...

The well hidden secret may be coming out...
Today I was in class and I... I made a puppy dog expression. Not so bad... people in college usually give you a little space. But not this time, this time I was in front of Meghna, one of those darling sweet natured girls who always want to secretly hug you.
That's when it happened... she reached out... fingers outstretched...
Coming closer by the second...
And she pulled my cheeks!!!
A flood of memories came tumbling into my dainty head. Oh, the outrage!
I was very short when I was younger. With a perfectly round face. It was the kind of irresistible face that made you make embarrassing "Awwwwww...." noises in your head. And the face was on a tiny body making it even cuter. For years I was shorter than everyone, it seemed my body had taken gravity lessons way too seriously in class. I have a photograph of me with a girl two years younger and a head taller than me. And she was of average height.
I had huge eyes too, the kind that if you saw on a normal sized human would make you run away in fear and give you Mila Kunis nightmares. And a nose that people had to stop themselves from pinching.
So they pinched my cheeks instead.
The average human goes through about 3 years of cheek pinching on a regular basis, and then if their grandparents live far away, annual or biannual pinches from them for a couple more years.
My cheeks were pulled by everyone including 6th graders till I was 15. Thats when I put on 12 inches, became 5'6" and developed cheekbones.
But for 15 years my cheeks had been worked with like they were made of dough. Kneaded till they became soft as sponge. Not too stretchy but still delightful to others because they knew I had long become immune to the pain.
Today as her fingers touched my face, I saw her eyes go from surprised to joyous. And she shrieked!
I know now at the end of the day that she is addicted, and as others see my cheeks being pulled and my face being shook so hard that if I were wearing specs they would've fallen off, they get a gleam in their eye that says... I'm going to do that next

The List

I recently turned 18, and then I turned 18 and a half. Now while the process of ageing like this is inevitable, I realised on my 18th half birthday that I don't really do most of the stupid things I think of doing.

That's when I made the decision of lists of things I will do before every half birthday of mine.
Every birthday celebrates my birth, every half birthday from now on would celebrate my life!!!

This list will probably keep having things added to it through the year, but right now:

• Things to do before turning 19.5 - 23 May 2012
• 1.       Write a book     This one's actually just a short, short stories book with illustrations that I did for my first year project (I'm in design school) It was the first thing I added, to the list because a) It sounds really cool; and b) I could strike it out
• 2.       Dip feet in a pool     Now, this one was a very specific, almost ornamental pool in the middle of a fancy club. The pool is surrounded by a chain that is opened only during swimming timings. I dipped my pool at dinnertime and no one even noticed. Someone asked me how I did it, and I must say...nonchalantly(and here I will snobbishly turn up my nose and look down on everyone else =P)
• 3.       Steal a road sign    The road sign is a No Horn sign and I didn't do this one alone. My room mate and I had gone to Chennai to visit a friend. While coming back from dinner with her boyfriend, the four of us spotted a slightly wobbly sign on the junction of a narrow road. Since it was on my list, I got off the bike and shook it. It was made to pull out. The next morning, we woke up at 5:00 am when there is no traffic and the cops are kind of sleepy; three of us(no boyfriend this time) piled onto one bike, uprooted the sign and brought it home. Later we sawed off the supporting rod from the sign on the roof completely scared someone would walk in on our illegal activities but it worked out just fine.
• 4.       Start a blog    Well that one's clearly been done; but if you notice the username, it's called angoorchinu, I'm Angoor and Chinu is the nickname of the friend I started this blog with. She's always been called Chinu, but I gave myself the name Angoor. Angoor is the Hindi word for grapes, my logic was, that when I grew old I could be called Raisin, and the urn with my ashes after I die, perhaps squished in a road accident would be called a bottle of red wine.
• 5.       Post on a blog 10 times
• 7.       Wink at a stranger    Well I finally did that. After all the crazy things I do I found this one oddly difficult. I did this only two days ago. We were at a concert and a I was dragging my friends to the front, and I was pulling them along by hand through the crowd when this cute blonde guy came out of nowhere. I lifted my arm (and that of the girl's next to me) for him to pass through and as he flirtatiously smiled at me...I winked.
• 8.       Water ski
• 9.       Gate crash a wedding
• 10.   Go to Delhi
• 11.   Doodle on every page of a library book
• 12.   Mark 20 currency notes    Too easy, did that for about a week so I've probably marked 50 notes. I think the idea of maybe getting a note I marked back has a nice whimsical feel to it. 
• 13.   Intern
• 14.   Get article published
• 15.   Draw a motorcycle
• 16.   Graffiti
• 17.   Crazy idea with Vibhuti (anything she comes up with and accompanies me in)
• 18.   Drink a carton of juice of juice with straw in one go
• 19.   Go to a concert    If you read above, you would realise that not only did I go but I also had fun. The best part though was that we got the concert (Jay Sean, Ludachris and Florida; yeah we danced and jumped more than anything else) passes from college.
• 20.   Make a bucket(I mean proper 1.5' deep bucket) of popcorn
• 21.  Put dish washing fluid in a fountain to make it overflow

Barney Stinson for Prime Minister of India

(and Lily Aldrin for President)

His holier than thou patriotism will rub off on Indians and we too will look upon all other countries as inferior
to us rather than superior, causing a surge in national self esteem and patriotism and scream from rooftops
“Love thy country, but only if it is India”…

His ideology of not having children, if spread would drastically decrease not just the population but also
arranged marriages…

He will propagate strip clubs and wearing suits, making the country more tourist friendly as well as helping
dispelling the widespread western notion that India is full of snake charmers…

He is more of a youth icon rather than an elderly icon which will encourage the youth to be more active in
politics as well as to raise their voice regarding issues concerning the nation…

The political party of Maharashtra Shiv Sena will be so scandalized by the behavior of Barney Stinson most
of them will die of shock ending their tyranny in Maharashtra…

…And Lily Aldrin will curb his enthusiasm when he gets too awesome.

Roads

One of the first things Barney will do if made Prime Minister is issue drafts to improve roads and reduce traffic
congestion in every part of the country, because he would never want to be late for a date because of traffic.

Education

There will be a two-fold benefit because of this leadership as far as education is concerned. Lily Aldrin is a kind
ergarten teacher who values education and primary school education made compulsory by Aldrin but at the
same time it will be dumbified by Stinson, reducing rote learning and the harmful side effects of geekiness and
stress that the Indian education system often causes.

Cleanliness

Barney Stinson will make sure our country is spotless, and will make advertisements, hire workers and do pretty
 much everything to make sure our country is clean because he wears very expensive suits and doesn’t like
them getting dirty.

Women’s Empowerment

Lily being a believer in female empowerment, she will not just help empower women by spreading awareness
about the legal rights of women with the help of her lawyer husband Marshal Ericson but also give them valuable
shopping tips.

Barney being a public figure with quite a cranky personality will subconsciously propagate a weakness in the
male minds. This will further help reduce crimes against women by males and also make males a bit more
sensitive decreasing domestic violence.

Also, being extremely interested in the number of twenty year olds around him every year Stinson will be
scandalized to know of female infanticide and will take quick and drastic measures to stop it.

Poverty

The education programmes as well as large quantities of Lily’s gourmaet food will help reduce the poverty in
the nation

The Chinese

Barney used to have a gambling problem playing a Chinese gambling game, so he not only knows Chinese he
also knows a lot of shady but wealthy; i.e. influential Chinese people. He can use this to make the Chinese our
friends to help make India a permanent member in the UN Council, to maintain peace across the border, gain
a strategic ally, regain land lost to China and also to get the leaders drunk so that they make stupid decisions
that set them back in their business rivalry with India.

Tourist Friendly

Barney will help make the country more tourist friendly because he likes variety in the girls he dates. Also the
country will become more alluring to jet lagged foreigners in special because he will not let any city (including
Bangalore) have an 11:30 pm deadline. And the large number of art and clothes shops Lily will help open will
obviously play a major role in making the country more tourist friendly as well.

So vote for Stinson and Aldrin for the next elections!!!

(and if they don’t want to stand for the elections kidnap them and make them stand for the elections
and then vote for them)

The Visit

 1/8th of the story of a four year trip to Sundar PG, my college home.

It started nicely enough. I had two roommates and a bathtub in my room and attached bathroom. It was in fact better than I thought it would be. You see the paying guest accommodation I was living in was meant to be an apartment. It even had marble flooring, but this actually bothered me. In all the houses I have lived in for more than three weeks, there has been only one thinsg constant. I never realized it, but they all had the same kind of tile flooring. And it made the place seem familiar somehow.

So here I was in this decidedly alien place with weird floors.

The Roomies

Lets call my roommates D and R. D was a friend of mine from Bombay. She bagged a boyfriend in the first week of arriving, so she was out all day with him and came back only at night.

R’s family stayed in Bangalore, so for the first few days she visited her family occasionally. But as time passed her visit became longer and more frequent, till one day she never came back.

This wouldn’t have bothered me, but she was the one who had put curtains in our room and she took the curtains with her when she went.

The Food

The food was pretty good. But the landlady had some problem with cooks. It seems she had an uncontrollable urge to change the cook every few weeks. This would have been fine except for the fact that every new cook made spicier food than the last, so that at the end of four months you could identify anyone from Sundar PG by their scalded tongues.

The Roomies II

When R officially left the room, I ran to the room covering 3 kilometers in 17 seconds. This was because she had the best bed not only in our room but in all rooms.  I reached there huffing and panting, because all the oxygen had been squeezed out of my lungs. But I was too late. That’s how I got my new roommate De.

The Air

D and De are both smokers. They are mainly nicotine smokers but not exclusively. So, the once pure and fresh air around me gradually turned into heaven for passive smokers. This was probably good; I will never have a chance to miss the polluted air of Bombay.

The Roomies III

De is moving out. I love her and everything but I’m really looking forward to her moving out. The reason? Yup, it’s the bed. But sadly she’s moved out for all practical purposes, i.e. she is already living in another PG but her things remain here. This means that I miss her already, and I don’t get the bed.

The Bed

Why is the bed so special? It is right next to huge French windows. It is in a corner. It has convenient plug points. It has an extra bouncy mattress. And it’s awesome.

The Roomies IV

To be continued…

Dear Ma’am...

A letter of complaint by a homesick lunatic with bad grammar.
(I apologise to American/Alaskan viewers, you probably won't get any jokes)

06 Sravana

Tapori Nagar

Colaba

Mumbai-400005

3 September 2010

Ms. Fucha

01 Sravana

Tapori Nagar

Colaba

Mumbai-400005

Dear Ma’am,

Sub: Letter of complaint

I am informing to you that the flat I am living in is highly unlivable. The rent is too too high for this dumpshit. I am already saying to my wife, there is no way I am paying you for this month’s rent. I am even remembering my amma’s food in Rayavaram and thinking why I am coming to Mumbai from Tamil Nadu? I am feeling like calling Veerappan to kill you, but too bad, Veerappan is already being dead.

Here I am listing all of my complaints, which you read and solve

·         Whenever I am hiding my chocolate under the bed, the ants are eating. And after eating they are roaming all around the house and my wife is beating me

·         The man next door is stinking. Very bad.

·         The toilet is blocked and we cannot bathe our children. Little Ramanarayan Krishnaswamey is completely dirty whenever he is hugging me.

·         The police is coming every time I am playing my Tamil pop music in the middle of the night and trying to arrest me. This is very racism type; if I am playing devotional music they are not arresting me because they are thinking I am good man, why every time for pop music they are coming?

·         I know I am not supposed to be saying, but the little kids here are not nice, they are never letting me play hide and seek with them. If they are letting me play, they are hiding so much I am not finding only.And the little boys are always banging their balls against my windows and breaking them.

·         The McDonalds is living too far away.

·         The girls are being very naked on the streets outside.

·         When I am having a bath and turning on the tap, I am getting even more hot. There needs to be a cooler for me atleast.

·         The walls, windows and floors, everything is being broken… you are always sending repairmen but my wife is not being satisfied.

·         50% of the walls are damp, 50% have crumbling plaster and 50% are plain filthy. 

·         The tap in the kitchen sink is leaking. That is ok, but at night the every drop’s sound is waking me up a lot. That also I am not minding. But when the children are waking up then I cannot sleep only, for the full full nights

·         Everyone in the building is making fun of my accent.

Whenever you are solving all of my problems, only then I am to be paying you for the rent. Otherwise I am to call the spirit of Veerappan to kill you

Lots of Respect and Loving

Ramanathan Sivamalya Jaijaishankaram