Previous episodes:
“I wish you had fried chicken.” I said, facing that hostess and passed a taunting smile to Shivali, “... something of KFC sort.”
“No sir, even I wish that,” replied the lady, smiling “… but a chicken sandwich is all we have.” She broadened her plastic smile.
“No-no… Thanks a lot.” I said, winking at Shivali. At last, she sighed and her eyes brightened just like Jerry did after an unsuccessful chase by Tom, if you remember Tom and Jerry. But yeah, I don’t understand why these veggies hate us so much.
The plane landed. We were standing near the conveyer belt to get our bags.
“You know what, Gaurav?” she said.
“What?” I asked, curious as she had already came up with some strange things whenever she called me like that.
“You are a nice guy.” She said, smiling. I don’t know from which part of her brain this thought came up but why did she have to tell that. I could feel something wrong somewhere (daal-mein-kala). I know I’m a nice guy, I felt like shouting that.
“Oh thanks…,” I replied smiling back, “and you are a sweet girl.”
“Sweet or stupid?” she winked.
“Both.” I laughed.
“I knew… I knew… you have been thinking that.” She too laughed.
“What?” I asked with suspicion.
“Yeah…,” she laughed more, “Ok, tell me one thing.”
“What thing?” I asked, surprised at her enigmatic laugh.
“Do you know about Aranya?”
“Aranya? Who’s she?” I asked, more baffled.
“Oh come on… at least you should know about it quite well.” She said as if Aranya was some girl whom I’d ditched. I really didn’t know whom was she talking about. I had never ever known any girl called as Aranya. Yeah, I do know Ananya, the lead character of Chetan Bhagat’s 2-States.
“I really don’t know yaar.” I said, frustrated.
“Hmmm… Might be…” she said, “that might have been a small thing in your life.” Now I was beginning to get irritated.
“Hey please. Don’t test my patience. Come up now. What are you talking about?”
“Wait…” she said, laughing again.
“Why the hell should I wait.” I shouted, much more irritated now.
“Because my bag has arrived.” She said, picking up her bag from the conveyer belt. I gave an embarrassed look and stepped back.
“Oh… Anyway, now tell. Who is Aranya?” I hissed. She laughed again.
“Who nahi, what kaho. I’m talking about the tech fest, dumbo.” She said. I don’t understand why these girls love this word dumbo a lot but yeah, I was completely taken aback. This girl had really surprised me. Aranya was the name of the tech-fest which was organized by our college and I had always been a major part of it.
“What are you trying to say.” I asked, trying to hold my nerves.
“That you have a very poor memory.” She retorted.
“Means?” I asked. I wondered if I really sounded dumb.
“Means that I know you are from Thapar Institue and… I remember that you were SPOC for computer science events.” I had no words at all. “And you… you don’t even remember who ate your brain the most during over-night programming contest.” She said, still laughing. I was still stunned. I was in a misconception that I had been fooling her for a long time but truth was totally opposite. I was embarrassed to the core.
According to what she said, there was only one girl who was coming to me every now and then and she even won the contest but this girl, she never looked like her.
“You mean you were in the winning team?” I asked, just to confirm.
“Yes…” she replied proudly.
“But that girl… she was… I mean… you are… I mean… you can’t be that.” I didn’t know how to express that the girl she was talking about was sort of ugly and very irritating, especially her boy-cut hairstyle. I simply hate that but she, she was quite good looking. In simple words, she was HOT!
“Now, I’m not getting you.” She said. At last, I confused her too.
“I mean you looked quite different that time.” Somehow I managed to say. She laughed again.
“Yeah… Say directly that I look beautiful now.”
“Hmmm. You do.” I blushed.
While all this chat, I forget that I was standing there to get my bag and when I realized, it had passed me but luckily, it didn’t reach the end. I sprinted towards the bag, jostling through the crowd gathered there and got all kinds of gestures from those people. I was lucky that that Sardar uncle didn’t come my way. Finally, I got hold of my bag just before it reached the end. I came back and stood near Shivali again, putting my bags onto a trolley.
"By the way, if you already knew me then what was all that drama for?" I asked.
"Come on, you are not Shahrukh khan that someone will see you once and immediately recognize you." She quipped.
"Yeah..." I didn't know what to say.
"More over, I'm like that only." She winked.
"Oh te pata lag hi gaya." I said, rolling my eyes.
“Gaurav, I still don’t know why you lied.” She said.
“Soreeee. I was just enjoying it.” This time my sorry was longer than the one she said an hour ago.
“Oh… Don’t be… even I enjoyed your company.” We both laughed.
“Anyway, when are we meeting again.” I said when we just reached outside the airport building.
“Aha… Someone is flirting.”
“No... just asking. In the meanwhile, I’ll think of some new pranks.”
“Keep thinking and do come up with some real good pranks. I’ll catch you on communicator.”
“Communicator?” I asked, shocked again. Did she mean yahoo messenger by communicator. No. Not possible. She’s not that fool, I thought.
“Yes, communicator. Don’t worry… it’ll be the last shock. I’ve joined Finacle, Mysore and I do know what Finacle bags look like.” She laughed again and I shook my head once again as Finacle is my business unit and my bag had Finacle's logo on it.
“Sure.” I laughed, on myself this time. This was all I could have done.
“Anyway, bbye. I’ve to get a cab from there.” She said.
“Hmmm… bye.” I said, giving her the way.
“And yeah…” she said, turning back, “Stop thinking that girls are stupid. We are not.” She smiled. I smiled back and bid her adieu once again.
cant be sure of continuing.. ;)
Previous episodes:
“Why did you laugh?” She asked with a bit of anger, genuinely offended.
“Nothing… Nothing… Actually my roomie works with Infosys.” I said. I didn’t want to tell her that I was an Infoscion. And thank god we don’t have Infosys logo on finacle bags.
“Wow!”
“Which Centre?”
“Centre? You mean IBU or DC?”
“I mean which place? By the way, I don’t know what is DC or IPU.”
“Oh. You are a new joinee?”
“No no… I’ve 2 months of experience.”
“Don’t tell me you don’t know what’s a DC or IBU… And yeah it is IBU not IPU, OK?”
“Hmmm. But what is it?”
“DC means development center and IBU means Industry Business Unit.” I replied with frustration oozing out.
“Ohhhh. I never knew it,” she said, giving an idiotic smile.
“But how’s that possible? I mean you must know your own unit, right?”
“Actually, I’m under training.”
“Oh…” I laughed. So, she considers training as experience- cool.
“What?” she asked inquisitively, showing her hands.
“You are not experienced ma’am.” I replied, still not able to stop laughing, “Your experience starts the day you join production… You must be in Mysore, right?”
“Haan… but tell me one thing, how do you know so much about my company?” she asked suspiciously. This time she caught me but I thought about it again, it was not tough to prank with her.
“I told you, right? My friend works with Infosys.”
“Oh. That’s what we were discussing na. You totally diverted the talk.”
“Me?” I asked.
“Yeah, who else?” she said, as it was the most obvious thing of the world.
“Fine.” I said in submission and she looked delighted on such an idiotic feat.
“Hey, you didn’t tell me. Your friend is in which center?”
“It’s not center, yaar.” I said, irritated.
“Chal whatever… You understood na?” she asked.
“Hmmm… he’s in Bangalore.”
“Oh.” She said, disappointed.
“What happened?”
“Nothing… I thought he was in Mysore.”
“He was trained in Mysore only, but later he was posted to Bangalore.”
“I see. He was from which stream?”
“Java.” I said so because I did my training in Java.
“Oh wow! I also got java stream.”
“You want his phone number?” I asked.
“No no…” she blushed taking her eyes down into the ground.
“But you are talking as if you were really very interested.” I laughed.
“Aiwe ee… Actually no use.” she said, laughing.
“No use… why?”
“He is in Bangalore na.” she said, making a sad face.
“So?” I asked, perplexed.
“Oho budhu… if he’d have been in Mysore, he’d have taught me na.” she said, very confidently.
“And how are you so confident that he would have taught you?” I asked inquisitively.
“Arey main cheez hi aisi hu…” she said, holding the collar of her top. I’m not sure what she’d have held if she was wearing a top without a collar. But the confidence, it was as if she was a master in this art. It surprised me once again. I reconsidered my thought that she was a stupid. She was not at all what I thought she was.
“Hmmm. Jo bhi hai mast mast cheez hai.” I whispered, laughing in my mind.
“What?”
“Nothing… Nothing at all.” I replied.
“You said something.”
“I said you are really smart.”
“wo to main hu…” she winked.
In the meanwhile, that air-hostess arrived again, but with a steward this time. I wonder whether these stewards also acted as eye-tonics for girls as those hostesses are for guys. God knows or these girls know. While I was drowned into my thoughts, I didn’t realize that my eyes were fixed on that hostess.
“Another chicken sandwich, Sir?” she asked, waving her hand, with what I think was an embarrassed smile probably because of my ha-ha-main-tujhe-kha-jaunga stare. I think even she knew me quite well, like everyone else on board. Thanks to the impression created by Shivali.
I was still deciding whether to buy it or not when shivali gave me a fierce stare and said, “Now don’t dare eat that chicken sandwich in front of me.” It was not a normal request. In fact, it was not a request at all. It was an order, an authoritative one. I shook my head again, smiling.
to be continued..........
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Previous episodes:
“Now what?” I shouted at her, with a silencer on my mouth. I’m a typical Punjabi, and shouting is our default trait. Even if I speak normally, I never come to know when my volume reaches the threshold to be considered as a shout. But this time my ego was at stake. I didn’t want to give her any chance to show that I’m rude. I had to show her that she’s the only one who’s rude and insensible. The volume of my shout was low enough that the sound waves would have struggled to hit the ear drums of that Sardar uncle.
“Actually… I wanted to say… that I’m… I’m extremely sorry.” She choked while speaking, struggling to face me, leave apart looking into eyes. I guess, she was among the over pampered lot. But still, she knew that she had made a mistake which could have been a crime for me if we were at an appropriate place. But her face, it looked so cute that even a Supreme Court judge would have forgiven a murder charge. It definitely made me to forget what happened a few minutes ago, but how could I’ve missed a chance to show attitude?
“Oh come on. Don’t give me that... Have you ever imagined what everyone out here might have been thinking about me? Anyway, forget it... You won’t understand…” I replied and started looking towards the window.
“I understand… but you know what, I’m a pure vegetarian… and… and you can’t imagine how much I hate non-veg. We don’t even eat onion you know.” This time she looked nothing less than a 10 year old innocent girl. Now, I was damn sure that she was over pampered and wasn’t out of her parents’ shadows.
“Please… … I don’t give a damn if you don’t eat onion or stuff. How can you just… ” I fell short of words and to express my anger, I clenched my teeth and closed my fist. It was enough to frighten her. She was just about to say something when I abruptly spoke, “Forget it!” She was instantly silent. It was fun troubling her like that. I was enjoying it so much that I could have jumped in air if given a chance.
“See, I’m among those who have never ever touched any sort of non-veg stuff and you threw a piece on my face…” she sighed. “I must tell you that I was already feeling uncomfortable while you were eating that thing and when that piece fell on me out of nowhere, I was just sort of… shocked. If you don’t give a damn, I don’t give it either. I’m still talking to you means that I admit my mistake.” She finally took a breath. I was still wondering if she was asking me to forgive her. It was just like someone writing sorry on a brick and throwing it on you. She kept looking at me, expecting me to respond. But I was speechless. I was never taught how to respond to such sorries. Her husband must be a fire-fighter else that poor would be butchered by her, I thought. I still kept looking at her like a dumb idiot. After a few seconds she realized what went wrong.
“Was I rude again?” she asked, this time as innocently as a child. I think this girl was suffering from multiple personality syndrome, considering the pace with which she changed her way of talking. Or she was carrying some evil spirit in her? It reminded me the Vidya Balan of the Bollywood movie Bhool bhulayia. Or there were 2 modes in which she was operated: devil mode and angel mode.
“Hmmm,” I nodded. “Anyway, It’s ok but you shouldn’t have reacted like that. You didn’t realize but everyone out here thought I did something really very wrong with you… you know what I mean, right?”
“Yeah, I know… I’m sorreeeeee.” She said pouting her lips. This sorry was pushed a lot longer than the usual one. As soon as she finished her sorry, she looked down in embarrassment. Even I pretended to look towards the window but one eye was still on her. No one spoke for a couple of seconds till she came again, “By the way, I’m Shivali.”
“I’m Gaurav.” I replied, offering a handshake and she responded with a smile.
“Ohk. So Gaurav, you belong to Bangalore?” She asked. I must tell you that, I’m a typical Punjabi by looks. People guess it so easily that sometimes I doubt if it is written somewhere on my face but this girl, she completely changed my views about myself.
“Yeah. Naanu Kannadiga.” I said, in Punjabi accent. I think any one from Bangalore would have killed me after hearing such an accent, “Neenu?”
She looked embarrassed. “Actually Gaurav…” she looked down and then again looked up, “I’m quite new to South India, so I don’t know your language.” Oh God, she actually believed that I belonged to Karnataka.
“Oh. Where are you from?”
“I’m from Punjab.” She said. Oh My God! She belonged to Punjab and wasn’t able to indentify my Punjabi accent. I was shocked.
“Oh That’s wonderful. Which Place?” I asked. Obviously, I was curious to know which part of Punjab has produced such a master piece.
“Jallandhar, I don’t think you’d have heard of it.” She said confidently. I tried my level best to suppress my laugh.
“No no, I know. Its famous for sporting goods and all, right?”
“Yeah, absolutely correct. But how do you know?” She laughed with a special glow in her eyes.
“Actually, I have my colleague from there. There’s one NIT, right?”
“haan.”
“He graduated from there.”
“Oh wow! I’m also from NIT.” She almost jumped on her seat.
“Which year?” I asked. Such an idiot can’t be older than a first year girl, I thought.
“Which year? Do you think I’m a kid? I’m earning, Ok?” She said. Who would have hired this 20+ years old baby, I thought.
“Oh great. Which company?”
“Infosys.” She said proudly. This time I couldn't suppress my laugh.
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to be continued ...
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