Arrival – Part 4

I got few warnings about Chicago airport that it is a very (very very… ) big airport and cannot be taken lightly if you have a connecting flight. I estimated its vastness from my aerial view and soon realized that it was an underestimation. There were activities to make it worse. Immigration check was one of them. I almost ran for that entire 1 and a half hour except those 10 minutes I spent in a train which took me from international terminal to the domestic one. I was very ready to experience all three classes in my one way journey and hence gladly accepted the cattle class this time and started waiting anxiously for my final destination.
No, the plane did not crash and I am not writing this sitting in Heaven or Hell.. I am talking about Dallas-Fort Worth Airport.

DFW was altogether a different beauty from the top of the world, huge and scenic. Sun was almost at his perish and by the time I collected my luggage it was dark. I quickly spotted a public phone, experimented with calling card and after a couple of hits and misses I got the caller tune. My wife answered and the voice did the same to me what smoke does to an addict. After utilizing a full quota of 15 minutes a day on my calling card, I headed to the exit in search of a cab.

The moment I stepped out I realized had I been here a month before, I would have seen the coldest nights of my life. Chilling breeze hit my face and I felt like having 100s of needles piercing my face. I ran to the taxi stand and jumped into one. It took 20 minutes to reach the hotel. Radisson, as they call it, was no where similar to any hotels in India. No boundary walls and no gate keeper with big moustache on the gate. I quickly completed the check-in procedure and took an overview of the lobby. There I spotted the place where I was going to spend all my evenings. The Cassidys. An in-house night club of Radisson. (wink.. )

Soul was hungry so was the stomach. I was feeling that I had only a day or 2 in this hotel and so I should be better hurry up to catch all the hospitality it was about to offer me. After taking a long and lazy hot bubble bath, it was time for some food. Not to my surprise, when I stepped in the restaurant and took up the menu, I was not able to visualize a single item in that. Somehow I zeroed on one and started waiting for it. In the mean time, the music started growing inside the Cassidys. I got up to take a quick view of the place. Now that was surprising. Cowboy hats, check-shirt clad men in their 50s cluttered the club. A maintaining ratio of women was decorating the club, both in the terms of number and age. But their enthusiasm was strikingly different from the people of my land. Feet on the dance floor, drinks on the tables and country songs in the air were enough to get me interested in this place. I asked a waitress to bring my food here so that I may not miss a moment. As the evening turned into night, younger guests started entering and competing with the veterans.

I gave company to my food and drinks throughout till they played the last song and then I walked up to my room. Welcome to Texas.

Frankfurt – Part 3

It was a cold day at Frankfurt. I desperately wanted to update my parents and wife that I was fine and safe. Although, there was no climate catastrophe, no terror warning or a war in Europe, still unlimited access to communication makes all of us addicted to status updates. It was 3 hours for my connecting flight to Chicago so I became a little relaxed and started searching for public telephones. But again, thanks to unlimited access to communications, everybody has a mobile phone these days which is why public phones are getting harder to be spotted.

To be on safer side, I decided to go the departure gate first and make sure that the information I have is correct and then explore the airport.
I was desperate to go the business lounge again.. : - ).
It looked like a self-managed, strangely disorganized, cluttered and yet amazing airport. It was easy to spot people of all walks of life finding their own space of comfort in that area. Blacks, whites, Asians, kids, olds, youth, rich and poor. There was a girl looking for a power socket to charge her mobile phone. Huge shops were lined up in one section. A plenty of Indian were there who were behaving exceptionally well as compared to black and white kids and young boys and girls.

There were automated moving walkways in the vast lobby which was a thoughtful innovation for old people. However some kids made it into a giant rollercoaster and were trying every possible to and fro travel across that walkway. Soon an old man, in his 50s, wearing roller skates, joined the game of coupling himself with the moving hand rest of the walkway and started rolling besides it.

My destination was near i.e. my departure gate# 65 and the business lounge nearby. It was morning time and breakfast was ready in the lounge. I headed straight to usual section of milk and cereals and suddenly stopped by some unknown force. A really humble idea came in my mind that now if I am on a 1 month journey, why not giving a try to new tastes. I looked at the counters and observed people and finally decided to go with a tuna sandwich. Fishes are always my biggest subject of disinterest when it comes to food. But I gave them another chance to impress me and after having that, I can say, I really can’t express the warmth, tenderness and exotic taste of that sandwich, in words.

Economy in west is in bad shapes. This was proved by the fact that the unlike Namma Bengaluru, Frankfurt airport was charging for wireless internet. : - ) Now that I couldn’t find a phone, I was uncomfortably hyper to talk/communicate to Suman. And what could be better than an email? Thankfully the lounge had few desktop computers, without any charge, which gave me a chance to send a couple of one liners across the continents. After spending some time, it headed back to the lounge and started acting like a busy-frequent-flier-executive. Took a drink for myself, grabbed a news paper and found a spot facing the runway. Exactly when I was about to start my performance of a business man who can make smart decisions based on a financial newspaper, I came to know that the newspaper was a German one. Almost grinning on myself, I got myself another drink.

12:30 was time for the boarding and I was enjoying my last 45 minutes in the lounge when I heard some foreign language announcements containing a word which caught my attention.
Dies ist ein Ankündigung für mr ebbyshaik, wenden Sie sich bitte an der Pforte 65.
It repeated itself in English.
This is an announcement for Mr Abhishek, please contact at the gate 65.

In negative anticipations I ran towards gate 65 and upon reaching, announced my identity. The lady at the counter took me 5 steps away from the counter and those 5 steps were really very heavy on my feet. Thousands of thoughts about passport, visa, tickets, security and what not, started running in my mind. Once she started speaking, my blood pressure started coming to normal. There was a hardware problem, as she said it, with my seat in the plain. The control buttons were not working and hence she offered me to take another plane i.e. FRA-Denver and Denver to DFW. After regaining my normalcy, I started thinking about pros and cons of my could-be-decision. I never travelled for such a long time in an aircraft so I was not able to imagine the level of discomfort I would get.

Without thinking much I opted for my original option and left everything else to my fate. On my extra grateful behavior, the ground staff also came to a different level. One lady escorted me to the craft. Called the technical support guys for the last attempt to make the seat working and guess what, it worked. Till today I suspect that they tried to trick me because they wanted to give that seat to some influential guest. : - )

Then again, started a gala time of eating, drinking, sleeping, stretching and enjoying the plain which ended in 9 long hours.

In-Flight – Part 2

Why I love window seat?
A. I flew for the first time when I was 22.
B. I am a fan of Bill Gates.
C. I don’t know.
D. I think, in case of an emergency I would safely jump out.

The right answer is C.
Yeah, I don’t why but in spite of having numerable instances of disturbing people on the aisle seat for washrooms and regretting of not having an aisle seat in case of Kingfisher airlines, I love to be seated on a window seat.

That day was no exception. My travel agent took my request seriously and arranged a window seat for me. My fellow colleague who recently came from US told me that LH air hostesses do not talk to the people who do not drink. So, with the clear intentions of getting a good customer service, I decided to say yes whenever anybody would ask me for a drink in the next 9 hours.
Interestingly, I had already set my biological clock before even reaching to the other part of the world. It was 3:30 AM and I was wide awake, experimenting with all the luxuries I was expected to use to their fullest. In those 9 hours, I watched a movie, Red Cliff. Revised a movie called Kaminey, slept, had touch-ups with the colon-dipped tissues, had food and explored the washrooms. In total, it was a nice experience to stretch and have a nice flight.

I opened the window panes after 7 hours, in the anticipation of having a look of firangi asmaan. Instead I got a very strange view of white clouds down there. They looked like snow on the vast planes but I knew that we were nowhere close to the land because there were still 2 more hours to reach Frankfurt. Yahan ke toh baadal bhi paraye hein... reminded me of a dialogue from DDLJ ... yahan ke toh kabutar bhi paraye hein.
(bad joke ?? skip this.. oh you have already read it.. :-D another bad joke.. )

Very soon my wait ended and I started seeing some land. Bright and colorful. Full of white color. Endless panorama view of snow and snow. Upon reaching closer to the city, the colors started changing. Streets, trees, cars, highways and mushroom-looking-unorganized-country-houses started cropping out of the snow, showing off.

After desperately waiting for 9 hours, the aircraft took a plunge. The snow region was left way back. Frankfurt was cloudy but snowless. The aircraft, with arms wide open, threw herself upon the dark, tall and handsome runway which cuddled us in himself with love.
I took my 1st step on a foreign land.

Departure – Part 1

After all possible checks, cross checks and double checks on my tickets, passport, luggage and clothes I started waiting anxiously for my cab to come and take me to the airport. While everybody in the house was wide awake, thrilled about my travel and interested in me talking to them, I was waiting for a call/SMS confirmation from my cab.
Finally I called up and got the confirmation that the cab would be there on time.

While on one hand I was really excited about my 4 weeks escapade from my usual life and ghar-grahasti, I was sub-consciously started feeling that how much I would miss my daughter in the coming days. That natural bond between an animal and its offspring was growing stronger inside me after every passing minute. So I took a strong step and asked Suman to put Nicku on sleep.

Then started the final hour which we all spent in chit-chatting with each other. At 11:45 sharp the cab guy called me and told me that he was outside..
all my bags are packed, I am ready to go… my taxi is waiting… already I am so.. … I am leaving on a …

Instantly upon climbing in the cab I dumped all my anxiousness and started enjoying the ride. In Bangalore, you cannot have such a beautiful ride at any other hour of the day. No traffic, no noise.. cool breeze and myself. It took just 20 minutes to reach Hebbal Flyover after that the long stretch of new airport road was waiting for me. But within minutes my driver started taking big volumes of air in his lungs.. which we sometime call yawning. With my natural instinct of survival I immediately stopped thinking about the blondes of USA and started concentrating on the driver.

That led to another disaster when I asked him how cab companies make money and why his company charge 900 bucks for an airport ride where Meru asks for 600. That night I got the most valuable business knowledge of my life in terms of logistics, govt policies, petrol prices, local companies, global companies, car insurance and what not. My patience ran out and I started praying to both Indian and American gods that my driver should shut up. However nobody listened to my prays and I reached the airport with the over dosage of the business conditions in India.

I was only 3 hours early for my flight and that was the reason, I believed that I am doomed and I will not get a seat. My heart was running and so was I. As I was flying with the business class, the lady at the check-in counter gave me a business lounge entry pass which I immediately forgot to use once I entered the waiting area where I saw the biggest inventory of alcohol I have had ever seen in my entire life. It was a you-name-it-we-have-it scenario. The only problem was that I did not even know so many names.

After gaining some valuable information(read Names and Prices :-)) of some very expensive alcohols, I headed to the other areas which comprised of shops, restaurant and bars. Showing off my ignorance once again, I thought that was the business lounge because it was stunningly clean, bright and exuberant. After spending an hour playing X-BOX and enquiring digital cameras in that area I finally asked a guy if that was the business lounge and he routed me to the right place. Upon entering I realized the value of the last hour which I wasted.

For the next one hour I experimented with different types of alcohols and airport’s free internet to tell the entire world what a gala time I was having.
Thanks to twitter and Facebook.

After some, I don’t know how much, time the LCD screens flickered and Now Boarding appeared in front of LH 755. With all the un-explainable anxiety and thrill, I walked towards my aircraft.

Curious Case of a Happy Pet

There is an advertisement on air these days, of a very popular washing powder, in which a young boy tries to bring smile on the face of his teacher, Rosy miss.
This ad on one hand shows the little effort of that kid while on the other hand show one aspect of love and emotion which not everybody can understand or I must say appreciate. That is the bond between a pet and its owner. Remember how sad was Rosy miss?

But the hint of what this article contains is – anybody noticed the big house and huge garden in that adv ?? The significance of the size will be explained shortly.

Fellow toastmasters and my dear friends, in reality, not everyone is like Rosy Miss. A couple of years back, I had a neighbor. A young and enthusiastic boy in his early 20s. He bought a golden brown Labrador puppy. Its name was Tintin. I used to envy that boy so much because I couldn’t have such a cute dog.

That boy had a helper for washing his car. To my surprise I saw that guy only walking Tintin, giving him bath and taking care of him. While it is not a crime to have a helper for your dog but it is surprising to see that a boy who is staying alone is not enjoying his pet's company.

Anyways... soon, my envy turned into disgust when I came to know that that boy used to tie Tintin in one corner of his house, for the whole day, when he used to go to office. As I myself had been a pet owner in the past, I felt the pain and loneliness Tintin must have had been through. I heard Tintin crying and howling for the whole day many times. Tintin used to get tied to a low partition, about 4 feet high, in the hall of the house. One day Tintin jumped the partition, couldn’t reach the surface on the other side and hanged to death.

Just because we love animals doesn’t mean that we are eligible to have one.



There are 2 kinds of animal lovers in this world. One who really love animals and two who think that they love animals. People of the 1st category do a lot of research and introspect before adopting a pet. They generally have some hands-on also on owning a pet. Even if they do not have pets, they show their love by feeding and caring stray and abandoned animals. People like Rosy miss fall in that category. While my not-a-pet-lover neighbor falls in the 2nd category who think that they love animals.

Now the question arises, how will we come to know if we can take care of a pet or not without actually adopting one? To answer this, we must be honest to ourselves and ask ourselves a question. Can we afford it? Can we afford to not only buy but maintain. What about its food expenses, medication, vaccination toys etc?

2nd factor which we should consider is what pet to adopt. We must think will that animal be able to adjust with us? Do you know, demand for a pet owl surged dramatically in the US when the 1st movie of Harry potter series was released. Owl is a wild animal. It cannot go well with human. It cannot play with us like dogs do. So we must not go for chameleons, snakes, tortoise etc.

Recently, the pedigree puppy of Paris Hilton has become a huge craze world wide and people think they can also carry it in a hand bag? We need to grow up, don’t we?
Paris Hilton’s puppy is of a very fragile breed and really really expensive to maintain. Not everybody can afford it.

Ok, now phase 1 is over where we have seen if we can afford to buy or not. Here comes the phase 2. In this phase we must cross check will the animal we are planning to bring, go well with our home, surrounding and locality. For example, big dogs must be adopted by people who have big houses, with high walls and big play area. The aggressive breeds like German shepherd can be very unpredictable in their behavior because homely upbringing makes them humble while their natural instinct makes them dangerous. Owner must watch and warn people and kids coming close to it. But the reverse is true at home. At home, let your pet free. Let him play around, explore the surroundings and socialize with neighbors. Studies show that dogs who always stay in confined places are dangerous. At home we really don't need a hunting dog so we must teach them some socializing.

If you have small house or you are putting up in an apartment, it is better to have small pets like parrots, cats and pedigree puppies. It is important to give toys to your pet. Toys not only keep them busy but actually push their mental growth. After all animals also need their neurons to be connected.

And now a very very important factor. Their physical requirements. Animals are also a form of life on earth. They also have hormones running up and down in their bodies. Understand those needs and try to find a suitable partner for your pet. You don’t have to bring one more pet in your house because luckily they feel the need only a couple of times a year. So do not hesitate. Talk to your vet who can actually act as a middle man for finding a potential partner for your pet. You can go online also these days. Social networking sites are very effective tools for this.

And last but not the least. Time !! Give time to your pet. Pets are like kids. They need love, attention and time. Loneliness leads to frustration which may result in violent behavior. Walking your dog twice a day, for at least an hour, is far more important than buying an expensive vodaphone pug and taking him to the best clinic in the town.

Friends, there are people, and we could be one of them, who think that they love animals but they never realize what it takes to own a pet. They never realize that pets are not toys. They are not show pieces. Animals are also living beings.
A mute yet and an expressive form of Nature’s gift which has a right to live not only with dignity but also with happiness.

Euthanasia

A deliberate intervention undertaken with the express intention of ending a life, to relieve intractable suffering.

Euthanasia or as it is more commonly known as Mercy Killing.

Euthanasia has come alive suddenly when the Apex Court has rejected the plea of a writer, Pinki Virani, to grant mercy killing to Aruna Shanbaug.

Aruna Shanbaug, a 61 year old former nurse who cannot even participate in the debate going over euthanasia because she is lying in a hospital, with her brain as dead as the bodies lying in the mortuary of the same hospital.

Leaving Aruna Shanbaug here for a moment I would like to throw some light on euthanasia. There are 4 categories in which we can put this concept.

Voluntary euthanasia: in which one asks for death if he feels his illness is not curable.

Involuntary euthanasia: In this category someone else decides for euthanasia on behalf of the patient because the patient may not be in the state to decide.

Passive euthanasia: it is called so because in such cases doctors discontinue the life support system.

Active euthanasia: In this type medical assistant inject lethal substance in patient’s body.

Let’s come back to Aruna Shanbaug who is waiting and do not even know that she is waiting. Waiting for justice ??? No !!! She got the bookmarked-justice when her assaulter got a jail term for 6 years for attempt to murder and robbery, only.

No she is not waiting for justice. My friends, she is waiting for something nobody waits for. A dignified and peaceful end of her 36 years long agony.




You coin the term Mercy Killing… and immediately world divides into 2 groups and hit the road in protest of each other. Showing placards for it, writing volumes against it and giving their own view of right and wrong.. life and death.. crime and sin..

When we talk about crime and sin, we know there are some actions which are restricted by law and hence they are crime. The ones which are restricted by religion are sins.
However there are cases, like the case of Aruna Shanbaug, where the line dividing the two goes blur.

I do not want to provide partial information to make a biased environment. So I will try to question both of the ideologies. 1st the mindset of the people who appose euthanasia.

The argument given by the people, who oppose mercy killing, is that, we are not god and we have no right to take anyone’s life. Aruna is a victim of an unfortunate event and thus we, as a society, have a greater responsibility towards caring her. We should not count the years but have a bigger picture of value of life. If we legalize it, we may set an example which can later be abused in the country like India where rules and laws can be flouted and manipulated.
The point is how we can define the quality of life. There are millions of people in this world who are differently able and have a right to live with dignity and freedom. Tomorrow a rowdy may rob and kill a visually disabled person and if caught, can escape with an excuse of mercy killing. Or a son may send his parents to the gates of heaven just to avoid the burden of taking care of them.

Even in the rarest case, as of Aruna’s, if you can argue that she cannot even appreciate the care society is showing to her, let us remind you that there is something above the physical existence of brain and that is the soul. Just think of how disgusted her soul will feel when she will see that the same society who gave her those scars is today running away from her. Therefore we must not forget that the existence of the human race on this planet is a result of 2 postulates: a. Staying Together and b. Protecting the weak.

After reading this do you feel that the argument was correct and the society should continue taking care of people like Aruna Shanbaug ???

If you answer is yes, that means you feel that she should continue living like a specimen for medical examples.
The other group asked us to respect the value of life. Can we call this a life?
Aruna Shanbaug simply exists. She doesn’t live.

Her case cannot be simply compared with any other case of sick or disabled person.
She is not on life support system. Her lungs and heart are working fine. But she is brain dead. She cannot feel anything. She cannot feel hunger. Even if the hospital staff simply stops feeding her, she will leave this world without a single pulse of pain reaching her mind.

Doctors say that there is no hope for her recovery. And even if someday a spark happens in her dead brain and she comes to life, what she will confront with ??? The traumatizing memories of the brutal assault ?? The realization that she spent 36 years like a artifact in a museum ???

Sometime back we discussed the trauma; her soul will go through when we will not care for her anymore. But isn’t it more practical to think about her body which is physically present in front of us? After the death we cremate the body with so much respect. Shouldn’t we show some respect to her body which is being kept alive artificially?

Even if we assume that there is a medically denied concept of soul, I want to say today – Her soul must be crying to get out of this world and go to heaven where it should have gone long ago. I must say that in this case, it would be a real mercy on her to either let her die without food or she should be given active euthanasia.

So that was my reply to the moral and ethical conflicts involved here.

Let me touch upon some legal aspect here. We generally forget that processes are for people and not the other way round. We are simply struggling to come out of the illusion of a process which says ending any life is a criminal offense.
After defining a super set called Life, we defined subsets and called one of them as Murder. But ending a life is justified in some cases. So to allow those cases, we defined one more subset and put a list of acceptable forms of murder in that. For example, war and death sentences.

Ending a life is a crime or not is clearly defined and documented in cases of war and death sentences. Shooting at enemy in a war is not crime. But killing innocent people during a war is a war crime. Penal courts granting death sentence to someone is not a crime but sentences granted by naxalites comes under offence.
Whatever can be used can be abused also. A surgeon can use a knife for saving a life as well as taking a life.

Friends I am not saying here that anybody who comes and says I am terminally ill, I want a peaceful exit, should be granted. We must have proper safeguards. There can be laws which enable people to write some kind of a will that if something incurable happens to them and they are not able to take the decisions, some assigned person should take such decision on their behalf. Laws can be strengthened to protect people from being abused by euthanasia.


The essence of my argument is, if we can brainstorm and standardize few forms of ending a life like sentences and war, why can’t we pen down some clauses for the rarest of rare case of Aruna Shanbaug and give her an opportunity to leave this world. It’s high time, that Indian Penal Court should be upgraded for the inclusion of new laws considering Euthanasia a rare-legal practice.

Holi-Day In A Hostel

Hottest in the hot and coldest in the cold is the place we call Rajasthan. On the north-eastern border of colorful and vibrant aapno Rajasthan, is situated a small town called Alwar, famous for 2 things-
1. Delicious Milk Cake of Baba Thakur Das and
2. Dry and sleepy Sariska Tiger Reserve Park which can be renamed now as Sariska Reserve Park because there are no tigers left.
All the ferocious tigers have been relocated to a place which is just 20 km away from the main city.

As I stepped out on a cleaner than expected platform # 1 at Alwar junction, I saw many food vendors selling Alwar’s famous milk cake. I wondered if the milk cake has also been relocated.
Stalls names were misspelled at some places, even when they are written in Hindi; still they were convincingly informing me that they were not collaborated with the famous baba thakur das in any sense.
Well, I needed a cab to go to the place where the tigers were. And that day there was a special show also because that day there was the festival of colors which we all know as Holi.

Soon I realized that I won’t be able to get a cab there and I tried my chance to get a place on a local public transport which looked like as if DNA of a small piglet has been mutated by a nuclear reaction and he has transformed into a giant swine. They call it a tempo.

I want to tell one more quality of Alwar without which describing Alwar is a crime.
In winters, Alwar becomes an invisible city. Covered with heavy fog, city looks like not even waking up till, sometimes, 11 o clock in the morning. People riding scooter can feel the tiny crystal of ice piercing deep in the face and melting beneath the skin.

Thank fully that day it was 7th march, the time of the year when the chilling winter comes to its end and the harsh sun still far away from kissing the earth.

I reached my destination which was Matsya Industrial Area. It looked more like an agricultural land. It was green and serene place, stretched in all 10 directions. There were a couple of boards saying the addresses of the factories situated there. Pepsi, Bindra Stone Crushers etc. Around 500 meters ahead, surrounded by the lush green mustard crop, I was able to see a large building. It looked like a flower mushroom grown in a grass field. That was the place where my tigers were.

Imperial Institute of Engineering and Technology. My elder brother Nikki, and 4 more tigers like him were studying there. Jitu, Chhota, Jimmy and Nana.


I was standing in front of the main gate of the hostel building and the college campus was on my right. My eyes were swinging left and right for the girl’s hostel as I was imagining fitness freak girls jogging around. Later I came to know that the girl’s hostel is inside the college campus for their extra safety. My brother took me inside the hostel and all my dreams of actually coming across a karan johar style filmi hostel started jumping out of my mind. Where are the studs going out with basket ball? Where is that pony-tail loverboy with his guitar ??
It’s 8 o clock now, it’s holi today.. still no activity.. no noise, no dhol, no fights nothing..

As I walked with my brother in the lobby, I heard some chuckles and laughters in the next room.
I knew them, they were my brother’s friends. I met them before. Jitu bhaiya was trying to unfold some paper chits and trying to pull out small balls out of them. Nana was holding a manual grinder made of stone. They had 3 big tea campers filled with thandai, a drink made up of milk, dry fruits and other flavoring stuffs. They were grinding the small balls with small amount of thandai, and mixing the entire stuff in the campers.
Those small balls were bhang, a common local drug which is extremely popular in north India during Holi.

That day Holi happened in 4 phases. In 1st phase 1st year students were called in and asked to carry those campers to the seniors in their rooms, wake them up and offer them the thandai. I was pleasantly surprised by this humble gesture of my brother and his frends to serve their frends. Within minutes the whole hostel was wide awake and started fighting for every drop of thandai.. There were smart people too who made their own smart arrangements before hand.

The other boys of the lobby, Goli, Pogo and their gang had the plan to start the holi with Dadu. A old looking bald guy whose actual name was rastogi but got this name Dadu thanks to his appearance. Dadu shamelessly refused to offer a cigarette last night to Pogo aka Portho Gonguly.. so today was the revenge day. Dadu was pulled out of his room like draupadi was pulled by Dushasana. In a blink of an eye Dadu was painted in Eastman color, in a blink of the second eye Dadu’s t-shirt was torn and before Dadu could’ve expressed his anger on local t-shirt’s cheap stiching, his jocky vest screamed and was torn down into pieces.

I was horrified by the sheer thought of level of fight which was about to start. Colorful Dadu was fuming, trying to be a lion by parting his lips and showing his multi-colored dental makeover to the crowd and watching everyone with an eye of a tiger. Colorful dadu’s eyes met with Pogo’s and the hard core enemies moved closer to each other, joined their hands, added the power and attacked Goli.

Yes, they joined together and attacked Goli who was still colorless.
Goli was shouting and accusing Pogo of betraying him but all efforts in vain and the very next second when the crowd spared him he looked like an insect coming out of an asian paint canister. Then started the massacre of color, water, torn baniyans, screams and shouts. Within half an hour all 200 boys of the hostel were half naked and not a single body was in the condition to be identified.

Phase 2 started without any formal inauguration. Some body picked the wet piece of torn t-shirt and turned it into a speedy projectile traveling parallel to the ground. And when the missile hit the naked target, there were 2 sounds. 1st was of wet cloth hitting the flesh and 2nd came straight from the vocal chords of the target. The target instantly started jumping in all directions to ease out the pain somehow. For the next 15 minutes, hostel witnessed the gruesome war between two on-the-spot formed tribal groups fighting with their future weapons; Wet clothes and wet clothes.

Phase 3 started when an opportunist dhol wala appeared outside the hostel boundary and started beating the dhol in the hope of getting some Holi bakshish. That caught the attention of the tigers and everyone ran outside to call him in. Boys called him inside the hostel compound and started dancing with the Dhol. One boy pulled the water pipe lying there in the garden, turned on the tap and held the pipe vertical like an umbrella. Gushing water from the pipe jumped high in the air and came down splashing on the tribal group dancing on bhandara beats of the dhol.

After enough dancing, phase 4 started with a simulated wedding procession. The most humble and polite boy of 1st year was made a groom and everyone else surrounded him. Following the Indian wedding tradition of groom’s friends and relatives going to the bride’s place for wedding, the procession started its march towards the girls hostel.
Lead by the dhol wala and the groom and followed by the naked tribal-looking baraatis, this procession was stopping after every 2 minutes for a dance session. People were coming in the center in round robin fashion to contribute. As the procession was leaving hostel main gate and heading towards college campus where the girls hostel was situated, the security guards got busy on their walky talkys. They conveyed the msg to the guards of the girls hostel that some 200 odd crazy-half-naked boys are coming towards the girls hostel. Please do the needful.

When we reached the girls hostel, we saw that the main gate of the hostel was locked with heavy metal chain. There were big windows in the lobby of the girls hostel where all the girls accumulated to see the Dulha. I came to know that this was the annual ritual on holi and that’s why the girls were already expecting the boys with the procession. Windows were covered with metal nets and hence reduced the visibility to a disappointing low. The only information which was coming out of those windows was that the girls also were painted black and blue from head to toe. We were not able to make out if they were also donning the tribal outfit or not.

It was 11:30 by that time and it was time to relax. All of us sat their only. Some started their efforts to get rid of the color using the taps near by.
Few started regaining their energy using stamina sticks which were carefully wrapped in polyethene to protect them from water. They used to call them cigarettes.

By 12:00, few men from boys hostel’s mess came to deliver the food in the girl’s hostel. That was the indication for us too, to wrap this up and head back for food. The rare event of getting good food on a special occasion was itself a celebration for the boys.

I am a holi lover and enjoy holi every year but I cannot forget my once in a life time experience of My Holi-Day in a Hostel.