I miss you, kgp

I hated people who would gather friends around and say shit like, "These are the best days of my life." I found that statement rather depressing. I thought life was long, things would happen, love would be found. I waited for times more exciting than sitting around in a room, not knowing how to spend waking hours. I can safely say I was wrong.

Sitting around alone in a room, whiling away time, I miss it.

Walking about the corridor lost in my head, jumping over water pools in the rain, surprised at the occasional water droplet in my eye. I miss it.

Catwalk, I miss you.

Patel's manhood, I fancied looking at you until I heard what they called you. I still fancied you, but only secretly.

Trees outside my window hiding me from the juniors in D-block, I miss you.

Stupid juniors, revering me like I'm Jesus, I wish you more brains.

The tennis court, I loved looking at you when it was raining. Just spelling it out, I'm sure you noticed me.

People on 2.2 saying Hi to me, I must've often seemed indifferent but just know I miss you too, if that soothes anything.

Scholsave. The Scholars' Avenue. You, saviour, you. What would I have done without you. Thanks for giving me my idols.

My hardwood bed, the missing spider, dear fornicating lizards, do you miss me too? Especially you, bed, who've you been sleeping with?

The wind. Oh Kgp wind, have there been more lovers like me? Do the trees speak to you like they did when I was there? Do you two whistle and creak still? Did you hear the story about the queer one?

Rain, you spoilt me. You might like to know I never opened my arms to anyone else like that again. I never slid and jumped in puddles again. I haven't stood on a car roof since. I never loved one of you again, never let myself fall ill and get hospitalised so I could stand in some more rain. I'm sorry I've been away, and I miss you terribly.

I miss my neighbour, the caring nanny who used to live next door. Thanks for saving my life one time.

I miss heartbreak. The sophomore who got hit in the nose by a senior. Funny, to think of it now.

I miss my flute.

I miss Patel's tempo shout. I miss the common room. I miss being the boss, the few times they let me be one.

What? No, I don't miss my Department. Sorry. Go away.

I'm doing well in my life, you know. I'm busy beyond capacity doing work that takes all of my creativity, and getting paid boatloads without even asking for it. This is the part where I do something with my life. And I'm doing it, bitch. But I miss things.

I miss aimlessness. I miss lying on the bed arranging shit in my head turning insights into one-liners, with Pink Floyd lulling me to sleep. I miss my speakers hanging from top of the window sill, those things filling my room and my being.

I miss random songs playing somewhere afar, in someone's room perhaps. I discovered Latika's Theme like that, and it ruined it a bit to finally know the nameless song I'd fallen in love with.

I still have my flute. It's still broken. It's just not mine. Like it never was.

I miss the 2.2 like hell. I miss the loneliness we shared. No matter how hard you're messed up in your head, a couple 2.2s can always set it right.

I miss a gazillion things, but what I miss the most are two.

I miss Bish, and I miss you, Kgp.

I took my time, but I miss you just fine.

The Bhabhi Manifesto

We are the Bhabhis. And we're here to take over the world, home by home, street by street, mother-in-law by mother-in-law. There is no escape. You are surrounded by us, and the only way to pacify a bhabhi is an unused credit card. We are in your homes, in your living rooms, in your television sets. We are in your hot cornflakes and breakfast cereal, in your popcorn-flicks and dinner serials, we are the Dhumtana in Kasauti, we are the jewellery in Kahani Ghar Ghar, we are the 20 year jump in Kyunki, WE ARE THE B IN BALAJI.

We are in the street haggling the sabziwala, we're in your lane straightening up your rowdy kids, we're in the market destroying the shopkeeper's dying self-respect, we're in Beautina giving due respect to our bountiful beauty. We are on the park bench discussing Obama and how he loves his wife, we're reading up Sachchi Kahaniyan and we know all the ways men cheat.

Wake up, my fellow Bhabhis. Wake up and make some breakfast and pack the kids' lunch. Wake up and wake your husbands so they can go to their little offices and pretend to be useful. Wake up and run the world. Wake up and gossip. Wake up the driver and go shopping.

You're a Bhabhi, girl, in the Bhabhi World. Come come Bhabhi, lets go Kitty Party.

Wake up, and haven't you heard? There's a sale in Lifestyle! Bhaag Bhabhi Bhaag!

Risky

It's risky, you know,
you and me.
And I don't know
what you're thinking

My heart's just chugging
on cue, really
It feels a bit
like sinking

Is it my love
turning you off?
How long am I
to keep trying?

All I'm saying
is, honey,
I don't know
if you're mine

Girl in the City

She won't look at you twice. Her world moves too fast. Yeah she's on foot, and sure the street's crazy crowded, but she's storming through it at her own intense pace. It's not a walk in the park, and it's not a run. It's not the way she jogs in the morning. She's slower than the jog, but stormier. The bags clutched and held close around her being, instead of making her feel laden and weighed down, feel more like propeller mass . She's the one lending them weight, it would seem. It's not hurry, it's just the speed of her life.

When she sits at Barista, peering at other tables, waiting for her coffee, she doesn't look like she's sitting alone, and she doesn't look like someone's coming to join her. Her looking at you is neither intrusive nor inviting. As you're about to realise, it has nothing to do with you.

Lying on the bed at night, a girl has a thousand things to think of. Grossly underestimated numbers those, but it's not a thousand things on this one's mind. It's just those two. Or maybe three. It's what's driving her life. It's what she's building her life to be. Day by day, hour in hour out. Her stormy walk through people and things yet touching none, her laser focus on things around her, her last few lingering minutes on the bed before she gets up in the morning, they are all reflections. Reflections more of this time in her life, than of her. This is the time of sweat and hair damp with sweat. This is the time when you either make it, or you settle. And she's not settling. Not yet, not now.

And yet, she has those moments of aberration. Not long-lived, not emotional. As logical as any. And yet, aberrational. Irrelevant, but only temporarily. Demanding, but only if she lets them. Visions of future, and glimpses of uncertainty. Blurred, future-tinted images asking to be cleared. Irrelevant, as I said, but only temporarily. She won't compromise, not now with the present, and not then with the future. One thing at a time.

A coffee shop is an amazing place. There are people, and there is coffee. And it's one of the few places where you don't really need company. Not that she lacks company, just that she has had much better. It's alright though. A coffee shop is a coffee shop.

You should see her shopping. It may not sound like much, but she's at the top of her game right now. She's the Major General of shopping. Her eye is sharper than ever, and her tastes severely exacting. She always understood money, but now it's her own. It's a whole different ball game.

Her new friends are mighty impressed with her, just like they've always been. Her bosses would count as friends if they weren't her bosses on the side. Her problems are real, but life's doing well. At least it makes sense now. It kind of always did but at least things are moving now. They kind of always were but at least now she knows what she's after. Not absolutely completely, at least as much as she does anyway. It's good, it's fine. Not half as bad as she would have imagined.

Look at her walk on the sidewalk. Bags and folder in hand. Cutting through the crowd, pupils dilated in thought. All systems running, all engines at go. She could be lost, but not today. Maybe tomorrow, maybe when she can afford it. For now, she walks. At just the speed of her life.

Firte the jhadte patton mein
Udte mausam mein nihatthon jaise
Maloom na tha mausam guzrega
Tu choo guzregi patton jaise

Dilli Wali: Day 115

“Who ever bought these things? Why does this market even exist?”

“You love this place.”

“Right. Like I love you? Spot on.”

A boy was selling mini-hookahs on Janpath. She would’ve hated the whole street for the rest of the day had the boy in tattered clothes not come to her, had he not thrown the artsy specimen right in front of her nose, and had he not said in broken english, “Madam, 200 rupees”. Her heart melted at the sight. She brazenly pushed the boy away and grabbed the hookah, clutched in delight herself, sighing her mighty love out. The boy didn’t know what to feel, stuck between taking offense at being manhandled and the prospect of a seemingly certain sale. He eats his ego, forces a smile, and stands there waiting for the money. I, the only one with nothing important to do in this emotionally charged setting, start to take out my wallet, and stop before it can take a peek at the happening world. “40 rupees”, says the businesswoman, devoid of all excitement from the previous, unfinished moment.

Continue reading

Dilli Wali: Day 123

"I don't like my parents. They love me too much. It's not healthy. They should treat me badly, they should throw me out of the house."

"They did."

"No, they didn't. Fuck you man I told you I LEFT. Go away, retard."

"Yeah. You had to leave home because they found your cigarette and you wanted to spare them the horror of living with a smoker. It rings true somewhere deep within me, you know it does."

"And yet, truth stays. 1. They were being too irritating. 2. You're right, I didn't want to inflict myself on them."

He knew it was true.

"They're so good, you know, and I don't deserve it. I mean I'm awesome, I give myself that, but I'm insane. I'm a freak rhino."

"That's insanely awesome."

"If only it meant something."

"It does. You're a rhino."

Continue reading

Dilli Wali: Day 124

All day long, he lugged his ass through roads unknown to man, into gift shops unknown to the spirit of giving. He went through every greeting card ever written and rejected them before his skull read the signals from his eyes. There was nothing in this world worthy of being gifted to the girl he loved. He’d bought a lot of crap though. Mainly in the hope that a theme will emerge as he buys more shit, and partly due to the psychotic fear that someone will buy them off by the time he returns to get it. A gun that lit up with blinding colors and made noises like a kid imitating Rambo grunts. A pair of blue gym gloves that looked badass with the gun, if you looked at them right. A Krrish mask, to cover the eyes in a badass, criminal, non-Krrish way. A couple more guns. A couple more masks, to cover the true superhero identity of the wearer. A metal knuckle, an eye patch, and a huge-ass empty Drawing Sheet that he struggled to fill through the day. With curses, stick figures, and sweet nothings.

Continue Reading