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Dear afu…

December 11th, 2008
26 comments

Another birthday gone..the wait seems like an elephant’s majestic crawl but it’s over even before it all begins..

Most people would wonder what the big deal is ! well, maybe it is a reminder of the fragrance of the forgotten years. The days when parents would pamper you no end and make you feel so special, when friends would eagerly wait to knock on your door to attend the silly birthday party of chocolate cakes and other feasts. The only day when you were officially allowed not to wear your uniform to school. The whole school would know and say ” arre aaj iska happy birthday to you hai !” and how every single person would make you feel that you were the best thing that ever happened to the planet…of course, the next day it would be someone else’s turn.

Aah…and all those lovely prezzies wrapped up in beautiful gifted papers, I folded each one of those papers and treasured them…So, birthdays in school years used to be a home affair…as I entered undergraduate college all I, cared about was treating a few of my close friends out in a fancy joint in the town, a movie for all and ice cream and just chirping away to glory about all the crushes…and what have you !

Things changed when I joined Medical School. All of a sudden it was not just about a few friends but the whole class…and I never had enough pocket money to treat everyone out. So, I went back to Ma who would delightfully host a wonderful party for the whole class. There were hardly many prezzies in this phase of my growing up. All the classmates would pool up money and buy the birthday cake, a practice which was followed for everyone…
 
One year, suddenly I was all grown up and on my own and this is the phase of my life when work took precedent over everything else. There were even some birthdays when I would be working my socks off on a night shift in hospital but a couple of times the nurses bought some cake and made sure I had a reasonable time even though at work. Sweet angels they sure were !!
 
The last few birthdays were times for me to go out for a meal with some close friends and spend some cosy time with them. Somehow, yesterday although I stuck to the same routine, a few things turned out different!
 
I only have afu to thank for it.
 
When I posted the blog about my devilish antics, I had no intention to let everyone know about the exact date and all. But, afu’s comment made me blurt out about it. Boy !! am I glad, I did that and how!!

Afu, really you have been the Santa Claus for me this birthday. If it was not for you, I would never have known how many people whom I have never met, genuinely wish well for me. To think that I would have missed out on all that but for you makes me feel really warm towards you.

So, my dear afu, thank you for making this birthday a memorable one for me. Although they are all my virtual friends, I know for sure that their emotions are real.

Hope you have a great birthday too whenever it comes around !!

Thank you to each one of you for making me feel so speshulll !!!!!!! :-))))

Kindness sure comes from unexpected quarters !!


La de La vil La me !!

December 9th, 2008
35 comments

Hmm…time and again I stop and think, what do I write next? paucity of ideas in my pistachhio brain does me in, but I perennially have this itch to post something. The fact that I will be growing another year older soon has me do nothing but look back at the days of my childhood.

According to Ma I was devil reincarnate from the minute I set foot on this planet. Ma would regale some of these incidents once in a while…I thought I will share some of these today.. There are far too many of my naughty works to be written in one single blog…so will churn out only few for now !!

I was apparently one heck of a crawler as a baby. I would crawl under tables and sofas and go quiet the moment I saw the prey approaching. The prey would be my Appa’s friends. The minute I saw a potential victim with his or her legs dangling, I would pinch those legs with my tiny fingers. Over time, I, realized that some of my pinches proved ineffective, cause the prey wore trousers and my tiny fingers could do nothing. So, I figured out the solution, I would roll up their trousers and then pinch with all the strength that my little fingers could muster.
     
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This second incident is when appa was the Project Lead in a camp. A whole set of families would live in these camps. It so happened that there was another company who had a camp adjoined to us. I must have been around 3 or 4 years old and I would make a gang of kids from our camp and take them along and reach the neighbouring one. I would get all the kids to line up in a queue and beat up each one of them and before they could catch me I would make a run for the house through another exit adjoining the camp. All the kids would go home crying and complain about the savage beast that I was. Most parents refused to complain to my appa as I was the boss’ s daughter. My parents were certainly not oblivious to my devilish antics. One day dad called all the parents up, he made sure I was at a earshot’s distance and told them all, ” Don’t worry, next time my daughter hits any of your kids I give you full freedom to hit her back on your kids behalf. You don’t have to worry that she is my daughter. ” Hearing that, I for one realised that I could tackle kids but not their parents, So I abandoned the ” Operation beat up”. This whole scenario got me labelled as Chhoti terrorist in that camp.
 
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I loved going to school not because I enjoyed studying but, it was an escapade to have all kinds of glorious fun. My ma never minded my mischiefs as long as I studied too. I would sometimes get 20/20 in Mathematics and the teacher would praise me. I would happily go and tell Ma that I got 20/20 not exactly knowing what the big deal was. But Ma being Ma she would say with a tinge of wit, ” Mona, only 20/20, you should get 100/20 !!” I would wonder how the hell would I get the rest of the eighty marks.

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This incident happened when I was a second grader.
My social test had a question, ” Taar ghar (telegraph office) mein kya kaam kiya jaata hai ??” I for one had no idea what ” taar ghar” was, let alone what work they do there !! But, I answered it anyway as
” Taar ghar mein kapde sukhane kaa kaam kiya jaata hai ( wire in the house is used to dry clothes!)”
 
I was obviously wrong but the teacher gave me full marks and I beamingly went home to show it to Ma. She certainly was not pleased, not with me and certainly not with the teacher. The next day she came along with me to school and pointed it out to the teacher and made sure that my marks were deducted.

To top all this, she would always know if I ever lied, I would rack my brains as to how did she know that. One fine day she told me that she had a hidden television at home through which she could watch all my antics in school and hence she would always catch me if I lied. By Joe, I believed her for a good few years…dumb me !!
 
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This incident occured when I was about five, Ma handed me a 10 rupee note and said, ” Mona, the driver uncle will come to take the money, give him this note to buy vegetables from town as I am going to take my bath.” I was happy that my mother bestowed on me such huge responsibility, and wanted to act in a likewise manner. As soon as the driver uncle arrived, ” I said, ma ne kaha hai aapko paise doon !” ( ma has asked me to give you the money)
” Yeh lijiye, aadhe aapke aur aadhe mere…” ( half yours, half mine) even before he could respond, I had torn apart the 10 rupee note and handed him his share.

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I was about three when we were all travelling to Benares for the holy dip. My father was given the responsibilty of a very old lady who was travelling alone to Benares by her son. Her son handed over the ticket to my father who had kept it in his shirt pocket. The monkey that I was, I ripped the ticket off and tore it to pieces without an iota of attention drawn towards me. The poor lady and appa kept searching for the ticket frantically but I wouldn’t move my butt from where I sat. After a while I got tired and stood up and there the pieces were sticking to my bum. Thankfully, my granpa was a ticket collector, so the poor lady didnt have to buy another one..

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It so happens that in my community we are allowed to marry our paternal aunt’s son. I was a pet to my granpa and so was my cousin who had only one love at that point in his life, ” Okra !!!”. So, my granpa went up to him and said, ” I offer you my granddaughter’s hand in marriage and for acceptance I will give you two bags full of Okra, marry her.”

At that my cousin replied, ” Even if you give me 100 bags of Okra I will not marry this devil !!”

PS There are many more stories from my school and college days and if I did not depressingly bore you all till now, I can write some more if you wish !!

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PS 2  afu seems a little hurt…Are you afu ? what can I possibly do to make amends…hmm..let me think…ok this is what I think I should do. afu am acknowledging that indeed a paucity of ideas in my pistachhio brain made me churn out old stories..especially cos birthday was few hours away and I was remembering my Ma who is not all alone but out there with Pa. But if you feel I need to thank Rahul…then here I go, ” THANK YOU RAHUL, THE THINK TANK FOR ALL THE INSPIRATION I RECEIVED FOR WRITING ABOUT MY CHILDHOOD STORIES, PRANKS THAT I DID, BUT INSPIRATION WAS OBVIOUSLY YOU, THE ONE AND ONLY, THANK YOU RAHUL, THANK YOU SO MUCH !!”
 
oh afu..ab toh khush ho jao tussi :-)… please have this jaadu ki jhappi also from me :-)yaar…aur yaara birthday cake khaane bhi aa jaana :-) !! DATE 10/12/2008 0043 hrs