Sunny Side Up

Sue loved eggs in every form possible. She ate the last spoon of scrambled egg from her box and got back to staring at the monitor in the lab. The university tower clock bell rang eleven times. The lab was all hers at this late hour. She had to head home in an hour as the lab closed at midnight. All her friends preferred to work at home. Sue however, liked being alone with only the sound of the ocean waves for company. It helped her to focus on her project.

At 11.45 pm she logged out of her machine, picked her pink bag which her doting mom had sent from India. Every few months a parcel would arrive with tons of clothes in all shades of pink. She was not sure if she liked pink. But hell she cared.

Walking back on the deserted and sparsely lit Centennial Drive at this hour lost in her thoughts had become routine for her. Her thoughts were mostly about the assignment she was to submit the next morning. Her apartment condo located on the end of Centennial Drive had become a summer camp of sorts with most of her friends hanging out there.

“I will restart the simulation from my laptop”, she was thinking as she climbed the stairs to the apartment door. Something flew and hit her specs and her hair received the first dose of protein in a long time. The yellow sticky egg dripped down her cheeks onto her white top. She knew it had begun.

 Most of her friends dreaded the egg beating ceremony. She was not the meek types.

“What the helllll!”, she cried,  wiping her specs with the edge of her top. Putting back her specs, on the other side of the window she saw Preethu smiling sadistically and ready with another egg in his hand.

The door creaked open and two more smiling faces appeared. “How do you like your eggs, Miss Sue?”, Amu asked, followed by a demonic laughter from Rohan.
Usually her response was " Sunny side up". But not today.

Then the eggs poured on Sue like the monsoon or like Ram’s 917 'instant arrows' raining on Raavan. She bowed down and shielded herself with the bag. Before the next round of shots were fired, they all cried in unison –

                                    “Happy Birthday  Sue!”

They were in no mood to subside though. They were just giving back what they had received on their birthday. Her “Stop it guys!” was an invitation for the next salvo.

Sue stepped back and started running to no where. The hounds followed her continuing to target her. Some eggs hit her, some missed and landed on the lawn. Sue picked an unbroken egg, stopped running and turned around. 

“Stop it now or I will hit you”, Sue warned.

“You drop it down now, or this will get worse for”, and before Preetu could complete the sentence Sue shot the egg towards him and started running. “My hairrrrr”, Preetu frowned as he wiped the yolk from his forehead.

Sue ran to the woods located in the back of the apartment. Not seeing any point in following her in the dark the trio decided to stay at the front door.

“She will have to come back here”, they muttered.

While in the woods, Sue noticed that the back door was left open. “How stupid of them”, she thought. She entered the apartment through the back door stealthily and saw Candy immersed in her Mac.

“Candyyy, help me!”

Candy looked up. “Wow! You are almost a French toast. Don’t even look at me. I am out of this”.

Candy was the most non-violent among the house mates. She loved her complexion too much and had opted out of the egg ceremony. She was never the aggressor but sometimes she did become the victim. Seeing the trio rush for her, Sue ran into the bathroom and locked herself.

The hounds moved all ammunition to the bathroom door and waited for Sue to give up.

For 14 minutes it was a stalemate.

Eventually the door opened. The elated feeling of the attackers was doused by a splash of sticky soapy liquid on their faces. They ran to the hall rubbing their eyes. Sue had not given up. She was very innovative – her weapon was - hot water + Dove body wash + Pantene Pro V + Tide + Listerine – everything she could find in the bathroom. Sue quickly grabbed the egg cartons lying on the floor and moved back in.

Relieved that there were no more eggs outside, Sue stepped into the shower.

Without any ammo the hounds had turned into sheep. Amu still had ideas.

“I have to crash into the bathroom while she is taking a bath. That is our only chance of getting at her. You guys get me whatever you can from the refrigerator”.

Very reluctantly Rohan & Preetu agreed.

Amu unlocked the bathroom latch with a hair pin and crashed in. She pushed aside the shower curtain and started pouring orange juice, followed by yoghurt, milk, leftovers….

“Amuuuuu! Amuuuuuu!”, was all Sue could do. Amu picked up the egg cartons and walked out slowly, knowing that the war was over.

Later, Sue stepped out – shiny hair, glowing skin, in her new pink dress. 

In the candle lit hall everyone waited for Sue to cut the cake. Sue blew the candles and cut the dark chocolate cake. The most unmelodious “Happy Birthday” song  followed.

Sue smiled for the camera, looked around and tried to remember whose turn was next.

Wanted - Indian politician

A large secular political party in India is actively looking out for new hires. An eligible candidate should have at least one year experience in the following –

•  Should be able to identify all mistakes of the opposition and condemn them aggressively. 
• Should be able to take responsibility and resign when you get caught committing the same mistakes.
• Should be able to collaborate with the corporate world for mutual benefits.
• Should be able to set up a 3 man joint enquiry committee when no other option works.
•  Should be able to multi-task effectively between attending inauguration ceremonies, award ceremonies, wedding receptions and inspecting flood affected areas from helicopters.
•  Hobbies should include either of – building elephant statues, attending cricket matches, social service or public speaking on democracy and secularism. 
• Any kind of educational or criminal background is a plus.
• Actors, children of freedom fighters/politicians and retired underworld dons will be preferred.

Discrimination will be made only on caste, region, language, sex and bank balance. Otherwise, we are an equal opportunity provider.

The Running Penguin

And she started running towards me the moment she saw me.  Not that she is a good runner or anything like that. Her running is more like a penguin running, just using the lower half of the legs to do all the work. The knees don’t bend and the upper body moves from side to side. 

She does run every time we meet. We may meet after a year, month or a week. Just looking at me stimulates the part of the brain which makes people run. While she runs in her ‘slow motion’, I keep looking at her and I don’t move an inch. This is the same person whom I keep talking to every day and night. Her long hair, her smile, her brown eyes and the dark circles around them which grow and shrink depending on her office work load.

You can be on the phone 24 hours a day, discuss everything you did and didn’t; make every major decision together about whether it’s going to be Taco Bell or Sub way or someplace else for lunch; make weekend plans for each other to make sure both don’t feel lonely and then go on a dinner date with the phone and the earphones.

But there is nothing that will give the same happiness as the physical presence of the person you love. And then even the silent company means everything.

While I am still going through these thoughts, the penguin collides with me and embraces me in a big hug, like I have just returned from a NASA lunar mission, safe and sound. 

And before I say anything, she asks –

“Main moti ho gayi na?”

Clouds and Silver Linings

The closet door opened in the evening and he struggled to open his eyes again. The 6x5 feet closet had been his jail for 2 years now. Solitary confinement was a way of torturing himself for the mistakes he had committed. Abandoned by his people, he had found solace and comfort in the darkness of the closet.

May be, it was an escape from the outside world. He felt he had done something wrong but whenever he ventured out amongst people more guilt was poured into him. He thought of killing himself but it was against his beliefs to run away from problems. But neither did he have any strength left in him to stand up and face the situation he had put himself in and to bear the repercussions of his actions.

Gradually he withered away and settled in his small dark world - day in and day out; where he didn't feel lonely as the place was too small. Time passed by quickly as he couldn't see anything and his mind was numb and blank. He ventured out of his confinement sometimes to eat when hungry.

This cloud was about to meet a silver lining. His good friend came to visit him and there was something she said which turned back the tide of his life.

"It's ok to make mistakes." "You don't have to be liked by all."

These lines wouldn't have meant anything to him in a different time and situation. It takes difficult times to truly understand the meaning of simple words.

After that brick by brick he re-built his life from scratch and he left his little dark world. Of course, the silver lining may meet a cloud again. But now, he does know how to get out of it.

The Fireworks

“Come on. Let go”, Shubha said as she urged me to join them for the dance. It was 1 am in the Desi Party in Chicago downtown. I can’t dance. I could never relate to the idea of moving your body to the music beats.

It took me exactly 4 tequila shots to join my friends on the dance floor. Martin my teetotaler friend sat in the corner looking at everybody happy that he will not see them in heaven. Initially it was easy –

The kite dance – where you pretend that you are flying a kite looking towards the ceiling,

The snake dance – hold your hands together like a snake hood and go up and down in wayward motions,

The Amitabh dance – walk slowly raising your hands up alternately,

The train dance – form a circle, keep your hands on your neighbors shoulders and keep running till you are tired,

Ball catching and throwing – Imagine a imaginary ball and keep throwing and catching it rapidly.

And then my body had consumed some tequila, my brain had come back to normalcy, I did not find any meaning in doing these exercises anymore. So I joined Martin in the corner and I drank some whisky while Martin kept sipping at his lemonade.

It was just this morning that we had landed at the Chicago airport. The July 4^th long weekend we were looking forward to. We were 9 of us. The names will appear in the order of appearance.

Our host Miss Sakshi was a very sweet girl. She left no stone unturned to make us feel at home. She treated us with her amazing cooking skills, which she claimed to have developed on her own. All her recipes have a flavor of the MTR rasam powder. Be it Pav Bhaji, Alu Mutter, or anything else. No doubt that she is the biggest fan of rasam powder. May be MTR made rasam powder just for her.

But I digress.

What I actually wanted to say was that we were treated to a sumptuous feast of Chole Puri, Hakka noodles and tea. And then at quarter past 12 we hit the road. The plan was very simple. Drive north 1 hour to Lake Geneva and jet ski, drive back 2 hours to downtown Chicago to witness the all important July 4^th fireworks. And the fireworks might be like any other fireworks we had seen before. But for some reason we were not supposed to miss it.

And what great weather ! Clouds and clouds everywhere. It’s funny how even ‘good weather’ can be a relative term. I just love the rains. I am just so hard-wired to love them. I wished for it to rain any minute.But everyone else in the group of 9 wished otherwise. They had jet ski on their minds.

“The clouds are dense. I wish it rains”, a very excited me said.

“Don’t be a sadist da”, came the pat reply in thick Tamil accent from Rajeshwari.

After a smooth drive of 30 mins which was full of conversations about favourite heroines and movies, the traffic came to full stop. And with that the faces went sad again. My only interest in Lake Geneva was the beautiful water front and the Vanilla softy ice-cream which was sold on the pier. I had to retire from jet-ski prematurely, thanks to my friend who was showing me how to make circles in the water. The jet-ski toppled and we were stranded in the center of the lake for about an hour. Forget the huge fine which the jet-ski company charged for their damages. Now making circles in the water on a jet-ski is a nightmare for me.

After alternating my leg between the accelerator and the brakes for a few hundred times, the traffic began to flow again.

Damn! No signs of rain yet.

Now, Lake Geneva is not just a lake. It is a small town built around the big lake. Seemed like the whole Illinois was there for the weekend.

Now this place looked so pretty. Restaurants and lodges lining the one side of the main road and the blue violent waters of the lake on the other side. Wait a second. Did I say violent? It was unusually windy that day and the high waves looked very dangerous. It took some time to get all 9 people at one spot. And after depositing a layer of vanilla softy ice-cream and the “salty and not so tasty” pretzels we set out to shop for jet-ski rentals.

“We stopped renting for now. The waters are very dangerous now. Go and check ahead.”

The next shop – “Everyone has stopped renting jet-skis for now. We do have a speed boat available though.”

Everyone was understandably dejected. But the most affected seemed Preeti. Her ever smiling face and 32 teeth (this is an assumption) had gone missing now.

I was more than happy to drive back to downtown and have some fun. But Miss Sakshi, our host had not given up. She had other ideas. She made some calls, gave some credit card numbers and then.

“Guys, we are going to Fox Lake! They are open now and I have reserved a few jet-skis for 6 pm.”

An hour at the lake side beach, another layer of BK veggie burger and we were on our way to Fox Lake.

And the first drops hit the windshield.

And I controlled my joy and gave this one liner –

“If you really want it, the whole universe will conspire to help you get it.”

Fox Lake was a smaller and quieter lake. The “Fun Sports” rental company had no problems renting in the rains. Our guys were very excited. They filled out a few forms, became a little poorer and off they went.

I had begun to worry whether we would make it to the downtown in time for fireworks. The fireworks were scheduled for 9 pm and even if we left on time we would just make it.

Jet-skiing was done and we raced towards downtown hoping to make it. But none of us had taken it into consideration that the whole of Chicago would be going to downtown. We reached about a mile from Navy Pier and the traffic just stopped on a bridge. All guys except me started walking towards Navy Pier, the fireworks place. I sat in the car listening to some country music on full volume knowing very well that the traffic jam was not going to end soon.

It was 9pm and I could see the fireworks in the sky from the bridge. I realized that not all things are meant to be perfect and that’s what makes them memorable.

I hoped that the others would have reached in time. But they didn’t.

All sad faces returned to a restaurant for a nice dinner which was followed by the tequila shots and the dance.

In high spirits it took us an hour to find the car in the parking lot. Thank God, he/she sent us Martin. We had no one else to drive.

Yett another marriage

“Anusha, yett another marriage?” Lucy teacher asked me with her eyes popped out and shaking her face up and down, when mummy had come to request leave for Sandeep anna’s marriage. Two months back we had been to Kolhapur for Shekhar anna’s marriage. I never have to lie when I take a leave. My school is better than Amit anna’s. He always lies that he has fever when he takes leave. Wish he was in my school. My school is near our house and they always give leave.

Amit anna is my own brother. All the other annas are my cousins. Amit anna doesn’t talk much. He does not laugh also. But when he does he laughs without making any sound. I cannot laugh without making sounds.

For some reason Sandeep anna’s marriage happened suddenly. Mummy doesn’t tell me anything. But I know. Uncle and aunty were not ready for his marriage. Tanu didi is a Bengali and we speak Marathi. But I like Tanu didi. She always gets me chocolates when she comes home.

The marriage was in a place somewhere near Kolkata. It was called something like Kharagpur. Though some people called it Khadagpur. It was a very very long train journey from Pune to that place. Pune is our home town. But we are not from Pune. My native place is Athani in Karnataka. Papa has his office in Pune. He is a engineer and he builds buildings.

It was my first train journey. But mummy says it was my second. She says I went with her from Pune to Belgaum in a train when I was very small. I loved the train journey. It was like a moving house. Beds, food, AC and toilets. Chetan anna and I played cards on the top most berth where no one could disturb us. He can’t play only. I won all the times. I love climbing up and down the berths. We used to get down at every station and buy something, dip chai, samosas, fruits, idlis and Frooti. I love Frooti and I can drink it every day.

Rohan anna had come from the US. We did not know he was coming for the marriage. He told me he will take me with him when I reach 7th standard. So only 3 more years to go. 

Amit anna was busy playing games on Rohan anna’s mobile. That phone has no buttons. We just have to touch it, it seems. They never give it to me because I will spoil it, it seems. Everyone knew about what Lucy teacher said and they would ask me to keep saying it again and again. I would pop my eyes out and say it in her style. And everyone would laugh.

My best friend’s name is Ayesha. She gives me her notes whenever I miss school. We eat our tiffin together and share it. I like her mom’s Biryani more than mummy’s pulaav. But she loves mummy’s pulaav and I don’t know why. She has never sat in a train and never gone out of Pune. I missed the lesson on Shivaji in the Hindi class. But I know everything about him as we have that lesson every year. Shivaji was born on 19th Feb 1630 in the Shivneri fort. His father's name was Shahaji and mother's name was Jijabai.

I have a lot of pet names. Shekhar anna calls me with many pet names. Dummi, Dummakka, Chimukli, etc. I don’t know if they mean anything. But I like to have so many pet names.

That lady who was Tanu didi’s aunty kept moving her tongue very fast and shouted loudly during the marriage. I used to laugh whenever she did it. We all tried to do it. But we could not. We ate a lot of rasgullas and pani puri.

I was in all the photos standing beside Sandeep anna wearing the new blue dress and the Baalika Vadhu jewelery set.

Rohan anna was about to leave to Mumbai for his flight and he asked me to do it again. I popped my eyes out, shook my head and said -

“Anusha, yett aanother marriage?”

Mujhe kuch kehna hai...

“Mujhe kuch kehna hai. Kaise kahu ?” that one line by Pallavi Joshi created an unprecedented surge of curiosity. What was she talking about ? ‘Whisper’, the name itself oozed a sense of mystery. With all the knowledge I had until then I concluded that - ' Boys could pee anywhere in the open. What about the girls ?' It must have been an extension of the baby diapers.

Few years later as one pretty girl on TV was about to set on a train journey, her bhabhi came to hand over a pack of sanitary napkins. Now trains had restrooms. The mystery grew deeper. And the peeing theory which I had come to believe so strongly had to be thrown out of the window. One day I found the answers. The ‘body column’ of the ‘Woman’s Era’ magazine cleared the mystery. It was the only source of sex education in those tough times.

Why didn’t we hear about all this before Pallavi Joshi opened the Pandora's box. Our society has a way of keeping things under wraps with secret codes of all kinds. I choose not to reveal any of them for fear of copyright violation. From ‘Kaise kahun’ to ‘Fly high with Ultra Wings’ it’s an indication of the change our society has seen.

In the mid 80’s this song was a rage, “Hum tum dono jab mil jaayenge. Ek naya itihaas rachaayenge”. My Hindi was all the bits and pieces I had picked up from the Hindi movies I had seen. I used to wonder why were these 2 guys going to this never before heard place called Jabmil and how would they create history !

We all have these mis-pronounced words when we are young.

While playing – 'templease' for ‘time please’ with the spit on the palm mandatory for the ‘time please’ to be valid. 'Hide n sick' for 'Hide and seek'.

‘Two two zaa four’ for ‘Two twos are four’

'Ambyasatter' for 'Ambassador'.

'Kinner' for the truck 'cleaner'.

And a brilliant idea struck me as I watched a balloon in the sky.

Just fly high in a big balloon or something. Hang in there while the earth rotates. And when you are above your destination just drop down.

Gravity betrayed me.

On an entirely different note, I liked to believe that all beautiful heroines from movies did not shit. They were too beautiful to get dirty. And I thought I was abnormal to like the rape scenes when I was supposed to detest them. Heavily influenced by the smuggler-police movies of those days I wanted to grow up to become a police inspector. ‘Engineer’ meant just building houses and I remember telling my grandma that I would build a house for her when I became one.

I also told everyone that my brother could run faster than a Maruti-800 car and I believed it too !

P.S. - I was tagged by Madhavi. Check out her post on the same topic.