ZIGGY STARDUST

What is a good time to write a post? I don’t think I have completely figured that out. But, like with most things, I do have an opinion on it. There was a time when I made up my mind about writing three posts a month, so after a week of writing one I’d browse through my thoughts and my past for another. Then came a time when I relied on sitemeter; whenever traffic reduced to a trickle I’d put something up. Of course some events are inherently post-worthy, dramatic breakups, first few days of a job, encounters with insomnia and so on. And sometimes I relied on the truly bizarre, like my facebook biorhythm application. Days that are announced as truly exceptional on the intellectual front often coincide with a post here.

Currently my intellectual levels are pretty average (Source: FB) but I shall take the risk of going ahead with a post because not only has this site been reduced to receiving visitors only interested in photos of the Great Khali, but also its author has just returned from a very colourful overseas trip.

It was a few years ago that I took my first flight. I was travelling with a girl and was for some strange reason determined to not let her know that this was my maiden voyage. Somehow I figured out the entire process of baggage screening coming before check in followed by a boarding pass leading to security check and finally boarding. I maintained elegant poise throughout; even though internally I had been reduced to what would be the plight of a school teacher trying to sell shares at a stock market. I just couldn’t believe what is happening. Of course I had the girl engaged in beautiful conversation and impressed her with my knowledge of the theatre and of films. Judging by my confidence and how matter of fact I was being with the whole process of getting into an aircraft she would have thought I was born on one.

Of course; my life, being one that is peppered with tiny tragedies; my quota of beginners luck was particularly small. Just as we were moving for security check I held out the tag I was handed by the lovely lady at the check in counter and cried out loud, “What the hell, what did she give me this for?” And then to underline my stupidity I strapped it around my wrist. The girl smiled and swirled not because she found me funny like I first thought but to hint at where my tag should actually go.

“First time??”
“Umm... Yes.”

And just to add insult to injury, I couldn’t even figure out how to strap the damn thing around the bag, she had to do it for me.

Of course now I am an expert at domestic air travel and regularly try to run over slow exasperating first timers with my trolley. At the security check I lift my arms only about thirty degrees and show particular disdain, unlike your animated first timers who will stand like Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. And I don’t look as exceptionally thrilled in the bus to the aircraft as I once did. Although I still haven’t managed containing my excitement during take off, or my panic at the slightest hint of turbulence.

Thankfully I was travelling to Singapore alone and had the luxury of goofing up and floundering at the international airport in private. For example, who arrives at an airport three hours in advance, especially for a morning 8 AM flight? Or who doesn’t realise that the in-flight movies can be paused and you needn’t wait till the end of the film to go to the loo. In my defence I figured this out on my return flight and that too all by myself.

Ah but what a way to travel. Every possible magazine (other than the inappropriate ones) you’d want to read, movies, music, alcohol, exceptionally hot air-hostesses, more alcohol, the view, as much alcohol as you want! The only downside was being told “DEATH TO DRUG TRAFFICERS” just before we landed; I thought it was a bit rude. But I was too drunk to really care.

Changi airport is some place, its hard to believe how quiet and clean it is. I think I was the only one making any audible noise there because I had the only creaky trolley at the entire airport. Oh I must make mention of my first meal, I had what an Indian would describe as boiled rice and water and salt with some boiled bits of pork, fish oil and strange slimy vegetables and/or sea food. Also it was just a few degrees cooler than the centre of the earth. I burnt my tongue at least a dozen times eating that strange culinary experiment.

Few things could be better than finding yourself, accidently, in a Mercedes Benz paid for by the company meant for someone else taking you to a five star hotel while realising that like its airport Singapore is as clean as everyone said it would be and quiet (nobody mentioned that.)

I had arrived separately from the rest of my team and by the time I got to the hotel they had already scattered themselves all over Singapore. So I used this bit of brilliant luck to discover the city by myself. And being a tourist not of the traditional variety my first course of action was to walk to the MRT find a 7-11 and buy four bottles of Jim Beam and Cola. Back in my room I ordered I grand lunch, and drank all the Jim Beam, while watching Die Hard 4.0. And then exhausted with all this effort I fell asleep. When I woke I think I had already got as much as I would want from a holiday.

Over the next week I accompanied others to time-honoured destinations like night-safaris, amusement islands, and all night shopping centres, all places I think I could visit only once. I preferred my aimless walks through the city centre, malls and quays. The city was only larger, cleaner, more orderly, and quieter than the ones I had seen back home. Essentially the differences were minimal, which is why I didn’t really feel I was in a foreign land. I also realised I’d love to live in a city like this. But you can’t really be sure of such things until they actually happen. The people were brilliantly and colourfully dressed, the girls had the loveliest legs, nobody, absolutely nobody had a regular hairstyle, the music shops were fantastic, I had my first brush with Starbucks (average, other than the freshly brewed coffee) and Burger King (spectacular), I drank a crate full of Jim Beam and Cola and spent a fortune on some fantastic dark chocolate, I got caught in a sudden downpour and waited under a tree for half an hour before realising that cabs here didn’t stop simply because I was yelling for them, I successfully managed conversations with cab drivers and realised that they think and behave exactly like those back home, I got lost, I discovered Cream, David Bowie and Death Cab for Cutie on my Ipod, and revived my love for Radiohead through I am a Wicked Child, found no such success in the case of Coldplay, I couldn’t bring myself to listen to Pink Floyd or read The Metamorphosis which I have now carried in my bag for five months, I ate the widest variety of meat I had eaten and ruined my health. It was a whole lot of fun.

Oh, I was there to be trained on my selling skills. And when the weekend ran out and the College began I quite dreaded it. But it was spectacular to say the least. For the first time I got a sense of the organisation I worked for, how big it was and how people it employed were largely similar even across countries. I met some of the brightest, nicest, and most charming people I have met in the longest time. And it also fulfilled a long time desire of mine, of meeting completely new people. People I had no prior connection to, and it gave me a huge kick to know I could get along very well with them. All through I felt I’d rather be working with them than with my colleagues back home, because of how well I got along with them, but someone ruined it by saying it would all change once I was competing with them. I like to believe it won’t.

Also, there was something to be learnt from them, they were as driven as I was when it came to work but at the same time violently possessive of their own lives and weekends and families. I guess they realise the importance of life outside of work if one has to sustain oneself at one’s job. Guess the day I feel I am here for good it’s one of the things I will have to consciously change about myself, I will have to separate work from my life. Anyway it was a great experience and lot of fun working with those people, and I look forward to being in such an environment for a longer time.

Hmm… And then I was off to Pattaya and Bangkok.

Q: Who goes to a country without a Visa?
A: Two men who realise that this will separate them from all the others (women) at the airport and give them a chance to discover Pattaya all by themselves.

Our plan worked and the on-arrival Visa took us two hours and when we got out of the Suvarnabhumi Airport we were confident of having gotten rid of the girls.

“Heyy Guys! How long we have waited…”

So there we were two guys and five girls in a cab hurtling down the expressway from Bangkok to Pattaya. And then certain hormones that are excreted every time a man wants to avoid shopping to go watch football or get drunk, hormones that help in the construction of elaborate excuses and ploys were released in bountiful quantities in our heads. I pretended to fall asleep (of course I took it too far by actually falling asleep) and my friend directed the cab to where the women were staying in Pattaya. See we had anticipated this situation and as Plan B we simply didn’t book ourselves into any hotel. My friend asked the women to wait in the cab, then went inside and checked them in, came back and informed us that, sadly enough, the hotel had no rooms and that we would be staying in the adjacent property. Then he almost threw out their luggage and we left, I was still sleeping as we travelled to the other side of the town and checked ourselves into ‘Bella Villa Cottage (See Facing)’. We also didn’t have phones by the way, so we met the women only three days later, at the Bangkok Airport.

It was one in the morning. And we did what any good decent Indian man would do at this hour of the day. We headed straight for Walking Street. And all of a sudden all my wishes of being in a foreign land were instantly fulfilled. How can a city exist simply on a foundation of massage parlours, go-go bars, and other exotic aspects of sex tourism? There were European men walking in underwear with three girls under each arm, and women shouting, “Aa yoo seksy maan, yoo bigga maan, wanna boom-boom??”, men with snakes, and women selling squid, and nudity, and young girls who would just appear from nowhere and cling on to you and not leave till you paid, and eunuchs, and alcohol, and karaoke. We walked through the place pretty stunned, and entered bars and almost immediately left the first few times. And at four in the morning we returned to Bella Villa completely disgusted.

Oh Pattaya has this interesting setup of young men who ferry you across the town on their bikes for not much money. The trouble is that their knowledge of English extends to okay and you-okay. So the next day when we woke up around lunch and decided to meet at the a pizza place near the beach we weren’t prepared to be dropped at two completely different pizza places on two ends of the beach. The essential items that one needs to survive on one’s own in a foreign country were carefully divided between the two of us. My friend had the money, the map and the credit cards while I had the hotel keys and the passports. Hmm, it was only three hours later and through a stroke of marvellous luck that we found each other. Not that we were looking, both of us just happened to go to the same place for lunch.

That evening we met John and Chris, two American marines, at Burger King. They invited us to sit and said how they felt that Indians were really smart and spoke great English, and that our economy was booming and that China was a threat to them and that McCain would win the elections, and that Americans are just doing what they can so that no “shit happens” any where in the Middle-East. They were typical nice, god-fearing, bush-loving people. Chris wanted to join college and study architecture while John wanted to serve in the navy. It was strange how they seemed quite aghast with the in-your-face nature of Pattaya; they said Hawaii was a far better place. “The women there are more of a challenge, but then it’s worth it, here we only care for the beer.” They took our email ids and left.

Bangkok has the world’s biggest malls and liars. The hotel we booked said walking distance from city centre; it wasn’t even walking distance from the road. But the two pretty girls at the reception made up for it by being really nice, one of them even walked into our rooms to wake us up. Wake-up calls are taken more seriously in Bangkok it seems. Oh the highlight of the day was the steak place we had lunch at, the best food of the trip.

Singapore Airlines will avoid giving you drinks by serving you food while looking at the ceiling; you have to be shameless to get them to fork out alcohol. And shameless I was, all the way back home.

I got lost once again at the Delhi Airport - went and stood at a line of passengers that I thought were from my flight and were queuing up to exit for baggage claim. As it turned out, they were boarding a flight to Canada. It was a mistake that the airport authorities were not particularly pleased with. And then I was led to the wrong immigration counters and Mr. Gyanesh Prasad Singh mocked my inability to understand the floor plan of the international airport and the fact that I was not carrying a pen.

Hmm, think I will love travelling, maybe that’s a good job opportunity, travel and write about it. But I am not sure how many people would prefer travelling like I do. I have been carefully studying this British Airways ad that offers a return ticket for ten thousand buck. It might lead to something very soon.

Sweet Wine – Cream

Who wants the worry, the hurry of city life.
Money, nothing funny; wasting the best of our life.

Sweet wine, hay making, sunshine day breaking.
We can wait till tomorrow.

Car speed, road calling, bird freed, leaf falling.
We can bide time.

Sweet wine, hay making, sunshine day breaking.
We can wait till tomorrow.

Car speed, road calling, bird freed, leaf falling.
We can bide time.

Who wants the worry, the hurry of city life.
Money, nothing funny; wasting the best of our life.

On the Road

Bixby Canyon Bridge – Death Cab for Cutie

I descended a dusty gravel ridge

Beneath the Bixby Canyon Bridge

Until I eventually arrived

At the place where your soul had died

Barefoot in the shallow creek

I grabbed some stones from underneath

And waited for you to speak to me

And the silence, it became so very clear

That you had long ago disappeared

I cursed myself for being surprised

That this didn't play like it did in my mind

All the way from San Francisco

As I chased the end of your road

'cause I've still got miles to go

I want to know my fate if I keep up this way

It's hard to want to stay awake

And everyone you meet they all seem to be asleep

You wonder if you're missing your dream

You can't see your dream

You can't see your dream

You just can't see your dream Dream [x12]

Then it started getting dark

And I trudged back to where the car was parked

No closer to any kind of truth

As I must assume was the case with you

A Horse with No Aim

Sometimes you do things just for the heck of it, like this song, I think…

A Horse with No Name – America

On the first part of the journey I was looking at all the life
There were plants and birds and rocks and things
There was sand and hills and rings
The first thing I met was a fly with a buzz
And the sky with no clouds
The heat was hot and the ground was dry
But the air was full of sound

I've been through the desert on a horse with no name
It felt good to be out of the rain
In the desert you can remember your name
'Cause there ain't no one for to give you no pain La, la ...

After two days in the desert sun
My skin began to turn red
After three days in the desert fun
I was looking at a river bed
And the story it told of a river that flowed
Made me sad to think it was dead

You see I've been through the desert on a horse with no name
It felt good to be out of the rain
In the desert you can remember your name
'Cause there ain't no one for to give you no pain La, la ...

After nine days I let the horse run free
'Cause the desert had turned to sea
There were plants and birds and rocks and things
There was sand and hills and rings
The ocean is a desert with it's life underground
And a perfect disguise above
Under the cities lies a heart made of ground
But the humans will give no love

You see I've been through the desert on a horse with no name
It felt good to be out of the rain
In the desert you can remember your name
'Cause there ain't no one for to give you no pain La, la ...

Doesn’t always result in disaster, I guess…

This blog has come close to be called The Stunned Silence. It’s ironic because the life of this blogger has been going through everything but peace or inactivity. Many posts have come and gone in my head. And even now I can’t bring myself to say much.

Have you thought of this – just before throwing something away, something you want to throw far far away, you need to hold it firmly, and pay it a lot of attention? It’s a bit crazy.

I wake up early morning, really early, sometimes even before five. And the first thought in my head is of the day’s priorities. I don’t know why this job has suddenly come to mean so much. When, really, now I know it doesn’t and yet my stomach won’t stop howling and feeling upset till I’m at work looking at numbers, calling for stock and somehow tackling the five inevitable big issues that crop up each day. Only about three are somehow tackled by the time I return, well into the night. Then I have just the amount of energy to pat my dog half-heartedly, change, eat, watch twenty minutes of TV, and nod in all directions at my mom’s daily family update and remark at my dad’s stupid yet actually funny jokes. Then I listen to a few songs and fall asleep.

Sometimes you grow up believing you were meant to do great things, really big things. And then you end up being a tutor, or someone who makes jingles for ads or sells shampoo, or as someone who makes reports for someone who needs to present an idea to someone who wants to launch a new chocolate into the market. Of course the chocolate will be manufactured by a different person.

What does one do? I am not even sure if there are any really great things to do, any big things to do. I don’t think studying economics was any nobler than selling detergent. At least the way I studied it and the manner in which it was taught (not always, I admit) and tested (almost every time).

And yet I grew up believing I was supposed to be doing something important. And it’s not just a random belief.

So even if I am doing the most mundane thing I end up putting as much of myself into it as possible. It distracts from the essential ordinariness of the work itself. And it adds a certain amount of graciousness to work. Be it Economics at Delhi University or managing a sales organization. I think nothing can be more dignified than effort. I don’t understand when people wonder why I’d fret to this extent over ‘work’ not like I am responsible for a billion lives. But to me anything you do is as ordinary as you make it out to be. You can just work or study or you can somehow manage a target in the midst of the worst floods in fifty years and somehow manage to get yourself through a class that involves reading Fudenberg and Tirole.

So right now I am not working for anyone but myself. I guess I will just have to wait till I actually do something that is essentially important, maybe social work or films. Till then I will work as hard at this, the work I have in hand.

RNAODM

It’s beyond two in the morning. And I am standing in the balcony of a girl with whom my dear friend is in love with… I am in Delhi, a few hours ago I was in Hyderabad, and a few days ago I was in Delhi. It’s a tiny balcony and is filled with warm humid air.

Lolita.

If I poured out my private-most thoughts, the clandestine bustle of my brain, it would probably make me unacceptable to society. Yet to me these feelings are perfectly normal, they never make me question myself. Is it so with everyone?

Mother died today. Or maybe yesterday, I don't know.

Its one year since I started work, a year filled with warm humid air.

The short, chaotic yet repetitive sound of the drums from Talk Show Host, do you remember how they are wrapped in the lyrics, in Yorke’s voice?

Receiving awards can be a scary thing too, especially when it’s before an audience of four thousand people. How do I always end up desperately seeking something and then not caring for it once I get it?

Just because I am winning, doesn’t mean I’ve won… Coldplay have released new music. I don’t know, I am not disappointed, yet I am. Maybe I need to come back to the album later, when I am more agreeable.

Some days I think I am the best at what I am doing, on others I conclude that I have never done even a marginally good job. The constant need for reassurance; it is the surest signal that I am indeed an artist of some kind.

***

Airports are remarkably conducive to thought, airplanes are not. The gentleman sitting next to me is trying to read this. I hope he gets this line.

The idiot!

Italo Calvino.

***

Sometimes I think if I get down to it, if I rely on mental images, I can be a good painter. I need to paint as if I am thinking, allow the painting to be a victim of my thoughts.

GP is getting married. I must say nothing surprises or shocks me anymore. Everything is matter of fact. But I am happy for him.

RNAODM. RODANM. RDANOM. If you keep the last two letters intact and rearrange the middle of any word in any way it will still be easily recognised by the brain. Random should be spelt randomly, don’t you think?

What on earth could lead to someone committing suicide? The realisation that with it ends everything, before and after?

***

Nothing is more oppressive than a completely still and muggy night. I would never have imagined being here, in this balcony that is surrounded by token patches of green and countless blocks of concrete.

But there is the smell of smoke, which is all I look for anyway. Confessions of Zeno, when will I find and read that book?

I’m pulled into a conversation, and I pretend to agree, that’s what I do when I am not listening.

Eventually, I’m left alone in the balcony, but slowly it begins to get crowded again, with my faceless thoughts. I hold them by their chins and look into their eyes and I still cannot recognise them.

Have you ever felt not being part of anything? I lead a strange life; on the outside I do so many things with great passion and commitment. But in the secret recesses of my mind I know that my involvement is only an act. Not that my sham is flawless, the aversion manifests itself as prolonged silence and a face painted in boredom.

But most often others simply fall for this image without recognising the latent emotion. But is it really aversion? Or is it simply boredom portrayed as boredom?

Middle-intelligence, once again I have the words for certain emotions, but not all the words. Not enough to exactly interpret them. Or am I just making an attempt to excavate fancy details of my mind where there are none.

I think I will spend all my life seeking reassurance, trying to prove to myself that I am of some good.

Self-assurance was identified as my key strength a few months ago. But that was in the folds of the superficial life I enact.

I may not have been sure about what really did interest me, but I was absolutely sure about what didn't. – I am not even sure about what doesn’t interest me.

I guess I ask too many questions of myself.

The Writurn from/to Siolence

In another five years I will almost be thirty, it’s quite something. It’s huge, and not in the same way being twenty was when I was a fifteen year old. (This wasn’t meant to be the beginning, it just occurred to me all of a sudden.)

I have a few opinions on life, they aren’t original but my renditions of these are. I have thought of them for long enough, and recited them to others quite often. But lately I have had no new opinion on being, or on living. In fact I think it’s been more than two years, actually three.

It’s probably because I haven’t been reading much, but then again books only provide the expressions to formulate the opinion. Maybe I haven’t met brand new people or at least interesting brand new people for a long time? You know people who or not linked to you through any elaborate complicated and flimsy chain of acquaintances. I hate people who try to establish these chains. I hate facebook too.

No – that is not the thing.

I guess as I grow older my thoughts, beliefs and ideas are becoming severely rigid. I look at a situation or at people from a perspective that isn’t changing. And it needn’t change; all I need is little flexibility. I think, in many ways, it’s the only path to a wider outlook.

Sometimes I feel I am caught with a frustrating level of intelligence and courage. It is enough for me to be aware of and understand all this, but not sufficient for me to do something about it. Life is easier for those who live on the extremes.

******

The worst is to do something you don’t like badly. But it’s a sign of strength, don’t you think? Isn’t it a brave act, that of rejecting the unpleasant but customary? Plus there is always the risk of falling in love with something just because you become good at it.

******
We are a generation that has seen no struggle for independence or war, a generation that didn’t have to wait outside the cinema to watch a movie or trick elders into buying us music. In many ways we have had it easy. Our only struggle is the confusion in our heads. It is a battle, and it is for freedom. But what from? And most importantly what for?

I have spoken to many people from college lately, and none of them are happy with work. More importantly none of them know what exactly bothers them. They just don’t want to have anything to do with it. Worse still, they have no idea what they really want to do. So they shift companies, cities and people hoping that the temporary chaos will distract from the misery. Others like me anticipated this dilemma and created for the benefit of themselves and others a mythical bohemian interest, making movies in my case, which allows me to explain my situation.

******

Cookie has registered strong protest against the predominantly vegetarian cooking at our home. She has taken to eating mosquitoes and flies. She lies still, almost playing dead and when the buzz surrounds her she snaps like a crocodile. It reminds me of that All-Out advertisement. An aunt of mine would insist on performing an embarrassingly accurate version of the frog like device eliminating the mosquitoes with its tongue. Anyway, I am feeding the stupid dog slices of salami to keep her from being disgusting. Come to think of it, Jolly too would feast on those sick insects.

******

Kureishi feels that hurting someone is an act of unwilling familiarity and confidence, reluctant intimacy he calls it. Is it? But even if it is true, what is the point then? I admire his suggestion of avoiding the trap of declaring all acts of injustice and every mistake as deliberate moral infringement.

His character is pathetic, large ideas but petty predicaments. But then again, the crises of our times are probably meant to be trivial because they are largely individual.

God Put A Smile On My Face

Supposedly, life repeats itself in cycles of four years. I read this somewhere, a long time ago. Then I projected myself into the future and thought about where I’d be in four years. At present, I don’t think much about the future. I guess my tendency and ability to predict the upcoming ended with my academic life.

So, today when the theory returned to me all of a sudden, I reacted differently. I looked back to four years ago…

For every thing that is ending in my life, there is another that is beginning. For everything that has ended something else has just been set in motion. I am among new people, doing something for the first time – my work. And I use it to block out the past and to introduce me to the new. I am losing myself in it, for no clear reason other than to rediscover myself. All the manic effort at work has led to much achievement, but what is most dear to me is the exertion itself.

Whatever your hands find, do it with all your might! Even if it’s something you don’t like.

Four years ago, life was much the same. I was caught in the midst of a series of adjustments. And then too I escaped being torn apart in the confusion by holding on to something. It was theatre. I lost myself to the stage, to the dramatics society. It replaced my friends, my thoughts, my dreams, my sorrows. It changed who I was, completely, forever. I submitted myself to acting and that gave me the strength to ignore everything else that was happening.

We used a small music player to entertain us between practices. At the end of the day I’d carry it back to my room. I discovered Coldplay for the first time on that player. I remember a weekend when I put A Rush of Blood to the Head on repeated play and sat down with The Fountainhead. By Sunday evening I had finished the book, and grown fonder of Coldplay.

Today when I got back, a Coldplay concert was showing on TV. The theory seems fairly scientific to me now.

This was my favourite song then, and I know this will sound phoney, but it was the song they were playing when I turned on the TV.

God Put A Smile On My Face

Where do we go nobody knows
I've gotta say I'm on my way, down
God give me style and give me grace
God put a smile upon my face

Where do we go to draw the line
I've gotta say, I've wasted all your time, honey, honey
Where do I go to fall from grace
God put a smile upon your face, yeah

Now can you work it out I'm worse than you
Yeah, when you work it out i want it too
Now when you work out where to draw the line
Your guess is as good as mine...

Where do we go nobody knows
Don't ever say you're on your way down.
When god gave you style and gave you grace
And put a smile upon your face, oh yeah

Now when you work it out im worse than you
Yeah, when you work it out i want it too
Now when you work out where to draw the line
Your guess is as good as mine.

It's as good as mine
It's as good as mine
It's as good as mine
As good as mine
As good as mine
As good as mine
As good as mine…

Where do we go nobody knows
Don't ever say you're on your way, down
When god gave you style and gave you grace
And put a smile upon your face

A Short-Love Story

She came to college quite often. In the morning, she’d come alone and sit in silence and enjoy her coffee. If you looked at her you couldn’t say if she was sad, or happy, or sleepy or bored. She just sat there, spoke to no one and left. But during lunch, it was almost as if you saw another person. She was surrounded by an entourage of noisy south Delhi kids, with goatees, fancy phones, clothes in the brightest of colours, and perfect teeth. I always wondered how teeth can be so perfect.

But it was the evenings that I really looked forward to. She’d stay on for much longer. Of course we never spoke, nor did I really go out of my way to see her. I’d just be doing my own thing; and if I happened to see her it would brighten my day. It wasn’t just her obvious beauty or her tremendous sense of style that I was drawn to… Okay, maybe, I was simply fascinated by how gorgeous she was. The intelligence, sharp wit, good nature, and other desirable traits were simply the construct of my own imagination. But I was quite certain that she was all these things apart from being incredibly attractive.

Was I going to do something about it? No! I don’t think I could ever make the first move. Previously I had been known to shy away even when the other party dropped hints, considerable hints, like send me a letter or something. And here I was up against someone who was completely unaware of my existence.

I was forever haunted by one question. Did she recognise me? Was I familiar to her; even a fraction of how recognizable she was to me? Every time we’d pass each other by I’d be aware of nothing else but her. Had she noticed this? Some days I’d be convinced that I was as known to her as she was to me, that she came to college only to see me. But in a different time, and this occurred more often, I’d be sure that she didn’t even know I existed, leave alone be aware of my attraction to her.
Okay the times that we crossed paths deserve special mention for my stupendous idiocy. If I was aware she was coming my way, I’d stare into the ground, double the pace of my walk and just pass her by. Sometimes I’d lift my head assuming she was behind me only to find myself caught staring directly at her. However, I reserved the full display of my foolishness for the few times I simply bumped into her. I’d just freeze, pretend to look for something in my pocket, blush, sweat and then eventually watch as she passed by.

Smiling at a complete stranger, it’s the one skill I’d be willing to give an arm for. I just can’t get myself to do it. My mind gets clouded with a million questions, hormones that temporarily convert me into an inanimate pumpkin are released, my vision begins to get hazy, and my face freezes into a scowl. It’s really not as easy some people make it out to be.

******

I was lying in bed, with nothing much to do, when I decided to make yet another aimless trip to CP. It’s amazing how quickly I could get ready and be at the metro station even though I had no idea why I was going to that place.
As soon as I got to the platform, I saw her!

It was quite brilliant because she was all by herself, and hadn’t noticed me at all. With the stealth that would put to shame a Russian spy, I walked towards her. The metro wasn’t there yet, so I hid myself behind other passengers and waited. When the train finally arrived and I saw her move into it, I darted towards the same entrance and then slowed myself before ambling into the coach.

I sat diagonally opposite her, the train was full of people and she hadn’t looked at me yet. I thought about what I could do. Maybe I could say hello, but then wouldn’t it be weird to just say so to a complete stranger. Maybe I could go up to her and ask her out for coffee. Maybe I could just tell her everything…

I remember she was looking particularly pretty that day. And for the longest time I kept staring at her through the crowd of people between us. This was quite a stupid thing to do because I was wasting valuable time that should have been spent planning my next move. But what the hell?!

Okay so my grand plan was - at Kashmere Gate when most of the passengers would get off, I’d get up and go sit next to her and then hopefully we’d strike up a conversation. She’d think I got on at that station and everything would be smooth. Of course the plan reeked of cowardice, but that was the maximum I could do without dying of nervousness. Anyway, I was only a few stations away from my evil plot, and got up in preparation.

What would I say? And if I did manage initiating some sort of a conversation what would we talk about? What if she had bad breath? What if she ended her sentences with – like this only? What if I burped? What if she fell instantly in love with me? Am I ready? How do I smile?

Such randomness floated around in my head as I waited for the train to pull into Kashmere Gate. For a moment, as the train slowed down, I realised I was doing something of this sort for the first time in my life. It made me smile with apprehension. As I moved through the swarm of people trying to get out of the train, I noticed a giant lady in a burkha was also heading for the same seat. I moved faster, and sliced through all the other passengers, and got there before her. But the wicked lady placed a hand on the seat, bloody hell I almost sat on it!

So there we were, I was looking at the colossal woman, you couldn’t say where she was looking exactly but it must have been at me. She, that is, the prettiest of us three, was looking at me. Now what does a man do? I had to get up and leave the seat for her. My heart sank; this had poured cold water over my plan. That woman will definitely burn in hell, I’m sure of that, she didn’t even say thank you.
So there I was, standing like a fool, in front of her. All of a sudden I felt too tall, too thin, my bag was dangling from my shoulder too stupidly, and my feet they were also all wrong. Hmpf.

But I guess there was some luck in store for me, because the enormous woman got off at the next station itself. Now there wasn’t much time left to CP, but it was still something. I sat down and slowly twisted my neck towards her. To my horror, she was looking straight at me and smiling. It scared the shit out of me and I jerked my face away from her. Damn, I was almost sure I had ruined everything. Unless… I jerked my face towards her again, gave the most awkward smile, and then turned away quickly. Now I was completely sure I had ruined everything.

Suddenly there was some movement, she was getting a call, and she couldn’t find her phone in her backpack. Interesting, she seemed a tad nervous too, aha! And then she did a very strange thing, she pulled out her phone and then turned it off.
Now obviously this could have happened for a million different reasons. She could have been avoiding her dad, her boyfriend, a stalker (ahem!); she could be late for something, or almost where she had to be. But my stupid mind couldn’t do away with the possibility of me playing a pivotal role in her refusing to answer the call.
In all this we were almost near CP. We hadn’t as much as spoken a word… I was running out of a plan, when suddenly she spoke, “Is CP next?”

I turned to look at her, my mouth half open, and then I looked at my feet, then outside of the window, into my phone and was just about to answer her when the electronic announcement for CP was made. I think I haven’t felt more useless ever. She smiled at me, and got up to leave the train.

What a smile!! Sigh!

I made up my mind; I’d walk up to her and ask her out for coffee. She was a bit ahead of me on the escalator, but I was certain I could catch up with her before the exit. But of course the CP metro station has enough people at any time for it to qualify as a separate country all by itself. I lost her to the crowd, and then when I found her she was quite some distance ahead. I walked quickly, ya, that’s a thing, no matter how much of a hurry I am in, I cannot run in public!

She was walking really fast, in fact she was walking so quickly I had difficulty in catching up with her. I had to swallow my pride and run a bit, a few steps only, then I’d walk, then run again, then walk. And then it struck me, maybe she is walking so quickly to avoid me? I was horrified. Sometimes stupid things like this suddenly make a lot of sense. I found myself slowing down, terribly embarrassed of my behaviour. What was I thinking? I had been doing things I’d laugh at others for.

I was really a bum.

I had almost stopped walking and took to staring at my feet and was in half a mind to return to my room.... So, I didn’t notice that she had walked back and was now only about ten feet away. I recovered from my shame immediately and tried to look all nonchalant; she was approaching quickly and wearing a large smile.

“Do you ha-have the time?”

I looked at her, then at the security guard, then at the roof of the metro and then into my phone.

“16 – No 4:45, err PM”

“Thanks a ton!”

And then she turned around and began to walk away, quicker than ever. Every cell in my body pleaded with me to go ask her out for coffee. But somehow I just stood there. Then I turned back and returned to my hostel room.

******

It’s really unfair, people should be born with the innate ability to smile at strangers and ask them out for coffee. Too much is left to be learnt all by ourselves.