obscured: can i tell you something?
obscured: u are not to tell anyone till it happens...
obscured: i mean its not anything great or anything
obscured: actually its quite silly
obscured: i mean there’s nothing abt it that u cant tell
obscured: but on the other hand there’s no reason for u to talk abt it
obscured: so i guess u wudn’t in any case
obscured: hmmm :)
dewdrop: sure babe

She tolerates so much crap from me I pity her. Dewdrop is one of the few friends I have made through the blog. And surprisingly a rather strong friendship has formed between us in the past year. Considering that we have never met and never even spoken on the phone! But man, do we talk or what! Well. Ok. Ok. I do most of the talking. But she listens and isn’t that what friends do? Yeah, smartasses so does a shrink. But then shrinks are paid for it. She needn’t.

Here’s wishing her a very happy b’day (a day late) and lots n lots of (heterosexual) love!!

Mr. Egret, Mr. Egret
Beautiful and white
What in your reflection

Do you sight?

I wanted to write something beautiful and profound. But the picture above gives me no such inspiration. (Damn! I really should get a better camera.)

I must tell you a little about the flamingos though (Yeah! The pink spots in the picture are flamingos.). It was absolutely beautiful. I managed to do a bird-watching trip with my father after ages, and right in the center of Mumbai. Thousands of flamingos! We had estimated about five-six thousand. Later the TOI mentioned a figure of ten thousand (along with a much better picture). Imagine that.

Just wish I had managed to capture a better picture.

I love marriages. Well, let me rephrase it. It’s not like I love getting married or that I am an advocate for the institution of marriage. No, it’s just that I love attending weddings. One gets to dress up, eat good food and letch at all the men (all dressed up for a change).

The last two years I have had ample opportunity to attend weddings. You see, I am at the age where all my friends are getting married. And however happy I am for them, I feel a little depressed at losing yet another friend to ‘Hotel California’. And thus, every time I have to attend any such marriage I spoil myself and buy a nice sari to wear at the wedding.

Another friend’s wedding day after tomorrow and another beautiful sari purchased just for the occasion.

So what if I don’t ever get married! I shall at least have wardrobe full of awesome saris.

She woke up in an unfamiliar bed. ‘Where am I?’ Feeling a chill she raised the sheet to cover her unclothed body. ‘Where am I? Where are my clothes?’

The last thing she remembered from last night was gulping down her seventh drink. ‘Or was it the eighth?’ She also remembered dancing. Yes, she was dancing with Avi when that handsome guy cut into their dance. A smile formed on her face as she tried to remember his name. ‘What was his name?’ She frowned as she racked her hazy memory. ‘It’s because of this damn headache. I should go home and sleep off the hangover.’ She got up from the bed and looked around for her clothes. She turned around when she heard somebody enter the room. ‘Deep. That’s his name. Deep.’

“Hi” said Deep, his face breaking into his attractive dimpled smile. “How are you feeling now?”

“Hi” she said, embarrassed to say anything more. ‘Oh no! Damn it. I didn’t. Oh God. I did. I must have. What must he be thinking of me?’

She glanced at him shyly. He came closer. He put his arms around her waist and pulled her close to him. She could see the tiny hair in his flaring nostrils. Suddenly, her feeling of shyness gave way to panic. She pushed him away. He stepped forward and took her into his arms again. This time, roughly. She winced in pain.

“You like to play it rough, don’t you baby?” he said as his handsome features contorted into an ugly sneer.

She pulled away from him and slowly backed into a wall. A strangely familiar feeling was gripping her stomach, that of revulsion and fear. Bile rose to her throat as she held the sheets around her tighter. ‘Not again. Not again. Not…’

"Copyright 13.01.06 by Shreya Jha"

Client Meeting (Marketing-Advertising) blunders- My all-time favourites:

“We can milk Rani Mukherjee to the fullest.”
(X convincing marketing team to use Rani Mukherjee as a brand ambassador for Y brand)

“I want to see a cock in every Indian child’s hand.”
(Brand Manager on vision of Coke. You must excuse his South Indian accent. Of course, he meant ‘coke’.)

A (at a Client meeting-mistaking B to be from the Client): Hullo. How are you? So, the sales figures doing well?
B (confused): Sir, I work in your company.
A (turns away and then looks at B again angrily): You should still know the sales figures.

She held the limp body to her chest and cried loudly ‘My baby. My baby’. She wept incoherently for a long time till her sobs receded to silent hiccups. The shadows were creeping into the room through the window. ‘He will be home soon.’

She told herself to calm down. She needed to calm down. ‘I had never wanted this baby in the first place. It was he who wanted a child, not me. Never me. He should have been here. It’s his fault. He was never around.’

She put her child back into his crib. Her tears drying on her cheeks, she gently covered the body with a sheet and turned to leave the room. She shut the door gently behind her as she would if her baby had just fallen asleep.

She went to the kitchen and made herself a coffee. Her favourite mug steaming with bitter black coffee she went to the study room. She switched on the computer and logged on to the internet. Leaning back on her chair, she typed ‘SIDS cases’ on the Google search page. ‘He will be home soon. I should get my story straight.’

There is a heroine hidden in all of us. Take for instance, my colleague x. We were at a pub the other day and some inebriated fool broke a glass. X promptly took off her shoes and started dancing on the broken shards. Basanti!

(Those who don’t know Basanti and her famous dancing-on-glass, go kill yourselves.)

Talking of heroines, another quick story.

The last time I went to Calcutta I paid a customary visit to my grandmother (I call her Nani). Our conversation went something like this:

Me: So how’re you doing?
Nani (smiling beautifully): I am doing very well, thank you.
Me: You’re looking good!
Nani (smile gets wider): Yes. I am into yoga now. And I have never looked better. Touch my tummy.
Rolling my eyes, I pat her tummy and comment on how toned it is.
Me (speaking because I am expected to say something): Wow.
Nani (smiling even more wider): Yeah.
Me (clearing my throat): So apart from your yoga, what else do you do nowadays?
Nani (the smile pasted on): I pray.
Me (preparing to hear how much she loves me and prays for my well being): So what do you pray for?
Nani (her smile achieving perfection. She could be a serious Miss Colgate contender): I pray for world peace.

Like I said, we all have heroines, beauty queens and lesbians hidden inside us.

(Did I forget to tell you all the lesbian story? Oh well, since I have already concluded this post we’ll keep it for another day.)