Thursday, February 18, 2010

An Open Terrace



An open terrace, 3 odd bean bags, a quarter of whisky (each) along with a few eatables, 4 guys having the time of their life, maybe the last of their few college life experiences that they'd cherish for their entire life ahead. Was one of them. Wonderful times those!!! No vexations no tomorrow no yesterday only thing that was was the present. When you’ve just had the correct amount of the ‘sharaab’ and there is no scope of ‘shabaab’ and suddenly you realise “who the hell needs ‘shabaab’ when there is ‘aap mein aur bagpiper!’ (Mind you it wasn’t bagpiper. Wasn’t facing the economic depression the world was in! One of the speciality of the campus: u never get to know what’s going on in the world since it doesn’t matter because you’ll always have a friend to share a drink with :P) its already enough colourful (khoob jamega rang)” during the futile talks that follow this situation we came on to... well... nothing less futile then talking about the vista lay in front of us... The site that we might have witnessed a thousand times at different times held a special significance today. A riveting fact about nature being it takes the colour you want it to at any instant of time. The weather is gloomy or felicitous depends on whether or not you are gloomy or felicitous.

The four of us in our besotted state looked at the horizon and the only thing visible was across the lake a small flyover shining golden (orange-ish because of the street lamps and the level of higher complexion can only be because of you know what...). one of us (call him A)had that power in his imagination and (no power in his eyes) to notice a small motor fomite with four wheels; usually propelled by an internal combustion engine which in turn is driven by the use of one of those non renewable fluids (sorry just finished my midsems J). Ok getting back to the futile topic, he observed one of these thingies and had an outburst of feelings as he said “The driver is a male of around 45 years of age. He is one of those silent guys who follows orders sincerely never demands recognition, never asks for promotion stays in the same position for his entire life only because of the fear of getting fired and hence not being able to support his family that has no other source of income and has been asked today by his own son ‘Dad, what have you done in life?’ only because of the fact that the father tries to explain to him not to haste in taking his decision about career and life. He’s just having a photo story running in his mind of his entire life as a parent of this son trying to answer the question put forward by him” This was followed by a huge uproar and laughter among us four because we had never heard A speak so much and with such depth in his voice (though none of us could actually make out what he said). We all started stopping him from attempting a suicide (at least that’s what we thought he’d do next from the weight in his vox) in the process of which we instead looked almost like the gangsters who have come to get back their money and are threatening him that we’d throw him off!

Then we actually discovered to our surprise that one of us was indeed listening with the same intent as it was said... Call this person B (names are not mentioned not because the characters object to it but because I don’t know who said what :P), he continued “the two wheeler that follows is a bajaj chetak the scooter that is now a vintage. It is carrying on itself the load of a couple who are carrying on themselves the load of a world of insecurities that they have for each other. Both of them have employed people to know the whereabouts of the other and have become susceptive that the other knows of this since he/she isn’t showing any signs of betrayal...” this was when C suddenly joined “do you see the auto rickshaw standing just by the road??” nobody said anything. “I said do you see the auto rickshaw standing just by the road?? “ And we were all in attention “roger that!!” “aai aai sir!!” “kya karein uda de boss!!”... A few smiles later C continued “the driver of the auto has been ramming his auto from Borivli to Mulund, Mulund to Borivli, Borivli to Mulund for the past 35 years. He occasionally met, as a passenger, a student of the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay and brought him into the campus. He used to love these passengers. He since his childhood had a strong wish to study but was deprived. He has had the same routine for the past thirty five years just to see his boy live his own dream and get admission into this place. The boy used all the resources that were provided by the mere auto rickshaw driver dad of his and had not cleared the required exam. The result just came out today. This driver has developed a sense of rage against the place now... he for the first time is thinking of changing the route he has travelled throughout his life because one of the destinations on the way that used to give him the heart to work longer days in illness and in health has now become the source of anger, poverty and despair ...”

The fourth D now had to have his take on the subject. D, the guy with the power in his eyes (spectacles), had just broken them today and had no idea even about the flyover leave alone the vehicles and the people in or on them! All he knew was the lake that was bestowing the wind that might have caused such a mood (yet again nature blending with the mood) in the group. D contributed “we met three, no infact four, different people today on the other side of the lake having completely different sets of issues among themselves they ponder over throughout the day and see in their dreams. There is a world of billions of such and different people each having subjects to reflect ruminate and speculate about. Inspite of all these we have what is called life and these cultivations of our mind that complicate life make us realise the importance of this moment, right here right now the dark of the night, the cool zephyr, the lights far off that I am not able to see distinctly, the company, the bean bags, clean mind (with dirty thoughts maybe :P but clean of those issues) the fact that I was here a few days ago ,with specs, and saw a person on the bank of the lake across from here staring at me maybe developing a similar story on the basis of my mental state and appearance that day I feel that it is in this silence somewhere that life lies and that this silence and a 10 minute look at the place is the solution to all the problems and anxieties of life.”