You've been tagged

Much before the networking sites took the world by storm and the digicams captured every moment ugly or beautiful, and we had our lives uploaded for the world to see... we tagged memories...in our treasure chests for only us to see, to cherish & to relive.

A slice of apple pie is a secluded beach, a movie on hbo a pre-dawn walk on dewy grass, a song from a movie is a full bollywood number during rol-call...it could be anything... a plate of double-anda bhurji shared... a song request obliged at the wicked hour... a table tennis match till 4 am...

if you are up here... i hope you know you are special. If not... I hope I can one day say to you - you've been tagged!

Splash!!!!!!!!!

Relax. Take a deep breath. Now dive.

My dad was trying to teach me how to dive. I was standing at the edge of the deep corner. Looking at the water. It was a mid-size pool...big enough to have a proper deep and shallow end. Dad had successfully taught me and my brother how to float and then swim. We had started doing breadths and now lengths. Now it was time to start diving.

The only glitch was - I had seen JAWS... 2 days back. 

Now, even in a pool as the water gets deeper it goes a deeper shade of blue. And as I stood at the edge of the pool ready to dive... I could almost see something move in the water. Even as a 8 yr old I knew a shark could not be in a pool - but you never know - freaky stuff like this happens all the time in the movies and you really don't want to take a chance especially when you literally have all your life ahead of you. So, the simplest thing would have been to tell my dad that I was scared and get out it.

Glitch no 2, phobia of admitting having a phobia.

So, I stood at the edge - took a deep deeeeep breath - thanked God for the lovely life I had lived till then... and dived. 

That was the fastest lap I ever did.

Seems like a good movie

I used to be a good listener... it was fascinating – the perspective – the world-view and the narrative.

On my way back from North campus (DU… for the uninitiated) – I traveled with a friend... and I happened to mention that I hadn’t seen Forrest Gump – so for the next hour and a half he narrated the story… frame by frame… while we considered our travel options – to hitch or not to hitch! We decided ‘not to’ … and took a bus on a circuitous route…we walked…changed buses…walked some more…while Tom Hanks fell in love…went to war…lost her…played ping-pong…found her… lost her…ran… ran some more… got a boat…made some money…invested in ‘an apple co.’ … found her… found his boy.. lost her & lived on…

It seemed like a good movie – and I thought I should try it… we even began to ‘analyse’ it – but had to drop it coz hostel lunch time ended at 3…and we were already at 2.55!

I reached by 3.05…and after almost breaking down the door of the kitchen got served food which I left untouched…one thought that did not leave me was that i wanted to watch this movie…since I hadn’t eaten – I went to Kutty’s (the TAFS canteen that has kept generations in my hostel alive… strange coz these were the same ppl who were incharge of the kitchen – but this isn’t time for conspiracy theories) Anyway, so I went to Kutty’s and placed the standard order of double anda bhurji with extra hari mirchi – was lectured by Dutt saab abt how so much chilli is not good for health… -- finally I sat down to eat and told another friend about how I was thinking about watching Forrest Gump – he corrected me “how you want to see FG again”… I corrected him “I want to see FG”… he looked at me with suspicion befitting a vamp in a K series soap… with an arched-eyebrow and said “you haven’t seen FG…even once”… “It’s the best!!! You know what happens….”

And he went on to tell me how Tom Hanks is… bt the house they threw stones at …she gets into drugs…he gets in the army… the capitol hill… the song by the byrds… his single-mindedness… the meetings with the president after the war and tt… how he runs… how he fishes…and believes in the capt… how he waits for the bus sitting on a bench…narrating his life simply (the only way he knows) to this lady…how he runs to find her… how he worries if the boy is like him… how he sits there when the bus goes by… how fantastic the movie is…

It seems like a good movie I think… it seems like a lot of things :)

Nostalgia...Scene I

One of the blogs i follow has a post called time machine... one of the posts i had written years ago was abt nostalgia... and now with christmas & new year here... i am getting nostalgic again... and am missing everyone... including the people who i meet everyday... so this is an attempt to remember a few very very heart-warming moments... with people who once were or continue to be an integral part of who I am.

Scene I (am wathcing too many movies I guess)

Set in a cold december night in Delhi... AFWWA hostel... Divya's room... 

Dibiya is out partying... and we (read - me, taru, rakhi, dhara, neha) are all in her room  -- (there were party hoppers too)... wondering what to do... so we think of having our own party... music list prolly was Chunari-Chunari on repeat... with some help from FM... on the menu - maggi!!! and we danced like there was no tomorrow... how that hostel bed survived the foot stomping will always be a mystery... why on that day the warden did not even bother to come for a round dispite the blaring music we'll never know. Sometime around dawn we all collapsed and slept off in that little room... 

cut to.... 12 hours ago... the same set of people + divya + ira + preety + gauri... make a plan to watch kabhi khushiiii kabhi gammmmmmmmmmmmmm.......... at chanakya... we have to catch the morning show... no body would ditch etc etc...

cut to... early morning... knowing us... ira comes to wake us up...with senti tht none of us is ready for after the "saturday-night-fever"... so we drag ourselves out of the room and into a foggy delhi morning;this is the time when we saw movies in the front row coz they costed less than air... which meant standing in lines for hours on end... for a ticket window that opened only an hour before the movie

sooooooo we reach and the show is sold out... so we get in the line for the next show (which means we are in the line for 4 hours)... while ira goes to her would be mother-in-law to get us food... i dont think any of us had the heart to tell the 'good ppl who stuck to the plan' that we should cancel the movie...or prolly it didnt strike anyone that we could catch the show another day...annnnnyway... we got the tickets and we saw K3G.. preety cried her eyes out...and we all lived happily ever after...

one of the days that i'll always remember... probably not vividly... but the fuzzy feeling... i liked those girls... i like those girls... i miss them. and i will remember them... all of them. 

taru n i...

it is strange how ppl can belong... and connect...i've hardly made any frens... and i've barely kept any of em...and yet here's this woman - i know will be around when i'm 70 - callin me n askin if i wanted to go get a mississippi mudslice - and how abhishek bachchan stil luks like microwaved truffle...thts how v talk... in choclate...its very dificult to imagine life widout this gal... taru -- my alter-ego