Tag: friend

  • THE ONE WHO CANNOT BE MOVED

    His name is Jain.. Achal Jain.
    Not Aanchal, not Anshul, not Chanchal..  its Achal.
    A synonym of “Hill” in “Hindi”.
    Or as the heading says, “one who cannot be moved.”

    15874733_10154968993894319_532233336675429815_o

    I primarily was not inclined to write this post at all. Because I couldn’t find anything which has not been written over here among all these blog-posts, or said to you directly. Or via Whatsapp, over calls, elaborated text messages and other hundred modes of communication. Out of the 26 years you have completed on this planet earth, our invasion into each other’s life is now exactly two decades old. We’ve been pillion riders on Bajaj Classic Scooter and Yamaha RX-100 for Christ’s sake! It actually sounds like something that should have come out from our father’s mouth. Are we that old?

    Mentally maybe.

    Looking back now, it actually feels like an era has passed. We have actually witnessed each other growing up, And believe it or not, I do remember how we first met.

    So this is about when we entered 1st standard. 1st July 1997 (It must be it, supposedly! I am not that good at remembering stuff), After a blissful summer vacation of entire two months, it was the time to go back to school. The first day of the session, no matter which class, is dreading anyhow. That’s what “the set of unwritten laws” says. To top it off, I had to change my mode of transportation also. As if the tiring work of applying covers to the books and copies, and making crucial decisions regarding which cartoon name-slip will go on which book cover was not draining enough.

    This migration from Horse-Tonga to Auto, was pretty taxing mentally. How much could a kid take on the first day itself? As soon as the high pitched horn sounded outside, my mother rushed me with an enthusiasm she probably wanted to see in me. Had I gifted her my bag, she would have happily took it and rode off in the Auto to school. Sadly that’s not how it works.

    As I dragged my feet to the gate, I was accompanied by my colony friends, who have been using this Auto for eternity and didn’t had to worry about being the new guy not only in the class, but also in the Auto. I saw them giving their bags to the driver, as they happily started conversing with their friends. A look back to my excited mother’s face ensured that there was no getting out of it.

    So I silently walked to the driver, handed him my bag, and gave a look at the children to find a space where to sit. Such an unfriendly bunch of runts I tell you! Just busy in discussing about Shaktimaan and Kapala fight! I thought maybe the friendly neighbourhood friends would help me out. But no, they were the moderators of the group discussion!

    There was this one guy with ultra straight hair and kinda triangular face, who looked at me and moved aside to let me in. I jumped at it and the auto started. After waving off to my mother, whose excitement was turning less visible with the auto picking up speed, my colony friends finally could see me again, and introduced to this triangle boy, who was the only guy in that auto of my age and class. “Hey Achal, this is Abhinav.”

    “Hi! So which section are you in?”
     “1st A”
    “Cool! I am in the same class! That means we are classmates!”

    I didn’t say much in that entire journey to school because all the talking on my behalf was being done by our common friends. We ended up on the same seat in the class, and by the end of the school that day I knew about his interest in drawing. I guess that was the point which led to the starting of a friendship. This friendship.

    Taking a trip down the memory lane does bring up many great things. But that’s the stuff to discuss and reminisce some other day. Enjoy now, as it is the gateway to a new you, 26 year old you. Question everything else but yourself, as it’s difficult to surpass 26 years worth of experience. Maybe next year?

    Any specific wish you have? Start collecting dragonballs then. Will give you a head start in it.. 🙂

    Many Many Happy Returns of the Day!

  • SHEEP IN THE BIG CITY

    I just have 15 minutes before the clock strikes 12 and your B’day starts. So I am pretty rushed because, duh! time crunch.

    This is the first time ever that I am directly addressing you in any of my posts, so well that’s a first. Congratulations Ms. Sheeba Faruqui for getting this far! Now this time of the year has never usually been a, I dare say, favourable time for our “Frenemy” relationship. It’s the time for everything to go south, haywire and mayhem. Utter chaos.

    It’s been 21 years since we first crossed paths, 19 years since we actually have been near each other, 16 years since we started a mutually acknowledging relationship (based on utter dislike), 11 years since a friendship was moulded into an ever-changing shape, something which is still hard to decide how it looks.

    Now, you are the most intelligent girl I’ve come across. But your true strength has always been the amount of labour you put in in-spite of it. The clarity of your goals, your thoughts, the way you want your life, that has always fascinated me. Maybe because I’ve never been so driven. But same is the reason for my respect towards your zeal and efforts. We can fight over the most stupidest of things. Sometimes we don’t even try to understand each other, where we are coming from. But that has never stopped me in acknowledging the importance you have had, in one way or the other.

    Now I am already 5 minutes up, and this blog in itself is filled with the references directly aimed at you. So I have no clue as of what I could possibly gift you that would justify the bond we have had since these 21 years. So I would say the words which I don’t think I use very often.

    Thank You.

    Thank you for being the person you are. Because it has made me the person I am.

    Wishing you a very Happy B’day. I hope God blesses you with everything you ask Him of. And gives you the strength, to ask Him for anything you want.

    By the time I am ending this, it’s been 25 minutes late. I know you don’t care. Still, efforts count, right? 😛

    Now bring a smile to your pumpkin face and be happy, as I won’t be doing cliched things like calling you or texting you.

    This post though, is solely for you. 🙂

     

    P.S. Did you notice how we use Him for God? I think I’ll start using Him/Her from next post onward.

  • FRIEND ON A SUNDAY

    Hi Friend on a Sunday,

    Sorry for being such an ass, but since you know I am an ass, that makes it okay. I had been thinking of so many people, to whom I could write a letter. But I ended up at you.

    Maybe because I needed to talk to you the most. You always complain that I never call you or contact you. That you are not sure if I even think about how you are doing sometimes. So first thing I would like to clarify with this letter is that, I do. I know what you have went through. I pray to God that nobody should go through similar agony and turmoil. I know what we burn with, is not how the world looks at us, but how we look at ourselves.

    Anyway, bottom-line, my lack of contact is not due to me being wrapped up in my own world. The distance which you feel is not because I don’t care or am tired of caring, but because I want to care. It is a safety cushion for me. That tomorrow when things go south in my life, it could be contained. People say, friends can help each other through all thick and thin. That they are the people with whom you can be your most shameful self and they’ll accept you.

    We both know that proportionality of the vulnerability is directly related to the amount anyone opens themselves up. And I trust you, but I don’t trust myself.

    I don’t think if you realise, that the stakes have been highest with us. I cannot afford to gamble here, do a little bit of experimentation. Our friendship is 20 years old. And it is a constant one. We have seen every single phase possible of each other. That is the concrete basis of my belief, that you’ll survive anything that comes in your way. However, just remember that whatever doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. But it does shatter your emotions. It starts from the zigzag broken edges, as with each hit, the crack travels a little more towards the center.

    You know when there is an uproar in any of our lives, we have our own way of dealing with it. Trust me when I say, I am more at ease when you are in a good space and I am in shitty situation, as compared to the opposite. Because I can handle my shit in some way or the other, but I cannot do so on your behalf. Moreover, what if my shitty response gave you a shitty idea which shat over an existing shitty situation?

    Too much shit all over.

    Now that we are clear on where we are coming from, I’ll start the actual letter.

    I was just thinking about some incidents that happened when we were kids. This was somewhere in 4th standard, when we evolved from pencils to pens. When bhaiya used to come to Johny’s house for taking drawing classes. So, my mom sent me to take those.

    I bought those fancy scented wax colors, the one with the heads of those superheroes, and a brand new sketch book. I was quite excited that I’ll get to learn something new. What he made me do, was copy one of Johny’s drawings, color by color. And man I was pissed. Since then we have mutual respect for each other, I guess.

    You ratted me out once when I bunked school to go to Manish Bhaiya’s  PS2 parlour. To take revenge, I changed all the moves of your default player Stone Cold Steve Austin to a female wrestler’s. You got your ass handed the next time you came to play. Though that would have been the result otherwise too.

    Knowing me, me forgetting about you should be the least of your concerns. However we are in a space, as opposite as possible, to the kind of future we imagined. Our past selves would have definitely been shocked, and bombarded us with all sorts of questions about what went wrong. And those jerks could be nasty and ruthless. We need to set things right, by bringing ourselves on the right track.

    The person who didn’t use to give or take shit from anybody else, should not be questioning their interpersonal skills now, when they need to be the person they always have been. People get misjudged all the time. People don’t get the second chance they thought they deserve, plenty of times. Open up any history book and start reading. The difference between the names you’ll find in the book and the ones you don’t, is what they did after that.

    As far as I am concerned, no I haven’t figured it all out. I am probably a bigger disappointment to my past self than you could ever be. But I think I have started to make my peace with it. Instead of thinking about where I should have been, what I deserved, I am more on the lines of where I am and how to make the best use of it to reach what I think I deserve. So that I could just get away with a tap on my head by my past self.

    It’s our individualistic journey. We can be of limited help to each other, but I believe that if any of us does good, it triggers the best in the other too. We never have been competitors, but team mates, who ultimately score for the team.

    I can continue writing for an eternity and still there will be topics left. That’s how long it has been and the kind of content I have accumulated over time. But maybe for some other letter, some other reality check.

    –Your Friend on a Saturday,
    Abhinav

     

     

  • WHY ME?

    Late night movie on the laptop, with the companionship of a packet of salted peanuts and an almost empty cold drink bottle; that was what I was engrossed in, when I heard a frantic running in the corridor, with thumping footsteps growing louder each second. I lowered the volume only to find that the door to my room was now being beaten down frantically. I paused the movie and half halfheartedly moved towards the door for opening it. Around 2 A.M in the supposedly morning, he entered my room. That was Pranshul.

    “What are you doing?” he asked in a hurried tone while being all sweaty, from what looks like a non stop run to my room from his, which had many flights of stairs between them. “Just watching a movie. Why what happened?” He collapsed on the bed, started fidgeting with his phone for a few seconds before he broke the silence and said, “She got a job.” He was talking about her ex. Their relationship of almost 3 years was brought down by the long distance relationship syndrome for about 4 months ago. “Okk.. So should I say congratulations or you are not feeling happy?” I asked him trying to be as normal as I could while pushing the door to close. “Don’t know. It’s a mixed feeling. It’s good she got a job. But now that she has got a job, would that anyhow make any difference in her feelings towards me?” I saw him sharply to check if he was okay. The fidgeting had stopped, but he was looking somewhere on the wall, fixated at a point, which had nothing. It was like his eyes were staring at something which doesn’t exist there; where he was trying to find it, or hoped it would be.

    Pranshul has always been a hyper person. Brimming with raw energy, which at times overflowed and this energy was infectious. Maybe a little rough some times, but then he knows it himself. All he hates was someone pointing it out. Then he puts a barricade around him and fortifies his defense which nothing can bring down. Seeing him in a defenseless state made me realize how deep his feelings are for the girl he loved. The breakup had it’s toll on him. The messed up stages of “Was all that fake?”, “The blame game”, “It was my fault” and “I know her, it’s over”, he had been struck by each of them. Confused and torn between his lingering feelings for her and his ability to fall in love again, he paddled between the seething question “Is it right to be with someone else” punching a hole in his heart at times, and on the other hand, secretly downloading her whatsapp display pictures, just to admire her without thinking about anything else by confining himself in a silo of his own, even if for some moments.

    He caught me watching him silently. “Don’t you dare trying to judge me!” He raised his voice as if something was building up inside him. “I am trying to judge the situation and not you. Relax. I am not always in the sarcastic mode.” I tried to calm him down as it was clear as daylight that his mind was running at a frenzied pace. I sat down and waited for him to speak. He started.

    Any story which gives chance to two people to come together and share some time together in love, is qualified to be called as a love story, like a fairy-tale, no matter how it ends. This was a love story too. A boy had feelings for a girl. One lucky day the girl said yes to the boy and they went to be in a relationship. That’s where the love story ends and the other story starts. After all life is not supposed to be just a love story. It is just a continuation of one story after another. Their’s took a reality check. Time and distance tested their compatibility, their love, their faith, their resolution. And the fairy-tale ended. Practicality won.

    He poured it all out. The story, how they met. What he liked about her. What plans he used to make for her. How he taught her riding the bike. How he learned sharing food with her. How he proposed her. How he spent days with her. What was the reason she gave him when she left. And the surge of emotions played all over his face. “You know, I know I’ll never change and so won’t she. Maybe it was supposed to end like this. I mean this was coming.” He tried his hard to justify himself all the reasons he could muster, as to why things are how they are and why they were supposed to be so. All I could see, was how that girl changed little things in him which nobody could have. Teaching a guy who claims to have foodgasms how to share his food is an impossible task. Making a hothead self aware of his behavior and way of dealing in public, is something someone only with a powerful impact on you could accomplish. That girl did that. Pranshul himself might not have realized it, or didn’t want to now.

    After narrating the entire story, Pranshul looked at me, then at his mobile phone. “Where did I falter?” I didn’t know what to do. Sweet talk won’t do any good to him. He had made mistakes. But the girl did them too. Long distance relationship are too fragile. Then the temperament of the people involved in the relationship and the situations and phases they are going through add up impacting the whole equation. I wanted him to talk to her to at-least get some closure and if nothing else, then move on. “It doesn’t matter. All that you did or what she did has already been done. Try talking to her once to get that last shard out of your heart.” Pranshul looked at me and the face was of a person wincing in pain. “I know her too well. I know what she’ll say. I know the shard will be pulled out and I won’t survive the loss of blood. This is the only thing which even if is paining me has bound me together. If she removed it, I’ll fall apart.” Anything sounding positive would have been giving false hope or a hope without a basis. I was talking about giving her up but how can someone preach something which he didn’t even practice. I didn’t know the girl at all. She must have had a story too, and by her description, pretty logical one. She had her own circumstances. I could only hope that she regrets her decision and it was just in a fit of rage.

    I felt helpless. Knowing the feeling always helps. So I decided to break it to him. “Only one thing could be done. Go and meet her.” “Are you kidding me?” He stood up and sighed in disappointment. “Listen to me first. I am not asking you to go and talk to her or beg her. Go and meet her for the last time. And when you meet her, lean in and inject the syringe you bought on your way, filled up with air. She’ll die with air embolism.”

    Pranshul stood aghast with no clue how to respond. “Excuse Me??” I couldn’t control my laughter and let out a smile. “Only that could solve your problem. Love, my friend has, doomed you forever. It’s either this or nothing.” Pranshul realized what happened and smiled properly for the first time since he entered the room, apart from the narration of the moments he cherished with her. “Kill her haan.. Could that be done?” “O yes! Detailed information has been gathered on this topic. Pretty neat way of killing.” “Whom do you plan to kill by this method?” he asked cheekily. “Well, we all have our list, right?”

    This lead to a proper discussion. We talked and talked and maybe that helped him to know his feelings better than telling about it to me. “So how does one decide if things ended right or not?” “Things never end right, if they ended they were not right, but that doesn’t mean mistakes can’t happen.” I went to my philosophical zone and pulled this one out. “Do you feel that if things were to be started from the scratch again and you were given the chance to remake decisions, knowing her and yourself thoroughly now, would you make the same choices again and try to avoid the crap you pulled, or you think whatever happened was for a reason and would take a different route?”

    I thought he would actually take some time on it but he instantly shot back “Same decisions again.” And it was clear to me and him that the ball was not in his court. We went ahead and had maggie, looked at some shoes online, he told me some of his favorite college stories and it was 5 A.M in the morning. “It’s morning! Let us take a nap of 3-4 hours and you should do the same.” I pleaded him while pushing him out of the door. “OK. See you at class.” and he walked down the corridor. “Suddenly I remembered something and shouted, “Do congratulate her on my behalf!”

    He turned back, smiled and replied “Sure I will.”

  • TWEETY EARRINGS

    With the aid of the liquid courage (2 gulps of Coca Cola), my mind has wandered off to a story happened quite some years ago.

    It was the time when I was in 6th standard. Fresh out of Class 5 State Board exams. Now those who don’t know about State Board Exams, Class 5 Board Exams for students younger than 10 years of age, were what IIT-JEE exams are for students interested in engineering. They were used to be one of the most rigorous and toughest exams, second only to Class 8 Board, Class 10 Board, Class 12 Board and innumerable exams, GDs, Interviews to follow rest of our lives.

    We always used to have our class divided in 4 sections. A, B, C, D (obviously). Till Class 6, the sections were the same. We had been studying with same people, seeing the same faces in the class, having the same friends, crushes and bullies. But due to a power shift in the ranking of students after the new criteria at hand (or maybe random shuffling), we all were allotted new sections that year. Hence, a new class, some familiar faces and friends, many unknown people and acquaintances.

    Anyways, the results of the exams were out and suddenly the students who were invisible before, were more shinier than ever, with a tag of “90% in Boards” stuck at their forehead. I have been among the horses who were bet hugely on and misfired. So well, for a person like me in that situation it was pretty hard to actually try to have a conversation with other kids, when the initiating line was “How was your result?”. Funny thing, they all knew it. But still I had a chance at redeeming myself. Something I was having as my birthright passed on to me from one class to another, the position of prefect. The first day is when the class representative is chosen by the teacher. Haah! Routine..

    To my utter shock, I was not even in the elected participants. There was this guy, who I kind of befriended, before him being chosen. And a girl, who I knew was with me in the last class too. How can I go against the guy I just befriended? So I channelled all the energy I was going to put in being a sore loser, to support my new almost friend. And he lost!

    “This girl I knew was with me in the last class” was just selected as the class representative! How could you expect a boy of nearly 10 year of age to cope, going through emotional distress due to reflection of his own below par performance in the mighty State Board exams, getting robbed of his birthright and loosing to “This girl he knew was with him in the last class”? Now he was furious.

    I looked closely at this single tailed (hair), dressed in white shirt and maroon skirt girl. That was the description of maybe 75% girls in the school. I tried for looking something peculiar about her. Something with which I could paint a red “X” on her as target. I scanned her again and again without blinking while everyone was standing and applauding for her appointment. That’s when I noticed something. Something yellow flashed on her ear lobe. I tried to zoom in on it (actually wished I could), but could not get a clear image. The girl was returning back to her seat when she crossed me. “Congratulations” I faked a smile and said. She stopped midway and turned to me. “Thanks!” and grinned hard. One could easily tell she was elated, but who cares! Focus on the ear lobe. She wore earrings which were shaped and designed as Tweety face. “Tweety” as in “Tweety bird”, the yellow canary on cartoon network!

    I smirked as she passed by and pledged an oath that this girl will face the most horrifying experience a prefect could ever have, even if I have to be the one who has to prepare the master-plan for it. That was the birth of a rivalry that kept on for 3 long years.

    I would love to think I made the most out of it, was successful in ruining it for her to the best of my capabilities, straight for three years. And I would also like to believe I have kind of lasting impression. That she won’t be able to forget me for the rest of her life.