does it prick enough?

Outraged, and horrified! that’s what I am. Petrified, terrified and angry. I questioned every body, I blamed the politicians, the police, the army, the navy , the intelligence…….and so on, we know the list is not small.
Then finally I questioned myself.
What did u do? What was your reaction when there was a blast in Ahmadabad, and Assam recently?
We come home and when we are informed that 50 died in a bomb blast in Ahmadabad, what do we do? Call few relatives there( if we have any located in that place), eat food and go of to sleep. We did not react then, why are we petrified today? Do we have rights to question when we did not react for years and years. We never reacted on blasts that normally happen in Srinagar every second day, Why? In fact that’s not a news anymore for us, we accept it, its normal, it happens everyday, there is nothing new in it.
People in Kashmir have forgotten that a human can die a natural death, but we go on. We have accepted the fact. We never reacted on Manipur blasts, on Vietnam blasts, on Iraq’s situation and now we want justice, we want safety.
Do we vote, do we take 2 steps forward to even go and make our voting cards?
Then why are we so angry? Who are we pissed with? Whom should we get pissed with? Who deserves to be questioned? And why are we questioning now?
We are questioning coz its happening to us, its happening around us, its happening to our people, our people’s people, the people whom you have met at least once in your life, now that’s what’s pricking us, and now its pricking enough, coz when we think, that we could be the one, we feel horrified.
We all are selfish, we don’t care of human rights and we don’t care about anything but our selves, and that includes each of us. U & ME.
When I question, why is it happening? The only answer is, it had to happen for us to realize something needs to be done. Because this was the only way for us to realize, it had to happen personally with us.
All of us who are passing statements saying, I hate the word ‘acceptance’ and ‘moving on’ and ‘Mumbai spirit‘, are very well a part of those statements, even if you dint use it verbally, u always practiced it. Coz u moved on, u mourned, grieved and moved on, for years and years. Terrorism is not today’s word, its happening from a decade, yes but it just entered our comfort zones, that’s why its something we all want to fight for.
And what are we doing even now? Surfing face book, writing notes and posting comments, that’s what we call fighting? lets not excuse ourselves by saying that I did what I could. You could do much more then this, you don’t know your potentials yet. You could do much more by going to the hospitals, donating blood, helping patients, clearly protesting about it, fight till the end, question till you got your answers and most importantly you could go and vote.
People lets come up with plans to show are anger, and lets protest big time, not just for Mumbai blast, but for all the people in Kashmir, Vietnam, Iran, Iraq , Afghanistan, Pakistan, and all those places and people who are fighting alone from years and years. Lets extend our hands to them. Lets not just talk and write notes and post comments, lets do it.
There was this small story I had once heard in a business training.
A dog was sitting at the corner of a rocking chair. As the master rocked the chair forward the dog would bark, and when the chair would go back he would stop barking. The neighbors were tired of the barking sound every second minute. One fine day they decided to protest, they went to the master and protested for the irritating sound and asked him to look into the problem. They realized that a nail was pricking the dog whenever the chair was rocked forward. They all wondered why the dog did not get up and moved from there. After a while master solved the query, I realize its pricking but not enough for him to take the efforts to get up and move out of his comfort zone.
Now the question is, is it pricking enough? Or we need more mishap and more blast’s so that we come out of our comfort zones, from our busy schedules, from our family, entertainment, jobs and money.
Its for us to decide now.

LET ME BE YOUR MOTHER

There is so much that you have given me, there is so much you have cared for, if you look at yourself carefully, you’re a divine creation of lord. Two hands full of pebbles; two hands full of snow, and two hands full of sugar cubes to sweeten up my life as never before. Go back to my past, way back when I was born, u kissed my forehead when I cried and also sang lullaby, u changed your mood to good when you saw me sad, u changed my undies and dippers when I made it bad. You loved me even when I kicked your breast with my tiny legs, and feed me milk as I wept. You saved the penny from your daily bread when I cried for a toffee; you ate half and gave me half which I feed it to my puppy. You smiled at me when I said sorry for scoring less, you hit me hard when I lied to you and pampered me when I was in stress. You even kicked me out when I took you for granted, you hit me hard when I dared to abuse, and later you cried harder, healing my bruise.
How many years has it been, that you have gone for a holiday or even planned next two years of your life? You have lived just for me, just for your children, just for your family, you are the selfless soul my mother, you are the perfect symbol of love, unconditional love.
Never a word of appreciation, or just a small thank you, not even a smile that we can remove from our busy schedules to greet her good morning or night. Thousands of tantrums we throw on her like our bags, shoes, socks, towels and files as if she was just a mother too happy just to love, unconditional coz she never expected, never said a word. We still kick her breast with huge legs, pull her hair and pinch her nose, and she still kisses us when we are in deep sleep and when we snore.
I want to give you all I can, not just a holiday package or some bucks, not even a thank you for all you have done. You deserve a life for you, a life that you gave me, let me be your mother mummy, coz you need love unconditionally. Let me make your hair, and press your clothes, let me make you chocolate milk with peanut butter toast. Let me scold you when you fight with daddy, just as you scold me when I fought with didi. Mummy please let me be your mother, coz you deserve it all. Do not think that I am trying to return all that you have done for me, how can I return something so precious, Can I please keep it always with me?

Thousand miles did I walk; and he walked with me till half way...I searched him in the other half; I searched him in meadows, in farms and barren lands, in holy churches and chilling verandas but found him nowhere. Finally when I gave up; I found myself hanging in the air....it was he who picked me up in his arms and walked faster than ever before. We crossed the river, we crossed the stream, we crossed the mountain, and the deep valley beneath; we crossed the farms with swinging daffodils, we crossed the clouds with the heart of sun and we crossed the wind mills.
I was sad, scarred and down in life; I was shocked, frustrated and I wished to say good bye. I had spent half the journey just to find him, while I reached nowhere. I wasted half my energy, half my time, half my passion to find him, yet he did not care. He fooled me, and let me go haywire by not showing up in my vision or letting me smell him in air, no aura, no light; no image in my sight, he fooled me half of my life, he fooled me half of my life.
Just to find him I lost my goal, my dream, my passion for which I thought I could die. It was he who was responsible for me to lose my vision, my eyes; it was he who was responsible for me to lose my nerves and my brains.
He swung me in the air, he flew faster and faster, and his speed erased all my thoughts, beliefs and sentiments. And then I filled the universe with my loud scream, he dropped me to the ground and broke my dream. I starred the air, as if I starred him, I hit the ground and slapped the stone; I abused and shouted loud at the mirror across. I cried and cried till my vocals broke, I wept and wept till my emotions choked. Then I remained silent for a while and the wind gushed in my ears, it was he who spoke for the first time, “I love you my dear”, he said. He picked me up in his arms again, kissed my cheeks and hold me tight; he took me to the paradise. A barren land with shining sun, a tree house church without a nun, a black hole in the universe, flowing river without the rhythm, no gravity no law, no rule to follow. It was dark, way to dark but there was light within my heart. It was paradise, indeed. It was paradise if u see, paradise of heart and soul, paradise of passionate goal.
We sat at a bank of waterless river, for he knew I had lots to ask. He said in the best voice he had, “journey of life is such, where you walk half the journey with passion and spirit and you always find me besides yourself. It’s when your spirits die, and your determination fluctuates you feel the need to see me beside. My dear I was never visible, but now u want to see me, if I really exist; now you feel the need to find me. Your journey always remains pre determined, well planned, it will always take the time it has to take to reach the goal, it is you who gave up, you who thought I left your hand, but my dear I was always there; there in your faith. Your faith in me helped you to spend half the time and journey remained and when you gave up on me, I picked you up and got you here not because I did not want you to lose your faith on me, but because the time had arrived for you to reach here. My child, the only way to see me, is to see within, coz when you talk to god, you talk to thee. My dear, journey of life is such, the day you stop finding me and questioning me you will kill yourself.”
I smiled at him, and hugged his aura coz I felt it now and whispered softly; “I love you, I love myself”.
I kept quiet for some time, and noticed the waterless river and looked at him,
“ahh! He’s gone to find me”, he said.

With all pride I must say, CHUTIYA JIGNESSSSSSSSSSSSSS
One fine day Jignesh (name changed) came to my dressing room to say hello. I was resting at that particular time. I had a word with him on phone twice before I met him. He was the scheduler for the show. As Jignesh is atypical Gujju name I inquired if he was a Gujrati. He was astonished to learn that I was a Gujju myself, as he always thought I looked like a Punjabi. May be he was honest on that note as I was playing a Punjabi character in the show, and they must have chosen me on those lines. He was all excited to meet a Gujju on set and so with all excitement took a seat to have a small conversation. Mean while when we were chatting he asked me about my birth date. Without thinking once I said, “3rd October.” He further inquired, “Which year, 1980?”; “1987”, I said. I thought he wanted to know my age. But just for proper clarity I questioned that why was he eager to know my birth date. He said he was an astrologer. He asked me to give my birth timing also. I feel very curious and amazingly heated up and love to discuss about my future, past, horoscope, kundli etc. I asked him if I could give my friend’s date and time, and if he could answer some of the questions regarding his career. He said okay and then asked me to get my kundli the next day. I did not carry it. To my astonishment, jignesh entered my vanity room with a small paper in his hand. My makeup man was busy doing my make up but I could see the paper in his hand from the mirror. I looked at that paper keenly, it was my kundli. I was shocked and asked myself, that why would a person take so much efforts to actually print my kundli, he must be so passionate and excited about it. I greeted him and asked him to sit.
Jignesh must be around 40- 45 years of age. He has white hair but with the help of mehendi he has made them golden-ish brown. He has a small tummy bulging out, but he is not over weight. U can say that he is ugly as there are no features that might attract you. He claims to be a writer and wants to be a director. Once u look at jignesh, it would not take u more than 2 seconds to recognise he is a gujrati.
My make up man and my costume designer took around 20 minutes to finish their work, but jignesh waited. I told him sorry to make him wait for so long. He said it was alright.
“Tell me what you want to know?” he asked,
“My career” I said
-“You can be a good writer; you can make a stand in any creative field. But as regards with acting, u will always get comedy to do and u will get fame only for such characters. You might be a better actor when it comes to serious roles, but you will never work in that genre. “
-“okay”
-“what else do you want to know?”
-“hmmm! nothing much. You tell me whatever you think is worth telling me. Ok tell me about my marriage”
I committed a big mistake by asking him this question. He said you will have good marriage in the beginning but later you might have problems because you will have extra marital affairs. I was shocked to hear that; but I did not react. He went further and said that I am very sexual and have hidden sexual urges and my sex drive is too very strong. The very next question he asked me was, “are you a virgin.” I couldn’t believe my ears that he had the guts to ask me that. I took a deep breath and said in a typical manner, “what type of a question is that, of course I am a virgin.” He shocked me even further and said in a casual manner, “don’t tell me at 22 you are still a virgin.” After reading my ‘what the fuck’ expressions he said, “Okay, u might be a virgin and u might not be feeling to very positive about sex and things related to it but your views will surely change. U will realise that sex is a necessity and everybody needs it. You will have extra marital affairs just for sex. Like a stupid girl I tried to defend myself telling him that I am not that kind of a girl and I was very strong with what I felt. The answer to that was the most shocking. He said that even he felt the same, but after entering the industry he realised that after working for hours you need some sex and having sex with the same partner is boring and hence you need a change. He even said that his wife was okay with it and they share a great relationship.
But this was nothing new, all of us have heard about such people in the media field, it’s just shocking when it happens to you. Jignesh crossed all the bars when he went on boosting about his sex drive and how much research he has done on sex, and one can say he has done PhD in sex. And the final bar was broken into pieces when he said, “aapdi kundli bau male che, according to tari ne mari kundli apno ruhna no bandh che.” Which means; that our kundlis are similar and we have met coz we were destined to meet and we have lots of time to spend together. On that last note he used an additional line which cleared all my doubts about his intentions and his character. He said, “So hope to spend all the life with you.” I reacted, “what?” He changed the topic by saying I mean we shall be friends forever.
I couldn’t understand how to react and what to say. I felt like slapping him, but I dint have the guts to do that. I kept quite. I wanted to get rid of him asap, god heard my prayers and there was a knock at the door, it was rajendar, the assistant director of the show. He had come to call me as the shot was ready. I hurried and left with rajendar. Few days later I realised that all the girls know that jignesh is a chipku, our dress assistant had started to call him kaka and the creative head named him ladies tailor because of his flirtious trait. L.T as we call him, with or without love. One fine day the director suggested that all the girls should decide and call him kaka, and the idea was put into action and the plan was successful.
I started to ignore him, but he did not get my clues. One fine morning he said, “chal tane nashto karva lai jau”( come ill take you for breakfast). While saying this he caught my hand. I just felt like slapping him, this time I couldn’t control my anger and jerked his hand off and said, “I don’t go out with a kaka” and left with my nostrils up. Everyone enjoyed teasing him and gossiping about him. I didn’t coz I was the only one tortured everyday with his sex talks. I had to bare his calls and even smile when he starred at me. One fine day I decided to tell my creative head about it and the day arrived. It was ganesh visarjan, and I was travelling back to town in her car. I told her everything. She immediately called my E.P and narrated the whole scene. He was horrified that L.T talks like that to an artist, he was so pissed that shouted at me that why I did not tell him this before. He would have slapped him then and there. He said I shouldn’t bother and he will manage. Next day I called Jignesh to confirm my dates; his voice was low lacking confidence. I was happy, to hear that low tone. I am sure he got to know his bhavishyawani was wrong and there was no rhuna nu bandh and that we were definitely not even friends, so no question of friends forever....with all pride I must say, CHUTIYA JIGNESSSSSSSSSS

SHAITAN KISKE ANDAR NAHI HOTA?
Bas thoda sa fasla hota hai,
Is oor se dujji oor pauhochne ka.
Sadak ke us paar andhera hai, is paar ujyala
Aisa kaun kehta hai ki farishte sirf safed kapdo mein hi aate hai,
Aur shaitan kale kapdo mein mandrate hai.
Aksar andhere mein hi safed roshni ka pata chalta hai
Ujale ke bin kala saaya kabhi nahi padta hai
Farishte kis mein nahi hai?
Hum sab mein farishta bas ta hai,
Kuch sehma kuch ghabraya sa
Kuch dara dara, murjhaya sa
Kisi ne kaha ek kash le le,
Dar bhag jayega,
murjhaya hua phool phir khil jayega.
Kash pe kash, nashe ka jadoo
Farishta hua bekaboo
Phir kya ujyala, phir kya sadak
Sirf shaitan hi shaitan har taraf
Shaitan hum sab mein hai,
par bas thoda sa fasla hota hai
Sadak ke is par se us par jane ka.
Mein phas gaya hu, mujh mein shaitan bas gaya hai,
Ab mein sab jaga ujyala chahta hoon,
Har ache insaan ke upar kale saaye ki tarah mandrana chahta hoon.
Behlaunga, phislaunga aur phir bhi na mane toh kheech ke is paar launga.
Yeh shaitan mujh mein bas kar khush nahi,
Yeh mere dosto mein bhi basna chahta hai
Daru, nasha aur ladkiyan yeh sab tak pohchana chahta hai
Cigarette ke dhuen se har disha ko bhar dega
Woh sadak ke us par, us par ke farishto ko
Isi dhuein se chipaa dega
Ek shaitan hum sab mein basta hai,
Ek farishta sab mein rehta hai
Yeh zindagi ek jua hai
Bas dekhna hai kuan jeet ta hai
Farishta ya sahitan
© khushboo shroff

3 big mistakes of my life

Last 3 days have been the most terrible days of my life. But with every terrible experience life teaches you new things. I have genuinely experienced now, that what LONELINESS actually means. What’s life after graduation. It’s fucking difficult to take your own decisions and be proud of them whether they are right or wrong. It’s easy to crib and fucking difficult to be in someone else’s shoes.
I’ve been lonely for three consequent days and nights with my parents there to support, with people around me, and friends there to be proud of me. Lonely as hell. All alone with my decision which I wasn’t sure of. With plenty of expectations in mind, all broken into pieces as each minute passed. I felt so helpless that I could barely smile. Life had already taken a turn, and the closest of people were there to expect but not to support. I was hurt. Every time I thought about it, I said to myself do not expect, and then I looked at my call log and my message inbox that whether I have a sign of support from the person I expected to be there. Then I realised a lot of things in life.
I went into an imaginative trip. I saw a group of friends coming out of college campus, enjoying life to the fullest, telling each other to remain friends forever. And then they see the crowd outside college. My imagination turned into an animation blog. Crowd stood in rows and columns. Each of the friends tried to get into one line. When the first one got in, another felt he was ditched. He thought about the promise to always be together and be friends forever. Slowly and steadily everyone got into one or another line but they all were far away now. Each line suited best for them but being in the same line was against their destiny. The lines moved either back or front and they moved with the line. They occasionally met and fought, had hard feelings and some just stopped talking. But as they grew, they cherished the time they could meet and thanked the destiny about it.
I learnt three biggest mistakes of my life in past three days

1. Being in one sided love is the biggest mistake I committed. That too for 4 fucking years. And even after 4 years I expected. I expected him to be there, like a fool when I knew he will never be... dummmm because it was 1 sided.
-------LEARNING- your one sided love can never be your good friend, whether you take him as a good friend or not, he will never, coz he will always think you are fucking in love.

2. It’s being coward to not backup your decisions especially when they were wrong. World is there to crib and criticise and I am also a part of the world so I understand it better. There are friends who will scold you, explain you or may be even hit you for your wrong decisions, but will be there no matter what. And some will just ignore thinking it’s their life and who am I to say anything and go off to sleep. The first ones are true friends.
-----LEARNING- stop understanding and analysing friends. They will prove themselves when the true time arrives. YOU WILL ALWAYS BE LONELY IN LIFE. STOP DEPENDING; EVEN FOR SUPPORT. SUPPORT YOUR SELF, U’LL NEVER REGRET.

3. The most important of all. But dicey to draw lines. Extreme of either which will spoil your life. PHILOSPHY & PRACTICALITY. PHILOSOPHY IS GOOD FOR MIND BUT BAD FOR STOMACH & PRACTICALITY IS GOOD FOR STOMACH BUT BAD FOR MIND.
------LEARNING- practically realise your needs and priorities in life and then work with some ideals and philosophy so that you don’t go on the wrong tracks. The most important thing is to have your own thoughts, ideals and ethics according to your own sensibilities. You can’t set your priorities according to bookish philosophies and philosophy of others. Think by yourself, according to your sensibilities.
FURTHER LEARNING: - UNDERSTANDING YOUR OWN SENSIBILITIES IS HIGHLY DIFFICULT, FOR THAT ONE NEED’S TO BLANK HIS SLATE.

TERRIBLE TUESDAY: TURNING POINT
It just started of badly, I got up an hour late and missed the perfect breakfast time and had to eat my breakfast at 9 am. The sleepy me went off to bed again after eating my breakfast and got up at 11 and by 11:30 I had my lunch and deliberately missed my apple which was due at 10 am. (I am on my diet and that’s my eating schedule; 8am – breakfast, 10 am- apple, 12 am- lunch. In short I have to follow a two hour regime diet). At 12:30 I have gym and I reached there at 12:42 and my instructor asked me to go back home, he gave these instructions on phone and refused to talk to me. I was terribly pissed. If he would have come in front of me I would have surely bashed him and broke his tooth. I went on complaining to everyone present in the gym like a second standard kid. I did realise it but I did not care much and went on with my cribbing with how unjust and unfair he is and how much dadagiri he does, and how much he has made me wait at times and I never complained. I was so mad at him that I refused to go back and sat there for 45 minutes waiting for him to come but hard luck he dint show up and finally I left for college. I went to college and met jinit near aarey booth where I met a guy who had worked in GSM last year. (I don’t remember his name; in fact I don’t know a lot of names in this post). He started to ask that why I had come to college? (This particular question pisses me to no end and anyways I just dint want to go to college but since parth called twice I went there so he doesn’t feel bad.) Getting irritated with his question I requested jinit to take me to rehearsals as I had just 1 hour with me. As we headed towards first floor auditorium I met mirpuri mam. I was so happy to see her that I still can’t control my feelings but she was so much in hurry that she did not wait to talk to me and rushed off, I stood there for few seconds to gulp that down. When I went up I met juhi with whom I was thrilled to talk. Later I went up and met parth, jinit and vinati who were practising for spoof. Divij was acting like a wannabe trying hard to direct but eventually everything was done by jinit with the help of others. It was a scene to watch, one could see Dasu part 2 in Divij. I couldn’t see the whole rehearsal because I received a call from parth( the guy who is an assistant director in the new weekly series starting on star one.) I had refused to work in that series but he forced me to take up the opportunity and within a fraction of seconds I said a yes. After keeping his call I was shocked to take the decision so quickly, as I had spent the whole Monday discussing with different people about my confusion whether to do television or not, regarding money etc. But all this happened in fraction of second and later I was again confused and stressed out. I asked jinit and vinati whether to do it or not and vinati refused and parth and jinit said please go ahead with it. In last two days I had realised that the biggest problem of life is in choosing. I went down stairs to meet rahil without completely seeing the rehearsal. Rahil as usual encouraged me for my decision and held his full support. Later I came home and told mom that I had accepted the offer and she was equally happy with my decision. I packed my food and took my bag and headed off to andheri for look test. While travelling in train I again started having double thoughts about my decision, and then I was scared what will anshul think, I just told him last night that I wouldn’t do it for that money and blah blah. I messaged him that I had accepted the offer. His reply to the message was shockingly pleasant. He replied that star one will now be called star two because now they have got another star as me. It was such a sweet message that it started giving me diabetes. I started assuming that he must be thinking that let this child make mistakes and come back. Later she will know what not to do, but I know from know what not to do. I don’t want to do television all my life, in fact not even a part of my life. May be I am doing this because I just want to act. I want to explore. I want to work desperately. I want to move on and grab opportunities as they come to me and this one has genuinely knocked my door. A thought passed by so fast that i was almost freaked out questioning myself, that why am I doing it? At that moment prince called and his thanda reaction about me doing television gave me a heart ache. I must have collapsed with nervous breakdown but I was lucky to find myself alive when I got down on andheri station. Till I got out of the station I was so disgusted that I felt blank for few seconds. I kept on walking and I suddenly realised I was wet. It was raining very heavily and phew! No auto. I waited for 15 minutes but no rickshaw wala agreed to go to adarsh nagar. Finally one rick guy called me and asked me to join the share a rick at Rs. 30. I disagreed but he left me with no choice as no rickshaw was ready to come. The most interesting journey of the day began. At every signal this guy offered cigarettes to random people like chaiwala and florist and beggars and even the guy who sat next to him. The guy in the rick asked the driver why he wasn’t smoking. Driver replied, “Main nahi peeta, sirf pilata hoon. Ek ek sutta sade chaar ka hai( Rs 4.5). Par sab lok apne dost hai, aur dosto ke liye main yeh sab nahi sochta.” The guy who was smoking said, “kyu saari duniya ko galat adat daal raha hai?” he replied,” main kaha daal raha hoon, woh log pehle se peete hai”. The two guys got off on their destination. Then I was alone in the rick with that crazy driver. I started chatting with him. Our rickshaw moved up and down on the muddy broken roads. He started his gyan once again.
- “Yeh raste dekhe? Kaise lage madam?
- “ gande”
- “Inpe chal payenge”
- “ bohot barish hai, aur nahi mere paas chata hai, aur main aapko tees rupye de rahi hoon toh chalungi kyu”
- “Agar meri rickshaw band pad gayi toh?”
- “toh chalna hi padega”(kya paka raha hai)
- “yeh international roads hai, yeh Europe ka road, yeh paaaaris ka. Aur yeh Europe ka tabela”
- (I smiled)” aap cigarette nahi pite?
- “nahi”
- “Toh pilate kyu ho? Is se accha seb khilao, juice pilao. Kam se kam maro toh mat logo ko”
- “ maine aadat thodi lagayi hai, woh pehle se pite hai”
- “ aur aap aadat ko badhava de rahe ho”
- “Kharab aadat ko badhava kaha chahiye madam? Main chahta hoon yeh log sutta maar maar ke jaldi mar jaye, phir hum shaanti se jiyenge”
- “Aap unko bachana nahi marna chahte ho?”
- “ nahi nahi, yeh toh mere dost ne di mujhe, bola le pee, main bola mein toh peta nahi, toh padi padi sad jaati is se accha jo peta hai use pila du”
- “Sach? Ya phir sach mein maarna chahte ho?”
At that very moment he bashed with a gas cylinder guy going with his huge cycle. It was my driver’s mistake but he was so cruel that he abused that poor fellow and even hit him. Poor guy, he was holding such a huge cycle that he couldn’t get down to slap him back, and the driver sat in the auto and ran away. I had to go somewhere near Honda showroom, he took me to Mahindra showroom way ahead of infinity and then took 35 bucks. I asked him to return 5 back as we decided 30, he said “arrey itna aage choda na, isiliye”. I laughed and said, “Paanch rupee do”. He gave me 2 rupees back but I eventually took 5 rupees. After giving me 5 rupees he swung in the air shouting, “arrey aapne toh mujhe kangal kar diya”. I couldn’t help but laugh at that. I walked back to the loacation and when I entered the studio I realised I was completely wet. I looked messy, and I was an actor and expected to look tic tac. Without hesitating too much I sat down. All the other actors started coming in. The cast included sumit raghwan( sahil from sarabhai), chachi from dekh bhai dekh( wife of shekhar suman in dekh bhai dekh). Shagufta(she was in parampara), homi wadia, sudheer pandey. The director was yes boss ka director and the name of the sitcom was panipuri. I felt out of the place. The actors were good, but the production guys were extremely bad, rude and arrogant. I felt horrible; why am I doing this? I just wanted to leave. The atmosphere was fake, or maybe it was all in my mind. The script reading for the first episode started. I had an impression that the script is disgusting, but as they went on it turned interesting. It was a pure sitcom, nothing with great dialogues but funny situation. It was a little darker as things went on going wrong, and I just thought of chor ke ghar thieves and p.g woodhouse. I was happy with the script. It wasn’t extra ordinary but it wasn’t disgusting at all. My mood changed. I started liking the experience. I wanted to know more, that how do they work. I wanted to experience more of that faking. While sitting in the rick while going back to station, I thought, this experience is equally important in life. Every one you work with is not going to be an anshul or hussain for that matter. Everyone on this earth is not a good person. I told myself, after college I had heard people experience the real world, now I am experiencing that myself. It’s getting interesting now. The game has just begun. These experiences make your life. This terrible experience had made me write....so at least I am using them somewhere. But the day did not end here. I was standing for churchgate fast on platform no. 4. Virar fast arrived on platform 3. It was so full that not a single person could get in but I viewed atleast 50 people managing to either get in or climb on the train. The train started and it slowly took up speed and suddenly an old man fell on the platform. I ran towards the crowd to see what exactly had happened. He had broken his head and there was blood everywhere. He was in immense pain and he cried so loudly that I couldn’t see his pain. Some men picked him up and headed towards the bridge. The bridge was so pack that it was impossible to go up. Meanwhile churchgate fast arrived. People getting down the bridge did not care much and just pushed and ran so that they could catch the fast train. The men picking up the old man shouted hard with anguish to let them go so that they could save the old man. Women around me started gossiping about the railways and inappropriate amount of trains. They cribbed and showed anguish and while cribbing all of us boarded the churchgate fast train. I wanted to see what happened to that old man, so I peeped low to catch the view. The bridge was not crowded anymore and the man climbed up holding the old man on their shoulders. The women behind me pulled me back and said, “tum ko bhi girna hai kya”. I went and took the fourth seat. I had met nahida on the station and we took the train together. We seated and started chatting. I have never spoken to nahida, she was in my class but I hardly had friends in class. I always had an impression that pooja, nahida and nikki are the good girls of the class but while I was talking to her I realised she was a snob. She was fake and loud and a complete wannabe who loved to say f**k after every statement. She told me about graduation ceremony which made me excited. She made weirdest of expressions which made me sulk and grin. I wanted to throw her out of the window but the windows had grill and I dint feel she was worth the effort of me getting up and throwing her from the door so I let her be. My journey ended and I reached home to grab some dinner as I had not eaten anything after lunch and my 2 hour diet regime was completely destructed. While I was having my dinner parag called to inspire me about my decision telling me that he was happy I took it and it was the right thing to do. I felt like believing him after a long time. One good thing that has happened in past few days is reunion of me and parag. We talk for 2 hours every day as we used to talk before which is the most wonderful thing that happened to me. By the end of the day I realised it was the most terrible day but the most exciting experience I had. I must have gone through all kinds of emotions, and I am happy to experience them. I wished myself good night and exclaimed, terrible Tuesday!
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