The weekend of dreams

The weekend that went by was the stuff that you always fantasize about. The kinds you wish would happen, but you know the chances are as great as dinosaurs roaming the world again. No I did not bump into a celebrity or win a lottery. (And those are not the stuff I day-dream about either).

Long long ago – more precisely 10 years ago, my bestie and I were lying on our hostel bed and making glorious plans for the future. One of them included having a family vacation together once in a while. I know there are people for whom such dreams materialise. There are people who are neighbours with their best friends! Such things don’t happen to me. Of the few friends that I have, none were in the same city as me for a long time after graduation. Now none are even in the same continent. 

But then life has a knack of throwing that odd bouncer, which struck just right goes for a six! After a decade of work and life, Ashma had the opportunity to visit a neighbouring island. It felt like an arm’s reach from UK. Of course she would come and visit us if she was coming to Ireland. There was the initial dilemma of whether she would accept the offer or not in the first place, given that she had a young child. My suggestion was to accept the offer with open arms and bring family along since it would be a very good opportunity. At least her fares would be paid for and they would have a mini vacation abroad. Everything progressed smoothly from then on. They were travel ready, but then she had a personal emergency due to which she had to cancel all plans. We were kind of prepared for some dreams being too good to come true. 

As months moved on, the opportunity presented itself again. Yayyyy !!!!  This time she was finally and definitely coming! It was all happening   very fast and we thought we would go about planning everything once she landed. She landed and we did some sketchy planning. Her trip was super compressed into 3 weeks giving her 2.5 weekends. She had to make a trip to UK in the middle week. Coming all the way to UK, she definitely wanted to give London a look. So the Friday, Saturday and Sunday she decided to come to UK with Saturday reserved for London. 

Friday morning Ashu, M and her lil boy S reached home. It was wonderful to have her make tea while I flipped dosas. K was trying to work from home :D. The home was filled with warmth as the adults chatted and kids after their initial shyness played along. I will admit, that thanks to technology its not we are totally out of each other’s worlds. We keep messaging each other, swapping pictures and I make it a point to call twice a month. We have our long chats about everything under the sun then. So though I was seeing her after 6 years, it was not 6 years  of white noise. It was  6 years where we were ‘virtually’ in touch with one another. Evening the men decided to hit the bar while being typical women folk, we busied ourselves with kids and cooking. It was very interesting to note the little bickering, competition for attention, the clamouring for same toy and the final reconciliation that the kids had amidst themselves. Evening it was gorgeous Indian takeaway and an early night in since Ashu and co had a rise and shine at dawn for London. 

We spent most of Saturday by ourselves. Sunday Chiyaa had her swimming class. Since Ashu was the only one awake (miracle!) she came along with us. As Chiyaa and K took to the pool, we got another half an hour to just randomly chat. It was S’s birthday! Once back home, after breakfast, it was time for cake! Woo hoo! The gift we gave to S was a bone of contention as both the kids wanted exclusive rights over them. It was so funny, entertaining and educating to watch how the kids dealt with the situation. Just because S began to cry at a certain point, Chiyaa started crying as well. Finally peace reigned and they played together. We were too lazy to venture outside. But finally at 5 in the evening K took control and asked everyone to get started. We went to the nearby docks which was a pleasant walk together. The kids were going berserk literally using anything and everything as an item to play with. We have been in this city for 5 years but we had never used the water taxi that ferries on the canal. With friends around, it was the best excuse and we all took a ride in it and thoroughly enjoyed it. Some really amazing Indian food was the perfect end to the evening. 

Back home, the kids played as we packed and got ready for the upcoming Monday. There was just so much to generally talk, the refugee crisis, disease control in India, fate and destiny and what not. I literally had to pull myself away when the clock approached 2200 since they had to depart to the airport at 0430 in the morning. I had a weird dream where I saw K and me walking with Ashu to drop her while M was coming along in a car behind us. At the end of the journey, Ashu just turned back and hugged me. I felt very vacant after that dream and it was a bit tough for me to get back to sleep. Finally the hands of the clock indicated, it was time to say goodbye.

The house seems vacant today. But somehow Chiyaa and the routine around her is making everything bearable. It is oh so rare that we get to have real friends over – friends with whom the times apart does not matter, because there are no actual times apart. Friends with whom one is perfectly comfortable making calls home or playing games on the computer without thinking what they might think. Friends with whom one is ok to venture out for a couple of drinks even if you have met them for the very first time. Friends with whom one is crazy enough to think of a family vacation together again in the near future.

(J)ob hunt and beyond

So Ashma and I survived our college years. We began our careers in different places in different companies. We remained in touch extensively because obviously we could not do without that. Gradually things at my work front started deteriorating. I took a leap of faith and ventured to  Bangy where Ashu was located to look for fresh opportunities. Ashu welcomed me into her home. She never let me pay a dime for all the expenses that occurred over the span of 2 weeks that I was there. It was very nice to simply be with her and in her presence. We used to have our morning breakfast together. I was friends with her room mates, so we would spend some time studying. Then I would go to the nearby internet café to apply for jobs (Yes internet was not a household phenomenon then), since the job market kept changing every day. Evenings Ashu came earlier because I was there. I used to be surprised at the amount of hard work she used to put in. She is a very lazy person. I used to joke that she can not keep herself vertical for more than 60 seconds and ends up lying down on a sofa or reclining against some body. Yet she was a go-getter at work. Just seeing her function around anything related to office, I could imagine how serious she would be at her work place.   She used to pack her days so that she could be  home with me earlier. After making and having dinner together, we used to watch some TV.(I know we sound like an old odd couple :D ) A couple of days into this routine, we started taking a walk after dinner. That is I am sure any sort of physical activity Ashma has every engaged in. Yup – she is too lazy(which I have just stated :D ) when it comes to doing anything related to fitness but very proactive in bemoaning her lack of the same! She used to live in a very posh area of the city. During our walks, we used to marvel at the exquisite houses there. Many seemed vacant and we used to think of the whereabouts of the owners. We would spend our hour long walks thinking if some house might be haunted or some house might be having people inside with all the lights switched off, or some might be teeming with servants to look after. We reminisced a lot about a similar locality in Rourkela where we studied and we were amazed how we had paid attention to the same houses! We were too attuned to each other. We still are. So much so Ashu says we don’t need to talk! In spite of it, we did and still do spend hours talking!

Weekends I had the support of Ashu and K as I went for walk in interviews. They would wait outside in the scorching sun hoping for a smile on my face as I came out. I was always slated to disappoint them. A change of job was not destined to happen during those days no matter how much I tried. They were always up to cheer me up with ice cream or coffee or cakes. Ashu introduced us to the most earth shattering sundae 'Death by Chocolate' at a local café near her house. It is still a hot favourite of K and mine. I remember years later when K and I made a trip to Bangy in late 2008, we made sure we booked time to have a date with DBC.

Ashu and I have moved on, had families, changed cities and continents. Yet the bond remains. I am a fan of her laid back and go with the flow nature. It would take quite a lot to ruffle her feathers. What comes along with it is her total lack of malice for anyone else. I have never seen her be jealous of somebody else's progress, take a stab at anyone personally or be vindictive or judgemental. She reinstates my belief in the fact that good things ultimately happen to good people. Ashma is definitely one of the few genuinely good people I know. Bless her!

(A)shma

Have I told you about Ashu? My super cool friend who goes by the dictum hum isse zyaada cool hote to freeze ho jaate?

I must have mentioned her quite a few times and I keep popping in her posts once in a while too *lucky me*. She was the one who started me on blogging. She is this brilliant mathematical and logical brain with a near photographic memory. One fine day surprise surprise she started blogging. I had already missed the boat though I always thought of myself as a 'writer'. When I saw Ashu's posts, I was impressed by her clarity and her vocabulary. That really inspired me to claim some space in the nebulous digital world and start writing. Yet again she has motivated me to get on with the A-Z challenge, where every day we post a letter from the alphabet. I am late for this too, I had seen people do this. This was supposed to be in the month of April(I guess). I am late by a good month. Ashu did ask me to get on with it, but I was too flaccid. Seeing her posts and the lack of mine, I thought – why not? So lets get ready for 25 days of rambling and ranting and bla di bla from yours truly :)

As I mentioned earlier, having the more scientific bent of mind, I did not associate anything literary with her. Which goes on to prove how prejudiced am I. Or maybe just how multi faceted is she! I had the first look of her during counselling for engineering seats (the process where successful candidates are granted admission into various colleges spread across the state). She was just ahead of me in the rankings and as we were going through the acceptance procedure I congratulated her. (I doubt if she has any memory of it at all, because she is a bit of a goldfish when it comes to attention span :P. I know this on one hand and a beautiful mind on the other – that’s Ashma!) Fate was to bring us even closer, since we were dorm mates. Coincidentally, our beds were adjacent. For the initial few days, she was practically at her local guardian's house. I got very few chances to meet her, till the laboratory sessions began. After which we got along famously.

Back in our days, we had a practice called 'ragging' or what the seniors claimed to be ways to increase interactions with new comers. One trick question we were often asked was our hobby. You say anything, you were digging a hole for yourself and sometimes for some others too. For the lack of anything better I had stuck with reading. When asked my favourite novel (people were very well read ) I had claimed Gone With The Wind. Which undoubtedly is a very nice novel and is definitely in top spot for me. Another fact that worked was, it was the only novel by Margaret Mitchell( actually written by her). So that helped me a bit. So I was not harassed on questions regarding her other works. The genre being quite typical was also not much of an issue to handle. Thornbirds being the only other which stake a similar claim. That was another book I loved at the end of my first year. I digress, its not about me :D

Ashma being the truthful soul as a typical Aries had said, watching tv was her hobby. Thankfully she spent a lot of time at her local guardians, but the days she was in town, she had to write quite a lot of stories of quite a lot of soaps :) Looking back it all feels hilarious though those days were very stressful with classes, inductions, assignments and what not. She had never read a book till she entered engineering. By the end of it, I am sure she could state reading as one of her major hobbies. She is now a voracious reader. Having good speed reading skills (me jealous) she could devour books in a single sitting. She also had this habit of not putting a book down if she was say a 50 or 100 or 150 or even 200 pages  away from the end. There were many times when she was reading well into the night, and would have a couple of hours of studying and would still ace the exam. Talk about being gifted :)

Post graduation, we moved on to our separate career paths. Ashu and I were… hmmm… wait a minute. I might as well take a cue from the soaps Ashu used to watch and leave the rest for another day. For I got 25 more days to blitz through.

Rest in the next episode ;)

Bangalore Express

I like Bangalore a lot. That's the place I got some real sweet and sad and warm and tingly memories associated with. And with my best friend A being there, it makes the city all the more welcoming.

Last weekend we made a short trip to the place. And it was a trip full of sweet nothings.

Friday evening was remarkable enough, when all of a sudden, dark clouds gathered and it started raining. And some rain it was, with blinding lightening and ferocious winds. I was all prepared and agog to scoot home soon so that we could be off to catch the train with lots of time to spare and I had promised A some snacks and savories, but seeing the downpour I felt dejected - it was gonna be a close call yet again :( with no time for purchases.

Then all of a sudden, I spotted a girl. Seemed to be a faintly familiar face, someone I had met while traveling in share autos to office. I gave her a buck tooth smile, but she never returned it. Ahem! Wrong number mebbe. Then after sometime she came up and said, did we meet before in a share auto or something? I was like Ya Lady! She was pretty petrified by the way the downpour was shaping up and tentatively asked me - shall we try to get home in this rain? I told, if you have an umbrella to get us till the main gates without soaking like rats, I think I am brave enough to face this rain. So off we went with a flimsy umbrella... and that poor thing was twisted beyond redemption thanks to the winds :(

We managed to get autos and reach till the penultimate stop for me. It was a pretty interesting ride too where I got to hear her love story, wedding plans and future programs. Once I reached the stop, my cell phone was ringing and guess who was it?! Hubby Gubby! He was close to the terminus.

So we met with the music of La la la la la la la la la la ( music of Sagar movie fame) :D We had tea and bread pakodas at a tea stall..... Hmmmmmm mild drizzle, K for company, warm tea in one hand and bread pakoda in the other ........ hmmmm heaven was close :)

Grub done, we ventured ahead. Caught the bus which would take us home in the nick of time, so much so that, we stepped into the bus at the same time and were stuck for a few seconds at the door :D Making a fool of oneself and still smiling at it - I am excelling in this talent I feel.

Journey itself was a little bit painful since all of a sudden I was having a headache - maybe a sinus prone person like me could blame the rains for it.

Sat morn as soon as we reached Bangy, the ever food loving K escorted me to a restaurant near the railway station. We shared a plate of uttapam while the most lilting songs wafted. The song that made it all the more special was Dhaage tod laao from Jhoom Barabar Jhoom. A personal fav.

Reached the destination and woke up dear darling A. And got on with the usual chatter chatter yak yak. A apart from sharing many of my opinions and tastes, also shares a penchant for getting the cold virus. Achoo Achoo Achoo she went hitting sixers and boundaries till noon. Thats when we decided to have a low key day. 3 of us generally lazed around in front of the TV, chatted and dozed intermittently, ordered and had some delectable sandwiches and noodles. Finally at 2000 we stepped out of the house to have death by chocolate - a lovely sundae at a nearby shop, which is a major hit with K since it was the very first dish I had shared with him. Once back, we guzzled generous portions of awesome ginger tea and emptied quite a few containers of snacks and savories :)

Time passed just like that, chatting,surfing the net, seeing pics of each others friends on Orkut, that A and I scarcely realised it was close to 0300 by the time we hit the bed.

Sunday started late, cos obviously we woke up late, were super lazy and there was some or the other thing on TV which was making us sit in front of it. Finally at 1400 we set forth. Again rains played spoilt sport. But inspite of it, we managed to make quite a few purchases. With her wedding coming up, A had quite a bit to do. But alas:( Still, what we accomplished within the 5 hours, was no mean feat.

Back home packing done, we had some pastries and puffs at a nearby bakery. It was really nostalgic to say goodbye, hmm, goodbye to miss A for the last time.

At the station, both K and I were reminiscing the 2 jovial days, we did not do anything, but still the time spent was so special. In the reverie we noticed that there was no sign of the train, though it was expected to depart in 15 more minutes. Thats when I spotted that we were facing platform number 6 rather than 5 (The setup is a bit weird, you cant see the platform number 5 though technically its just behind you. ) So we sccccccccccccccccccrammed to the other platform and got into the train Jab We Met style ( Ahem no no the train had nt started yet :) )

The rains and cold climes had forced me to take a couple of medicines to ward off the headache et al. But thanks to them, I slept like a dead decayed log!

When embarking on the journey, I had armed myself with the fully charged digicam for a lot of clicks. Ironically, dont have a single picture - but enormously precious memories.

Friends are the family you choose - you are an integral part of mine dearie.

Knot to be

I am writing this post on behalf of a very lazy friend of mine whose out groom hunting :)

Shes my alter ego and we often have this tag between us that we don t need to talk cos our thoughts are just mirror images :)

Now her parents are looking for alliances and after every session with a prospective groom she is sure to have a session with me, discussing what were the good, bad, ugly, immaterial aspects of the person whom she met.

She expects some one who would have all her good traits and negate all her bad ones (Perfect is boring but who would not want to have a try at some one perfect ) So she wants some one who reads, is intellectual at the same time game for a dash of fun once in a while, a sport when it comes to outdoor as well as indoor activities, not lazy, is frank, superior to her in terms of educational qualification and monthly income,etc etc.. Apart from these tangibles, she also wants some one with whom she feels an instant connection, feels mutual respect, some one who has a nice personality, some one who would support her in her future ambitions, some one who would encompass her and make her comfortable in his own circle while also allowing her room to continue all her old relations and friendships, and some more qualities which I am not able to recollect now. I know her wish list is pretty long, but being a girl, who has to leave so much and consign herself to an utter stranger, it out right SCARY.

When I was deciding upon the point whether K was the right person for me or not, I had innumerable sessions with her and another friend of mine discussing, debating, analyzing. There were more loose ends and question marks initially. But slowly there were a few but pressing reasons for me to go ahead with the alliance. I wish I remembered the deliberations that went on then. But now as I help my friend analyze the people she meets I feel scared and tensed and really worried for her. Every time she goes to meet some one I nearly pray that may she make the correct choice, may she get the nuances of the person's behavior. But just how much can you grasp in one meeting? :-S

The other day while talking she said, "I know with what reasons you can reject a person but what do people see that makes them say yes." I had no answer to that. Then she went on to say"How are you doing Amu?" I was like what kind of question is that? She said , "No dear, you are so mature. (She always feels I am mature :| ) You can handle a lot of things. But you are also a jovial fun loving person who does not like any strings attached? How are doing? How is marriage treating you? Don t you ever feel burdened? Tied down?" I did not want to answer her with the fears I have of leaving my old life. Of leaving the smooth circle of friends I have now.

Then she continued "Really I am not sure I can live with one person all the life" I was surprised at this. She comes from a pretty traditional family where some things are not questioned. Shes a thorough romantic at heart and she having doubts about living with one person brought me face to face with the fact how freaking nervous she was. She said, "I have seen people being happy when their alliances are being fixed. Why am I not feeling so? Wish I never questioned anything and went ahead with any alliance my parents got for me." I said," See dear, we are intelligent enough and free enough to questions some things. And I am sure our parents are proud of this fact. They will be sadder if we compromise and settle down thinking we are troubling them rather than speaking our mind. So please tell whatever you feel about the person to your parents and take a judicious decision."

I don t even know if I am guiding her on the right path. I just speak as I feel, what I feel at that point of time.

She s close to getting an alliance fixed. Hope things work fine for you dear friend. And as we say, marriages happen with the person with whom its supposed to happen. I just hope that person is the rightest for you dear, a real good friend and who loves you to pieces. Amen.