Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Who needs friends...

Woah... Don't bite on me yet...! I do need friends... However...

Sunday morning saw the entry of two 'friends (who needs enemies???)' into my house in the wee hours ... 8 am on a Sunday morning!!! Even the rooster nearby cock-a-doodle-doos around 8 on a Sunday...! Anyway, undeterred by such irrelevant facts, X and Y (identity protected, for absolutely no rime or reason!) plunge in to my till-then-serene bedroom... and yank the warm blanket off! Mom's voice from far behind could be heard, saying... 'He's slept at around 0230 last night... let him sleep...'. Well, as I told you the X and Y in picture do not much care about irrelevant facts...

The next moment, I found myself levitating... a heavenly experience... all fine except for a light strain at my ankles and wrists followed by a thud! Realisation dawned, consciousness made a come-back... and I found myself screaming a good loud 'OUCH!' ...

'Thanks! You buggers...' ... and I was on the verge of losing consciousness again as I heard a ... 'Any time, dude!' followed by a violent tug at my ankles...! I gathered all my might and strength...and remembered the famous saying... 'When you are pitched against the toughest of opposition, fight ... and you find it going tough... just give up!' ... So, basically without much of a consideration to the former advice in the saying, I just simply gave up!

The next 30 mins saw my friends beating one another up (they are pretty much a Dumb and Dumber sort of a duo!), my mom shrieking again, Y getting kicked out of the kitchen, X holding a prized possession in the air (oh! that would be a juice bottle from my refrigerator...), X being kicked out of the kitchen, me beating up Y for no reason, my dad shouting at me for some reason (i can't recollect), X and Y thrown out of the house with a re-assuring 'I will be at the ground in 15 mins' from me...!! I sat down as the commotion cooled off... contemplated sleep... but feared a repeat sequence of events if did not make an appearance at the ground in 30 mins...!

So, finally I drank my daily glass of milk, brushed my teeth (note the order! Its a sunday, i said!) ... and put on a worn out pair of shoes to go off to play FOOTBALL..!

And, off late there haven't been many things that I would term pleasant, forget the surprise part of it... but here what I see at approximately 0845 on a Sunday morning came as a Jack-in-the-box-with-a-gift-in-his-hands kind...

The gruond where I was dreading a sloppy day of 4 of us trying to simply knock around a size 5 tattered football and all of us falling down exhausted in an hours time or less, instead boasted of a 20-strong clan playing nothing other than CRICKET. The initial shock, or should I say, Jack-in-the-box-with-a-gift-in-his-hands kind of surprise was not so much of a blood-pumper; what with 50 year old Gujjus spawning the field with their Manikchands and cigarettes and general noise...

Seeing not a square foot of the field un-occupied for us to place a football and the general nuisance that we may cause anyway ... I resorted to joining them...! The first piece of news, that I wasn't to play till another 9 overs (a good 40 mins.) frankly din't excite me one bit! And, then came the big bit... a good-looking-friendly uncle (or, shoudl i say 'bhai' ... the term that I would use for the rest of the day to address each and every member of the Gujju species...) asked me to go and bat... for the final 3 balls or so... And so I did...

Now, I am not too bad a player in the under-arm form of the game... however I feel much at home in playing over-arm! Anyway, my confidence level hitting a new all-time low, I took the bat in my hands after a good 8-10 months..! The first ball I could connect. I suddenly remembered I was a quick runner between the wickets. I set off for what seemed to be an easy single only to be turned down by a 35-odd year Gujju uncle... oops...bhai, who seemed really engrossed in getting the latest stocks right over phone...! Anyway, that meant I should be running back to my wickets, specially when I have a record of being run-out by direct hits by the most lousiest fielders in the opposition! The next half-a-second or so saw me flying mid-air to make it to the crease. The next second saw me getting up to thundering applauses for having made it back home... I was a hero... I had done what they thought cuold never be humanly possible... I was soon crowded around by 4-5 people congratulating me and other general stuff... I could understand everything, but I am yet to find the thing that tripped me..!! Anyway, felt really nice that I had scratched my right thumb, middle finger and knee... and felt a weird pleasure that this should be done while I started playing cricket!

Anyhow, that being the highlight of the day... I continued in a similar vein falling all over the place, running like hell and before we knew it was scorching 1230! It was then that the Gujju bhais parted with a 'Dikra, next sunday aana...!' and a content smile..!

Well... 5 tired, really exhausted bodies (including X, Y, me and Z apart from a stray H) gave a vain attempt at football... and then finally gave it all up at around 1300!

A good start to the Sunday! :)

Oh Ya! Wondering... just more of a random thought...

If I were to play cricket every day with unknown gujju bhais and stray 'H's ... will I still need friends to live a daily routine! ;)

@Girls... DO NOT pounce on me... it was just a random thought!

Sunday, December 24, 2006

Bombay calling...

To all my friends... a Mumbaiite or not... and specially to you Miss R...

After a really long drawn trek, tired and totally sleep-deprived, I reached Mumbai yesterday... To be really frank, off late the glitz of Mumbai was losing its sheen somewhere deep inside me... That Mumbai is something vastly different from any other Indian 'city' seemed too far in reality... (Cut the smile, Ms. R...)

And then like all illusions, even this faded and I was snapped back to reality... And all it took was a night...

Ok... for the records...

Sunday, December 24, 00.15 am
Back from the trek, a friend of mine and I were in a ST bus headed to Dadar. Busy discussing finance and management schools, I hadn't felt the journey to be long or demanding! Somewhere near Chembur naka, there was a heavy inflow of traffic on the other side. I exclaimed the same and muttered to myself about the smooth flow on our side! Suddenly, the smooth and fast ride was cut short... There was a traffic jam! A good heavy jam at 00.20 am in the morning!

Sunday, December 24, 00.35 am
15 minutes ad we had hardly moved; and we were still moving at a snail's pace. I just popped out my head saw that the traffic jam extended to at least a kilometer more, right up to Priyadarshini... I told my friend that we get down at the petrol pump near my grandma's house and go to Kurla station to take a local back. So we did!

Sunday, December 24, 00.40 am
We had reached Kurla station. Paid the 12 Rs. that the meter showed (wondered why he hadn't charged us the night fare, approx. 1.5 times the meter reading). Took a ticket each and went to the platform. My friend wanted badly to eat a 'vada-pav'. We went to the platform just to see the 00.38 am Ambernath local leaving the platform. Praying that the next local should be empty (yeah, locals can be really crowded, even at 00.45 am on a Sunday morning. The indicator changed, and read "00.30 N". That would be a Kasara local (fyi... Kasara is 129 kms away from CST. Yes, that is how long the Mumbai local stretch is.) And, just as we got down the steps of the bridge... the Kasara local started entering the platform. Now, we had precisely 40 seconds (10 for the train to come to a halt and 30 second halt) in hand to get the 'vada pav' and get into the train. We went to the stall. I asked my friend to take position, just in case the train is crowded. Reached the stall and...

"Brother, 2 'vada pavs' and I have to catch this train!"
"Right-ho! Coming up..." and almost immediately, 2 pieces with the pav amazingly chutneyed. i open my wallet... and find just one 500 Rs. note!
"Brother... ", just as I hand it over... "don't have change!"
"Oh! Its just 8 bucks...", he says teasingly...
I plead... looking at the train which just halted... I could get another 2-3 seconds, thats the time the train takes to pick up speed... ;)
And in a flash, Rs. 492 in change was handed over to me... :)

Sunday, December 24, 01.05 am
21 minutes is all it takes to cover the 15 km stretch with 6 stations in between... and exactly at 01.05 am I reached Mulund. Got out at the station, took an auto again from the stand, and reached home by 01.15 am.

What leaves me dumb-founded is the contrast this city presents...

In Chembur, 15 minutes to cover 75 meters... and from Chembur to my home in Mulund 18 kms in all, covered in just 30 mins!

Wondering if I could have gotten home spending 31Rs. and covering 18 kms in 30 mins... in any place in India, forget that it takes place at 00.45 am on a Sunday morning!

That is why I love Mumbai, Ms. R!