"sahib, aaj toh aap baal baal bache."

last week was an extended weekend for me. i distinctly remember goining to office last on thursday. then on i was on official holiday! the person i report to was on leave....and so was i! extremely eager( read extremely late) to get out of home, i had a quick bath and ran off to catch my bus. it was a luxurious ride to office. i spent half an hour there before starting my routine site visits. an engineer had volunteered to show the construction site around. i had just put on my helmet when he suggested to rest the string of my helmet on my chin. it was hanging loose near my ear. "as if anything's going to happen." ( though i am witness to an accident, i thought it was not that kind of a day). he enquired if i wanted to climb up the vertical ladder to the upper levels. "oh yes! lets utilise the helmets!"
with a grin i started climbing up. it was a long ladder. i reached the top,out of breath and my palms scrathced. i sat there till i felt blood running in my head. as he was explaining the type of construction i realised that i was a foot away from the edge of a beam, 25m high. i stepped back. it was then that i saw what i had missed the last 10 mins. what a view that was! clouds high up in the sky, the yellow blot on the clouds marking the sun and trees on both sides of the road. it was good!

when i went to the other end of the beam, a hissing noise took all my attention. the engineer had stepped on a rubber pipe attatched to a gas flame cutter with an lpg cylinder right behind us. the nozzle was a defective one. i was scared shitless! 2 labourers present on the beam tried there best to close the valve of the cylinder, then of the gas cutter but all in vain. running away from the pipe, a labourer, an elder, started shouting that its goining to blow! phew! "so this is it then." i thought. i had just put my foot forward for the dash when suddenly the hissing faded away. the other man had temporarily repaired the pipe. i wiped the sweat off my brow. i tried to breath deep. i inhaled lpg. when my heartbeat reached normal, i climbed down the ladder. we both sat on a bench a few metres away.
"sahib, aaj toh aap baal baal bache." i almost cramped my neck to see a labourer smiling at us.
" so how are you?" the enginner asked.
"better."
" these sort of things are normal, but yeh toh kuch zyada hi tha. i thought this is my last project."
" nah. they say your life flashes back when your moment arrives. mine is yet to come!"
we laughed and ordered a dosa from the shop behind us.
a friend of mine says "do second main duniya badal jaaati hai."
i agree!

my love story

i met a girl in 3rd class, zermina. it was love at first sight. the way she smiled to me straining her neck every time she turned to talk-her eyes twinkling and her colgate white teeth made of the 'whitest' ivory- what a sight that was! i used to sit just behind her always cursing the boy she sat with(my teacher used to call it "desk partners" but i refrained from calling him that). i read at Bhartiya Vidya Bhawan, Chandigarh and she used to almost consistently top my class. her "dark greenish blue" eyes had the depth of an ocean her rich black eye lashes were the shells that kept the pearls safe(my debut at Google with a purpose enriched my lexicon wiht turquoise and emerald), her shoulder length hair neatly made into 2 pony tails and the sweet accent she used exponentially increased her charm. she was indeed a beauty with brains. i have a natural attraction to the things that i dont have.
it was a time when i wanted to leave a good impression on my teachers so that they complained less about my bad hand writing to my parents. when she raised her hand to answer, mine went down as a reflex. her voice had no comparison. i used to sit with a girl named Sugandha and had her telephone number too but i hardly called her. many of my friends had a crush on her. she was mean to me. i always used to forget some of my stationery at home and she used to complain to the teacher when i asked her for a pencil. i hated her to the hilt. time flied by and my dream of running away with Zermina on my cycle will never turn into reality. i had a talk about this with my grandmother and after a couple of minutes i realised that i had scared the wits out of her so i didnt tell her the minute details of the plan.

one day as my class treacher introduced us to a boy, a new comer in class who was to sit in Zermina's seat which had been vacant for a couple of days and i could hear my heart tearing apart. i almost cried in class. i let tears roll down to my ears under the cover of a bedsheet at night. i could hardly go to sleep.
whenever something bad happens, i compare it to my emotional state that day. it's the lowest i have ever felt.
well, after she was gone, i started talking to the girl who now occupied her seat and develped a distinct liking for her. well, it didnt last long. i was scared to see her go too.
13 years hence, i'm still the same. afraid, scared, fragile hearted..........

Spring time!!

i wrote the last post in a not very happy mood! well, it happens!

it had been an almost sleepless night after eagerly waiting for bhabhiji to come home after nearly half an year. after the long drive back home from the airport, legs cramped and backs aching we were all finally home by 3am and after a having the various dishes and my cousins laddoos i was in bed by 4.30am. being sleep deprived for long, i fell into the arms of Morpheus instantaneously and woke up leisurely by noon. (yes we all had bhua's permission!) i started my daily routine and after breakfast settled down to type my report. after a while, we all started video chatting with dada(my eldest dear cousin). till then it was an extraordinary day, though predictable with the usual humuor and jokes.
then it happened so suddenly that i could not believe if it was real. yes. i had a newly gifted phone from my dearest bhabhiji! yay! well, i cant recall if there was any emotion that didn't surface. the ear to ear smile (people call it grinning) expressed my happiness the best. i thank her from the bottom of my heart. it had been long since i experienced such happiness! although the loss of the last phone brought me a little closer to reality, it was the present that i concentrated on!
what an evening it has turned out to be! even this happens and i'm sure not to common people!
as people say,
"if winter comes, can spring be far behind?"

PS: if you read this, please mail me your phone number!