Me My Friends and an Aunty

By Jagadish Nadanalli

One big city, four friends, monotonous jobs and lethargic life….. Jaggi works in a TV production house that churns out saas-bahu saga that would give competition to chewing gum. He is desperately trying to break into movies. Giri, Deeps and Shinu work like bonded labors in the software factories of Silicon Valley. After working for three years in those factories they have become robots obeying the commands given by their masters. On top of this, they have their landlord to cope with, who treats them as some lazy bastards. They are frantically looking for a breath of fresh air to survive.
That fresh air comes to their building in the form of a beautiful middle aged lady, whose name is……ahhh… whose name…. ahhh… ah yes… Aunty.
Aunty… ?!!.... WTF…!!!
Yes she has no name, no credentials, no back ground and she is not even in Facebook. So the four friends decide to christen her as Aunty and the lady gracefully accepts it.
Their world suddenly turns upside down after arrival of Aunty, who seems to transmit new found exuberance in their life whenever she is around. They all start to take their grievances to her and she, as if though some oracle, quells their problems with her perfect prophecies.
But all of them are not sitting quite, somebody is intrigued…..
Who is she? Why is she helping us? Why is she changing our life? Why we are getting dragged towards her? What is it that I have in my heart for her?
Jaggi is finding it difficult to get answers for all these questions. Would he get the answers to those questions or not is once again a billion dollar question itself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Notion Press
• Release date: Aug 4, 2014
• ISBN: 9789383808809

Book preview

author.

Dedicated to…

All my former Roomies

Girish Badiger

Manjunath Badiger

Deepak Kurandwad

Vikash Joshi

Badrinath Joshi

Shrinivas Hirur

Prasanna Karamadi

And

Bheemu Gadyal

Thank you guys for inspiring me…

Dedicated to…

Praveen Kurandwad

A million thank you won’t suffice…

Just an appreciation won’t be enough…

Expressing gratitude won’t make any sense…

But I don’t have any other word to describe…

So, thank you for being with me in my struggle and for making this book a reality.

Part I

Chapter 1

How could you do this Sarayu? I never expected this from you.

No mother, I haven’t done anything.

Then what is this … how could these gold ornaments come in your closet.

I don’t know Mother, believe me.

Stop those crocodile tears of yours, Mommy don’t believe her, she is lying.

No Geeta, I am not lying. You think that I stole your ornaments, no, never ... Even in my dream I wouldn’t think of committing such kind of sin and you are suspecting me?

Suspecting? No, no, dear I am damn sure that this is handiwork of yours. Who told you to do this? That Kumar … na, your boyfriend?

Geetha …! don’t you …

Stop this nonsense. Sarayu I don’t know about the others, but I want an answer from you. Tell me how these ornaments came into your room and that too in your closet; do you have any explanation?

Believe me Mother, I really don’t know how they came here, I swear by my husband, Harish, your son. Ever since I stepped into this house, I always thought of bringing good name to the family and you know how much I love this family, how much I love Harish and I never thought you as my mother-in-law because you are not … You are my mother and you are also suspecting me of stealing … no mother, don’t do this to me … believe me … Please.

…………………..

…………………..

Cut it. Oh wonderful, excellent, shot is OK. Jaggi have I left any close ups?

No sir.

Jaggi, remember this is Friday’s last scene of the episode. Tell that bastard Bhaskar to edit it correctly, OK?

OK sir.

Pack up.

That was my director calling curtains for the day. It was ten in the night and my mind was already contemplating on getting some sort of vehicle to drop me at my room. I spotted my production manager outside settling the day’s account.

Hari sir, do we have any production vehicle going towards Rajajinagar? I asked him.

His head swayed thrice with a smirk on his face as if saying to me ‘Why do you ask me every day for a vehicle when you know that you are not going to get one?’

It has been my practice to ask for a vehicle at the end of shooting since I joined the production house two years back. Although, in two days of my joining, I came to know that pickups are meant only for artists and not for technicians, I still kept the practice alive. I don’t know why do I do this, maybe somewhere in my subconscious I hoped that I might get it one day if I kept on asking for it. It never happened in two years and I don’t think it will happen in the near future but it is always good thing to think positive rather than negative, even though you may get the negative side of the story more in your life.

In Bangalore, you should not wait for a bus after ten in the night. Because if you wait, the bus will never appear and out of frustration if you take an auto the bus will pass by you, adding more fuel to your frustration as it already would have made you to spend ten times the amount of bus charge which otherwise fetched you three days of lunch. So, I had found a unique or say ancestral way of countering both the bus and auto, i.e., to walk. Hence, whenever I finished my shooting late in the night, I always walked to my room as it saved me money and kept my health in check. I never bothered about the kilometers I had to cover to reach my room. But truly speaking, a guy who earns three thousand bucks per month in Bangalore has no other option but to switch his willpower to saving mode rather than to spending mode. Today also, I wasted no time and began my long walk to my room as the traffic signal of the nearby circle changed from red to green.

***

When I entered the 62nd cross of Rajajinagar, where I reside, my made in china digital watch showed ten past eleven. Although there were few people on the street, the houses on either side of the road were still buzzing with activity. The burning lights inside the houses, the sound of people chatting and laughing with much higher pitch than normal, the hyped volume of television sets and music systems made me feel that I had gate crashed into a late night party. As I walked through the street, my mind began to search for the reason behind the buzz in the street. I did know that I was wasting my useful energy in finding the reason which wouldn’t have done any good, but still sometimes my mind would hook up to such a silly thing that it wouldn’t rest until unless it found a solution. Before I could waste any more mental energy, I heard a TV channel announcing loudly that today was Saturday, so that’s it, it’s weekend and all the guys were doing what they normally did on Saturday night, staying awake late in the night and waking up late on Sunday morning or whenever they wanted (oh! What a relief). With a job which least cared about weekends and holidays it was not unusual for me to forget the names of days. I once again looked at my china watch which was showing only time in digital numbers, I cursed myself for not buying the other watch in the National Market, which would otherwise displayed the day, date and time and would have cost me only twenty bucks more. Yeh I know, sometimes my bargaining skills suck.

As I came closer to the other end of the road, I looked at the two-storied building painted with white color. Yes, it was the blessed house of Mr. Viswanath Rao (or Mr.Vishu) where four young but useless, mischievous, empty headed, laziest (these all adjectives were used by Mr. Vishu whenever he used to give us long how-I-was-in-my-young-days kind of speeches) souls lived in the first floor including me. We had been living here for three years. In these three years, the building has become our symbol of struggle, endurance, fun and togetherness, and Mr. Vishu is like an entertainment package that came as a freebie while renting the house. We would always make fun of him in a language, which he would interpret in a different way, and it was like instant entertainment for all of us. But, once in a while, he would catch our double meaning dialogues and would scold us left and right. We didn’t have any problem with his scolding but the only problem is that he would give us examples of his young days and how he behaved with elder people with his speech that would last for eternity, and we had to bare it because he was the owner of the house. As they say you get what you sow, in our case sometimes it would come true.

I was just beginning to climb the steps to my room, I heard someone calling my name and I looked back, it was my owner, Mr.Vishu, standing near the entrance gate wearing a white lungi and banian. He looked at me through his soda glasses, which made his eyes bulge like a Meerkat. The banian made his overweight stomach look more prominent. With his protruding nose and bearded face, it is obvious that he didn’t have great looks, but for a man who is in his mid fifties, the looks mattered less. I approached him by climbing down a few steps.

Has Deepak come to room? he asked.

I don’t know sir, I just came from work.

His bike is parked in the front … but Giri said that he has gone out … hmmm … He mumbled something and looked at me questioningly.

Why sir, what’s the matter, anything serious? I asked.

No, no, nothing … I just … just tell him to meet me if he comes. He went inside his house once again mumbling, he looked somewhat disturbed. A few things bothered Mr.Vishu, one, the payment of rent and the other one, his daughter Kokila. I was sure that the matter, which was disturbing him, was concerned with either those.

When I was leaving my slippers in front of my room’s main door, I saw Deepak strolling frantically from one side to the other side in the hall. I entered the hall and stopped him. Fuming with anger, he looked at me for a while and again began his strolling. I went inside the kitchen, removing my shirt, where our room’s chef, Giri, was cooking something. I asked him in gesture ‘What happened to Deepak?’ he made a face, which said ‘ask him.’ I came back to the hall and began unbuttoning my pant, after continuing with some more strolling Deepak stopped and looked at me with agitation.

"Is that mamu still there?" he asked.

Where?

"Arre yar, at the front gate man," he said irritatingly.

Yes he was there, and he has asked you to meet him.

"What the fuck man, you work the whole week, and the bloody project leader calls you on Saturday also, after all this hustling throughout the week when some window of entertainment opens this mamu spoils it all."

What’s happened now and what’s that entertainment thing you are talking about?

Shekhar called me half an hour back, told me that he will give a DVD.

What DVD? I asked, my ears wide open to hear the next holy words.

You know what DVD I am talking about … the holy GOD’S! he gestured raising his hands towards the roof.

Which GOD?

"Not god … Goddess … pari … Pa …"

Paris Hilton? I asked with my mouth wide open in anticipation.

First you shut your mouth. It’s not Paris, it’s Pamela … Pamela Anderson.

That’s too old a goddess man.

Yes she is old, but not the DVD. It’s not even available on the net. If you don’t want to watch it, go and sleep with your butt up. He gave me angry look and began to stroll again. To me his facial expression appeared more frustrated than angry.

Deepak, why are you angry at me? If you want to watch it go to Shekhar’s and fetch it, that’s it. What’s the problem? I said calming him down.

There lies the problem Jaggi, if he goes down Vishu will catch him and will ask him to come tomorrow to teach computer to his beloved daughter … ko-ki-la, said Giri coming out of the kitchen.

Oh! I forgot, tomorrow is Sunday. The day when Deepak transforms from a techie to a teacher for his beloved ko …ki … la

Making fun of me ah! You will see, one day I will come out of this Ko … kila mess, said Deepak disgusted by our comments.

I was just kidding yaar. You can go down, no one is there. Vishu went inside the house.

Deepak glanced at me with a smiling face. I also smiled in return to confirm that what I said was true. Deepak went out at lightning speed. I went inside the bedroom to hang my clothes where I saw Shinu sitting in one of the corners and silently reading his company training journal. He looked at me and nodded his head in despair as if saying ‘You people won’t improve in your entire life.’ I gave an expression that said ‘You will not become a man in your entire life.’ Whether he got it or not, that was left to his imagination.

After ten minutes or so, when three of us were sitting in the hall with our dinner in the center, Deepak came back with the same lightning speed, the speed with which he went out to bring the DVD. He placed the DVD wrapped in a plastic cover on the computer table and turned towards us.

"That mamu, Vishu, is on my back. Tell him that I am not in the room."

I have already done that, I won’t do it again, said Giri in denial.

Shinu you tell him. Before Shinu could say anything, he hurriedly went inside the bedroom.

As soon as Deepak went inside, Vishu came running and stood at the door breathing heavily.

I heard Deepak’s bike sound. Has he come to the room? asked Vishu.

No sir, he is not in the room, Shinu answered.

Running for a whole twenty steps and getting a negative result in the end obviously made Vishu unhappy. With a sagging face, Vishu turned his back and moved out of the door. Before we could rejoice for avoiding the inevitable, Shinu suddenly stood up and went towards the door running.

Vishu sir, wait a minute. Responding to the call of Shinu, Vishu came back.

What son?

Sir, I told you that Deepak is not in the room, but I never told you that Deepak is not in bedroom.

What’s that for? Where did it come from? Why did Shinu do that? These were some of the questions that would pop into the minds of people upon seeing Shinu for the first time, but as far as we were concerned, it was not uncommon for us. It was a characteristic of Shinu that he always turned situations from bad to worse, sometimes by asking unmindful questions, other times wagging his tongue too much in situations where it should not wag. So, we just looked at Vishu with our blank faces as he scowled at us. Before he could start, his customary speech of eternity, Deepak appeared from the bedroom and relieved us from the torture which would otherwise have made us run for cover.

Oh! Vishu sir, how come you are here, that too at this hour? asked Deepak with an exaggerated surprise.

Son, I came here to tell you that tomorrow is Sunday and Kokila …

Kokila will be waiting for me to teach her computer skills, I know that sir, I will come tomorrow sharp at ten in the morning. Why did you take so much pain by coming to our room when you could have just made a call?

I have been making calls to your mobile since morning but you never took my call.

Oh! Sorry sir, I have been very busy today, but don’t worry I will definitely come tomorrow.

You told this on several occasions but you never showed up on the last two Sundays. You know how much it saddened my daughter. If you don’t come tomorrow she will get upset even more.

It will not happen again sir, I promise, I’ll come definitely.

Don’t miss, son, she will be waiting for you.

Deepak agreed by nodding his head. His face appeared as though he was about to cry. With a smile on his face, Vishu patted Deepak’s cheek.

You have a good heart son, but some people always take pleasure in spoiling someone’s happiness. He looked at Giri and me with the same scowl which he had a moment ago.

Finally, as we thought the drama had finished with a happy ending, suddenly Vishu looked at the computer table, came in and took the DVD in his hand as we gasped for breath. Holding the DVD, he looked at it with his bulging eyes.

Which CD is this? he asked.

It’s not a CD … it … It’s a DVD sir, I said hesitatingly.

Whatever, which movie? he asked again.

GOD’S movie said Deepak taking the DVD from Vishu’s hand. Before he could hide it behind his back, Vishu brought his hand forward and gestured as if saying ‘Let me take a look again.’ Deepak gave it to Vishu. He glanced at it once again by flapping it both sides.

Which god’s movie is this? No label, no picture, nothing on it, he replied and we thanked the real God, for the DVD not having any label or picture on it.

Actually, it’s not God’s movie, it’s a goddess’s movie sir, I said to avoid God. But I didn’t know that it would boomerang.

That’s what I am asking, god or goddess it doesn’t make much difference, said Vishu irritated by our answers.

Sir actually it is a goddess pa … pa … pa ... before Deepak could complete his sentence Shinu intervened.

Pamela Anderson, he shouted loudly as if though he remembered something important. When Deepak looked at him angrily, Shinu realized that he had already committed a blunder.

Come again, what’s her name Pamma …

Actually its Pammelamma sir, said Deepak correcting Shinu’s mistake (or say enhancing the mistake which had been already committed).

Pammelamma? I never heard about that goddess. Where is she from? asked Vishu in astonishment.

She is not an Indian goddess sir; she is an American goddess, very powerful. She fulfills all our desires, I said.

Then I should definitely watch it. I will take this to my home.

We all tried to say something but no words came out of our mouths. Before Vishu could put his foot out of our room and before our mind could forget all the words in the dictionary, one word came to our mouth and we all shouted in unison.

S … I … R.

The shout was so loud that Vishu froze at the door. He looked at us with a face that appeared as if it had been watching a horror show all day.

What happened? Why did you guys shout so loudly? he asked shivering.

Nothing sir, just … you cannot take that DVD to your home, said Deepak.

Why?

Because … because … that DVD should be watched in night time only, said Deepak as if no answer was available.

No problem. I will watch it tonight and will give it back in the morning.

Sir you are not getting my point, said Deepak with a bit of hyped temper, the thing is, that the DVD should be watched first by those people who bought it, in this case I am the one who bought it and I should watch it first, otherwise the goddess will become upset, is that clear sir? said Deepak firmly. Nothing would have stopped him from watching the DVD tonight. Grasping the urgency in Deepak’s voice to watch the DVD, Vishu relented.

Ok, I got it, you watch it first. Vishu handed over the DVD to Deepak and went out.

Deepak took a big sigh of relief and sat on the floor. He gave a look to Shinu that had ‘I will kill you bastard’ written all over it. He stood up and came face to face with Shinu. Before he could commit any crime, Giri stood in between them.

Don’t do anything right now. We have already had enough for the night, just sit and eat. Then we will watch the DVD. Is that clear?

I am leaving him for the sake of Pamela, otherwise he would have tasted the fury of my fist today, said Deepak and went into the bedroom to change his clothes. Shinu silently sat on the floor, deeply involved in soul searching. Before he could put a handful of rice in his mouth, his hand stopped halfway and back came the result of his soul searching.

Hey, hey … Fist Of Fury … Bruce Lee movie … Now I remember, he said, with a big smile on his face as though he remembered something, about which, the whole world was unaware of.

Without giving much attention to his useless mumbling Giri and I kept on feeding our empty stomach.

***

When you indulge in something, something which is of your interest, something which ignites your imagination, something which inspires you to go beyond your limits, something which makes you spellbound and fires your spirit, then you don’t give heed to tiny things like good and bad, truth and lies, sin and sacred, pure and impure, holy and unholy, crime and punishment, God and evil, everything which is of highest importance in your life, at the point of indulgence, appears as nothing but a round circle of chalk on a blackboard. It’s like you are in deep meditation that will never break until you want it to be. And sex is the one and only thing which alerts all your sleeping senses, at the same time makes you remain absent-minded for other worldly things.

Although we were not indulging practically, still, the fact that we were watching the indulgence on TV made our senses go on high alert. We did smell what we could not smell, we were hearing what we could not hear (TV was on mute); we were imagining what we could not do practically. It is as if, as I said, we were in deep meditation. In the matter of sex one thing is for sure, no matter how much you watch it on TV, no matter how much you see nude pictures in magazines or on the Internet, no matter how many times you undress your dream girl in sleep, it will make you crave for more until you do it practically. I don’t know whether it holds good in the case of people who may have been doing it on daily basis, but as far as bachelors like us are concerned, we will meditate once in awhile until we experience it.

My meditation was broken when I saw Shinu, who went to sleep announcing that he didn’t want to get involved in the sin we were committing. He always did this disappearing act whenever we turned the TV on for porn. But today, I think he succumbed to Pamela Anderson. I swayed my hand in front of Deepak’s face who glued his eyes to the TV like a hawk. He looked at me like a disturbed monk. I gestured him to take a look at Shinu and in the process, Giri also joined us. For a while the three of us fixed our eyes on Shinu who was looking at the TV, mouth wide open like a well, eyes bulged like an owl and ears straight like a fox. All in all, he looked like a man who just now saw something astonishing on TV. Unable to control himself, Deepak suddenly threw himself into a hysterical laugh and Giri and I followed suit. Embarrassed by the sudden spurt of laughter, Shinu, not knowing what to do, came and sat down on the floor.

I couldn’t sleep because of the loud sound, he complained like a child, even though the TV was on mute.

Don’t worry Shinu … it happens to everybody. Sometimes you hear divine things in utter silence; only thing is that it happened to you a bit late. Today you have become a man, declared Deepak, patting Shinu’s back.

As we four joined to watch Pamela tossing and turning on the bed, the night passed like a fast-forwarded motion picture.

***

I don’t know what time it was; when I woke up, the hall was still in darkness but the light from the TV still flashed on my face. I scanned the hall, Giri and Deepak had dozed off where they were sitting but Shinu, who sat only a few inches from the TV screen, was still glued to it.

Shinu, what are you doing man? I asked in a sleepy voice.

I am watching the movie in fast forward, he said, bluntly.

In what way can you reply to such kind of answers? I just dropped my head on the floor and went to sleep. And that’s how one of my young days submerged into the memory lane.

Chapter 2

Sunday, the day, just the name of it makes an active person inactive. The day, which makes people stretch their yawns a few minutes more than on normal days. Even though the name of the day has ‘sun’ in it, I am not sure whether people actually watch the sun come out of the horizon on this day. And as for bachelors like us goes, I have to confess, we are among the breeds who hate to see dawn on any given day, and Sunday is no exception to that. But having said that, on weekdays, we do wake up early in the morning, go through our morning routines and head for our workplaces to earn our livelihood. Just by following this robotic kind of lifestyle, we have become oblivious to the beauties of Mother Nature, hidden behind the buildings of these concrete jungles. We never watch sunrise, we are always late for the sunset and in the night, cannot see the sky to make a wish for the falling star. In between, we just ignore the presence of nature’s paraphernalia (birds, trees, flowers etc). But life never stops, it is always on the run to catch something, that something, which in the end, emerges as nothing but a mirage.

I was dragged out of some weird dream; a dream of mirages, when my mobile rang to the tune of an old Rajkumar hit number. Baffled by the sudden buzz of the mobile I stood up and searched for it. After a few seconds searching, I found it hidden under the butt of Shinu. No wonder, this man could sleep under a big thousand-watt vibrator. I dragged it out of his butt; the call was from my director. I came out of my room and took the call as I stood on the balcony. As I mentioned, in my job, it is hard to get holidays, either you have to leave the job or work like a maniac. When I saw the name of my director on the display I was certain that my lone holiday (you cannot call it a leave because it is taboo even to mention the name of it in our industry) which I got after two months, that too on Sunday, was at stake. He told me to come in the afternoon for a script discussion as he had suddenly come up with a new twist for our daily soap. If your director asks you to come at midnight, for whatever reason it may be, you should oblige without asking any question, this was the first lesson, learnt by me, when I entered the field. So I obliged like an obedient servant of his master.

Disconnecting the mobile, I leaned on the parapet wall and looked down, the street seemed deserted except for a housewife (or say aunty), spreading Rangoli on the road in front of her home. I looked at my mobile for the time, it was clocking five minutes past nine, and I thought, Saturday night must have been a busy night for my street folks (again except that aunty). I looked at the concrete structures opposite my building, though I had lived here for the past three years, I never really bothered about these buildings. But today as I stood on the balcony, I began my vague scan of the buildings. I couldn’t notice any change in them, they all looked the same as they looked three years back. But, frankly speaking, even if there was any change, I would be the last person to recognize it. Even though we may not point out the changes in an area, if we consider Bangalore as a whole, it has changed drastically in a decade, more so in the past three years of my arrival to the city.

I still remember the day, or rather say night, when I put my first foot in Bangalore. My friends Deepak, Girish and Shrinivas who came here a year before me, were more than happy in welcoming me aboard. The first hurdle I faced, when I entered the room, was none other than Mr.Vishu who kept on arguing for three hours for not taking me as a tenant. After some negotiation by Giri and some hike in the rent, he agreed to keep me in their group. Although the place is a single bedroom flat, by an old practice, we always addressed it as ‘Room’.

These three years have been like a memorable journey for me, and it continues to be so. Having come from Dharwad, a small sleepy town in north Karanataka, it took me a while to adjust with the ever buzzing, fast-paced Banagalore life. But these cities are such that they will mould you to their terms even though you may not be ready for them. They will make you run, hide, beg, cheat, steal, corrupt, sing, dance, laugh, cry, shy and if these things don’t work, in the end, they will push you to die. In these three years, I have also been through some of these phases but given a chance I would confess that, if I hadn’t come to Bangalore, I would have been a silly frog of the tiny well.

After finishing my civil engineering, I worked in my hometown for a year, but I couldn’t come to terms with the cement concrete job where I always betrayed the rules of my engineering books. So, I decided enough was enough and jumped out of the well to do what I always dreamt of throughout my engineering studies.

I came to Bangalore with a big baggage of dreams on my back i.e. to become a movie director. After running from pillar to post, I crash-landed into a TV serial production house as a writer and assistant director. Before that, in one year of my struggle, I worked as a part time salesman, data entry assistant and some paltry jobs which paid me in daily wages. The struggle hasn’t stopped yet but I am happy that at least I am on the right path to my destiny.

I really don’t know how I was sucked into this filmy thing. I think it is just that the routine of watching movies in my school and college days with my buddies, unknowingly drilled a hole of becoming a filmmaker in my subconscious mind. And that hole kept on filling with different ideas and imagination till I reached my engineering finals. Sometimes, I can’t stop thinking that too much attraction to films took a toll on my studies. At the end of my pre university studies, I hadn’t scored enough to choose computer science as an engineering option so I had to be happy with civil engineering. At the time when the software industry was at the helm of affairs, everybody was in the mood to taste a slice of the software pie, including my room buddies, obviously I was the loser as I didn’t go all out in tasting it. But, truly speaking, I was never in the league of engineers, even though I have an engineering degree certificate with me, calmly sleeping in my suitcase.

Some peculiar characters also played important roles in spurring up my imagination. The lecturer of my class who sang film songs while he solved problems on the blackboard, my grandmother who cried for every episode of saas-bahu serial, and my neighborhood girl who used to imagine herself as Jaya Badhuri and always shied away from me because she, in her most wild imagination, pictured me as Amitab Bacchan (that’s why I say you should not grow beyond six feet).

Speaking about characters it would be an incomplete list if I didn’t mention my roommates. They also played their part in enhancing my ability in understanding characters of different age and personality. In my early years of engineering days, though I had friends in my class, I always mingled more with Giri and Shinu as they were my buddies since my schooldays. Deepak joined us later when we were about to enter our respective branches, me in civil engineering and they on computers. Even though we were parted by our branch status, we made sure that we remained in touch for the rest of our studies, and the fact that we stayed in the same college made things easy. Giri, with his bulk stature and big brother like looks, always commanded our decisions, whether it was a matter of going to the movies or attending seminar we always followed Giri’s ruling, and often he made sure that we remained in touch with studies rather than making us completely sway away from it. He was devotional and followed his Brahmin tradition to the core. Hailing from a family of priests, he never skipped morning pooja. Till today, every morning, he chants mantras for half an hour as part his worship. Deepak who came all the way from Mandya, south side of the state, made Hubli (the city where I studied, 20Km from Dharwad) his home in the early years of engineering. His self-proclaimed playboy status and joke cracking ability, on every other person, not only made him famous among his branch friends, but also in the whole of the college especially among boys. He would always look for the attention of the female fraternity, which he would get rarely, but it never made him stop wooing them. And Shinu, well he was among the few rare personalities in the world whom you cannot describe purely in words. With lean figure and a big glass on his eyes, he always seemed vulnerable to the wind. He had this uncanny knack of making matters worse by doing something, which should not be done, or quoting something, which should not be quoted. He always acted like a child who would throw anything which is accessible to his hand, and whatever happened after that only bothered others, not the child. As far as my character goes, I would say, it is mix of all these three characters. I am the kind of person who loves to take risks in life and what better risk than when one decides to become a film director against a well paid engineering job?

Sometimes places also play their part in changing the personality or characteristics of a person, and Bangalore is one such kind of a place. Although nothing has changed in my personality, or for that matter in character, it is just that the feeling of passion has increased considerably inside me. A walk through the lanes of brigade road and MG road of Bangalore makes my youth and the passion, which is inside me, stand on the edge of the heart. You can’t ignore tight pants, wearing tight tops and skimpily clothed girls with their nonstop up-down motioning chest and hips on these roads. Why go so far! If you walk through Bashyam Circle, one of the main hubs of activity in Rajajinagar, you will notice girls dressed for male attention. For a guy who has always been in the middle of chudidars and saris it is not easy to cope with these tight attires and model-like figures. But I have moved on, leaving behind trails of perspiration and desperation.

I was so engulfed by my memories that I didn’t notice Deepak coming out of the room.

What bro! Sightseeing in the morning, want to start the day on a good note? Ah!

Deepak stood beside me, looking at the roadside aunty with a flirty smile on his face. I said nothing, just grinned at him.

So what about our plan of going to a movie today? he asked, leaning on the parapet wall.

Plan? a laugh came on my face Whatever you plan there will be an entity to spoil it, I said, remembering my director’s face.

And who’s that entity?

As always, the one and only, the tormentor of humble audience, the master of soap opera … Before I could extend my adulations further, Deepak cut my