Just another day..

I am at work, sitting in front of my laptop, having my n^th Google tab opening up on the Explorer. There are other windows visible on the Taskbar – an Excel, a PowerPoint, a couple of PDFs and a folder. I am rummaging through the folder for some ‘prior knowledge’, not as efficiently as Google which is busily processing the work delegated to it.

I have a STRICT 12 noon deadline for the morrow. I am lucky today. I usually have ASAP deadlines, which are actually deathlines. On such eventful days, at least 3 people stand behind me, peering in to my laptop with tensed looks and grief stricken faces (quite weird and funny), saying, “Boss has closed the laptop, he has put on his blazer, he has picked up the BlackBerry, he is coming towards us”, while I do a quick “sense check” before hurriedly clicking the magic word ‘Print’.

Today, I am bored. There is no one breathing down my neck, no one calling me over to their desks for ‘quick meetings’, no phone calls, no hundred thousand mails. I check ‘BookMyShow’ for tickets to plays and movies. I find everything to be most uninteresting, even Kareena’s bare back. On second thoughts, I guess it is perfectly alright for me to not be interested in her back.

I wonder whether I should Tinker again. There are a couple of ideas floating around in my mind. But, I need YouTube. Oh, damn! It is blocked here.

I check Google Reader once again for some shared items, may be an ‘It Made My day’ link, maybe a ‘Laugh It Out’ picture. I find none and feel let down by my Google Reader pals, who have been inactive for the past 3 hours. I refresh Gmail for the thousandth time. No luck there either. What the hell is everyone doing?

Maybe work?? I suddenly am enlightened (yet again). I open the n+1^th Google window. The presentation is waiting to be repopulated, restructured and generally jazzed up (screwed up). The graphs are hanging around aimlessly, the ‘dabba golas’ are at war over which of them should stay and which of them should die. I can hear the deck groaning in agony and pain.

I do not have an option.

It is a STRICT 12 noon deadline.

Hey.. Goodbye Nanba!

'Nanba' is Tam for Friend. The title of this post has been borrowed from the first line of a song from the Tamil version of the popular Maniratnam movie 'Yuva'. The song, incidentally, is about the girl's "special friend".

Sleepless I have been,

Romancing you every night

Music has become oppressive

Books have become painful

Internet does not enthuse me any more

My feeble, almost broken heart,

Thinks of you and you alone

Day in and day out

It has been a short

Albeit vigorous relationship

Between us

Though it is sad to concede

You must have got weary of me by now

How about trying someone else, Mr. Flu?

Why I love you as I love you..

I was having a long argument with P (who loves having long arguments over everything on Earth), about why everyone should love Mumbai. Ok, that is a tall claim. Not everyone can love Mumbai because, like he says, it is too crowded and too expensive!

P says that I love Mumbai only because I have good memories from there, because I have had the right set of people there. I vehemently disagree.

P says that we have a Marina for a Marine Drive, we have a substitute in Chennai for everything we have there! Again, I vehemently disagree.

And, I decide to list down why I actually love Mumbai, beyond just hanging out with friends, walking along Marine Drive and shopping till I drop down dead.

Here we go, all over again, about Mumbai Meri Jaan.

• The crowd thronging VT station and Elphinston bridge, focusing only on the train, not caring about what you are doing and where you are going ‘cos it is just too busy running on its feet.
• The city that never sleeps, literally! The sheer independence and security that Mumbai gives its dwellers at 2 in the morning – I have no more words!
• The infectious spirit. In my Manager’s words, “I land at Mumbai airport and something gets in to my blood. The adrenaline rush is faster, the mind asks for challenges. I just want to keep going, on and on, unmindful of the road blocks and the speed breakers.” He stole the words from my heart totally!
• I take a rickety cab from Lower Parel to Matunga, the meter shows 3.5. The cab wallah is old, he is wearing a pair of really old looking, dull spectacles. He flips out a card slowly from the dashboard and we check how much 3.5 is. It says Rs. 48.50. I give him a Rs. 100 note, apologetically stating, “Bhaiiya, mere paas change nahi hai”. He says, “Koi baath nahi Beti”, takes out his wallet gives me 5 ten rupee notes and a one rupee coin. I take it and turn around to leave when he says, “Ek minute beti” and fishes out a 50 paise coin.

I rest my case.