A series of shocks

Having parked the bike he took out a file of printed papers and a pen drive. I looked at him questioningly; he giggled and said, ”you are supposed to give a presentation here”. This was a shock for me, this was no where mentioned till now, I thought It was a randezvous for him and a long drive for me. Apparantly, it was a randezvous for him alright, but work for me. I punched him on his abdomen which he very well reciprocated and added, “Just tell ‘my girl’ that you came for a presentation and I came to drop you.”

“What kind of presentation is it?” I protested.

“Ohh! do not worry. It is a topic from biotechnology, you would be able to present it. It is on Artificial Silicon Retina’.” He smiled.

Life is extremely difficult when you have good friends who know you in and out, but grows much more difficult when they give such rude shocks.

“I have not prepared a presentation.” I persisted, reluctant to spoil my day in an unknown college.

He waved his pen drive and said “I prepared one. The print out of the Presentation is in the file along with another printout of the entire original document.”

My mouth was agape, he continued, “I am sure you will find it easy and would be able to memorise and understand most of it. Don’t worry! ”, he patted my back and whispered “Just do it for me.”

We found our way to the registration counter, and patiently stood in the long queue. All of a sudden his face beamed. A girl with a glowing, wheatish complexion and flowing, dark hair in a pale yellow georgette Salwar-Kameez  came our way. She came straight to Tejasvi and said “Hi” in a sweet, cute, sing-song voice; her excitement was evident from her restless features.

Tejasvi introduced us to one another.  She sang out another “Hi” in the same sweet, cute way but this time to me.

He began, “He would be giving a presentation and I came along …..”

“Tejasvi would be managing the slides.” I interrupted.

He was aghast; with great difficulty I controlled my laughter.

“ooooohh!” , She sang again.

“Ey! Come I will get your registration done“ she pulled us out.

We followed her along the long serpentine queue, Tejasvi glanced  furiously at me. We reached a small table on the other side of which a stout curly haired boy, a beautiful girl in a violet T Shirt, and a rather skinny boy were filling forms.

“Rohit !” our girl called out.

The stout boy looked up,” He is Sarath, she is Vydehi and he is Rohit. “ She introduced them to us.

”Rohit! They are my friends and they are here for a presentation, could you please complete their registration.”

The stout, curly haired boy did not speak much, he pulled out a book from under the drawer and tersely asked:

“Names and college?”

I shot out our names and college name

“Topic of presentation?”

Tejasvi gave the topic.

“do you have any slot preference?” he asked again.

“mor… “ Tejasvi began.

“Evening 4 ‘o’ clock slot would be perfect.” I ended.

Rohit looked up at us questioningly.

“Evening Rohit! we are sure.” I said.

“Okay then, your Presentation would be at 4:30, and 200 Rupees for registration.”He tore a pass and handed it over to us, I made the payment.

Puri then lead us to an isolated corner in a groove of Cashew trees, behind the generator room.

“This is a perfect spot for you guys to rehearse. “ She said. “I would not like to disturb you while you rehearse“; she had this girlish attitude of be-sure-to-get-a-prize when she said that.

“I will come back at 4:00, and escort you to the auditorium.” She said and then turned to Tejasvi, “Akka is also there, just do not annoy her.” Tejasvi’s already gloomy face turned gloomier at this. 

She left.

I innocently asked for the file, he instead handed over a fist, followed by a string of expletives. I laughed and defended myself. He was annoyed at me for having ruined his otherwise perfectly planned randezvous. It did not convince him when I gave the fib that her akka was the bigger spoilsort.

“Counld’nt you have atleast allowed me to opt the morning slot. “ He shouted.

I laughed, and hit upon his abdomen. “Do it for her” I whispered, Trying to imitate the way he had said in the morning.

* The words from Indian languages with the exception of proper nouns are spelled according to the Harvard Kyoto convention for romanisation.

The morning at Vizag

The air smelt of camphor and incense, there was a beautiful music of a double reed flute and the divine chants of Sri Sooktam in the background. The darkness which had engulfed my eyes was reducing, I pandiculated and rubbed my eyes. The flute music was my cellphone’s ringtone and my aunt was praying. The cellphone’s panels displayed, ‘Tejasvi’.

” this oaf never gets up before 8:00 in the morning” I thought to myself and looked out. The sun rays were quite dull and the morning mist had not completely evaporated, It was surely not even 6:00 in the morning.

“What are you upto?” I asked drowsily.

 He laughed and asked “are you in Vizag?”

“Yes, who told you?”

“No one!  I guessed so.” He laughed, “You are the only rival I have in terms of attendance shortage.”

“you did not answer my question. What are you upto?” I insisted.

“What makes you think that way. I just wanted to wish you good morning.” He said with deliberate earnestness in his tone.

“You are the biggest oaf I know. Out with the truth! Why did you call so early?” I smirked.

He cursed and replied, “There is a college fest in Puri’s college, I would pick you up at 7:30. Now get up you pig and get ready.”

He hanged the phone.

I checked out the time, it was still 5:30 in the morning and I was still quite tired. I slept again.

The sun was streaming in through the window; the maid’s loud banter was accentuating the inconvenience and then the sound of alarm. My eyes were wide open all signs of drowsiness had vanished. I got out of the bed and lazily brushed my teeth, and went out to the terrace. The early morning air in Vizag is quite unique. Unlike Jamshedpur where the early morning air is fresh and sweet here it is fresh and salty, perhaps it is the proximity to the sea that brought the effect or perhaps it is just my imagination. The coconut palm trees and the jasmine climbers perched on the walls filled my heart with joy, scampering squirrels and still kingfishers topped with a distant call of a cuckoo, the morning was perfect. I watched the big orange sphere in the east turn yellow as it gained altitude. I closed my eyes feeling the heat on my eyes and the cool gentle breeze on my face.

“orEy! Donkey …”

I turned around to find the source of the not-at-all-pleasing glib call. Tejasvi was grinning from the staircase.

“You said you would be coming at 7:30”, I accused.

“I changed my plans, I thought I would be finding you at the beach, you are improving I see.” He giggled.

I was furious at the sarcasm. Cursing him, I got down into the house along with him. I took a speedy 20 minute shower and gobbled up the Upma, we laughed when he said that even he had Upma that day.

At 7:30 we started, we had reached Isukatota junction when I had a brainwave to go along the beach road. He protested that he did not know the way to get back onto the highway but then finally yielded to my insistences.  Taking a 360 degree turn we headed towards beach road.  Mornings on the beach is stunning; free from the crowds and hawkers, there were the joggers, the sand, foam, gulls, kingfishers, dogs , screwpines and an occasional carcass of an Olive riddley turtle. We could see the fishing yachts right below the sun in the horizon and a big, lonely ship at some distance away from them.

I was admiring the Sea till the moment the beautiful sea was obscured with large Casuarinas. I looked around we had reached Rushikonda beach.

“Hey! We have come off too far!” I exclaimed , “you should have taken the diversion just before GITAM college.”

He cursed out aloud, a few passers-by looked at us, I smiled politely.

The diversion was a narrow, rarely used street to one side of which was the Zoo. More curses followed appended to my name all along the 4 kilometre long stretch connecting beach road to National Highway 4. He had always hated such narrow, lonely, wild paths but I was enchanted by the sheer wilderness which we were experiencing that morning. NH4 took out all the excitement of the journey and instead filled it with exhaust fumes.

It was 9:00 when we reached our destination.

When I could not read

A 3 km walk with a heavy bag is extremely exhausting but is good to ward off concussions. I was panting by the time I reached my Aunt’s house. The door was open and I could see my aunt busily reading in the drawing room. I barged into the house; she was shocked. Thanks to the horror of the day, I had forgotten to inform her that I would be arriving.

After exchanging hospitalities she headed to the kitchen to cook additional rice and curry for me. I dumped my bag into my room and headed to the bathroom to take a much required shower.

My uncle returned from office, took a shower and had changed into his pyjamas by the time I stepped out of the bathroom. I got into a Bermuda and joined on the dining table. 

“How is College?” He asked

“Its fine”

“Hmm ! how are your girlfriends ?”

Usually I would laugh and say something silly, but that day I felt like crying. Still I smiled and replied.

“They are dead. “

Uncle chuckled and Aunt joined him after a disapproving grunt ( In Indian Orthodoxy one is not supposed to speak of death after sunset).

We had our dinner and I retired to my room. I pulled out Harry Potter and the Goblet of fire for the nth time and began reading. While Potter’s broom zoomed all around Hogwarts my mind zoomed all around the world. I was unable to concentrate; it was one of those rare times when I find it difficult to concentrate upon a story.

I took out my cellphone and checked out the contact list. Upon reaching the section under “V” I slowed down the rate of scrolling. And slowly all the names propped up which I never knew I had saved. Sandwiched between “vijayakumar drpnpll” and “Vidyavan” was her name. I shook my head It was the worst place for a girl’s name to be in, each of the neighbours being far worse than the other. Five minutes later I had conjured a new set of mnemonics and one hour later I had rearranged the entire contact list, with the loose ends in a safe corner, where even if such accidents were to happen would have least repercussions.

I felt relieved, now that I had reordered my contacts and that the impact or such an accident would be much less if it happened a second time. I was thinking about all kinds of situations that may be waiting after my return, each exponentially horrific than the previous one. The little relief that came was from the fact that I had used Sanskrit to send the message and not Hindi or English or Telugu, very few people on the face of earth know Sanskrit; Vijay and Bharani were sure shot failures in Sanskrit even The Almighty himself was to teach them the beautiful language. Sleep engulfed me as scenes of horror reeled one after the other.

Never search your pockets while texting

The bus that day was unusually vacant. There were two girls giggling away in the seat right behind the driver, a beautiful woman was sitting beside a tall bespectacled man on the other of the aisle, the bright myrtle and the exceptionally large number of bangles covering both her arms, from wrists to almost elbows told that they were recently married.  I took the window seat just before the last row, far away from the happy couple and the giggly girls. Shoved my bag under the seat, took out a mango, from my pocket I took out the parts of my cell phone and assembled them. With crossed fingers I switched the device on, it worked, I made a brief call to my mother, who was disgusted at the turn of events, after a lengthy complaint on the rising cost of vegetables and an equally lengthy lecture to take care of my health she reluctantly disconnected the call, considering the rising cell phone bill.  A message from the vodaphone told that I had another 10 rupees worth talktime left. Reluctant to spend it I decided to send an SMS to ‘her’.

“eh rati … vskp gacchAmi ….. adya nA vadatu zaknOmi … st .”

I opened the contact book and searched her name in the long list of carefully ordered contacts.

“ekkaDiki!” came a hoarse grunt.

Startled, I looked up it was the ticket conductor, his bad mood was evident from his irritated face, and I decided that it was better to buy the ticket first than to send the SMS. With the phone still in my hand I dug out my wallet out of my Jeans pocket.

“Vizag” I muttered out handing a rare, crisp, new, unscribbled 100 rupees note to him. He put it into his leather pouch and dug out a dirty 20 rupee note, two wrinkled 10 rupee notes and a disintegrating 5 rupees note and tucked it into my palm.

He then unceremoniously plucked out two small slips of paper from a big bunch of papers which looked more like lottery tickets that bus tickets, punched holes on 4 different numbers and handed them to me. I took them and smiled to myself, one of them had the number 5000 and the other had 500 upon it. Paise coins are long gone from the Indian market; these bus tickets are perhaps the only reminders to the Indian common man that the smallest unit of Indian currency is not 5 Rupees but 1 Paise.

Tucking away the precious slips of paper (If you lose them you have to part with 1000 Rupees) in another pocket, I looked at my cell phone. The screen flashed

“Messsage sent. Call cost 0.00 INR INR. STD/local SMS balance still left 2909. Your current balance is 10.98INR”

Perhaps I had accidentally pressed the send button at some instant while buying my ticket. Now I was waiting for her response which usually is instantaneous. With the cell phone in my left hand, I took another big bite off the sweet raw mango. The reply had not yet come; I did not text her anymore. The bus had reached Tagarapuvalasa, another one hour and I would be in my Aunt’s house.

I felt a vibration in my palm and then a beautiful tune on a double reed flute. My cell phone was ringing the screen flashed, “VijayKumar Drpnnpll”. He was a fellow classmate and I wondered what made him call at that time, for rarely does he call.

“Hello! Durapannapalli Vijayakumar”, I called out(I love calling people by their full names).

“You know I found out why you go to Vizag so often!” he smirked.

“What’s there to find out? I go to my aunt’s house away from the stupid hostel.”

“Don’t lie dear. You go to meet ‘Rati’.”

I was dumfounded, not a word came out of my mouth, how the hell did he find out the name. I was still wondering when the speaker came alive with his words full of sarcasm.

“’Eh rati, vskp gacchAmi…………………………………’, now tell me sir who this ‘Rati’ is. Isn’t she your girlfriend?”

“I need to change the order of the wretched contact list.” I thought to myself, interestingly when you are nervous your thoughts come out through your mouth, and that’s what happened to me.

He laughed at my unintended comment.

“I do not have girlfriends.”  I said.

“Not girlfriends, just a girlfriend, Rati. You know, I googled the name and have saved the screenshot of the results, which I am tempted to show you.” he laughed.

“Anyways enjoy your trip…………… lets talk after you return.” The phone got disconnected.

“Enjoy my trip! now that you have spoiled it.” I said aloud.

The conductor and the other passengers stared hard at me. Embarrassed I was trying to find out a way to cover up things when the silly thing rang again.

This time the screen flashed, “Bharanikumar Papiraju”, my thrashing heart lost a couple of beats.

Bharani and Vijay, were two bodies one soul, they exemplified bromance, if it had not been for their own individual personal affairs, a stranger could have easily confused them of being gay, now that it is legal in India.

“Why has Bharani called?”

“surely not for Rati or is it for that.”

“But how would he know? Could Vijay have told Bharani?”

“It’s impossible. See the time it is not even 1 whole minute since Vijay disconnected, during such a short duration no one can tell stories.”

“Perhaps they are nearby?”

“Hey you know their parents. Bharani would get the thrashing of his life if he dared not return on time from college.”

My mind and heart argued while the cellphone kept ringing.

Confused and cautious I answered the call.

“Hello” I could not say anything more.

“Hey ! Would you be able to come for second show tonight.” Bharani boomed

I was relieved; surely he had not yet spoken to Vijay.

Gathering my voice, I replied.

“Oh no Bharani, I am sorry I can’t.”

“Why?  what happened? What will you do over the weekend? You will get bored. Why don’t you join us?” Bharani was adamant.

“you see Bharani ……. I am going to Vizag, and I would return only after Vinayaka chaturthi.”

“To meet Rati” Bharani added casually

My heart sank. The idiots had spoken to each other. No! They were nearby for I could hear Vijay guffawing and catcalling on the other side.

“Stupid fellow! “ bharani continued. “You never let me get the slightest hint of it. Just return! We would talk about it.”

The phone got disconnected.

I was in a shock; I cursed my phone aloud, ignoring the disgusted looks. Indira Gandhi Zoological garden did not mesmerize me that day, nor did Kambala Konda eco park. Visalakshi Nagar and Hanumanthawaka flew by. At Venkojipalem I gathered my luggage and told the conductor that I wanted to get down at Isukatota. The conductor stared but obliged. He signaled the driver to stop at Isukatota, where I got down.

I did not feel like taking an autorickshaw to my aunt’s house. Rather I took the much required walk to snap out of the concussion, which had engulfed me since the horrific calls.

* The words from Indian languages with the exception of proper nouns are spelled according to the Harvard Kyoto convention for romanisation.

The Escape

The Friday was no ordinary Friday It marked my freedom from college for the next five days. VinAyaka chaturthi was round the corner and the college had given a day’s holiday on the following Tuesday, and I had no plans to re enter college before Wednesday, ignoring the absenteeism on Saturday and Monday.

Einstein had so beautifully explained the theory of relativity :

E=MC²

“When you are with your lady love you hardly feel the time pass by but when you are in waiting for her each second passes as an eon”

This applies not just to one’s lady love but also to one’s escape from hostel. The periods seemed to have doubled their duration and when I felt it was time for the final bell to ring, it was just the lunch break that got commenced. Neither the lecturer’s lengthy speeches nor the prankster’s silly comments made any difference to my anxiety. After what seemed to be eons the final bell rang. By the time the lecturer had reached the bottom of the staircase I had raced to my hostel room. Packed the duffel bag in a jiffy and reached the warden’s cabin right in time when he was about to go out for his evening tea.

“Out-pass!” I panted.

“The management has asked not to issue any out-pass till Monday evening.”, the warden smirked.

“There are guards guarding the way along the lake”, poor Rahul added in a frustrated tone, apparently his attempts to slip out had been quashed.

I made my Jaw drop with the mouth unusually wide open, put up the most pitiful expression I could conjure. My thoughts raced along all the alternate escape routes which I alone was familiar with.

Usually under such tense situations two routes proved trustworthy, one was through the cashew orchard of Easwar Rao(whom I fondly called Izwar rAo tAtA, tAtA is a Telugu word which means grandfather) and the other was through the mango orchard, whose owner was a woman whom I called tOta-mAma(tOTa in Telugu means orchard and mAma means grandmother thus tOTa-mAma means granny of the orchards).It was the mango season and tOTa-mAma always gave me mangoes whenever she saw me. Tempted by the fruit I made my mind in favour of the second route.

The warden was long gone and most of the hostlers were in the mess or the playground having left their hopes of going home. I took my bag and went out carefully looking out for the watchful guards. After about 20 yards of brisk walk I went behind a row of teak trees. Things were easy from there as people hardly ventured out here since the day when a cobra was spotted, those who did dare to come around occasionally, left all the courage after a python was spotted. Having crossed the teak trees the thick groove of Palmyra palms, tamarind and canon ball trees with a dense undergrowth of elephant grass ensured proper cover. 30 Yards of brushing about and I had reached the high fence that marked the college boundary. I slung my duffel upon my back. Rolled up my jeans upto my knees and climbed up a Margosa tree, whose canopy extended well beyond the other side of the fence. Carefully crawling on the branch for a few feet I then jumped off to land on the other side, into tOTa-mAma’s orchard.  The small temporary hut made of Palmyra palm leaves was in its usual place, with a big heap of mangoes on one side a string cot on the other. tOTa-mAma was nowhere to be seen. With a low spirit I walked along the way to reach the bus stop, which would be a 20 minute walk through the orchard followed by a field, a cemetery and a hamlet. I crossed the orchard and had barely entered the field when a high pitched “bApan bAbU(It is country slang of Telugu which meant ‘Brahmin boy’)” I looked up, granny was sitting on a thatched platform alongwith another woman in the middle of the field.

Carrying an additional, small polyethene bag of kottavillikobbari mangoes (given by tOTa-mAma)(Kotthavillikobbari is a type of mango that is eaten raw, it is large and almost weighs a kilogram per fruit) and sapodillas(given by the other women), I stood at the bus-stand waiting for the bus. It was 7:00 in the evening and the stars had started to appear. The village street was alive with hawkers, farmers were returning on bullock carts, birds flew from everywhere to everywhere, when at last the bus appeared.

* The words from Indian languages with the exception of proper nouns are spelled according to the Harvard Kyoto convention for romanisation.

‘Cool’ or ‘Misogyny’

It had been two days since I had rinsed my cellphone. The boredom that had plagued me initially waned with the discoveries of nature’s bounty and the joy of spending time with friends. Even though I was enjoying myself, anxiety was killing me; it had been two days since I had spoken to my mother. I checked out the window sill the parts of cell phone were neatly laid out to get maximum exposure to sunlight not unlike the pieces of mangoes kept out to dry in the sun for pickling. I assembled the components and switched on, lo and behold my cell phone was working once again, and I tried making a call it got connected but then got switched off. Encouraged by the progress I disassembled the device once again and left the components to dry in the sun.

It had been a boring day; each lecturer came on time leaving our chances of momentary freedom to wither in the Indian summers. The Microprocessor lecturer took no pity on the Jam packed classroom of 120 students sweating in tropical summer afternoon. The occasional soft sighs from the different corners helped only to magnify the drone of assembly level commands.

As we scribbled the diagrams with disgust a further disgusting face of the Principal’s secretary appeared with a disgustingly thick pile of papers. The micro processor lecturer skimmed along the papers and then followed the secretary.

The silence gave way to whispers which gave way to a loud noise. The decibels from the corridor told that similar was the situation in other classrooms. People all of a sudden started remembering the books which they had lent out to fellow students of other classes, some were reminded of their bursting bladders, still others of their parched throats. In a short while the jam packed classroom was anything but populated.  A couple of pony tailed, bespectacled girls sat correcting their already perfect diagrams. I along with a few others was listening to the wonderful mimicry by Kartik of a comedian from the previous night’s movie, a boisterous voice boomed.

“abe teri mAl A ri hai!!!”

We turned back to find a greasy haired Manoj grinning by the door, while poor Ramesh turned purple when a fair, haute girl entered the room. Before Ramesh could return to his normal shade a commotion followed with a loud announcement:

“The devil is back.”

Sure enough we could see the checked paunch of our Microprocessor lecturer amidst the scampering students.

The period ended soon, to be followed by two more no less boring periods. At last the much awaited 5:00pm bell rang to mark the end of the day. Frantic looks at the watch made the teacher leave the topic unfinished. She had barely reached the door by the time the sleeping class was jiving around.

We were guffawing at Ramesh when a shrill piercing voice said “Don’t you guys have any shame!”

It was the terrorist. We wondered what we should be ashamed of. Perhaps our blank looks said more than our mouths, for she continued.

“What do you think girls are? A piece of entertainment!

You call yourself educated, but have least signs of even literacy.”

I was tempted to show my certificates at this juncture but restrained, having learnt a couple of lessons from my previous experiences.

She continued – “You could have said ‘teri girlfriend A ri hai’ or perhaps ‘teri prmikA A ri hai’.”  This was too much for anyone to remain silent.

“Who says ‘premika’ nowadays? Come on! do you want Manoj to sound right out of some black-and-white movie.” I interrupted.

Her tone rose, “okay if not premikA then pyAri, dulAri or perhaps just her name. But what do you mean by ‘mAl’.”

Now she had come to her point, just one word and we have to bear this torture.

“Come on! Just ignore it.” I said

“Ignore!” she distorted her face to resemble a wringed towel and continued.

“Ignore the misogyny! The disrespect shown towards the poor girl.”

“Hey! Now you are going too far. How was that disrespectful leave alone misogynist?” Manoj defended.

“How would you feel if someone told shouted ‘XYZ tera mAl a rA hai’ upon seeing you Manoj?” she questioned.

We had no answers, but the idea was enough to release a bout of laughter. Very patiently she waited till the last smile faded and she continued with the rarest sign of humor on her face.

“Do not laugh, I am serious. The word is overwhelmed with misogyny. ‘mAl’ is used for non living things usually by businessmen to mean goods. Do you guys think we girls are goods to be dumped in a godown?”

“Oye! I never meant that. I was just joking while maintaining the cool lingo.”  Manoj was exasperated.

“COOL! How could you ever think it cool? Are you out of your mind? That is the kind of language used by rowdies. If that’s cool for you why are you sitting in this classroom go ahead and join some gang you might seem ‘HOT’ not just ‘COOL’. And what you said was not a joke, it was a jibe, mean in every aspect! And all of you are no less bad, laughing at such indecencies and atrocities towards girls.”

“‘Atrocities towards girls’, it sounds like Shabana Azmi/ Sushma Swaraj speaking in Parliament for women’s rights.” I thought to myself and knew better than expressing it aloud.

The terrorist had not stopped, “You guys are not worthy of receiving education. You should first receive some morals and etiquettes. Etiquettes are to life what grammar is to language.”

“arey meri mA ! English kA grammar kam pad gayA hai kya, ab life kA grammar pakdi hai!” I was getting restless.

“Do you people have any idea of the pain she might have undergone? I would have a word with her about her relationship with you Ramesh, you senseless fool.”

Ramesh’s mouth was agape but another hoarse voice said, “ammA tALAlu veyyAli ammA!(I need to lock the doors dear!)” it was the peon with a big bunch of keys in his hand.

With no second word we left the classroom to get some air before we fell into the depths of our own guilt.

* The words from Indian languages are spelled according to the Harvard Kyoto convention for romanisation.