My Little Tsunami Incident

I always wanted to visit a beach. A real beach with real sand and real sea or oceanic water. Not the ones that are kept for display for people who have never been to a beach. In short, for people like myself.
      Now, I was really excited and happy when I learnt that we would be visiting a beach - a real one. And so we made a trip to Pondicherry from Bangalore, Karnataka, by road. We hired a driver. No, let me be more specific - we hired a potato for a driver. I mean, fine. You don't know our language (Assamese; also, nobody was expecting to hear him speak Assamese out of the blue) But he should have at least known how to speak Hindi, or any other language that we'd understand (which would be Hindi still). but no. I swear we could have interacted with a potato better than this guy. He'd also taken us through a road which was lonely and dark ( dark because it was getting darker) and which had ancient forts at distances on either sides (I could almost hear a female ghost shouting or singing "Aami je tumar") And when it was finally night, the forts seemed all the more scarier and sinister. In addition to that, my sister, Amrita Madhukalya, out of being bored to her bones, wanted to watch "Taare Zamein Par". In the car. Yes, you did see the word 'car'. Mom, dad and I were too tired to ridicule her. So yes, we finally reached Pondicherry and entered the first hotel we got, Annamalai. Very nice hotel. I loved the bathtub.
      So, moving on, the next day was normal, excluding the fact that I and my sister posed for a local newspaper (I could see Portuguese people admiring us while reading the newspaper next day) and I having a miniature tsunami like incident ( I suggest you do not plan any beach trip with my sister. It could be your last).
        Let's focus on the tsunami incident since the paper-posing wasn't that pretty ( neither was the tsunami one, but was pretty interesting ). So, that day we went to two beaches. One was not really a beach. It had a rocky cliff sort of a coast. It's this, you avoid the rocks, you jump into the water, the water pushes you back against the rocks, smashes you and you die. You get the picture. Ther other beach was good. But, quite obviously with a driver like the one we had, we were on the wrong beach. Anyway, it was a nice beach, with nice sand and shining blue sea. However, there was this one thing; it's coast had a little slope to it. There was this family, who were going mad in the water. Like, they were so happy or something, they were going mad. Also, that was the only other family in the beach beside ours. Yes. We were in a really wrong beach, you can imagine.
          So what happened was, the four of us were standing on the coast when my sister went wild and caught hold of my hand, dragging me into the water. Before I could get over the shock, she let go of my hand and started doing the Titanic pose. And before I could understand what the hell was happening, a wild wave appeared and threw me off balance. As if that wasn't enough, the wave literally washed me like I was in a goddamn washing machine. I experienced the "I-saw-my-life-flash-in-front-of-me" moment. The wave went back and I looked to my side. My sister wasn't there. She was shouting from the coast to me, along with my parents, "Crawl! Crawl before the waves come back!". Yes. I crawled like a gorilla towards them. And I was crying, obviously. Not because I nearly died in the water, or that the water could have actually taken me into the sea and I'd have been dead and not be alive to create a blog and narrate this story. I cried because my hair got wet in salty water. I felt stupid thinking about it then. I feel stupid thinking about it now. I cried anyway. Also, the bathtub at the hotel wasn't so lovely anymore.




P.S. Anwesha Madhukalya wasn't with us on this trip because she was doing a better job than nearly drowning in sea-water, crying because there was salt in the hair and dragging people in the water and doing the Titanic pose without a fair warning.

Everyday

"I was happy. I was waiting outside a shop and I found the exact thing I'd always wanted that thing through which you call someone. I think its called a 'mobile phone'. Yeah, that thing. It was hanging from a hook, wrapped inside a plastic packet. Once, I saw a man coming out of a pretty shop. It was huge and they'd put up decorations, like lights, because Diwali was near. The man was with his son, who was holding a flat object and pressing something on the object. It was a phone because he exclaimed,
"Dad! This is such an awesome phone!"
Phone. I heard it. So I asked my owner (Yes, I have an owner)
"What is a phone?"
She got surprised. She looked scared, to be honest.
"Where did you hear about that, eh?"
"I was roaming about and I saw a boy holding a flat object and pressing things that might be on that object and then he exclaimed that it was an awesome phone. What is 'awesome'?"
"You ask too many questions. Phone is an object through which you can all someone . And the other question? I don't know. Must be some rich-people language." She said with a frown.
"Rich people?" I asked, my eyes wide. Seeing that I was getting excited, mostly about what she told me the phone.
"Yes. Rich people. People with lots of money and that is why they could buy an object like that."
"But you have one too. And we are not people with lots of money. We barely get to eat."
"I had been saving some money for a while and when there was enough, I bought it." She said, showing me the phone. It was that flat but it was an object through which you could call others or anyone. She noticed that I was staring in awe at the phone. So, what she did was, she kept the phone back in her small hand-bag that hangs on her wrist, since morning and I don't know if she ever takes it off. Except for when bathing.
"What are you staring at?"
"No, its just tha-" I started but she cut me in,
"Listen here, you stop roaming about in the streets. Because I don't want you using your brain and getting me into trouble" which means, I should not use my brain to run away from her clutches, "and no more stupid questions" which meant, no more questioning about the phone.

But I did use my brain and ran away. As I was saying, I saw the phone and since I had some money, which I had stolen from my owner, I bought it. It cost me only 10 rupees. I had more than 10 and my owner clearly told me only rich people could buy phones. So, does that make me rich? This thought made me happy. I am rich! I am rich!"
"Lakshmi! Calm down!" I shouted at her. Lakshmi  tells me the same story everyday without fail. And every time, she ends it with the "I am rich!" shout. Well, I end it actually. There's more to it. As I sit near her bed, staring at her, her round eyes looking at me, I tell her,
"Sit. Sit down." She'd gotten out of her bed and was legs apart, hands-up, wide apart. She calm down and slowly moves towards her bed, mumbling,
"But I am rich. My owner told me, a person needs to be rich to -"
"She is a bad lady. Forget about her. Sleep. It'll ease your head-ache" She  was surprised that I knew she had a head-ache. "yes, I know" She lied down, I tuck her in and she closes her eyes.

Bad Record

      I really hate recounting incidents like these. Makes me so mad I can eat everything inside the fridge. And that is bad because that'll make me overweight which in turn will create many stuff in my body which is bad because I don’t need to tell you why, it’s all common sense stuff. So this particular incident came by my mind, to say hello or what, and I wrote it down, for my mind’s peace sake. Because you see, until I write it down somewhere, I will keep thinking about it. How irritating will that be? Yes, very. But the point is this is awfully irritating.

          Okay, so I had this friend, who turned to be my so-called best friend in 8th grade. I mean, I had all these experiences where I never had a boyfriend but I had multiple best-friends. Either I don’t know how to distinguish between close friends and best friends or what, but just like girls magically need boyfriends as soon as their puberty works on them, I had a real lot of ex-best friends. Ironically, boyfriends and best-friends, both truncate to BF. Hah, nice work. But since we were talking about that friend of mine, who was my ex-best-friend, we should just continue talking about her. She, you know, did the worst thing ever done by a friend to another friend. I mean, jokes in their own place, this was mindlessly dirty. Not slutty dirty but dirty in its own sense. What she did was she was absent from classes, science classes. We’d just started our term and she had to mess things up. She was absent so she called me up. Asked me about the work, I told her. I won’t detail it, but I halved the work, which her stupid convent brain didn’t understand, even after I mentioned it, like twice or thrice. But yeah, she called me up for the science assignment. I told her what the assignment was. I mean, I really detailed into the assignment, page numbers and where the answers were, the questions. Everything; and by everything, I mean every darn thing. It’s a wonder how people don’t appreciate what you do for them. It’s like, they’re done with you and then they are like, “Ok thanks bye”. So maddening. So, anyway, after all that, it was a biology assignment, by the way, she called me up, like half-an-hour later to tell me that she didn’t have her biology copy but physics copy. I mean, come on! Just change the label and write “biology copy” there. I did the same. I got my chemistry copy so I changed the label. And it wasn’t that hard too because our biology, chemistry and physics copy were more or less same and you can only tell them apart if you have a label that says it’s a biology copy or physics or chemistry. But obviously, she didn’t do that, even after I told her over the phone. I got to know of it after she created that drama out of nothing and made me cry, the next day.

          The next day, I asked her if she did her homework. Evil grin on the face, she told me coolly, that she didn’t. She obviously felt cool while saying that but I felt my ears go warm, hot actually. Even though I can’t see my ears, I knew they were getting red. I felt them getting red. And she, she was smiling still, like it was all fun and games. Well, it was for her. So, I thought that may be since she is smiling, it’s a joke. I mean, would you say, “OMG! I committed a murder! Yay!” If you would, then that’s what she looked like that day. So evil. So serenely evil. Well, after all that, we went to the class. Now, during science class, I was feeling really weird, uptight because I knew she’d do something wrong. And she did too. When the teacher started collecting the copies, she said, “My friend didn’t tell me about it”. I heard it. Damn clear it was; also because I was sitting on the front bench. For a moment, everything felt quiet around, when in reality it wasn’t. The teacher asked, “Who?” and I think she pointed at me. I felt like I was about to be executed, getting my head chopped. And I pictured her, her foot on my head, which was separated from my body; she was laughing an evil-victorious laugh. I heard the teacher take my name and because I didn’t want further humiliation, I got up a tiny second before she even finished calling out my name. I guess I wanted to run away. I looked at the teacher and she had an angry look in her eyes. And she started with the “why-didn’t-you-tell-her-about-it?” where I occasionally replied with an “I-did-tell-her”. Didn’t work; She was mad angry. I mean, you could see that fury on her face, annoyed and all she was. I wasn’t prepared for all these of course, but I did put my head down and listened; I stopped defending myself because I was stammering and that made the teacher feel I was guilty, even more. You see, I am not very comfortable while speaking things out. That was even more intense then; now, however, I run about like a rabbit. So, while she was telling me stuff like “very disappointing”, “tsk tsk”, “very irresponsible of you”, the one thing that caught my ears was “I can imagine now the kind of friend that you are”. I looked up at her, real eye contact, we made. Like, I could see the color of her eyes (it was brown) and I knew tears did roll down my cheeks. That was the first time I cried in front of a teacher. I was sort of, how do I put it, hurt. And believe me that was the day I knew what it meant to be hurt, literally. Like, I’ve heard it in movies, read it in books and also heard some of my friends say it too but they didn’t mean it of course. Because this was what it felt like to be hurt. Not when “Oh my God! My boyfriend dumped me! I am deeply hurt.” Yeah, your boyfriend dumped you because you happened to have hugged a couple of other guys too. You are, I can say with full confidence, not hurt or anywhere near it. You’re just sad he found out. But this was different. I knew she never really appreciated my existence and therefore I could never calculate as to why she would call me her best friend even, but this wasn’t expected. Because I damn well know the kind of friend that I am. But then you are “innocent” because you lied and you are sure hell lucky there was a teacher there or I’d have really forgotten my limits and would have bad-worded you to death. But what I really did was cry. Cry like mad because I was so hurt and angry and sad. I don’t usually cry like that but when I looked at the ground, my eyes turned into a magnifying glass. Yeah that’s how much I cried. My face, I think, became so salty with tear-water that snails wouldn’t survive to tell their children the tale of how they “snail-ed” onto a human face.

But I wish the story got over here. I didn’t. She denies doing any such thing. Like, on my face. She told me once. But I won’t detail it. Because that isn’t reading-worth, because that was real cheap. And good people don’t read cheap stuff, nor do they write about it. 

Memory

     October was coming to an end and I was damp and cold. It was mid-day and I was in my room, the numbness of winter seeping through me, although I was in the vicinity of the sun-rays, whose heat was fading away, I noticed. I was waiting for lunch. Mom loves cooking. And not just cooking, she loves feeding people – my friends, my sister’s friends, relatives – with her simple cooking and a twist in there. I believe it is communicable because I too love cooking now. I mean, out of three attempts, one was really good. I will spare you the details of the other two; they weren’t very friendly to me. The one which was good, it was a Classic Spaghetti Bolognese. Well, I had to substitute beef with chicken. Beef isn’t allowed in my religion nor do I ever want to taste it. So, the dish was a first attempt. I was really hyped about it. And mom appreciated it. So, we went shopping together. Picked up stuff and I made it. But then I realized that mom had gastric which might make it unable for her to eat just that. I thought that out loud and mom waved her hand in a “don’t-be-ridiculous” kind of way and said, “It’s my daughter cooking. I will taste it” with a smile, that twinkled her eyes. Turned out, it was low on spice. Well, that was the recipe’s fault, not mine. Next day at school, my friends appreciated it. But they had eaten the edited version of what I actually made. Mom just “Indianised” it with more stuff. Her version was better than mine was, though. I mean, I make noodles – boil and add salt and pepper, real dull – and if I ask mom to “edit” it, it just tastes so good, like so, so good, I wonder why didn’t I think of it. Well, obviously I didn’t think of it and she did because she is more experienced, but still! Now I look at cook books and think, if I add this and that to it, will it taste? I share with mom, she gives me her advice and I end up not making it because I get so happy at the thought of being able to make it then I think I should pursue a career in cooking, go to Masterchef and win it or something. I just end up not making it.

            So, as I was saying, I was waiting for lunch. I was really, really hungry. Like, my stomach was making dying sounds. Mom called out my name and I guess you could hear it three houses away. I went and had my lunch. After all the food thinking I just did, I took out the cook book we got with our microwave and read through the International Cuisines section. I looked at “Chocolate Pudding”, I made it, ate it, mom loved it but frankly speaking, I thought the chocolate felt bitter. Since it was a dessert, I guess it was a ‘bittersweet’ one. Then I saw “Baked Macaroni and Cheese” and I remembered, I, teaming with my elder sister, whose name I shall not enclose because I don’t want to be history so soon, melted a bowl; a microwave safe bowl, at that. It was written at the bottom of the darn bowl! The thing that amazed me the most was that I saw the plastic bowl melt. I was terrified and amazed, both. Terrified of mom, who, I was damn sure, would kill the life out of me. She didn’t, by the way. She just laughed. I was staring at her, “what happened just now?” and amazed because I saw the bowl melt, like real action inside the microwave. The whole atmosphere was somewhat crazy. Mom took a wooden spatula and started removing the molten plastic from the round glass (that moves round and round). The best role was played by my sister. She was doing the dishes in the kitchen. So, when there was real commotion in the kitchen itself, she ditched the dishes and came forward to look at what had happened. Hand on the hips, she asked me, “what is that melting?” to which I replied, “The bowl?”

“No, I mean what is that melting? The yellow thing? Is it the cheese?” she asked

“It’s the bowl! Can’t you see it or what?” I nearly shouted

“I can see the bowl but what is that dripping thing?!”

“It’s the godamn bowl, woman! The yellow thing that is ‘dripping’ is the yellow microwave safe bowl. We melted a bowl.”

“What the…hell.” She looked me at like she heard the ‘its-the-bowl-melting’ for the first time.

“Yeah. We melted a bowl. How awesome is that, eh?”

            Seriously speaking, I still wonder why mom didn’t throw us out of the house. Because as far as I know, destroy the food, no worries. Destroy the utensils, get out of the house. This was real amazement. Next I saw the “Chocó-chip cookies”. I made it too but those weren’t really cookies that I ended up making. Cookies are crisp and brittle. Even though mine weren’t that bad, tasted good and all, was pinkish-brown in color, which wasn’t suppose to look like because those were chocolate cookies, not strawberry, they weren’t crisp. The thing is, cookies are suppose to be awesome, the way they are, factory-made; Chocó-chips melting in your mouth and all, real tasty. What I made was a damp cookie. You can’t really pigeonhole it in Cookie section, because it was neither a cookie nor a cake. Stuck in a midpoint between a cake and a biscuit, it was.

            Well that’s it. There’s none more to it than that. Melting bowl, cookie stuck in a limbo and a bittersweet chocolate pudding. And if ever there is more (I am promising a friend of mine that I will attempt to make the Shepherd’s Pie, I might do some weird stuff there), there will surely be Memory Jr. or Memory II.

Know The Difference

                                                               Know the difference.

So, after the 9th July incident, i Google-ed the word "beast". I found: Beast [n]: any non-human animal, especially four footed mammal, savage nature or characteristics. And then i Google-ed "human being", i found: Human Being [n]: a person, especially as distinguished from other animals or as representing the human species. 

I personally don't see any difference between those remorseless "human beings" preying on that helpless girl and hungry tigers fighting for deer meat thrown to them. This is, by far, the most cold-fish act I have seen in my whole 18 years of life. The girl being publicly molested is nothing compared to what the society didn't do at that moment. I am a teenager myself and I don't feel safe. I didn't before but now, its worse. The girl was drunk and she might have said something to them, provoked them. But that wasn't the way to "teach her a lesson". She could have been handed over to the police. Every time I see that video on TV, i have goosebumps on my body. Is this where we stand in the eyes of the public? This low? Are we barbie dolls, to play with whenever you want? Are we materials that can be shaped according to men's fantasies? 
  These men, is this where their pride sits? Molest a girl publicly, is this it? How about contributing towards reducing crime rates? This is not the first time a girl has been publicly molested or a girl has been out that late, drunk and out of her senses. But this sure is the first time I've witnessed the most nerve-chilling act on a girl. There's just so much to be said and to be done against criminals like these, so much frustrations to be melted out on people like these and people with power who choose to be onlookers. I wouldn't call them animals because that would simply be an insult to creatures who attack as their defense. This is simply heart-breaking. 

I have absolutely no idea what i should write on my first blog. But eh, here it goes! 
I have a neighbor who, I wonder, ever saw the sun's ray or the rain or if they felt the scorching heat or the stickiness of the rain water on the body. I mean, the only time I ever see the woman of the house is when she has to walk the dog, which usually ends up with the dog peeing at everyone's gate to the house. The family, containing only three members, the mother, the father and the daughter, has always (and i mean always, in the real sense of the word) kept the doors and windows closed. The girl, i don't know her name (and i wonder if even the landlord does), used to, initially, come out of the house for walks. With earphones tucked to her ears (i always wondered the kind of songs she listens to), poker face on, she comes out any time of the day, and night too. Any time, as in any time. Any time, at 1 in the afternoon, 6 in the evening or even 12 at mid night. Yes, you saw it right, 12 at Mid Night (your eyes aren't bad, no worries there). Once, at night, probably 11:30 or so, i  was trying to sleep. I heard sound of chains. Like, someone was playing with it. I got up and sat on my bed, scared to death (i believe in ghosts, thought it was one too!). I saw one small white shape moving and then a medium height girl. I was seriously on the verge of peeing on the bed when I heard the girl say something to the dog, somewhat like, "Don't go there, no.". I was like, eh? What the hell? Whaaaat!? And then i realized, its that girl from the neighborhood. I didn't know if i should laugh or have a poker face on. That's one example right there. 
        But things have changed now. Now, we never see her. Not even on her walks cause she doesn't go on anymore nor to the market or ANYWHERE. Nowhere. I have seen people who go out less, are less sociable, introverts and all. But not like her, never. Oh well, you can find the most uncanny people even in the most unexpected places and hours.