The Car has stopped, now what?

I pressed the disconnect option, “harder” this time. I knew the best was over and there was no point dragging it. But even after I explained her thrice, she wasn’t ready to understand. How immature can people be? It’s not a leaking tap that a mere twist of a wrench will fix it. We human beings are far more complex. And then she called again, the same name, the same number and that smiling picture of hers. She had started haunting me now. I switched the phone off.

“We are dogs chasing cars. Don’t know what to do when they stop” said a visibly drunk Vineet radiating sainthood and banged his fist on the table to prove his point. He listened to everything I narrated for over three hours and almost three quarters of Johnny Walker. But his take on the topic was top class. “We are the dogs chasing cars. Don’t know what to do when they stop”. True.

It started almost three months back when I offered her my seat in Delhi Metro. The kind gesture led to numerous smiles and coy glances. “Art of communication” is the only sure shot tool for a nerdy, bespectacled and not-exactly-a-great-looking-guy like me. And I utilized it to my full potential when the uncle on the next seat decided to leave at the next station. She was breathtakingly gorgeous and had the exuberance of a teen. She was excited about everything- her life, her friends and her work. I told her I wasn’t working and that I was just employed. She scribbled a note and handed it to me before leaving. I knew it was her number even before opening it. Well, it was her email id.

And those ten digits took almost 20 days to come to my phone. She was a tough nut to crack and I loved every bit of the pursuit. Every day was a challenge, for every smile that I managed to bring to her face, I patted my back twice. For every appreciative glance she passed at me, I mentally congratulated myself. I sang for her and she smiled. I wrote for her and she smiled. I acted crazy for her and she smiled.

And one fine day she decided to sing and write and act crazy for me. I didn’t smile. I was happy but that was because my ego got a huge massage. I felt good. The hat on my head had another feather and by far the most colorful one. And then she started feeling like a possession and then a liability and then a burden. The car had stopped and the dog had no idea. There were other cars speeding ahead, I decided to chase them.

And this was not the first time, the fifth time I guess or seventh or maybe I lost the count. There is something wrong with me or as Vineet says after his body and soul are full with Alcohol – “We set off for a destination but it’s the path we fall in love with, not the destination”. Philosophical but true.

The path, the pursuit of love excites me. When I chase a girl, I see her all around me - in my ideas, in my actions and in every part of mine. I see her on my car’s windscreen when I drive and every song that plays in the stereo somehow relates to her. When I try a new shirt in the trial room I mentally ask for her opinion. Yes, I become hopelessly romantic. And maybe, since the climb is so startling, the descent is dramatic too. Or as Vineet would say “It’s all temporary madness my friend, it too will die down”.

I am a spendthrift, a man with extreme fondness for a fine lifestyle and saving is always the last thing on my mind. When you crave for a superlative lifestyle, you have to part with your cash and I do that compulsively and hence stay empty handed most of the time. I am a spendthrift in matters of love too. I spend all pennies of love even when it needs to be preserved to be used in times of adversity. And consequently when the dire moment comes, I turn my face towards richer vistas. I hate looking at the venture whose budget has been depleted. The emotional budget has been depleted. Vineet wouldn’t brand me a villain and would assert coolly “Love is eternal, partners change”.

But am I the only one? Or I am just being vocal about myself, like I was vocal about my self-obsession a couple of months back. I have seen my friends leaving their phones unattended and then making the most horrendous excuses to justify their acts. At least I am Satan enough to pick the call and let it all out. How do people survive in long relationships then and what about those “Lived Happily ever after” couples? Do I have commitment issue? No, of course not because I don’t mind my space being invaded by someone I love, even if that’s a temporary feeling.

Maybe people like me need a mid-path in relationships as well, like we do in all spheres of life. Maybe, people like me need a more calculated approach in matters of heart and not a headfirst dive . Maybe people like me need to save the best for the worst.

And as I hate to believe maybe people like me don’t deserve love or as Vineet would put it “You know what dude, narcissists like you and I stay single. No big deal!!”.

Laws of Practicality!!

Placement is one keyword of every college student. I mean every one wants a good bike, a pack of good friends to hang out, a hot girlfriend that you can boastfully walk with, but at the end of your academic innings, you want to walk away with a good job. I love my habit of being “exception” to the obvious things but for this theory I was happy being a stereotype. And the art of getting placed at our college was a tough task. The Jaypee Engineering Colleges are three Campus strong educational infrastructure but the companies entertain only the best located campus, the Noida campus only. And that meant for every single company visiting our college campus, we had to pack our bags and land straight to Noida to be a part of the process.

The Sixth semester was about to end and I was packing my stuff to get back to home. Home is where I felt that there is a civilized person somewhere inside me or else in college we were nomads who wandered room to room, road to road, class to class without any well defined objectives. There were people who wished to flourish, while my friends and I just wished to survive. And in the act of survival we ended up with forty cigarettes and twenty cups of tea. The money that my parents sent vanished in a wink and in a matter of 10 days we came at the verge of hardships. And to add to it, I somehow broke the laptop of one of my juniors and hence I owed him a mammoth Ten thousand bucks.

There were two companies that were supposed to come at the last day of the academic semester that meant, first we had to rush to Noida and from there straight to our respective homes. I did not wish to be a part of the process, firstly it was pain to travel so much and more importantly I was out of money too. But, one of the companies was a big name hence I had to go. We went to the campus and the news broke out that the bigger company is not coming and the smaller one is only for Electronics Engineers. “Awesome, Couldn’t have been any worse”, I thought and started packing my luggage with a heavy heart.

It was an uncomfortable journey back home with train compartments stuffed like hell. Anyways 12 hours of hell and I was back to my home. I just wanted to relax, play and forget about placements, career and other serious aspects of life. I hardly spent a day at my home that I got a call from one of my friends who said that the bigger company is visiting the campus the day after. I was shocked. There are times in your life that your own faculties start hammering each other. My Brain and My heart were slamming each other and since we are practical people, living a practical life following the principles of practicality, my brain won and I made up my mind to get back to Noida. I somehow managed a ticket to Delhi for the next day

Shramjeevi Express was to depart at 11.45 and it was already late by ten minutes at Patna Junction. I had two bottles of mineral water, neatly packed separate boxes for lunch and dinner and three magazines that ensured a nice comfortable journey. And to add to it, the train was strangely vacant, a rare site on any Patna-Delhi train. The Train started with a jolt and hence started my journey.

“Faster than fairies, faster than witches,
Bridges and houses, hedges and ditches;
And charging alone like troops in a battle,
All through the meadows the horses and cattle”

Lines from one of my junior school poetries, I was enjoying it. Some things can only be enjoyed when you are in the company of your own self and “World through a train window” is one of them. Three hours passed in no time and the Train just left Buxar station. I was now trying to dig deep into a magazine to get a glimpse of what is happening in the world’s largest democracy, home to 1.17 billion people. The concentration of the concerned citizen was broken by a slight murmur. A foreign couple was trying to get suggestions from someone. The helper, however was little weak in English but he was utilizing all vowels, consonants and syllables of English coupled with lots of gestures and postures. But poor guest were very confused. I find a lot of foreigners traveling in Sleeper coaches when they could have easily afforded a flight. Probably they wanted to catch a glimpse of real India and hence they were bearing the brunt of it. Anyways, at times I can be a serious interrupter so I became the part of discussion as well.

It was a Russian couple, who came to Bihar to visit the Buddhist Monasteries and temples and they were on their way to Varanasi which is a 7 hour journey from Patna. I started talking to them. They somehow found my language a bit clearer and hence asked if they can sit with me for sometime and find a solution to their problem. The Male was a 60 year old handsome man whose name was “Alexei”, the Lady was probably two-three younger to him and she was also a pretty lady. Unlike Indian Wives the Russian Wife was allowing his husband to speak. The Problem was a very simple one, the Couple had a general class ticket and they were traveling in a sleeper coach and they didn’t know whom to talk to avail the right ticket. I told them the TTE is the designated authority who will charge them the routine fine and then would make a ticket for them. The Couple then started talking all good things that they saw in India. They were very happy to see the Peepul tree in Bodhgaya under which Siddhartha found his Enlightment and turned to Gautam Buddha. That was nice to hear. I told them a little bit about the culture and heritage of India. After half an hour the couple left and I again started looking out of the train window. Now the train was speeding towards MughalSarai junction one of the major railway stations in the Patna-Delhi route. While looking out I was carelessly wagging my hands to find out the magazine that was laying somewhere on the seat, but instead my hands found something harder and clearly bigger. I turned back and I saw a black pouch with a crocodile symbol on it, beautifully bearing the word “Lacoste”.

I realized that the Russian woman was carrying the Pouch. “How careless can people be I should search for them and return them their bag!” this was my instaneous reaction. I stood up with the pouch to look around for them. And then the hidden evil inside me came to the picture and this is what it said: “Why to return the stuff to them, you did not steal, they left and hence now it’s yours”. And again I was caught in a whirlpool, where one part of me was saying to look around for them and return it to them and the other was saying that it is all yours. The Evil’s role was more pronounced and it convinced me to check out what stuff was inside it and I foolishly followed it. I looked around like a thief and then went inside a washroom. The Pouch had three sections with zips and it was surprisingly spacious for its small size. Inside the first section, there was a Blackberry Handheld and a fancy Samsung phone. The other section had a Sony Camcorder and the third section had twenty thousand rupees, yes I counted it too. The Evil said “See! Not a penny less than sixty thousand bucks and it’s all yours.

“God is great, in one go he has solved all your problems”, the evil said again. “I can pay ten thousand bucks to the laptop owner and spend the rest partying next semester”, I thought. MughalSarai junction was hardly at a distance of 30-35 KMs. I made up my mind that I would pack the stuff in my bag and get off at MughalSarai and from there would take another train. The impact of the evil was so great that the good part was dumfounded. I packed the pouch in my bag and sat down waiting for the train to reach MughalSarai. In the meanwhile I started recollecting the Russian couple’s conversations. They were overjoyed by the kind of treatment they got in India. They said that the very warmth of the Indians will keep them pulling back to India every year. They were also impressed by the Indian youth whom they found very talented and hardworking. And they had a special mention for Bihar. Before coming to Bihar, everyone warned them about the crime rate of it and the cases of loots and murders. But, when they left this place they left it with a very happy heart. They found every one in Bihar, very helpful and cooperative.

The Train was speeding along the green farms. I still remembered the lines of my old school poetry but I was not enjoying. There was a sort of restlessness inside me. My good part was weak but it still was alive and it was trying to knock the evil occasionally. There are times in your life that your own faculties start hammering each other. My Brain and My heart were slamming each other and since we are practical people, living a practical life following the principles of practicality, the brain has got every right to win. But this time my heart was not ready to lose this fight.

Two foreigners on Indian soil with no money in hand and no means of communication and all because of me. A stack of rectangular papers the mother of all evils which people call money, is that the only driving force in the world for which I will singe the goodness of countless Indians. And to add to it, when the police officials in Delhi will enquire from the couple that where did the theft took place? They would get Bihar as an answer and they would say “We knew that, that’s why we stop foreigners from going them”. The Evil now was on back-foot and my good part was firing all around.

Without wasting a single moment, I took out the pouch and started looking for them compartment to compartment. I hardly went 5 compartments ahead that I saw them desperately searching for SOMETHING. The Woman was standing with tears in eyes, she was paying hard for her carelessness. I waved my hands at them and showed them their “Something”. They came running towards me.

“Where did you find it?”, The man asked.
“You left it on the seat when you were sitting with me”, I replied.
“God bless you. You don’t know how valuable are these to me?” He said again
“No problems, just be a little more careful when you are traveling”, I said.

The man nodded in acceptance but the woman was staring blankly at me. And then she hugged me, the silent warmth of her hug was speaking volumes.

I still owed a fellow ten thousand bucks. I still had a strenuous placement session to go through. I had 8 hours of train journey and a full return journey left but I was a happy man because I was again enjoying “World through a train window”.