26th September, 2014
As two of my friends and I had taken a few steps into the National Institute of Technology, Trichy (fondly called NIT-T), after having played for a few minutes with the revolving door that blocked the entrance, passed by us a very fair-skinned girl wearing a red sleeveless t- shirt and a dark blue jeans. My eyes followed her, with my head rotating slowly in a 180 degree turn and my eyes remained glued on that dazzling beauty till she stepped out of the college. As I slowly turned to continue into the college, I found my two friends staring at me, their eyes widened and a shameless glee spread over their faces. I smiled in acknowledgement and one of them completed the moment by saying a huge and an extended 'Wow'. I knew right then that 'Festember 14' - the inter-college cultural fest of NIT-T - was going to be an experience that I would cherish. And I was right.
Two hours later, I was screaming my lungs out in the barn hall of NIT-T in support of my friends who were performing a street -play. Or at least so it would have seemed to my college-mates who stood around me, shouting out their lungs on their behalf. But there was a more selfish and more petty reason behind my shouting. A girl. (It is always a girl, isn't it?)
The girl
My friends who were about to perform in the street-play had been taking selfies of themselves as they all had had their faces painted for the street-play. I had been roaming around the barn hall aimlessly, looking around for something interesting. And it couldn't have been more dramatic when she walked in, one among a group of 10, wearing a green churidhar with a red shawl.
In the midst of all the girls who were wandering around in sleeveless t-shirts and skin-tight jeans, she seemed like a more than welcome change. A charming face, hair tied behind in a neat plait, eyes decorated in a beautiful thin layer of mascara, a smile accompanied with a dimple - she seemed the quintessential Indian girl.
We boys, generally, have two categories of girls -
i) girls, at the sight of whom we call our friends nearby and show the girl, leading to a barrage of exclamations and appreciations and desperation(s)
ii) girls, at the sight of whom we turn around quickly to check that none of our friends are looking at the girl and breathe a sigh of relief as the girl is someone more special
She belonged to the latter. I stood transfixed at the sight of her as she kept walking away from me, with every step. A minute later, I quickly jolted myself out of the mesmerised state I had gone into and ran behind the girl and her group when one of my friends called out my name. I stopped my chase halfway and walked towards my friend, frustrated. He had called me to hand me a biscuit. I gave him a nasty look and snatching the biscuit from him, I walked again in the direction of the girl. But by then, she had disappeared among the crowd that filled the barn hall.
About twenty minutes later, as my friends had gotten on the stage to perform the street-play, the rest of us from our college rushed into the crowd to cheer them. As the street-play started, we let out a cheer so loud that half the crowd turned in our direction. And it was then that I saw her standing two rows ahead of me. For the briefest of the moments, our eyes met and that sufficed to set flame to my cheers. As our group's cheers subdued and the play proceeded, I suddenly let out a cheer for no apparent reason known to me. But it made her turn again. And my heart leapt in joy. And from there on, the cheers and the shouting increased gradually and so did my blooming romance.
The failure
By two clock, I found myself and my two other teammates wandering around the 'Lecture hall' of NIT-T for our event - Tamil cine quiz. As we finally found the room where the prelims was happening, we settled ourselves down and asked for the question paper, the three of us pretty confident of clearing the prelims and making it to the finals. The question paper was handed over and as we turned over its 5 pages, we suddenly felt a chill spreading. It seemed more difficult than what we had expected. And the duration also seemed less - 45 minutes as opposed to the general norm of one hour.
One of my teammates lost hope as soon as we finished reviewing the question paper and started panicking that we were not even going to make it past the prelims. Being the organizers of the event in our college and not even making it past the prelims in a neighboring college is something that does not sit well with the 'organizer' reputation. And the very thought of not even making it past the prelims started haunting us and it took us a few minutes before we could come to our senses.
We started approaching the questions one by one and slowly, the answers started showing up. And by the time we had completed about 30 of the given 40, only five minutes were left. As we sat breaking our heads to answer the remaining ten difficult ones, the five minutes flew away in a jiffy and the question paper was literally snatched away from my teammate's hands.
We walked out of the room to our eagerly awaiting college mates who asked excitedly as to how we had done. My teammate replied that we could have done better but said that he had confidence that we would easily make it to the finals. My feeling was not mutual but I did not want to shatter his hopes and remained silent.
The hours passed and by six, after an exhausted tour around the college, we still hadn't received a call saying that we had made it to the finals - there normally is a phone call when you make it past the prelims. But the absence of it started worrying us and as we decided to call the organiser of the event, we unexpectedly came across him. My teammate rushed towards him asking as to why they had not made a call yet regarding the finals. After asking as to who we were, the organiser very calmly replied that we had not made it through and asking us to attend the finals that was to be held the next day saying that we would enjoy it more as an audience, he walked away. And we were left in a state of shock and humiliation at having not even cleared the prelims when our seniors and super seniors had had the accomplishment of having won the event in the past.
Both my teammates walked to a nearby bench and sat down on it dejected and I was left standing there, staring at the setting sun, not knowing how to console them.
The twinkle
It was about eight at night and my college mates were still trying to console one of my teammates on the loss. Of the two, one teammate had accepted it after some time and had left it behind. But my other teammate had not been able to digest it and even after consolations from about 10 of us, he still refused to accept it saying that he had let them down and had not completed the one task he had come for, properly.
As our group stood around him consoling, started a drizzle and we, who were standing at about ten meters away from the 'Open Air Auditorium', quickly ran towards a huge tree nearby, seeking shelter under its leaves from the drizzle. In a few minutes, the drizzle turned into a downpour and most of my college mates started suggesting that it would be better to run to the auditorium and get drenched a bit along the way rather than standing there underneath the tree and get completely soaked in rain. I am not someone with athletic abilities and so I refused, leading them to start their sprint towards the auditorium.
As I stood there holding a hand-kerchief above my head, trying to find the thickest of foliage, came running a small group of people towards the tree. As the unknown faces stared at me, trying to fit themselves under the tree, my eyes glanced upon a sight I thought I would never see again. It was her.
As I typed the above paragraph, I paused for a moment because it seemed like a scene straight out of a Tamil film. But sometimes, life does present scenarios more dramatic than cinema and that moment under that tree in the thrashing rain seemed out of this world.
She had seen me and by the slightly upward angle her eyebrows struck, I could make out that she had recognized me from the morning. I looked back at her trying to bring about a smile as charming and romantic as possible. As we kept staring at each other, suddenly her lips seemed to widen slowly to a smile giving a premature birth to her dimple. And appeared a childish twinkle in her eyes for a split second that totally ripped apart my heart.
It would have been at the least a twenty second romance that our eyes would have shared. And as I tried to widen my smile, splattered a few drops on my spectacles that caused me to wipe them in a hurried manner to look at her again which made her let out a chuckle. And I looked at her through those water splattered glasses, a sheepish smile spread over my face.
One could probably not ask for a better romantic moment.
****
Standing at the foot-board of a crowded government bus gives a rush to the adrenaline. But standing at the foot-board of an empty bus with the wind slapping your face hard and talking to your teammate standing nearby is something heart-warming.
My teammates and I had left NIT-T as soon as the rain had stopped while the rest of my college-mates had decided to stay there longer for the 'Pro-nite'. My watch had displayed the time as ten-thirty as we had boarded the bus to our college. And having paid for the ticket, my teammate and I had stood by the foot-board as the other teammate settled himself down on an empty seat and had started listening to songs on his music player.
My teammate standing by my side, now recovered from his self-condemning phase, started discussing about cinema in general and the chat that followed is one of those chats I would remember for long.
As we got down at our college by eleven o' clock, my teammate had decided that he would attend the Tamil cine quiz finals that had been scheduled for the next day to see the standard of questions that the NIT-T organizers stuck to and also to snub the organizer who had replied haughtily, if a chance presented itself. He had readied his mind for retribution.
The other teammate also agreed to accompany him the next day saying that he had not taken any photographs inside NIT-T and wanted at the least one good picture of him inside that campus. Seeing that I was silent, they asked me if I had any problem accompanying them the next day. I immediately shook my head saying that I had no problems.
How could I refuse?
I wanted another one of those 'breath-taking' twinkles and probably, her name too. She had, after all, ran away with her group as soon as the rain had stopped, her hair and her red shawl dripping wet, taking along a piece of my ready-to-burst heart.
And so, I wanted another day filled with fun and frolic and her dimple.
But little did I know that the next day would be one of the most defining days of Tamil Nadu politics and would hand me an experience I would never forget.
As two of my friends and I had taken a few steps into the National Institute of Technology, Trichy (fondly called NIT-T), after having played for a few minutes with the revolving door that blocked the entrance, passed by us a very fair-skinned girl wearing a red sleeveless t- shirt and a dark blue jeans. My eyes followed her, with my head rotating slowly in a 180 degree turn and my eyes remained glued on that dazzling beauty till she stepped out of the college. As I slowly turned to continue into the college, I found my two friends staring at me, their eyes widened and a shameless glee spread over their faces. I smiled in acknowledgement and one of them completed the moment by saying a huge and an extended 'Wow'. I knew right then that 'Festember 14' - the inter-college cultural fest of NIT-T - was going to be an experience that I would cherish. And I was right.
Two hours later, I was screaming my lungs out in the barn hall of NIT-T in support of my friends who were performing a street -play. Or at least so it would have seemed to my college-mates who stood around me, shouting out their lungs on their behalf. But there was a more selfish and more petty reason behind my shouting. A girl. (It is always a girl, isn't it?)
The girl
My friends who were about to perform in the street-play had been taking selfies of themselves as they all had had their faces painted for the street-play. I had been roaming around the barn hall aimlessly, looking around for something interesting. And it couldn't have been more dramatic when she walked in, one among a group of 10, wearing a green churidhar with a red shawl.
In the midst of all the girls who were wandering around in sleeveless t-shirts and skin-tight jeans, she seemed like a more than welcome change. A charming face, hair tied behind in a neat plait, eyes decorated in a beautiful thin layer of mascara, a smile accompanied with a dimple - she seemed the quintessential Indian girl.
We boys, generally, have two categories of girls -
i) girls, at the sight of whom we call our friends nearby and show the girl, leading to a barrage of exclamations and appreciations and desperation(s)
ii) girls, at the sight of whom we turn around quickly to check that none of our friends are looking at the girl and breathe a sigh of relief as the girl is someone more special
She belonged to the latter. I stood transfixed at the sight of her as she kept walking away from me, with every step. A minute later, I quickly jolted myself out of the mesmerised state I had gone into and ran behind the girl and her group when one of my friends called out my name. I stopped my chase halfway and walked towards my friend, frustrated. He had called me to hand me a biscuit. I gave him a nasty look and snatching the biscuit from him, I walked again in the direction of the girl. But by then, she had disappeared among the crowd that filled the barn hall.
About twenty minutes later, as my friends had gotten on the stage to perform the street-play, the rest of us from our college rushed into the crowd to cheer them. As the street-play started, we let out a cheer so loud that half the crowd turned in our direction. And it was then that I saw her standing two rows ahead of me. For the briefest of the moments, our eyes met and that sufficed to set flame to my cheers. As our group's cheers subdued and the play proceeded, I suddenly let out a cheer for no apparent reason known to me. But it made her turn again. And my heart leapt in joy. And from there on, the cheers and the shouting increased gradually and so did my blooming romance.
The failure
By two clock, I found myself and my two other teammates wandering around the 'Lecture hall' of NIT-T for our event - Tamil cine quiz. As we finally found the room where the prelims was happening, we settled ourselves down and asked for the question paper, the three of us pretty confident of clearing the prelims and making it to the finals. The question paper was handed over and as we turned over its 5 pages, we suddenly felt a chill spreading. It seemed more difficult than what we had expected. And the duration also seemed less - 45 minutes as opposed to the general norm of one hour.
One of my teammates lost hope as soon as we finished reviewing the question paper and started panicking that we were not even going to make it past the prelims. Being the organizers of the event in our college and not even making it past the prelims in a neighboring college is something that does not sit well with the 'organizer' reputation. And the very thought of not even making it past the prelims started haunting us and it took us a few minutes before we could come to our senses.
We started approaching the questions one by one and slowly, the answers started showing up. And by the time we had completed about 30 of the given 40, only five minutes were left. As we sat breaking our heads to answer the remaining ten difficult ones, the five minutes flew away in a jiffy and the question paper was literally snatched away from my teammate's hands.
We walked out of the room to our eagerly awaiting college mates who asked excitedly as to how we had done. My teammate replied that we could have done better but said that he had confidence that we would easily make it to the finals. My feeling was not mutual but I did not want to shatter his hopes and remained silent.
The hours passed and by six, after an exhausted tour around the college, we still hadn't received a call saying that we had made it to the finals - there normally is a phone call when you make it past the prelims. But the absence of it started worrying us and as we decided to call the organiser of the event, we unexpectedly came across him. My teammate rushed towards him asking as to why they had not made a call yet regarding the finals. After asking as to who we were, the organiser very calmly replied that we had not made it through and asking us to attend the finals that was to be held the next day saying that we would enjoy it more as an audience, he walked away. And we were left in a state of shock and humiliation at having not even cleared the prelims when our seniors and super seniors had had the accomplishment of having won the event in the past.
Both my teammates walked to a nearby bench and sat down on it dejected and I was left standing there, staring at the setting sun, not knowing how to console them.
The twinkle
It was about eight at night and my college mates were still trying to console one of my teammates on the loss. Of the two, one teammate had accepted it after some time and had left it behind. But my other teammate had not been able to digest it and even after consolations from about 10 of us, he still refused to accept it saying that he had let them down and had not completed the one task he had come for, properly.
As our group stood around him consoling, started a drizzle and we, who were standing at about ten meters away from the 'Open Air Auditorium', quickly ran towards a huge tree nearby, seeking shelter under its leaves from the drizzle. In a few minutes, the drizzle turned into a downpour and most of my college mates started suggesting that it would be better to run to the auditorium and get drenched a bit along the way rather than standing there underneath the tree and get completely soaked in rain. I am not someone with athletic abilities and so I refused, leading them to start their sprint towards the auditorium.
As I stood there holding a hand-kerchief above my head, trying to find the thickest of foliage, came running a small group of people towards the tree. As the unknown faces stared at me, trying to fit themselves under the tree, my eyes glanced upon a sight I thought I would never see again. It was her.
As I typed the above paragraph, I paused for a moment because it seemed like a scene straight out of a Tamil film. But sometimes, life does present scenarios more dramatic than cinema and that moment under that tree in the thrashing rain seemed out of this world.
She had seen me and by the slightly upward angle her eyebrows struck, I could make out that she had recognized me from the morning. I looked back at her trying to bring about a smile as charming and romantic as possible. As we kept staring at each other, suddenly her lips seemed to widen slowly to a smile giving a premature birth to her dimple. And appeared a childish twinkle in her eyes for a split second that totally ripped apart my heart.
It would have been at the least a twenty second romance that our eyes would have shared. And as I tried to widen my smile, splattered a few drops on my spectacles that caused me to wipe them in a hurried manner to look at her again which made her let out a chuckle. And I looked at her through those water splattered glasses, a sheepish smile spread over my face.
One could probably not ask for a better romantic moment.
****
Standing at the foot-board of a crowded government bus gives a rush to the adrenaline. But standing at the foot-board of an empty bus with the wind slapping your face hard and talking to your teammate standing nearby is something heart-warming.
My teammates and I had left NIT-T as soon as the rain had stopped while the rest of my college-mates had decided to stay there longer for the 'Pro-nite'. My watch had displayed the time as ten-thirty as we had boarded the bus to our college. And having paid for the ticket, my teammate and I had stood by the foot-board as the other teammate settled himself down on an empty seat and had started listening to songs on his music player.
My teammate standing by my side, now recovered from his self-condemning phase, started discussing about cinema in general and the chat that followed is one of those chats I would remember for long.
As we got down at our college by eleven o' clock, my teammate had decided that he would attend the Tamil cine quiz finals that had been scheduled for the next day to see the standard of questions that the NIT-T organizers stuck to and also to snub the organizer who had replied haughtily, if a chance presented itself. He had readied his mind for retribution.
The other teammate also agreed to accompany him the next day saying that he had not taken any photographs inside NIT-T and wanted at the least one good picture of him inside that campus. Seeing that I was silent, they asked me if I had any problem accompanying them the next day. I immediately shook my head saying that I had no problems.
How could I refuse?
I wanted another one of those 'breath-taking' twinkles and probably, her name too. She had, after all, ran away with her group as soon as the rain had stopped, her hair and her red shawl dripping wet, taking along a piece of my ready-to-burst heart.
And so, I wanted another day filled with fun and frolic and her dimple.
But little did I know that the next day would be one of the most defining days of Tamil Nadu politics and would hand me an experience I would never forget.
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