sparkymat

Of late, an event occurred that disturbed me immensely for it defied logic and try as I may, I was unable to explain the incident in a logical manner. It happened a couple of days back. After lunch (in my bedroom, what with me being quarantined and all), I went to the bathroom to wash my hands. I noticed that the mug was in the bowl of the toilet (and not in the bucket where it usually hangs out). It took a whole 2 seconds for this to sink in. For a split second, the part of my brain infested with primitive fears and base instincts jumped to the conclusion ‘Ghost!!’. However, the rest of my brain kicked in immediately and reasoned that there must be a logical explanation for this. As I washed my hands, I pondered on this strange incident. The bucket was at a much lower height than the toilet and even so, no wind strong enough could reach inside to blow it in. I certainly hadn’t dropped it in or left it on the shelf from where it might have fallen in. My mind raced searching for explanations, and panicking that it couldn’t find any. I had taken a bath an hour back and it was in the bucket then. How could it have moved on its own (apparently)? My theories started growing wilder and wilder. Maybe the handle snagged on my towel, and when I left the bathroom, dragged it into the toilet. I stopped. Ok, that sounded stupid even to me! It slowly dawned on me that the possible explanation was a very unsettling one, and no, it wasn’t one that shook my entire belief system. The most possible explanation was that I had accidentally knocked it into the toilet and didn’t even remember one bit of it. I staggered back as if hit physically. For those who wonder why, its because I have always suspected that I have memory issues, even complete lapses, but this, was something I was not prepared for. To forget incidents that occurred when I was half-asleep or distracted with work/hobbies was one thing, but to forget something in “broad daylight” when I was in my full senses (relatively speaking of course) was definitely scary. The words “short term amnesia” and “Alzheimer’s” marqueed across my brain. Think as I may, no other explanation made sense, and the pale, translucent, spooky ones were definitely not logical to me. Unsurprisingly, this incident left me disturbed for a while, until another memory lapse wiped this from my active train of thoughts till yesterday.

I was taking my regular afternoon shower, and once done with that, I set about cleaning the bathroom which mostly involved just Dettol-ing the floor and washing it away with scoops of water from the bucket. Once the floor looked relatively Dettol-free, I turned towards the door and was throwing the mug back when I stopped myself. I looked back incredulously at my hand which had aimed the mug at the toilet. Realization came crashing down on me. Damn! Me and my “complex reflexes”!! Not the first time that my so-called “acquired reflexes” have come back to bite me. The repetitive process of throwing back the mug once I was done, had slowly grown into an acquired reflex associated with turning to leave the bathroom. As such, the control for that passed to some other part of my brain which obviously had a dismal sense of aim. Hmm, or maybe there was nothing wrong with its aim since it was aiming right for the toilet bowl. Maybe there was something wrong with the logical circuits there. Bucket - container. Closet - container. Put mug container. See container. Throw at container. Sigh! The toilet just happened to be the nearer “container”. I don’t know if I should be scared or just resign myself to being a complex bundle of simple pieces trying to group together and pass itself off as an “intelligent” human being (homo complexio simplo sapius?)

All my delusions of youth were shattered when I took my cousin shopping last time I went home. We went to this really classy place (according to my cousin) and I was busy shopping. However, after a while, I noticed that my cousin was hardly interested in anything and was just standing around, staring at the ceiling. I asked him what was wrong.

‘Nothing here really interests me’, he said. ‘Oh-kay’, came my skeptical reply. I wondered why. This place had some of the best garments collection in the city. So I asked, ‘then where do you want to go?’. ‘Oh, there is this place I like..’.

Half an hour later, we were standing outside this box-like room that called itself a garments store. My cousin went in and I skeptically followed him. Together with the boy at the counter, we filled up 3/4th of the entire “showroom”.

The moment I stepped inside, I was blinded by the dazzling lights, only to realize that it was the sunlight being reflected from the clothes there. There was metal everywhere. Every single piece of clothing had metal on it. Rather, there was metal in all shapes and sizes, with strips of clothing hanging from it.

He took a jeans with a few (thankfully) cloth straps and only 2 metal buckles on it. He showed it to me. Trying to appear supportive, I made a long ‘hmmm’ and suggested he try it out. His face eager, he made his way to the “trials” room and soon came out. I was, somehow, reminded of Joey pretending to be 19. Keeping a straight face, I nodded and said it looked okay. I was very careful in choosing my words. It was a tricky path to walk.

As expected, his choices became more and more unpalatable, until I had to put the brakes on a pant that looked like the love child of Denim and a chainsaw. A very wicked chainsaw. Deciding that I have had enough, I told him I would wait outside.

As I watched from outside, many “youngsters” came and went, all dressed in flashy clothes and heavy metal. I liked heavy metal but not in this way. A melancholic thought descended on me at that moment. Have I grown old? Has time and fads moved on, leaving me behind, a relic of the past? Is the desire to wear clothes made from cloth, that doesn’t have holes in it, old-fashioned now? I always used to pride myself at being part of the “youth of the nation”. Suddenly, I felt so old.

The earliest memory of conning that I can remember was when a guy approahed me in the train station, asking for help. Still green those days, I lent a concerned ear to his woeful tale. He spun a fantastic tale of how misfortune befell him on his journey and how he ended up without a penny to take him back home. Taking pity at his plight, I gave him a then-princely sum of 400 rupees (studying in college, that would mean no partying for quite some time). I still remember the fake joy and relief on his face as he repeatedly promised to send me the money as soon as he got home. In one week’s time, I had learnt a very important lesson in life.

Skip one year. Same place. Different time. This time, his story was slightly different. He claimed to be an engineering student. Despite knowing that I was prolly being conned, I wasn’t able to resist the urge to help. This time, my folly cost me a hundred rupees.

Two years later, I was in a different city. Now, I was earning. The daily travel from work to office brought me into contact with many people, among which was the next con-man. This time, however, it was a complete set of father, mother and 2 children. They claimed to have lost all their money and needed help. They offered to speak to me in the language of my choice which set off alarms in my head. Politely excusing myself, I walked away.

Fastforward to last week. A guy in (extremely) dusty clothes approaches me and, much to my suprise, speaks to me in almost flawless English. He narrates another fancy tale of how he was going to his friend’s place and lost all his money. He wanted 15 rupees to take a bus to there. One look at him and I apologized and walked away.

Last night, yet another guy approached to me with pretty much the same story, different clothes, slightly faulty English. I did not even give him the courtesy of an apology. I just said I am in a hurry and hurried off.

Looking back, I think college and working alone, has opened my eyes, to the people around us. Not all of them are as nice as they look (or in the latter cases, sound). These incidents have taught me a valuable lesson, though they did charge me 500 rupees for it.

Humming loudly to vent some of the happiness bubbling up in me, I entered the elevator and jabbed ‘10′. Wordlessly, the doors slid shut and the metal cabin slowly started making its way up the steel corridor.

It stopped at floor 4. Someone entered and pressed ‘9′. I was too busy humming and celebrating to care. The doors closed and we continued our merry journey upwards.

Next thing I knew, the elevator had stopped at 9 and the doors slip open. My eyes just ran over the details of the office in front of me, when suddenly they dipped and noted that the floor of the elevator was not aligned with that of the office floor. ‘Was this reason for concern?‘, I thought. Before I could pursue that line of thought further, the doors slid shut, cutting us off from the rest of the world. ‘Well, so much for that..‘.

This time, there was no gentle stutter or jerk to indicate that the elevator had started its merry ascent again. I looked up at the LED display. It showed 9. Then all of a sudden, it started couting up and down at a rapid rate. Within a brief instance of time, I was on high alert. I looked around me. The others were yet to notice this. Even as the situation was dawning on them, all the button lights switched off.

Now, they were all looking at each other. I looked around the lift in panic. Was this, as far as my life would take me? Was I going to die in a painful and horrible manner? The lift gave a small shudder, as if the cable had given way a little, and my heart plummeted down 10 floors. We tried the buttons for various floors, tried to close or open the doors, but nothing worked. Immediately, I called my friend and informed him of our predicament. He ran off to get help. Meanwhile, we tried the “emergency” buttons. We pressed the ‘phone’ button. Nothing happened. We tried it again. Nope, it was dead. We then tried the next one, whatever it was meant for. That didn’t magically rescue us either. Then, almost frantically, I jabbed the ‘alarm’ button, and somewhere in the distance, I heard a siren go off.

Almost relieved, I kept jabbing at it, a bit worried that I was causing much commotion outside. ‘My life is worth more than other people’s discomfort!‘, I thought savagely. All the while running over in my mind, what I could do should the cable break. I looked up and saw that the ceiling had several glass panels. Would they be breakable? Could I break some and hang from them when we fell? So what if my hands came out of their socket? Maybe the rest of me might make it. All this while, the lift kept groaning and shuddering, playing its deadly game with us.

Then, as abruptly as this nightmare had started, it ended when the doors slip open. I almost literally jumped out in a single leap. The others exited less dramatically. In an almost hysteric tone, I asked a friend of mine, who happened to be there at the reception, which floor we were on. With a look of mixed amusement and astonishment, he replied that it was the 9th. Without further ado, I made my way back to my office on the 10th floor via the staircase.

The rest of the day was spent in pretend-elevatorphobia. I am not the superstitious kind (ok, maybe a little) but it was fun pretending that the elevators were cursed and that as long as I am alive, I would never use another elevator. However, at the end of the day, when I had to return home, the prospect of climbing down 10 flights of stairs, made me enter the elevator quite meekly, thus ending an adventure that lasted barely 10 minutes, but had cut, probably, 10 years from my life. My life had, for 10 minutes, dangled by a thread (well, so it was a steel cable - the point is still valid).

An all time favourite true story:

“A lady in a faded gingham dress and her husband, dressed in a homespun threadbare suit, stepped off the train in Boston and walk timidly without an appointment into the Harvard University President’s outer office. The secretary could tell in a moment that such backwoods, country Hicks had no business at Harvard and probably didn’t even deserve to be in Cambridge.
“We want to see the president,” the man said softly.
“He’ll be busy all day,” the secretary snapped.
“We’ll wait,” the lady replied”.
For hours the secretary ignored them, hoping that the couple would Finally become discouraged and go away. They didn’t and the secretary grew frustrated and finally decided to disturb the president, even though it was a chore she always regretted.

“Maybe if you see them for a few minutes, they’ll leave,” she said to him.

He sighed in exasperation and nodded. Someone of his importance obviously didn’t have the time to spend with them, but he detested gingham dresses and homespun suits cluttering up his outer office. The president, stern faced and with dignity, strutted toward the couple.
The lady told him, “We had a son who attended Harvard for one year. He loved Harvard. He was happy here. But about a year ago, he was accidentally killed. My husband and I would like to erect a memorial to him, somewhere on campus”.
The president wasn’t touched…. He was shocked.
“Madam,” he said, gruffly, “we can’t put up a statue for every person who attended Harvard and died. If we did, this place would look like a cemetery.

“Oh, no,” the lady explained quickly. “We don’t want to erect a
statue. We thought we would like to give a building to Harvard.”

The president rolled his eyes. He glanced at the gingham dress and Homespun suit, and then exclaimed, “A building! Do you have any earthly idea how much a building costs? We have over seven and a half million dollars in the physical buildings here at Harvard.”
For a moment the lady was silent. The president was pleased. Maybe he could get rid of them now. The lady turned to her husband and said quietly, “Is that all it costs to start a university? Why don’t we just start our own?”

Her husband nodded. The president’s face wilted in confusion and bewilderment. Mr. and Mrs. Leland Stanford got up and walked away, traveling to Palo Alto, California where they established the university that bears their name, Stanford University, a memorial to a son that Harvard no longer cared about.“

Readers please note this. I have since found out that this is an urban myth. Stanford University throws some light on the actual events here.

Three Indians. One Vietnamese. One of the strangest conversations of my life.

“India?”
“Yes! We are from India? Where are you from?”
[blank stare]
My friend thinks for a moment. “China?”
“Ohh.. No no no.. Vietnam..”
“Ahhh….”
Silence for five minutes.”You computer?”
“Yes, we computer.”
“Good Good..”, [thumbs-up sign and big smile]

Another bout of silence.

Suddenly he speaks up.
“India… Computer.. [taps on temple] .. Goooood!!!! ” [accompanied by a thumbs-up and a wide grin]
We smile politely..
“Computer.. [shows cash sign with his fingers] .. Gooooood!!!!” [again the thumbs-up and grin]
My friend replies, “India.. [cash sign] .. Not gooood!!!” [thumbs-down and sad smiley]

Long silence. He seems to be thinking hard.

He asks something in German, and none of us understand a word.
He looks around desperately.
Soon he was scribbling on a piece of paper.
“E 8000-100000 / m”
We stare at it for a moment. WTH?! He really thinks that??
My friend writes back
“E 1500 / m”
“Noooooo… ” [ head shaking] , “nooo..”
My friends replies, “India.. [cash sign] .. Not good!!!” [thumbs-down and sad smiley]
“ohhhhh..” [sympathetic expression]

Long silence.

“Germany.. Baaaaaad!!!” [thumbs-down and sad smiley.. then downturned palm at low level]
We nod sympathetically.
“America.. Gooooood!!!” [downturned palm at mid level]
“Canada.. Gooooood!!!” [downturned palm at high level]
“Green Card… Gooooooooooooood!!!” [HUGE thumbs-up]

Long silence.

“Germany.. Baaaaaad!!!” [thumbs-down]

Long silence.

He scribbles 1990 on the paper.
“Germany.. Goooood!!!” [thumbs-up]
He scribbles 1995 on the paper.
“Germany.. Baaaaaad!!!” [thumbs-down and sad smiley]

Long silence.

“Ehe?” [got that from the dictionary]
“Jaaaaa.. Jaaaa.”, showing us his ring.
Then gestured to the counter..
“Oh! That was your wife.???”
I think he understood that.. He nodded..

Then he runs to the counter, and comes back with a picture of a kid.
“Oh… that’s your kid??? Cute kid..”
He puts it back.

Much longer silence.

More silence.

The cab driver came and we said our byes and left.

“Green card gooooooood!!!” .. . .. . . . ..

It took supreme will power to drag myself out of bed. Transiting from a warm cozy bed to the cold floor was not easy, but with supreme will power, I finally managed to drag myself to the bathroom. A little later, I was dressing up, quite lazily, to go for work. Putting on several layers of clothing, I wondered whether all this was necessary, for my body seemed to have adapted to the cold. Anyway, I put all of them on, looking very much like a punk-age, shady private-eye. Finally, I had all my things packed into the shoulder bag and ready to leave. The sight that met my eye when I opened the front door, is hard to forget.

It looked like something straight out of a christmas post card. Small cottages with pine trees all around. Snow dancing with the wind, draping everything. I enjoyed this beautiful scene for a whole second until I realized that I was freezing. All the layers I had pulled on, were no match for the snow. Hugging myself tight, I ran to the restaurant to have my breakfast, with the snow blowing into my face.

One thing I came to realize from this incident is that snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes are NOT among my favourite things. Yeah, they are really pretty, but only if they dont touch you. Or if you are a polar bear.