tell the harsh wind to blow in another direction to save its beloved!
It accepts things as it is!
It teaches us to just be as we are meant to be!
Not fight...not fret...not resist...not insist!
Go with the flow like the river...no matter how much the meandering...how many rocks to stumble on...how much slackness in its path...there is no other outcome, except to reach its destination if it just keeps moving on!



Stop asking ‘Why me?’
Start saying ‘What next?’
Stop looking for their motives...
Start searching for your motivations!

Don’t be scared of confusion...welcome it to lead to flow of thoughts...channelize it!
Don’t deny the presence of voids...attempt to fill them!

There are many things to do, to feel, to ask, to tell, to live, to show, to share, to build, to destroy, to care, to enjoy, to hold on, to give up, to celebrate, to own...
All this to be done...just for the mere “reason” that they must be!

And after my volley of questions, I am sure you have one to ask me too:
What is the sense of this post?
I don’t know!
I am still trying to find a reason!

My Childhood Goof-ups!

Okay this one goes in memory of how weird I was as a child...
That would kinda explain the way I am as an adult!
Thank you Mohit for the inspiration!

Picture this:
I am ten years old...sitting at a table in a restaurant having ordered my favourite chicken noodles soup...
I have besides me my parents, a handful of married couples and bunches of kids*yup family planning was not so much in action then or young couples my parents age were simply put-too horny*

Everyone was asked if they wanted soups and my dear papa had declined...
When my soup came...my eyes widened into little globes and mouth literally watered enough to create a farce that there can be no water scarcity till the world has me!
And my papa asked for tasting...
I scrunched my nose, took a long whiff of the aroma to make it stay with me while the bowl took a round and returned!

And I waited and waited...and waited...
Watching my father gulp down a spoonful and another and yet another...
*Just for the record, I was that kinda child, who would measure in a tray full of coke glasses which was closer to the brim or which plate looked more filled up with Maggie and then pick it up!*

So now my poor soup within the bowl was going deeper and deeper...when emptied by five spoonfuls, it was time to throw a fit!
Sitting hands folded on my chest and pouting like a kid*err...I was a kid then...anyways!*
I said firmly “Humph, I don’t want that soup...papa can have it all after saying he did not want soup!”
Everyone stopped dead at my comment n my father was red as a tomato!
Yup...I was born this dumb!

Now this is when I must be 5 years old and symptoms the symptoms were apparent till maybe 21*I know that does not categorise in “childhood” memories but my childhood got extended by a couple of decades*

This is about my mortal fear of lizards!
I just can’t stand *or even sit or lie* them!
No matter if it was my board paper the next day, I used to waste a complete hour in just looking by how many centimetres the wriggly character had budged! And if it won’t, I would scream at the top of my lungs for someone to enter the portals of my room and ‘shoo’ it out of the door! If I had to kiss a frog to turn him into Prince Charming, I could do so...but were it to be replaced by a lizzy, I’d rather never be kissed at all!



Again me in some blessed years when I was smaller*in age n width*. No matter where food was hidden I would find the way to reach it. I remember my grandma tugging the muffin box in between her clothes, in the ration shelf behind the pulses boxes, even in her undergarments drawers and I would find them, finish the contents and leave the empty box in exactly the same spot, to let her gloat for days in the belief that it is lying there untouched and safe! Till eventually we would hear a screech from her room one fine day and the theft was caught! I would have been a master at crime had those skills been aptly honed and encouraged in my tender years! Tch, what a waste!

How silly though I could get, does not really end here!
When my parents would go out for dinners n stuff, my sniffing would begin through in my mom’s cupboard too!
Now I was not a malicious or materialistic kid...just a perpetually hungry one, who seemed to think all the adults of the world have hoarded chocolates, dry fruits and the rest of the delicious sinful goodies in remote corners of their cupboards!

So I would get down to investigating, with my microscopic eyes and tong like fingers! And one day, just like that, my fingers groped upon a video cassette....

Now an ordinary kid would think that since it has been hidden in the piles of my mother’s suits, it is supposed to be untouched!

Naah! But not me!
Being all of fifteen and ALL of curious, I had to put it in the video player to realize that it was about what ‘adult’ people played when they applied the game of ‘hide and seek’ to the human body!



Ah! So this is what I am supposed to do when I grow up...I thought! Thankfully I soon got a bit scandalised and gave up on the idea of doing it all! Till of course better reasoning prevailed with maturity!

As a child I would get infatuated with every remotely interesting boy that came my way!
As a child, I would sing Michael Jackson songs holding the water pipe of our bath tub, blaring my lungs out and then suddenly switch to being a swimmer and make a dive full length in the poor 12 by 12 tub!
Needless to say, the poor tub suffered from having a big crack that never got repaired and it got transformed into a laundry basket thereafter!

As a child, I also wrote a little diary...but when it stopped being child like...I decided to stop at that too!

As children in our class rooms, we gang of girls would duck down while sitting on our school desks and take a peek n tease those behind us about the colour of undergarments they would be wearing or not be wearing at all! And then sit all glue-joined legs when we were at the receiving end!

As a child...okay a teenager, our gang would get together to make crank calls to hot looking dudes of the town! My friends were professionals at the task and would put any call centre bimbo to shame! The only time I tried it out, I was caught*I still don’t know how* and the boy ended up giving blank n crank calls to my house for months!

Again as a teenager, I was the gutsiest one in my gang and had gone to a video parlour alone to ask for a soft porn flick*this was prior to me discovering the one in my mom’s cupboard!*
That’s a different story that the parlour owner made me run for my dear life when he said, “Beta, pehle apne papa ka phone number dena...unse confirm kar loon!”

What else did I do as a kid?
Did I tell you I would pretend to be the latest n hottest actress of those times and stand before the mirror pretending to be talking to the hottest actor*yes, only talking...I was a kid then for Christ’s sake*?



Did I tell you I caught a friendly neighbour couple doing the act, one afternoon when we kids were supposed to be playing on their terrace?*I tell you some libidos*
Did I tell you I ran on the edge of a fountain pool in a public garden, thinking I was feather light and went thud into the algae infected water, much to the amusement of the throngs there?

Did I tell you I pricked a condom pack for my cousin brother’s wedding night, with a needle*although it left me miffed big time eventually as it didn’t materialize into a baby in exact nine months*?



Did I tell you...?

Oho...never mind if I did not!
These things aren’t worth telling either!
Some other time ;-)

The Sad Void of Youngsters!

Although every phase of life is beset with difficulties and its own set of issues...a sad trend is emerging in the young brigade-including teenagers to those till around 25-30 years of age and especially those who are single. One would think that getting a partner in today’s time is the simplest thing of all and just about everyone has a boyfriend/girlfriend!
Sadly it is not so!
There are too many frogs to be kissed before hitting upon the prince or princess!

The youngsters are most boggled by a sense of emptiness in their lives which they can’t put a finger on! Sometimes it is parental pressures, ambitious expectations and uncertainty of the future! Often it is lack of love or someone to share their thoughts with!
Of course it is not age binding, as the symptoms are being apparent in older generations also. However, the youngsters lacking the experience or appropriate support to handle it are getting sucked into a pathetic state of being in solitude even in a crowd!

The more I interact with those venturing into the threshold of youth, the more apparent it becomes how isolated is their existence. They have so much to say but refrain from the fear of not being understood or snubbed or laughed at! So on the surface they appear hale n hearty...but a little bit of scratching shows within a vulnerable grown-up child!

They may have friends, flashy lifestyles or good family back ups and yet somewhere down the line they are also harrowed by a gnawing sense of loneliness and a void, often a constant mind-nag that something or someone is missing!

The modern era has enabled us to communicate with a thousand people at the click of a button but not have one true soul to hear us just bare our guts out!
We may have three hundred people following us on our twitter account knowing:
-Have left for hostel!
-Mutton biryaani in lunch...mmm!
-Damn, these traffic jams!

Yet not even a handful who’d know
-That you had a pathetic fight with your parents before leaving for the hostel
-That the biryaani you may have made but have no one to accompany you to enjoy its pleasure and you shall be gulping it down alone, talking just to yourself or to a black hole called the internet.
-That while you stood there alone stranded in the traffic jam, the thought of being stuck in a life-rut drove you to the point of self destruction!

Busy schedules and just too many chores and deadlines at hand...wanting too many things too fast and then getting bored of them as easily as that....are not just the symptoms of this depressive tendency but also the factors that are preventing them from reaching out!
So it is all a viscous cycle at the end of it!
And before you know...you are whirling in a hurricane of your own emotions!

You get inclined and addicted to the first person who shows consolation and empathy towards you!
You get drawn irresistibly and addictively to any hint of empathy or understanding, isolating yourself even more from the real world!
So while our best friend may not know what’s bothering our mind...an internet buddy would not just know but also be guiding you through the mess! A puppet show, anyone? The strings slowly move out of our hands as we merely become slaves to our emotions! We feel crappy one day and happy at another for no apparent reason at all triggering them!

Everyone’s bored of just existing...
This despite that we now have at our disposal a host of technical facilities...a hundred channels on the television, the social networking sites providing you a throng of “friends” at the click of a button, mobiles to help you be tracked no matter what, blogs to vent out your deep n latent feelings and more hang outs in posh looking malls to kill time! You have the world at your feet and yet your feet refuse to budge...take you further!
What fetters are these?

And yet the boredom!
Is it justified?

Or is it the case of too much on the platter spoiling the fun out of enjoying each individually!
We are gulping down instead of relishing!
We are texting a “send to all” message instead of taking out time to spread out a sheet of paper n penning our thoughts!
We are now window shopping more than going to a favourite store to lovingly hand pick!
We prefer to sleep around instead of getting into the hassles of love...or some at the other extreme edge...keep waiting for true love so desperately that they forget to reach out altogether!

We create little cocoons to shelter us fearing too much revealed is too much putting at risk!
We show the world what they and we want them to see....not what we really are!
And hence the short-lived gratification of an achievement that is as quick to fall out as sand in the hand!

What should be done?
If we are all alone...aren’t we united then in our loneliness?

Is there a solution...a suggestion...or some help?
Or is it just a part of growing up that they must endure the hard way...be killed a little everyday...to feel alive*hypothetically* some day?

And Thus I fell!

Another one of my walk ventures, turning into misadventures...

Yup...I fell!

And I remember Shakespeare uncle’s words here in Julius Caesar:
“What a fall it was my friends!
Then not just he (here you read as-she), but you, I and the country fell”
*Well, I know that’s not an exact quote before you prepare to sue me for being an English teacher and not remembering this...helloooooooo I have better things to do than run after Shakespeare....err...better people too;-)*

Okay...so it was a fine evening!
I was oscillating between the idea of going for my signatory walk or going shopping!
And I chose the former!
Obviously a grave error of judgement!
Who the f@#$ chooses walk over shopping?
I had to pay for my sin against the reputation of women-kind and the dainty, well-manicured, well-shopped-minus-the-credit-cards fairies in the heavens were ready to show their wrath!

The weather was beautiful...frothy, cotton ball like black clouds were stretching on the horizon, Mr. Sun blanketed by them and a cool breeze was blowing transforming my little town of Kanpur into an industrialized version of Nainital!
To add to the awesome mausam was the greenery of the lush green campus of the college I walk in, just dipped clean by droplets of a shower!

So what the heck...I collected my paraphernalia!
My I-pod, my mobile, the head phones, my room key, the umbrella and all of myself...now you can imagine the burden on my not-so-tiny and yet fragile shoulders!

And I began my walk as though my life depended on it...picturing a mini romance waiting for me somewhere down any corner*I had even imagined a blog post after the events to unfold entitled “Woh Barsaat ke Ek Sham”* knowing full well, that there are greater odds of finding a dinosaur egg in that campus than a decent cute enough guy to flirt with!

Within 15 minutes, the drizzle became stronger!
The breeze seemed to be in a teasing mood instead, raising my Anarkali style kurta here and there. I was telling Indra Dev-
“Prabhu, go n woo some other apsara...
I am anyways wearing tights under my kurta!
It’s not like this is a skirt,
So stop being a flirt!”

But probably Indra Dev*is he related to Rahul Dev by any chance?* did not like my refusal to oblige...
He blew harder*it’s just the wind...don’t get excited*
And called upon his bro Megh Dev to assist in his not so decent designs!

It now began pouring n blowing and with me multi tasking in the middle of it all!
One hand holding the umbrella, tugging at my hands to join the gust...with another holding the I-pod and the key and another managing the cell phone!
Okay...error...I remember now I have just two hands...
Well, what the heck! They all assisted in the tasks...mushkil ke ghadi mein apne haath he saath dete hain...no puns intended!

In all this mess came a speeding youngster in his swanky car and whooshed past me with so much force that I had to step down the cemented road, one feet down on the muddy fringes and in between there somewhere, somehow, I slipped and fell!

Not like a thud-thud slip!
Just swish and swoosh slip!
Fell on one knee and before anybody could realize that a woman in their straight line vision suddenly went out of it and would have to lower the eye lids to find me bundled on the ground...I got up and began to saunter as though nothing happened at all!

Home was still 10 minutes away and I walked with my head held high, not even waiting to examine the damage done below till I reached home!

And when I did...
Voila...the tights which were relatively new and cost me bloody 320 bucks were gone from the knee...
It pained like the pain in the arse!
A big red patch, covering my entire knee ball had surfaced there instead and the remains of the cloth stuck to my wounds!
Was that white thing my bone actually?
Must be...there can’t be anything else possibly white, running along with my blood, no matter how pristinely white and pure my thoughts are!

OMG...I am injured...wounded...hurt!
I called my dearly beloved...
Me- Mein gir gaye:-(
My beloved- Oho...baby, is the road alright?

Grrr...I called my best friend...
Me- Mein gir gaye:-(
Best Friend- Tch, awww how did you come home?
Me*excited at the first dint of consolation*- On my own...just imagine!
BF- Oho...you should have called up the crane guys...they would have done it for free...considering you are a lighter burden than what they mostly carry!
Grrrrrrr..............

I put it up on my status on Face book:
“Mein gir gaye!”
My friends:
1. - Kiss par? Ab uske haalat kaise hain?
2. – Abhi recently they had built the campus roads...what a waste!
3. – Go in for a tetanus injection...I’ll pray the needle does not break before getting into your skin!
4. – Hopefully this would not affect your brain and you’d continue to remain....abnormal!
5. – I never thought that could happen...err...you meant physically na...mentally to we all know that’s your perpetual state!
6. –Mein Kaziranga Gaya!
7. – That can’t be the bone...that must be a layer of skin under the hypo...blah! Blah! Blah!
8. - Humpty Dumpty had a great fall!

:-(
Boo hoo...of course there were sweet responses too!
But then...
Mein Gir Gaye! :-(

The Work-Out Express!

The gymnasium can prove to be the epicentre of loads of action!
*And by that I do not mean just lifting weights or performing with the rod!* It is a full blown gossip monger’s paradise!

My gym is abuzz with some scandal or LOL moment always!
It’s like going every morning to your very own news weekly or daily!

There’s this late 30 something guy who comes there...I call him Mr. Blackie!
Dark as ash, with moustache...and somehow living in the conviction that the vest style uppers were made for just his kind of drop dead looks*yes, one can actually die after looking at him*
Pssssssst...my dear, those multi coloured vests are awful...wish I could tell you that...but to do that I would have to actually TALK to you...and I wish THAT never happens! A torture for the eyes is preferable to the torture to the entire system!

Of course the blessing there is, he is so dark n sweaty that the bunch of ugly gnawing patch of underarms’ hair get hidden in his skin colour*nope, I don’t stop my regime to look at that but the very things that you pray life does not show you, end up becoming the very things that surface before you, more than often-like lizards mating- ewwwwwwwwwww!*

And this obnoxious guy*he has sparkling white teeth, by the way* the other day was checking himself out in the huge mirrors put up on all the walls. Suddenly the music changed to a lively number and he broke out in a Mika-style head rotation along with springing jumps and actually continuing to do so for full one minute!!!!!!!!!
Had he done it for half a minute more, I would have for sure needed an ambulance for sudden and irreparable cardiac arrest! The jarring moves leave me in shudders even now and I dread the number being played again in the gym!

There’s another specimen! He’s Mr. Stud!
Lean, tall again mid 30’s*that’s the dangerous age bracket it seems* and some would call him handsome!
When he moves it feels as though his body is screaming, “Oh look at me! I am god’s gift to mankind!”
He wears the hosiery material shorts and t-shirt that cling to his physique worse than that white saree in the waterfall, on Mandakini’s body in the flick ‘Ram Tere Ganga Maile’! The scene here is equally obscene my friends, or perhaps that is his very aim! If you have it, flaunt it syndrome! And by now, every boy and girl, instructor and helper, receptionist and watchman in the gym knows he has it!
Thank god for small err big err...whatever mercies!

He would work out and then check out*himself and the handful of women around* and then raise his leg or protrude out his butt!
He’s almost Menkah in action, thinking we all lesser mortals are Vishwamitras!

Then there is another nerd...a Punjab Da Puttar*PDP* who insists on wearing Capri pants to work out!
Twice they have torn during leg lunges, yet not deterring him to alter his path...I think he likes the idea of his trouser slitting...
He believes in that tagline
“It is not right to always pull someone’s leg...
It is not right to always pull someone’s leg...
You should also spread them sometimes ;-)”
Does anyone here comes actually to work out*except me of course*?

And then there would be the aerobic sessions!
These are revelations in themselves!
If you happen to be standing in the third or fourth line, you are bound to be a victim of ‘Dhrishti-atyachaar’-the screwing up of your vision!

People would bend forward in their teeny weenie t-shirts, giving you a full view of their lower inners peeking out unapologetically at the first hint of public glory!
And now my dearies...brand does matter!
They’d be a VIP or an Amul gazing in our faces...
They’d also be Jockey’s and Tommy Hilfiger’s!
And you’d be surprised to know how famous bright red and fluorescent yellows are with men here in Uttar Pradesh...or is it just another one of bizarre Kanpur traits or worse still...is it actually a men-all-over-the-world fetish?

Animal prints too, eh? Hmm...I discovered these at the gym...where else!
But sometimes I get confused...not in the exercise step silly, in the dilemma, if it was the same print tit bit worn yesterday, covering my predecessor’s butt, as of now!
And please would people stop wearing low waist undergarments...it can be so bloody disturbing in so bloody everything!



As for women...they are pretty much the same here as anywhere else!
There are items of these species with full make up on at 6.30 a.m.*yes, in the morning*
There are a couple who exercise for 15 minutes and make the male trainer press their bodies for the next 15 minutes in the name of stretches to relax! You should watch them close their eyes and smile with pleasure while in this act. I would give my right hand, right leg and right everything to know what they’d be thinking at that moment!

There is one who emerged out of a cubicle in the changing room recently and when I tried to venture in, much to my surprise a full bloodied man somehow squeezed his way out too from the same 6 feet by 6 feet box!
Something inside me warned not to rush out screaming “Magic, magic...8th wonder just happened in there!”
I soon found out that both are happily married...to separate spouses of course!

There is another lady who one day rushed into the changing room with tears in her eyes. Out of concern, I followed her*yes, only concern...my gossipy antennas were resting in peace...at least till then!*
She was screaming to someone over the mobile phone...
“What do you think of yourself? You would give that bitch more attention than me? You think I don’t understand these games? How dare you touch her waist?”

I sneaked out thinking I can’t help in this...only to bump into the new six-packs instructor in the corridor explaining over his mobile, “I am so sorry...I will not touch any female again...I promise...come out baby...I’d touch you and heal my mistake!”
OHH MYYY GOOOOOD GODDD!

Then there is an enthusiast with holes in track pants that are begging termination of their lives, but the hostess holds on to them as though her own dear life depended on it!
There are some who come with hair neatly tied in a plat the first day, but seeing the heat quotient soon come with their zulfein laharaaoing in the ceiling fans!
Some ooze of the most expensive perfumes, others make you pray that you could keep your nose at home and come there for training!

There are some who wipe their sweat in slow motion format of movies and others who drench their chiselled countenances with cold water in full public view!

There are those who lift the 1 kg dumb bells as though they are obliging it and some again who would increase the kgs going by the number of onlookers admiring it*no matter if they can barely walk out on their own legs after that*

You can spot the best of cat walks on the tread mill and the craziest of moans and screams coming from the weight section! Since there are just men in that domain, we do not rush to aid or speculate!
There are many who letch and many who are being letched at, both categories feeling their paisa was vasool-ed!

It’s a fun world of work out...you just need to work out the way to fun!

And now in writing this, another significant revelation has dawned upon me...I now know why I am bloody not losing any weight! :(