V, R and Me

Time flies. It was about three months back that my friend V told me about her wedding planned in September. That got me, and another common friend making plans for the wedding and at the end, both of us ended up not attending the wedding.
As luck would have it, this other friend also got engaged and is now busy preparing for her own wedding and thus could not make it to V's marriage. Why I never made it - that is another story - which I would rather not discuss :(
The bottomline being, that we didn't make it to V's moment of happiness.... I can only imagine V clad in a rich silk sari with heavy gajra (God knows if she would have worn jewellery on her marriage or not - she was always a no-jewellery person) sitting in the mandapam amidst the sacred chants with R by her side, clad in a white dhoti ("Topless" as V describes the look).

God knows if we ever will meet again.... All three of us together again, like we used to when we were in the college - over a lunch at Shrikunj or for that pao bhaji at the Unit 1 market.
O! What fun it used to be. Going all around the city of Bhubaneswar in an autorickshaw to visit various temples, or a trip to the far flung forests of Simplipal and the adventurous Hirakud dam excursion, or the innumerable visits to Puri and shopping at Raghurajpur, or (as a matter of fact!) the various assignment where we played those you-did-not-do-anything blame games, getting caught by the professor for helping each other and sending apology mails to clear the mess - they will all be the sweet memories that one can never forget.
Am sure V and R (not V's R) will agree to this.

Of auto-rickshaws and the auto-wallahs

Ever since I joined my MBA course and have been away from home, I never have had the sukh of keeping my motor-bike with me. So my sole dependencywas on the autowallah wherever I stayed.

First, it was Bhubaneswar. This land of temples has got nothing in the name of public transport. The government seems to be so busy in solving the issues of flood and drought that it hardly would have had time to notice the sad plight of public transport in the capital city. And as they say, when the cat is away the mice are on the play; the Bhubaneswar auto-wallahs have taken up the charge in the city. The share-auto that ply across the city are pretty nominal but, if you happen to take a reserved auto then you must have your mom's bargaining skills. And, if you happen to be somewhere close to an IT park or some educational institute then be sure you are being taken for a ride !! (Yeah that pun is intended)

Let us move on from Bhubaneswar to down south, the metropolitan (Says who?????? )-Chennai. Here taking an auto is like a two edged sword. Neither do they charge you by the meter nor do they understand your language (or at least pretend that they are not). So you land up in a catch 22 situation. Let me make you experience the same.
Now just imagine yourself on one of the busy roads of Chennai. Let us make it more realistic. Say you are at T. Nagar, Venkatnarayana road and wish to go to Kilpauk Garden Road. And you obviously do not know Tamil. Now here is this autowallah gentle man. The first one that stops at the signal of your hand.
You: "Kilpauk Garden Road"
He: "Kilpaukam?"
You (speaking Tamil in English):"No no..No Kilpauka, kilpauk Garden road... opposite side"
He: "Mummy daddy showroom, watertank?"
You (still wondering how to communicate): "no water tank... Cemetry... burial ground"
He (is getting confused, or pretending to be so): ?????
You: "Dead people, Christian samadhi, New Avadi Road, Halls Road, Kilpauk Garden Road"
He (His face lights up): Ok
You: Evlo (that is "How much" in Tamil)
He: @#@$%#% (some figure in Tamil, which you obviously do not understand)
You: "Tamil Teriyad" (Do not know Tamil)
He (Wondering, if You do not know Tamil then how are you speaking Tamil)
He: 120 Rupees
You: 60 Rupees
He: Makes a hand gesture in negation and goes away
Now trust me this is the most frustrating thing that can happen. All your efforts going waste and you start allover again and again and again.....
and then there would be times that no matter how much you are ready to pay they are not interested in you. May be you should check your face in the mirror... may be you are that ghost for them who would turn their auto-rick to a stone monolith if you ever boarded it....

And now from Chennai to Mumbai... Here things are very much in order. The auto wallahs charge you by the meter and they also understand your language. So things are much easy. But there is a catch here as well. They are not ready to go where you want to go. Blame it on the traffic jam en route your destination or their greed for a longer ride.. they will simply not go. So you try one after the other and hope that the next one would take you for a ride.....