The lazy Sunday morning…. Still half asleep, I could not resist myself from reading the catchy advert on the front page of TGIS… “The happiness sale”… Upto 50% off!! Wide awake from the state of dormancy.. I brought it to everyone’s study.. and as it was, bound to happen… we had already made a resolution that we are not going to shell out on anything but this “sale” today.
Voila! Everyone was ready within an hour after the time this decision was taken. And there… we reached, the stimulus being at its maximum ( Note that in the hysteria which that crap fragment of newspaper created, we are still famishing, devoid of the very first meal of the day called breakfast)
I never knew there are so many people on this earth who think alike, until I saw this huge stream of humankind making their way in the mall… as if they have been casted a spell upon, to grab as much as they can.
And so did we… entering into the interior, flying start with the quest for women’s section and countless other goodies a women considers worth spending upon. People were diving and dashing upon the things… and in the scurry, all 4 of us were lost in the crowd… each one too busy to notice that. I managed to choose 5-6 garments which I was about to take to the try room ( As it is simply not possible to choose each garment and try it one at a time when you have kilometer long queue of people lined up outside the try room in a frenzy). It was then, that I realized that I am alone. Having called up Anu, we somehow re united. After a wait of about half an hour, it was my turn to have a trial of the apparels I had very smartly chosen. Traversing with each piece of cloth, I fathomed that none of them befitted me the way I wanted. Already in a fury, I emerged out and discarded all of them. After a hunt of 3 hours, we had found out 2 things ( as if it was a treasure hunt) for which to now pay and get ourselves something to satiate the starvation. But the worst was yet to come… Dudes were standing in the billing succession as long as one would see outside a temple renowned for making your wish come true. Amidst all this, there were announcements being made through a loudspeaker time to time of lost children, lost parents and pals. Then to my amusement, some guys had even started having a trial of the garments in the billing queue itself… having lost all patience.
Finally, we paid for the goods we had bought, taking a vow never again to even imagine going to any kind of HAPPINESS SALE.
Since we had lost all our get-up-and-go attitude by now, we thought it better to eat something first, and then forge ahead with our day long adventure. In quite less amount of time, which was another half an hour, we were able to self serve us with some junkies…
Boarding a conveyance, All broken down, distressed and drowsy… we brought ourselves to our adored apartment late evening..

MORAL OF THE STORY : Do not stop shopping, but DO NOT get sentimental about any damn sale trying to fascinate you.
HAPPY SHOPPING!!!

I woke up early on Christmas morning and couldn’t believe my eyes. There were no soldiers on the road, no tanks and guns, no sound of bombings. After 5 long years would I have a real Christmas …. I wondered. Yes it was 5 years ago that it all started, when my world came crumbling around me…

That Christmas morning… sudden deafening sound in the dawn engulfing a large geography, followed by showers of fire all around, turning into complete darkness… everything bleak and dreary.
And sooner, I realized I was the only soul breathing in my family. Life took a turn from riches to rags in a matter of few hours… Everywhere one could espy mother earth in worst of condition.

Forlorn hopes of the abandoned, mothers crying for their children, children looking for their mothers, hungry personage starving to death…

There was no flipside to taking a shelter in a refugee camp. And four precious Christmas’ of my life passed since THE day in that camp, but there was no end to the agonies of common man. Days passed like eternity, with each day a confrontation… to fight against hunger, to fight for a living, to fight even for life. But the massacre was not going to stop. This year too… as the Christmas season was just showing itself, I was quite hopeless about anything good to occur. Perhaps Santa Claus had vowed not to shower his blessings on this bunch of unlucky souls...

Little did I know that life has something good for me...

…I woke up early on Christmas morning and couldn’t believe my eyes. There were no soldiers on the road, no tanks and guns, no sound of bombings. After 5 long years would I have a real Christmas …. I wondered.

I could smell winter, I could see the snow clad oak trees, with snow shining like white pearls…. Nature smiling at me actually.
I wondered if it was a dream.

Jingle bells, Jingle bells, Jingle all the way…. The singing sounds became louder… and louder.

It took a couple of minutes to realize it all…
The whole nightmare was the aftermath of me watching too much of NEWS which was broadcasted on the very ‘eve’ –

“And here we take our viewers to the site where the bombings have happened. The death toll has reached a thousand, and many a thousands are critically injured. This all happened when a bomb was dropped over the area by some militants. The investigation is being carried out to find who is the evildoer, and according to our correspondent…. “

Perhaps I was too deeply touched by all this.. entering into a virtual reality as I went to bed.

As I perked up from the bombshell the night had given me, I found the lovely gift besides my pillow… Oh!!! So sweet of you mommy!!.... Mom used to sneak into my bedroom in the dark of night and very quick wittedly put my gift besides my pillow before the dawn every Christmas.

As my thoughts dangled between the trauma I underwent in the night, and my real world, I suddenly felt the importance of a family, the feeling of being loved…
I realized I was among the very lucky souls on earth to enjoy every Christmas with my loved ones, and there are people not-so-lucky too, who do have some wishes as do we have.

Some dynamism inside me swiftly emerged, and that morning, I took this resolution – ‘I would be happy for whatever life has for me, and I would never complain for not having anything I wanted but didn’t get’. This Christmas was indeed a very special Christmas for me, not because I got a new dress as a gift this time, but for the reason that we visited the orphanage near to our place in the evening and bestowed Christmas gifts to those lovely children who deserve to be equally loved. Smiles on their immaculate faces made me feel I had the best Christmas ever…

It was the drowsy Saturday morning… rather afternoon when I woke up to realize that I was the first one to get up… all other lethargic people of my flat still in their dream world…
Wanting them all to get up… I switched on the idiot box on full volume not knowing the aftermath it may lead to… they perked up and in rage came towards me… “Kya ady… sone de yaar” but I was not going to quit from my mission. Finally, after the long haul did I manage to wake them all… still half asleep… my roomie said “ bhookh lagi hai”
And the next errand was to think and then prepare something for the so called Brunch..
Being the favourite of all bachelors, easy to prepare…. There was one option to satiate all starving souls.. Maggie Maggie Maggie… bas 2 min mein taiyaar!!!

We managed to somehow send Anu to the nearby life saver shop to bring 3 packets- Rs 13 each… Angry, she went.. after being assured that I was going to cook them for all…and after 5 min, there she came with those Maggie packs.

And now it was my turn.. poor chap.
I put the water in the pan… and after 2 min put the Maggie masala in the very pan. Suddenly, to our horror, there popped out an entire species of cockroaches from god knows where… dancing and jumping, some of them even dived into our masala mixed Adams Ale… I shrieked in dismay ( P.S – I have a phobia from the entire race of cockroaches)

As I already had put the masala in the water… we were left with 2 choices :

1. To cook and eat the maggie with cockroach toppings
2. To throw away the entire thing and bring 3 new packs @ Rs 13 each

And all hygiene conscious people would without a doubt, opt for the second option. So did I… and there was Anu again…
… “Anu plz maggie lekar aa na”

Everyone was dying of hunger... and Anu was the only option who was in a state to go downstairs.. so she had to.

Though it was a very serious situation( Cmon people… when u are starving, and u find it very hard to even lit the gas stove out of laziness… and this all happens, the situation is quite critical), I could not restrain myself from laughing, it was all so funny.. everyone looked at me in anger… then burst out into laughter seeing the plight of the kitchen which got all messed up due to this catastrophe, those poor cockroaches… who probably must have taken a rebirth by now… their dead bodies lying on the floor.

And yet again… the entire story of making those stupid maggie happened again.. but this time… we made sure there was no other species other than we humans in the kitchen…

So, you all can very well envisage how sometimes, maggie making can be disastrous. I hope people who have read my blog have gained some invaluable information and tips about how not to make maggie... and I know how thankful they must be to me.. for enlightening them.

The day was Saturday… And I was quite unusually, under severe depression…

Oh hell!! Now what…. What hav I done… why did I do this?? I should have thought about it before… damn!!
I was not in any mood to talk to anyone… It was so critical a situation.. how could I think about anything else?

I wondered whether the blunder commended could be amended….
They were in front of me… making me every second feel like a goof

I still remember… a whole day in delhi to search for them…
And I could not get the perfect one… until then… there… at that place
I found……the black one, and the grey one
Oh… so very perfect!!! I couldn’t resist leaving them

But now.… these 2 pair of trousers can no more fit me
The tailor, according to my wishes…. Shortened them to a length which i thought would be so flawless a fit to me…. But alas!!! They were clipped too short

I was standing in front of the mirror in horror…. And, like a dope showing my roomie of what I had done… and a background process running in my mind as to what to do about it.

Then, with endurance I went to the tailor again… narrating my grief stricken saga. I was assured with the hope that they would once again, be probably tailored to fit me

And the present scenario… my dear friends is that they are combating for their lives in the tailor’s den.

People, after you have read my sad story… I want all those who care for me to pray with pure heart realizing how depressed I must be… that I get them back in perfect mode as I want them to be…

… sadly hoping

… Ady

The wide black gate…(but low enough for a human to jump across it, as done by us many a nights…), mind it, you have to close the door once you enter inside… and if u r a bachelor guy, you can expect someone to emerge and ask you… kis se milne aaye ho?? (Guys not allowed!!!)
Finding way through the stairs, up on the third floor.. Welcome to Flat No 7, peopled by five damsels… Me (Ady), Ms Anu, Ms Anubha(rather, bhanu), Ms deepika and Ms Isha. This is our sweet little world…

All of us left our homes an year ago to make a career of our own… destined to meet in the Mysore campus of the very prestigious… INFY!!

After having buttoned up with all the so called training.. we, along with many others, landed up in Pune(Well, this is what we wanted… posting in pune) Though we all didn’t know each other much at that time.. (Exception : Anu and Ady wr already roomies in Mysore) here in pune, we decided to stay together.

And here, after a week of hyper activity searching for a decent flat… we managed to find this Flat no 7( and the credit goes to Anu and Bhanu for this!!)

With all our priced possessions, we, according to chronology… on 9th of april 2005.. embarked into the place… an altogether new vitality!!

The first thing on the crappy afternoon( with no electricity!!) was to look out for a salon- de-femme where we could at least prettify ourselves a bit…. And let me tell u, we did manage to find one pretty quick.

Entering into home… the first thought was to doctor the house for some basic necessities...especially me…being a cleanliness freak (let me tell u though… that it is a decent fully furnished house with a hefty rent amount)
It took a week or so to embellish the place with all our belongings and other necessities..
And there it was… our sweet home

In no time… I got very well adjusted with every other member.. (oh… how damn perfect I am…) It was all so fun… enjoying carte-blanche( people living in their home town… don’t be so enthu ‘bout it… with all this enjoyment comes every bit of responsibility too)
Late nite gossips… pyjama parties at midnite… useless aunty talks too!!

In a very less stint I must say…. We are like one family knit together.. a home away from home and I cherish all my roomies for being there… where we all have made every other person learn to be so absolute and so self contained an entity..