Sidharth's mail with an attachment- But who on earth invented this power cut yaar?

      Finally I had a mail from Sidharth with a word file attached. In no time I had downloaded the document and stored it in the folder named ‘Personal’, in which I keep images of closed ones, some of the word documents I have made by cut- copy- pasting while chatting with friends and closed ones just to relive in those memories and some very little porn. It is so amazing how a lazy Monday morning at office would bring some inexplicable energy in you from nowhere which you would wish last long forever. In one word I was ‘Thrilled’ after receiving that mail from Sidharth.

      Being Monday there was a lot of calls to manage. Some nice, rude, gentle and majority of them would fall under the category ‘SIT calls’ (Sadly I Took:(). If a guy or a girl had just finished a ‘SIT’ call he or she would literally SIT for awhile on his or hers chair or would go for a smoke or a Coffee break or in worst case damage the headset after smashing it on the table mistakenly assuming the table for the client’s head with whom he or she had just conversed. It was surprising for me that even though it was a Monday morning no calls are been put into SIT category from my side. It might be the impact of that mail from Sidharth with the word file attached, which I decided to open only when I am at home (Precisely in my room) I had never ever rushed home in that hurry!

      Usually I catch a bus which would take 30 minutes to my area. But it was unbelievable for me to pay the Autowala Rs150 without stepping into any bargaining drama so that I can be home very soon. (These autowalas in town are the experts in skipping traffic) I had my shower in 5 minutes and asked mom not to disturb me even for dinner before bolting the room from the inside. No Indian mom would think too much about it unless and until her son had been caught watching porn by her red handed! Luckily I had never been caught by her! (Yes it does mean that we (I and my friend) were caught by someone else while watching a b-grade movie in our boyhood days. But I don’t think that it should be narrated here) Hence I was pretty sure that I would get a serene atmosphere to go through the file sent by Sidharth.

           I thought about Mom and my younger sister Keerthana as potential disturbance sources. Mom would never take her eyes off from the serials, which seems to have been invented exclusively for Indian homemakers. I had no worries about Keerthana. She became very quiet ever since she had joined for her CAT entrance coaching classes. I wonder what techniques these professors in TIMEs and other well rated competitive entrance coaching centers are successfully implementing to make these girls to shut their mouth. It was strange for me to watch Keerthana without scribbling ferociously on the keyboard of her Blackberry. She seemed to forget her BB pet forever!

         I was all set and switched on my laptop. There are two things about my laptop that should be noted here;

One:  it would take 5-6 minutes to get booted.

Two:  if it is unplugged from the power socket, my system would get shut downed in a flash of a second. Finally after full five minutes desktop appeared!

         It was the third longest five minutes I have ever experienced in my life so far. First was when we were caught by my ex- girlfriend’s uncle in the early hours of the day while we were ‘trying to make’ some love at her place and the second was when we were exhausted after a love making session at my place by my mom, years back. Both red handed!

          Now all I had to do was that to open the folder named ‘Personal’ and double click on the word file sent by Sidharth. The moment I double clicked on the word file the power went off!

          I could only curse my laptop for not having enough back up and the State Electricity Board for not letting the moment to come that I have been waiting for a long time.

Guys probably we would get something interesting to read after the power cut.

Sharath Muthirakkal

Mail without an attachment- A disappointing mail from Sidharth...

I was desperate to contact Sidharth. All my efforts to find him on any of the social networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and even on orkut failed miserably. He might have deleted his accounts temporarily, I thought. I was that fool to leave my contact details to a person like Sidharth, hoping that he would get back to me with his full story ASAP. Soon Sidharth and Rwitika faded away from my memory. Hardly have we memorized dancers and supporting casts of a movie which we had seen months ago. One fine morning during my office hours I got a mail alert on my cell phone. And as always I dropped the plan of checking the sender. Everyday hundreds of such mail alerts would come if you have registered your profile on any of the online job search engines, matrimonial sites or in worst case online dating sites!

After lunch I thought of signing in on to g-mail and chat with some friends who would always be seen online! But that afternoon I could not even look at the left side of my screen for those blinking green bulbs. My eyes were glued onto an eight letter name ‘Sidharth’. Finally he has mailed me I thought. But my happiness was short lived. It was just another mail without an attachment.

His mail read; “Kishore, hope you are doing good. I am sorry that I could not attach the word document that I have been writing since the day we met for the last time at Café Coffee Day. It goes like this; Everyday, I would finish writing before I go to bed thinking that the document is well set to be sent. But the next morning when I reread what I had written till last night, I always feel like “what all crap have I written”! This is what is really going on. To be very frank I don’t know how to put black on white about what and who is Rwitika to me? How close we were (At least I thought so) till she said…and How much I miss and love her still. Dude, I don’t think words would ever replace those feelings. You always feel to edit the stuff you have written about your love and that process would never come to an end till you are satisfied. But at the end of the day guys like me would always remained as unsatisfied while explaining those feelings in words. I am sorry.”

His mail ended with the word which I often find girls using more than thousand times a day; SORRY!  I was sad that Sidharth didn’t mail me with anything substantial but I was happy that at last I had his email Id! After reading his mail I threw both my hands in the air disgusted but pretended before my colleagues that I had an angry customer mail just popped in my mailbox!

Thanks for your time

Sharath Muthirakkal

Coffee at Cafe Coffee Day- Sidharth telling his story- Part II

As agreed we three met in the same place, Café Coffee Day at Forum mall in Bangalore. Sidharth was before time! Neither I nor my author friend had expected him to be on time, let alone before time. Like the last evening we met, we settled ourselves in a corner from where our eyes would be restricted from watching gorgeous girls. Cappuccino, Samoosa and sandwich were our picks for the evening. I have seen girls wearing bikinis in beach and enjoying their sunbath. But I still wonder why they wear ‘almost bikinis’ inside an air conditioned shopping mall! My inner being warned me that I was neither there to judge people’s dress code nor to comment on them. All I wanted was to hear from Sidharth about his relationship with Rwitika and the ultimate interference of the destiny that Sidharth mentioned before we bid goodbye when we sat there for the last time!

Sidharth looked more relaxed than the other evening. He went on explaining from where he stopped,

“I became attached to Rwitika in a fraction of a second. As days went along as I mentioned the other evening, our morning jogging became casual walks and soon it became casual- chat walks and that too hand in hand or sometimes hands wrapping the waist of the other. Initially I found difficult to adjust with her childish behavior. But my inner mind always chanted me that I should make her mine. Each seconds spent with her taught me new lessons.  It took us only a week to go for our first date. Coincidentally our first date happened in this same Forum mall and we kissed for the first time in the PVR multiplex while watching a movie that I understood nothing though it was a movie even a kindergarten kid would have easily digested!  We were making frantic love inside the theatre. I had to watch out if some guys were interested in making a short film out of our public lovemaking stunt. When she got aroused she started moaning in pleasure and it attracted a group of college students’ attention and they gave us ‘WTF is going on here look’. It was just enough to shrink my erection and Rwitika almost shouted that she wanted more, as if she was asking for more popcorn. What she was actually asking was just porn and more porn. I had to take her out of the theatre.

“Sidharth you donkey, how dare you neglect a girls’ plea to have a wonderful make out?” She shouted. People on the third floor looked at afore mentioned ‘donkey’ as if I had rejected something like country’s presidential ship.  Amidst of all the mess she was creating I could sense that I was not hating her. My attachment towards Rwitika only increased. All of a sudden everything looked funny for me. Somewhere inside me I was enjoying the childishness, frankness, innocence, cuteness and everything she possessed for that matter. She was a complete package and handling her would be the funniest task in the world, I thought. Though her ‘donkey addressing’ in a public place pissed me off a bit, I had not shown any sign of it to her. Had I shown, I am not sure; she would have minded! She was that careless. But I still love that carelessness she possessed and displayed irrespective of the place, time and people. Sidharth concluded as he gazed at the infinity.

Sidharth told that he had to consult his psychiatrist on that very evening at sharp 7.30pm. I told him that I would be leaving Bangalore on the next day. Suddenly nervousness which we earlier thought had gone forever came back on his face and he said sorry and looked really helpless. He was indeed helpless. It would be far better for him consulting with his doctor than narrating his sob story to us; we thought. Before leaving Sidharth whispered to me, Kishore ‘I am sorry that I could not even complete telling you about my first date with Rwitika. Get me your email id. I will surely mail you up the rest. What all things happened in our first date after I literally dragged her out from Forum mall, our first fight, our first patch up, wild lovemaking which followed the first patch up and many other after such fights and finally when Rwitika revealed that…”Sidharth paused as he let the sentence incomplete and his gaze fixed onto infinity again. 

I gave my card to him and stood up. He hugged me and I could sense tears wetting the back of my left shoulder. I hugged him back while fighting back my tears. Those were the tears of trust, I understood. But when Sidharth was out I had to excuse my author friend and rush to the restroom. I let the tears pour in while splashing the water against my eyes. I wanted not even a stranger to spot me crying.

When we were about to leave, my author friend’s parting words were these, “ Kishore the guy who has come up with the slogan, ‘a lot can happen over coffee would have never dreamt in his wildest of dreams that, these much of things would ever happen over coffee”. Hearing him, I felt a drop of tears set to roll over my cheeks. Management is management; be it the spontaneous movement of my fingers that wiped it off.

Thanks for your time and patience

Waiting for updates from Kishore...

Sharath Muthirakkal

A lot can happen over coffee...

    That evening, people around me might have found me excited. In fact I truly was. You know why?

     My author friend has agreed that he would introduce me to his mysterious friend on that evening. I was like a small kid who had allowed by his mom to buy and eat any number of chocolates from the costliest and obviously exclusive chocolate outlet. One thing I knew was that the evening would be different. Hearing a lot from my friend, I had a fair idea about the character of the guy I would be interacting very soon. My friend had told me that Sidharath had agreed to come on one condition that he would unfold one mystery about him a day and I should not question him (Losers and half nuts like Sidharth makes people agree on certain wild, unreasonable conditions before meeting a complete stranger, I thought). That Condition was double okay with me since meeting a character like Sidharath and listening to him seemed most important.

      Both of us, me and my author friend was waiting for Sidharth to join us at the Café Coffee Day in Forum mall Bangalore at around 5.30 in the evening. As always Forum was full of young couples, college students, window shoppers and many such categories of the society. Had we not ordered our mini Cappuccinos and settled ourselves on the empty couches of CCD, the floor manager would have asked us to leave long back seeing us scanning each and every hot chick checking inside CCD as if we were expecting someone to show up. We only knew we were.

       Finally against the odds my eyes were glued onto a guy. Not that I am a gay or something. He looked misplaced in that crowd. He wore a loose full sleeve faded green shirt and faded blue denim. His slippers only widened my already opened mouth. He must have sleep deprived for months I thought. In fact he was heading where we both were sitting. Seeing him coming, my author friend stood up and shouted and gave him a half hug, ‘Sidharth we have been waiting for you since 5.30 and you are almost 20 minutes late, whats up mate?, Meet my friend Kishore and he looked at me and continued as if we were the only customers at CCD Forum outlet in that peak hour, Kishore, Sidharth!

       I was taken aback with that sort of introduction. Sidharth’s facial expression told he too was. My author friend was in a hurry as if his girlfriend was roaming in the mall without knowing the whereabouts of her better half. It was so quick that, none of us could even blink an eye. I shook hands with Sidharth and that handshake was the weakest one I had ever got from a guy in my whole life. His hand was dead cold. At least I felt so. Sidharth’s gazed down. I and my author friend has looked at each other; confused!

       I was confused how to initiate a conversation. My author friend started his casual conversation with Sidharth. I knew I should be framing the conversation in such a way that Sidharth could open up and chat casually. I had to excuse both of them and went to the counter to order 3 large cappuccinos.  None of us preferred an unpleasant atmosphere. I noted the huge grin on the face of the floor manager this time. He might have seen me checking the price of the sandwiches as well, I thought. When I reached at the table Sidharth looked at me and asked ‘How much interested are you in hearing about my life?’ I told him passing his cup of cappuccino that my interest towards his life is actually from the bottom of my heart and is not just like listening to other’s misery and laughing at it. Sidharth seemed a little nervous and said firmly, ‘I don’t need anybody’s sympathy’. I choked hearing the same but luckily managed to keep my cappuccino inside that gigantic cup, on which it was written ‘Café Coffee Day- A lot can happen over Coffee’

       Sidharath exhaled a deep breath and looked convinced at my sincerity in hearing his passage of life.

       He continued: It all went wrong since we started meeting in the early hours of the dawn just 8 months ago.

      Sidharth’s mentioning of early hours of dawn and yet to disclose female character made me pull my couch towards him.

     He continued:

     I met Rwitika eight months ago near Christ College at about 6 in the morning. She was on her jogging dress. It was quit intentional from my part that, I chose the footpath near Christ College Bangalore for jogging. It served me two ways. I would not miss any hot-beauty conscious girl who comes out early in the morning for jogging and after finishing mine I always preferred a strong tea served from a nearby bakery. I had seen her running at my direction from a good 30 meters away. Though I was gasping, I tried my level best to hold my breath when we crossed. Automatically a smile came on my face. I could not resist smiling at her. She was that gorgeous. I was sure she had seen me smiling at her. Her face expressionless! She would have seen enough stupid guys smiling at her like that, I thought.

      When sipping the morning tea from the bakery, I tried scanning the images of each and every girl I might have met ever since I started jogging on the same footpath. None came out and the CPU inside me had to register her as a new entry. But somewhere inside me someone told that the girl I met a while ago was special and I had to make an effort to make her mine. I was at my 2 BHK flat near Madiwala by 7 and started my routine meditation. But unlike everyday my mind was still on that footpath following a pair of Nike shoe she wore. Then only I have noticed that my subconscious mind had even spotted the shoes she wore. Her round face, dark black eyes, Shoulder length brownish hair, lovely lips and even the smell of her perfume, which I felt when she crossed me, thrilled my nostrils. One by one, her features started disturbing my mind. Her structure picture perfect!

          I could no longer concentrate and stopped meditating for that day and prepared to leave to office before the company bus showing up at the gate. Though I was not done any meditation my mind was cherishing on an unknown pleasure and unlike every day I was at the gate before the bus reached. My colleagues surprised and driver Ramayya who always gave me a dirty look amused. Inside the bus after settling down I prayed to god for the first time in my career to give maximum traffic jams for Ramayya to negotiate with before reaching the Infosis campus so that I could listen to my favorite melodies, thinking about the unknown girl I had met a couple of hours before. When you are in love, you pray for something and get exact opposite of what you prayed for. That particular morning Ramayya was happy that he could make us reach in the campus before time!

         When it was night before I set alarm to wake up at 5.00 in the morning I gave my second application to God. It was just to shrink the night. I turned many turns on my bed and might have slept between 2 and 3 in the morning. Image of the girl which has got registered hours back seemed working!

        She was breathtakingly gorgeous and I should speak to her when I meet her next time, a quick resolution passed without having a second thought.

        Next day I was very early at the same spot where I met her yesterday. I kept waiting. It was unusual for me to not look at the girls jogging on that footpath. On that day I had just come to see her and to talk to her. Nothing else and no one else mattered. I kept waiting. My eyes had identified that pair of Nike shoe from a good distance and she was such a treat for my eyes. Everything blurred for a second when both of my eyes got wet. I quickly wiped them off and remained clueless when I thought the reason behind the moisture. She might have wondered at my posture, looking at her like a statue, mouth wide open. Had she noticed me last day she would be thinking Oh, the same mad guy, I thought. She came running and the same automatic smile came on my face. She looked puzzled; her expression told.

       Excuse me, I said. She stopped and gave me a look. I was really pissed off by that time. Yeah, May I know you? She said.

      Err…Umm...well no. I am Sidharth I said after clearing my throat. It was hard to pretend that my lips were not shivering. I went on, It would be really great if we could sit over tea at the bakery out there, pointing the bakery. She looked confused. Her black eyeballs asked million questions and pierced my heart so deep that I almost felt taking her in my arms telling the whole world that, ‘Finally Sidharth has decided to fall in love with this cute little angel’. Her childish-innocent face was such a cute thing to watch. Please… I almost begged.

     Well… Okay she said but clearly nervous

When she came to know that I was working with Infosis she let pass a relieving sigh (I don’t know why) and seemed comfortable. She said she was Rwitika and she is doing her MBA from Christ College. She was actually from Hyderabad. We finished our tea and strolled on that footpath. From that day till we got separated we didn’t jog. We just walked. As time went along we just walked hand in hand. I never thought destiny had a cruel face as such. It was just fate which separated us. She still lives in my heart.

I guess CCD is about to close. Guys we should be going now, Sidharth Said. Then only I realized where I was. I was with Sidharth and his cute girlfriend. He brought me back to reality and I was curious to know what happened to them.

My author friend stood up and said ‘Chalo guys we should be moving now’. Sidharth you take care buddy, see you.

       Sidharth said the same to him and turned to me. Nice meeting you Kishore.

 I was dumb for awhile. He pointed to me the sign board where it was written ‘a lot can happen over coffee’ and said, in my case it happened over tea!

    He left us in a hurry. I stood up, agape!

But I was pretty sure that a lot more will happen over coffee at Café Coffee Day before I leave the garden city. I had to blame myself for taking Sidharth as a loser and an insane person. If it was all about destiny as Sidharth had said what a guy like him would do, I wondered. 

Thanks for your time

Sharath Muthirakkal

Tale of an ordinary performer...

       Though he was excited of attending his first ever quarterly review meeting, he could sense butterflies flying all over his empty stomach on the D-Day. He was excited because he got invited for quarterly review meeting which is going to be conducted in a lake side resort in one of the beautiful landscapes of the world itself. Butterflies flew freely in his stomach because he had been asked to give a presentation in front of a decent-educated-geeky crowd. When he contacted the other guys who had also been asked to give away presentations they gave him the impression that their presentations are as equally boring as his. Poor man believed them and decided to go with his sick looking power point slides before afore said audience. Point here should be noted that; presentations had been assigned only to newly recruited employees. Ragging? Well let’s see.

       Presentations were scheduled after the quarterly reviews, in the early hours of the evening. Whole team reached at the lake side resort at about 10 in the morning and gathered over an oval shaped table of the conference hall. He told that there were some 30 people including the bosses, managers, assistant managers and would-be ragged (?!) new recruitees.

       Being the youngest in the group he tried hard to understand what they were discussing. But in no time he got disappointed after seeing the figures, jargons and matters discussed flying over his head. He told that he had felt misplaced in that crowd. When everyone clapped he also clapped, when everyone laughed he also laughed. He wondered how many of them would be clapping and laughing like him without understanding a single sentence/figure/jargon discussed. But he believed that everyone but him might have understood everything. That belief only increased the number of butterflies.

         At around 1.30 in the afternoon conferences dispersed for lunch after the reviews. Buffet lunch was delicious. He tried almost every item. Hardly very few of them were known to him. He told that none of them tasted great because of the butterflies except the Kerala special fish curry (He told at least he felt it special, God knows). But he had to keep the table manners and hence pulled back himself from going the catering area for the 2^nd time. He noted during lunch one of the would-be presenters leaving the dining table without having food. He thought she was sick or something and felt very bad for her. Little did he know she had gone inside the conference hall for rehearsing her power-point slides!

            After lunch, people who talked more till noon looked relaxed and the three including our man felt exact opposite of the rest of the crowd. Lady presenter went first on the podium and started her presentation after being invited by MD of the company itself. It was when the lady presenter was about to march to the podium he noticed some papers in her hands. Though they were trembling in her hands he felt like cheated. He peeped to his left to see the other guy who is about to give the second presentation. He saw some papers in his hands too. But unlike the lady presenter those papers were not trembling. He felt horrible inside. He knew that he would not be making any better presentation had he known that the fellow presenters were pulling hard to make superb presentations. Though she was bit shady in the beginning, lady who had given the presentation first had slowly picked the speed and summed up well. Huge round of applause followed. More butterflies this time in his stomach. He was shocked because, he felt the fellow presenters hid from him the fact that they have prepared well and confused because he had no clue about what to do with his sick looking slides.

           When the second presenter started with his slides, our man has almost had a cardiac arrest. Second presenter has made sure that he had used almost all features of Microsoft Power Point and Google to give maximum attraction to his more than 30 slides presentation. (He even thought of flying to US of America and kill Bill Gates, Larry Page and Sergey Brin) Our man glanced at each audience presented. By reading their face expressions he was certain that they liked the second presenter and would benchmark the rest of the presentations with the second one. And he knew that his substandard presentation would get rated ‘horrible’. Huge round of applause pulled him back to the reality and he also started clapping as the second guy finished his presentation. He told that the applause lasted for good 2 minutes. More and more butterflies this time.

          MD invited him for giving the last presentation scheduled for the day. Unlike other presenters he had no papers in his hands and good looking slides in his USB drive. He connected his USB on the laptop. Nobody noticed his hands trembling. Then he went to the podium and looked at the audience. Almost another cardiac arrest! Finally after clearing his throat for the 3d time he could open his mouth. Neither he could puke what he had practiced before going to take the presentation nor did anything appear in his mind from where to begin with. Everything went blank. He did not know what to do and started doing the best thing he knew, that he had taught himself during his Masters that is reading from the slides!

        In no time he had finished his dictation and looked at the audience as if he had done something wonderful. He knew that it was the worst presentation he had ever given in his whole life. But audience clapped for him too. But this time just for few seconds. He acknowledged their claps and cursed his Adam’s apple for not letting him utter a sentence with full confidence and his mind for being blank when it was required to be full functioned. He hurriedly disconnected his USB from the laptop and went to his seat. His head hung in shame!

        He told that the fun wasn’t over yet. He could not discuss with the author what happened during the post review party at night on the very same day, as he had to leave to for a counseling session. Author chose not to ask about the counseling to his already dull looking dude. Hence our man had to leave his author friend in a hurry with an uncompleted script. But he had promised the author that one day he would narrate the whole incident when he could actually able to remember the blur images in his memory and link them in a better way. My author friend’s mind clinched on the ‘blur images’ usage of his friend and thought, Alcohol?! He looked at his friend leaving the restaurant. His head still hung in shame?

        I should acknowledge here my author friend who doesn’t want to reveal his name, for letting me share this tale.

Thanks everyone for your time.

Sharath Muthirakkal

ULTIMATE SMELL- THE DEATH!

His sleepless nights continued as they were for last couple of months.  Only few could note the changes happening in him. He was living somebody else’s life. Everything he thought existed disappeared as if he was awakened from a beautiful dream to the state of being nothing. Soon he became depressed. Slowly it caught up his professional life too. He went office regularly, pretented to be enthusiastic. Once he really was, he thought and let pass a sigh. But he decided to stop playing around! He tried to have some introspection. Nothing happened. Nothing seemed visible. He became more depressed. He thought about alcohol. But he decided against it because he was worried of getting carried away. He thought of spending more time with his friends whom he met since he came to that City. But none of his thoughts were getting executed for last two or three months. He doubted whether he had some thoughts in the first place and occasionally sighed like a lost man. UNCONSCIOUS SIGHS YOU KNOW..

 He thought about his early days in the office. He was never worried of anything. He asked stupid doubts and moved around. Positive energy was oozing out of him. Nothing seemed impossible. But everything turned upside down in no time. He even started thinking about bunking office; he started finding stupid reasons to stay away from the office and more surprisingly from people. He just wanted to be alone. Once he himself told his boss that he is feeling sick and he almost wept. Then he came to understand that he is a miserable manager of his emotions. He found his tongue tied when he was asked about something. He could not even look straight into the eyes of the security guard, let alone his colleagues and bosses. Even the jokes cracked during the breaks became horrible to his ears. None of them had made sense to him. He was in another world. Soon he had withdrawn completely inside the shell of his own thoughts. 

When the depression and unnecessary thoughts started eating his brain he rang up his professor who earlier introduced him to a counselor when he encountered the same problem during his academic days. Amidst of the entire busy college schedule his teacher tried his level best to motivate his mentally stuck ex-student and guaranteed him that he would arrange a meeting with the Counselor very soon. Though the telephone conversation with his professor was comforting, his ex-student, the depression stuck (un)professional was not finding his sleeps and ran away from the city to his home town early in the next morning without even telling his boss that he would be absent. 

All he wanted was to reach home as quickly as he could. He didn’t think about his boss, job and his colleagues. All he knew was that he had to be home as fast he could. Nothing else seemed mattered. He got irritated and worried when each time his phone beeped in his pocket. Sometimes it was his colleagues, sometimes it was his parents. He didn’t bother attending them.  After all he had no answers for their questions. Finally his boss also called him. He felt guilty and took the call and told him that he was in a bad mood early in the morning and could not tell him that he was not well and would be on leave. Had it be any other boss his association with the company would have finished then at there.  He expected a firing at the other end. But it was as if his boss understood the changes happening in him. He consoled him and asked him to call him when he reaches home back. He thought his boss would be one of the most respectable men in his list, had he made one. It only increased the level of respect in his mind for his boss. He felt really energetic and enthusiastic. Well, regret was in plenty, that question itself seemed out of place. But soon the train reached the station, everything flown away like a kite which has lost its’ rhythm in the foul wind. 

When he reached home, every incident flashed against his memory walls one by one. He wanted to cry. But he understood sadly that he was that cursed, even tears stopped coming. Then he wrote what he wanted to write. He thought of publishing it straightaway without editing. But someone inside stopped him from doing the same. Though he battled hard against it, finally he listened to the insider and he removed most of it. But before removing those paragraphs he might have read the original script for fifty times. Every time he read out, he could realize a peculiar smell attached to those words and sentences. It took him a whole night to identify that smell. It was nothing but the smell of death. The ultimate fate! He checked himself for an assurance. He was not dead. UNLUCKILY :(

Beijing se II (Few pages from the book Beijing Se!)

I don’t know whether I am a good writer or a bad writer.I have no other choice but write. These pages would take you to Beijing. If not all Beijing, some part of it with absolute realities. You could call it as my life. But I would call it miserable life.In Beijing I had all luxuries in the world but without Mom it was just a hell with all decorations of the mighty heaven. But like every average Indian I too had to burn my ass to make money to live a life. All the characters are fictitious. You may please go through the pages of Beijing Diary.

31^st March 2012 Beijing, China 7.52 am Saturday

Shanghai – Beijing south train had pulled it’s brake exactly at 7.52 am at Beijing south station. The last stop of the train and my first destination to begin a new life was coincidently same. I stepped out of the train along with Philip Sir, Jacky Liu (My boss in China) and Benjamin our sales guy (who is such a nice guy). Trina went home without saying a word to us. But it didn’t bother me at all. I took a deep breath and inhaled whole Beijing inside me. I took another one. Then I realized how much I miss Poonkavu temple, how much I miss India, How Much I miss Kerala, How much I miss Kannur, How much I miss Home, How much I miss my room and bed, how much I miss sweet Malayalam melodies, how much I miss every little things back home, which I never knew existed. I missed every one back home as well. But I missed Mom more than anyone else.

8.00 am

Jacky went back home. I, Philip sir and Benjamin took a taxi and left the station. I couldn’t believe my eyes first, seeing the massive structures, designs and teenage girls wearing miniskirts. Those were too short in deed. I decided not to sleep. I wanted to see all the buildings and wished I could have more eyes. Since I had a sleepless night in the train, my brain switched on the sleep mode inside me.

8.25 am

We have reached near the hotel where Philip sir would stay for 3 days. I met Anderson out there and we greeted each other. We left to the apartment where I would stay in Beijing. Our flat was big enough for 3 families. But I came to know that only Anderson and his family stayed there. Anderson guided me to the room allotted for me. Oh Man I was shocked to see the room. Massive room, Antique bed and a tidy attached bathroom made me happy. I left the entire luggage there (Not in the toilet). In no time we left to office.

8.40 am

As Anderson opened the door of Akay Beijing, aroma of spicy curry powder embraced me. Interior was set in such a way that one would feel like ‘working’. I thought of Cochin office when I saw Akay, Cochin photographs on the wall. More I thought of Cochin unit, more faces flashed through my mind. Jomy Chettan, Rakesh Ettan, Jaison Chettan, Sam sir and the list went on and on.

8.50 am

I was just going through my mails and Jacky came to me and introduced rest of the staff in the office. I met Anny. She could speak English and she greeted me with a smile. I saw a good fellow worker inside Anny. Another girl was also there. I don’t remember her name. The only English word I heard from her for the whole day was ‘Hello’ which she told when I met her early in the morning.

12.30 pm

Lunch was ready. Anny invited me to the dining room. We all sat there and started eating. Wait, I should say we all sat down and they started eating. I was still playing with the chopstick. I wanted to kill that fellow who came with the crazy idea of using Chopstick and eat him with the chopstick. Anny understood the situation and gave me a spoon and a knife. But I told her that I would try with the Chopstick. Sports man in me was ready for a game. Soon I too joined the warriors and started battling. But it was the worst food I had in China since I reached there. I was left with no choice but eat. I felt like throwing it down. Somehow I managed the food and went out. It was really chill out side. Temperature was about 10 degree centigrade. I decided to start a bad habit which I tried and miserably failed in the 10^th standard. Smoking!

Had I not charged my nicotine level in that atmosphere, I would have died there. I lit a cig and inhaled the smoke deep inside. But unlike years ago, I didn’t cough. After a cig, I felt warm inside and decided to quit smoking forever. A smoker’s pledge after all!

2.00 pm

I was back to work. Hence it was my first day I didn’t have much work to do. Jacky gave me some company’s websites. I just had to go through it carefully and identify the potentialities in them. Many friends came online in g-mail. I sent ‘hi’ to everyone. Few of them replied. Few didn’t. I assumed that they would be busy at work. At least that was what I wanted to believe. I missed all my friends as well. Sharon, Vyjesh ettan, Thayyib, Amir, Jithin and Shallu were the few of them I was missing very much.

5.30 Pm

Jacky dropped us in the hotel where Philip sir checked in in the morning. Philip sir went to change and I and Anderson waited him in the lobby.

5.45 pm

We were off to dinner. Yes, in China people take dinner so early that they could go bed early. No wonder why China is still number one in population. God damn they have all the time in the world for it!

6.00 pm

Anderson took us to a restaurant and ordered some dishes. Philip sir was suggesting him something. I sat down like an idiot and watched them. My knowledge in Chinese dishes was very limited. Noodles and chilly chicken were the only Chinese dishes I knew. In no time waiters started bringing all the dishes. I saw five unknown dishes on the table. Philip sir then told me that this is a custom in China that they would order dishes till there is no place left on the table for another one.

I wondered if the entire populations in China eats like this thrice a day, world would soon become a place there is no food left. We somehow finished it with a bottle of wine which contains 53% Alcohol and left the place. Chinese people don’t dilute the spirit. It was anyway nice to taste the spirit in it’s original form.

7.45 pm

Philip sir bid us goodnight and left to the hotel. I and Anderson bought a packet of oatmeal and a pack of milk and left to the apartment.

8.00 pm

We both reached the apartment. I bid goodnight to Anderson and took a shower. Then I started checking my mails and video chatting with someone who is damn important in my life.

9.30 pm

I don’t know what made me missed my Mom more than ever before and soon I realized it was raining inside me when it was quit chill outside the apartment. Soon the level of water raised and it became a flood inside. Over flowing water rushed through my eyes as if a dam had broken down completely. I cried loud calling out my mom in every nano second which has passed. I didn’t have much balance in my skype to call home and tell them to call me back. I logged in to g-mail. Luckily Jostna, a trustworthy friend of mine was online. I asked her to call my home and tell Mom to call me. She did it in no time and started consoling me as an elder sister. I have many cousin sisters who are elder to me. But none of them had ever showed a hint of caring in my whole life. I thanked Jostna once again and logged out from g-mail.

10.10 pm

Mom called. I didn’t tell her that I miss her so much. I thought why making important ones in your life so sad when you are thousands of miles away from them. I buried all the sorrows inside me. For the first time in my life I felt so content after burying them inside!

11.00 pm

I was lying on the bed and thinking about everyone back home. One picture stood there unmoved before my eyes. It was the picture of Poonkavu Temple. Soon the walls of my dreams started displaying each one of the Gods and Goddesses who have been protecting me from the evil forces. (Being an evil I seriously wonder why, still God is caring me like anything).

 1^st April, 2012 Sunday

6.00 am

It was Anderson’s call which rattled my sleep. Bugger wanted me to accompany him for a morning walk. But I was very sleepy. Because the biological clock inside me was not yet set with the Chinese Standard Time. But I stood up and got ready for the fucking walk. On the way Anderson asked me in his broken English, “Jango, you Indians never do exercise no? “. I just wrote it correctly for your understanding my dear Diary. He asked something else. I wanted to tell him that, we play shuttle badminton every morning for 2 hours. But thought of explaining him what I said made me stop and I gave him a wry smile. It will take hours to make Anderson understood what I wanted to tell. Why take unnecessary risks early in the morning, I thought.

6.10 am

Both of us reached that park where Anderson stated some stretching, which even nursery kids would do without much difficulty. When I started stretching my own way, curious Anderson also started to copy my work. As long as it didn’t matter, I kept quit. After 30 minutes we decided to go back home.

6.45 am

After reaching home, I rushed to the toilet to finish all the basic routine one would do in the morning. When the warm water embraced my body, sleep went away somewhere.

7.15 am

I cooked milk and later applied it in oatmeal and had it. Anderson went a step ahead and added an egg in his bowl of oatmeal. After finishing it he told me that it was such a stupid thing adding egg in the oatmeal. I wanted to tell him that; there are only few things that he would do without stupidity. But I didn’t tell him and finished my oatmeal.

7.50 am

Jacky had asked us to go for an exhibition somewhere in Beijing city. Hence I and Anderson started our journey to the exhibition center in a bus. Unlike in India there is no conductor in buses in China. We had to swipe a card and they would take the money required.

8.20 am

We got down near a subway station. In subway station also the procedure was the same. The same card would help you to get in the train. We got in the train and it left the station exactly after 2 minutes. Chinese subway is just like Indian metro railway service. The train reached our destination in 5 minutes and we bored another train from that station. Anderson asked me to get down when we reached a massive station. It was really big. When we stepped outside I could see the big buildings, attractive designs and Porsche cars running all along the road.

9.00 am

We finally reached the location where agricultural exhibition was underway. We met Benjamin there and he told us that, the exhibition was not meant for us and we didn’t have ticket to check in. I was utterly disappointed hearing that. But I didn’t want to waste my time crying over there. As always I preferred to cry in the night. I asked Anderson to take few photographs. Anderson took a few lying over the floor as if a professional photographer. I thanked him and we three started our way back to office.

9.15 am

We decided to go back office by bus since bus journey would be appropriate for site seeing. When we were waiting for the bus, I came to know that in Beijing there is electric bus also. It is just similar to our electric train in India. Inside the bus I was so happy sitting by the window and seeing the mighty buildings around. I could not believe my eyes when I saw the Beijing Olympic Stadium in distance. One more building caught my attention. It was nothing but IBM’s office. It was designed in such a way that every single passenger would look at it and let out a WOW!

10.00 am

We reached office and settle with work. Wait, we reached office and they have become busy at work. I was just about to settle and Jacky called me. He wanted me to go through some more company websites to understand the potentialities in them. I came back to my cubicle and switched on my laptop. Soon I found myself engaged with checking my mails not the company websites that Jacky insisted. Sometimes I wonder why people insist something to others. Why can’t they leave people alone in their world and work according to their wish. Why people even restrict freedom. But soon I found myself checking those websites.

10.30 am

Philip Sir and Jacky went out to check few plants in Beijing. As they went out, I threw my hands up in the air and let a sigh. I didn’t know whether it was a sigh of relief or just another sigh!

But the worker in me was not ready to be lazy. I pushed hours checking some websites. Few of them were really interesting and some were quite boring. After finishing the so called ‘Website scanning’, I logged in yahoo messenger and g-mail to check whether some friends were online. Nobody was there with a green light on.

Sometimes if you want friends online, none of them would be there. Sometimes if you want none of them online and just want to be alone, all of them would be online and throwing Hi’s at you.

12.30 pm

When Trina called me for lunch, I pretended as if I didn’t hear her and started going through the websites as if I was searching for something important. Poor girl had to come to me and invite me at last. I shut down the system and went to have lunch. Before entering the dining room I prayed to God for not bringing the same food we had last day before my eyes. Luckily it was something else that I found on the table. We had food peacefully. I played around with chopsticks once again and created a mess all over the table. But nothing wrong in it, I thought. When you were kid you eat like that only. More food would be going out of your mouth initially. Then slowly you find the direction with your spoon or plain hand. I let a sigh and hoped one fine day I would also eat like these Chinese people with the stick.

2.00 pm

I went back to my cubicle and found some friends online. Luckily they were free and we started chatting. It went on and on. I had to stop it to start working on the websites. Some very interesting websites even displayed how to make some dishes. I watched them keenly with a thought of experimenting after reaching home. The thought of home once again shred few tears. I let them go.

5.30 pm

Jacky dropped us near to the hotel where Philip sir stayed. Philip sir went inside to check some mails and I and Anderson waited him in the lobby. It took around 20 minutes for Mr. P to come to the lobby and we strolled towards a restaurant. Anderson guided us through a beautiful park. Ancient Chinese houses, massive buildings, a beautiful lake, lake view hotel and many more things feasted my eyes. Soon we reached near a town and found few restaurants. Anderson selected one restaurant and told us that they serve good food. Then three went to a super market. Mr. P bought a Chinese wine and I told him I would have beer this time, not the wine. He bought me 2 bottles of beer. Then we searched for cornflakes and Philip sir bought me one oatmeal variety, which I could use for making Breakfast or dinner.

6.50 pm

We settled down in a restaurant and as always Anderson and Philip sir ordered something and poor me who didn’t even know the name of a single dish waited for them to arrive. In no time waiters started bringing the food on the table and soon the table became full. The good looking dishes tasted horrible and not so good looking tasted yummy. I enjoyed both. Diary you know how much I love food irrespective of the places and varieties. After finishing my 2 bottles beer and food I felt full. But Anderson bought me another bottle of beer, this time a bigger one and gave it to me. I had to drink it.

7.50 pm

We left the hotel and started walking back. Philip sir bid us bye when we reached near his hotel and I and Anderson walked alone to our apartment. We bought milk from the Wu-mart and left to home.

8.20 pm

I was tired when we entered inside the apartment. I took a shower came in front of the system to have a chat with someone important it went on till 10.30.

10.45 pm

Since we have 3 holidays at a stretch, I decided to watch a movie online. I watched CID.MOOSA, a Dileep movie which I had seen more than 5 times. But I thought of watching it again. It is nowhere written that watching a movie more than 5 times is a crime!

1.30pm

I decided to sleep.

Yawns and more yawns

Thanks For your time

Sharath Muthirakkal