The Nights Before Examinations

Midnights, creeping in, usually find me gaping at the window, absentmindedly doodling on the margins of my notebook. My doodles usually conform to depictions of typhoons, Chinese fans and noses. It probably reveals something deeply disturbing about my psyche, but I choose not to delve on it.

It is 12:30 soon and the cellphone tinkles. The first message of the day is a cryptic plea from an unknown number. I read it again and again to make sure I have not skipped a few words or sentences.

"Sweetie (it says), I miss u. V hv not met up for so long. I know u hv exams but cant u make some time. If yes, give me a missed."

I gaze fascinated at this epistle for a long time and then call up Bonky.

"Whom do you know," I ask wonderingly, "who would miss me?"
"You should really learn some phone skills, you know. How come you never say a hello?"
"But who is capable of missing me," I ask insistently.
She ponders. "Apart from the entire faculty in our department, I really can not think of anyone else. Why do you ask? Having a sneezing fit?"
Whereupon I tell her the story.

"Hmm," she says after a few moments reserved for giggling. "Give this person a call. See who it is."
"Is not that a bit desperate," I muse.
"Honey, when you can not recall any person who would miss you in the middle of the night, chances are you are desperate."
"We are not having this conversation. Go study."

It is now one hour and ten minutes. I have finished my seventh typhoon and am starting on my fifteenth nose. The cellphone tinkles again. This time it is a phonecall.

"I have not started Indian Economics. Do not ask me anything. Go away."
"Umm, Pongs," says the voice on the other side. "I am in love."
"Oh dear," I sigh. "Now?"
"Uhh, yes?"
"Who is it? Does he have any single friends? Please do not get married before I get a boyfriend," I plea, my voice trailing away into a whine.
"Well, I met this guy in the metro. I actually bumped into him and apologized. Then I looked into his eyes, oh Pongs, such dreamy eyes, and fell in love."
There is a pause.
"Uh," I say, breaking the pause. " Then?"
"That is it," she replies, matter-of-factly.
"You do not know the guy," I exclaim, scandalized.
"I do know that he is my soulmate," she mumbles in a small voice. I can even visualize her puppy face.
"OK, honey, you know I am all for this sort of thing. But I can hardly help you hunt for the love of your life. I shall be very busy the next couple of months."
"Oh no," she hastens to explain, "that is fine. Actually I called you to help me find a perfect song for this moment."
"Oh."

It is close to two. I have actually read something from my notes and fallen into a reverie, most of which involves ghosts materializing through open windows.

The cell phone tinkles again. I start the conversation with the familiar denial of ever studying Indian Economics when I am interrupted.

"Could not care less. Listen, I bought two club sandwiches for dinner today. You know the hostel food. But I could only finish one. If I keep the second one for breakfast, what are the chances it will not stink or something?"

I blink.

"Is this a probability question," I venture, flabbergasted.
"No, idiot, I am asking you. You are a girl. You should know about stuff like this. Food and rotting and things."
"Ohh. Right. But, you see, I do not," I reply, as gently as possible.
"I knew I should have called Deep. He would have known. By the way, we have to go to Chennai in a month's time," announcing which he hangs up.

Wherein begins a flurry of phone calls, messages and further downloading of application forms.

It is soon almost half an hour past three. I have now degenerated into spelling my name in Bengali. Succeeding in that, I now venture to spell the names of the characters in Harry Potter, faltering badly with Hermione, and shift to spelling the names of the characters in Feluda.

The next tinkle on the phone is Bonky.

"Want to go out for coffee tomorrow?"
"No."
"Eh, this is coffee we are talking about, something you have Freudian dreams about. How can you refuse coffee," she asks, taken aback.
"Bonks, I have been practically stuck in this house for three months. My face is now a deathly white, and my dark circles make me look like a poltergeist. I actually have a haze all around my face. I look like an indeterminate mass. If you take me out for coffee tomorrow, everyone would think it was the family ghost's day out."
"Want to meet up in your park and crib about our lives then?"
"Yeah, all right. Also, I need a couple of notes. Get me the text on commerciali.."
"Never mind, Pongs, I think I will take a nap tomorrow," she says, a little wistful.
"Bleh."

It soon is five. I close the windows, give the books a malevolent gaze, avoid my image in the mirror and thankfully go to sleep.

This morning, however, I blogged.

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Chronicles of Part 2 Exams: The Results of the Toil

One always ends up learning something from life everyday, regardless of one's willingness or open mindedness. Like how simple it is to distract oneself. You can spend the entire day changing the look of your blog and then recreating widgets, you can spend nights watching Tashan, and if sleep does not come, you can always write a blogpost.

This template was not my first choice. I had selected a rather sad looking fish for an image and a dark blue background, something, I felt, which went with my image- sad and inconspicuous. But the fonts displeased me. They would not be inconspicuous. They were large, overbearing and completely dwarfed my poor sad fish, who was soon lost among the verbosity of the written words. So I bade goodbye to the fish and got these water droplets. Fiery yellows and oranges, loud, brash and blatant, everything I would not let my blog be. But I let it be so. For the one water droplet waiting there at the top, to cool off the heated shades someday when they rage too fiercely.

I kept my fish too. Look around, you may find it, a tiny red thing in a sea of blue amidst a sea of yellow. Sad and inconspicuous. The fish of the Fish Faced Follies. Does anyone realize the title makes no sense? That I am not referring to myself as fish faced. That it is there for the sake of alliteration. That Fishface is a tribute to college, the way ad libber is a tribute to school. Like milestones referring to what meant the most at one point of time.

It is curious that I chose a fish as a motif for the blog. I have never been very fond of fish the way Bengalis are usually fond of fish. Perhaps the most important role a fish ever played in my life before the blog was in Finding Nemo and as a Fish Fry.. A cow would have served better as a symbol. Not because I like consuming it, but because I am obsessed by them. I use them for self deprecations, for insults, as metaphors and examples. The literature in my mind is a cow dominated one. Sometimes, I feel my rather surprising crush on Karan Johar evolved from the fact that I had recently studied about a cow breed known as the Swiss-Karan and had immediately associated it to DDLJ (Cow - Swiss-Karan - Switzerland - DDLJ - Karan Johar). But a fish it was and a fish it is. If I ever make another blog, it will have lobsters. No, I am not fond of lobsters much either, either as food or as entertainment. I think the only food I really like is Begun bhaja and Brinjal does not attract me as a blog motif, purple as they may be.

While recently re-reading some of my blog posts, I realize that the same time last year, I may not have been a brilliant blogger, but I was a happy one. Lately, my posts seem to be rather depressing and doom tainted. As I try to trace back the reasons, I receive a message announcing that results come out tomorrow. Stupid world, stupid university, stupid this-time-the-results-are-important-they-decide-your-stupid-masters. Last time, the results led to a multitude of blog posts. This time, they just lead to incessant brooding, insecurity, an irritable temper, loss of friends, and a probable heart attack. Of course, they also include nightmares where my HoD insults me in front of everyone for failing everything, where my results are not published to save the country humiliation for producing an imbecile like me, where everyone refuses to speak to me, where I am socially boycotted. Sometimes, I think, I perhaps am a little paranoid where results are concerned.

Someday, I may have to accept the fact that results are things beyond my control. That I study under a despot University with whimsical examiners who thinking making paper boats out of exam papers are fun. That if I gave a horrible exam, I may get horrible marks and I will deserve them. Right now, all I know is that my results come out tomorrow and if I do not do well, nothing untoward may happen, but it may mean a end to a lot of things. Perhaps more nightmares. It is always results. Never ghosts, never tigers, never parents, never crushes. I do not prioritize things well.

I will now go back to a sleepless night and a fear laden morning. I will go back to what promises to be the most devastating site since my Hindi paper in class seven. I will go back to listening to Kung Fu Fighting to remove depressing thoughts. Perhaps watch The Graduate on Sony Pix. Brood more on a future which seems bleaker than ever.

The world is a very damned place to live in.

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Notes From Early Mornings

After having harried me since time immemorial to stop making her feel as if she gave birth to a blob, my mother has finally succeeded in making me agree to early morning walks. This fact should do no credit to her, since the only reason I do go for walks is that I do not feel like Mathematics after 5 a.m. in the morning and I never can go to sleep until the rest of the world sharing my timezone has awoken and arisen.

Morning walks, though a rage among most health advisers, is an extremely lonely undertaking. A person resorts to it only after he is past his first, second and sometimes third youth. And they all seem to severely disapprove if a person boasting of less mature years, wisdom and looks invades their territory. An ensemble of eyebrows raise themselves to frown upon walking attire, headbanging ( Any sort of rock is a thing of awful beauty during early hours, specially when accompanied by chirping birds, against whom I have a special dislike) and random trippings along any sort of uneven roads, stones, rocks and invisible barriers. Icy looks are all a part of the thinning process in this part of the world.

Morning walks are also devoid of any sort of guys. I do not even ask for cute. But anyone who is remotely dateable seem to while away their entire mornings sleeping, unmindful of the fact that their probable soulmate is taking headbanging morning walks along one of the most beautiful and romantic settings possible, happily wondering what is for breakfast.

The best thing about early mornings are yellow flowers. They are present everywhere. They dot most trees, they lay strewn about on every path and you often end up sweeping them away from the bathroom floor after the mandatory shower. They freshen up the warmest of mornings and brighten the dreariest of streets. Not that streets look dreary. An young sun, dew bathed roads, a dimmed moon somewhere out there in the skies, and sometimes, while changing music in the player, the drunken calm of day create a vivid, joyous, exhilarating world, challenged, perhaps, only by the magic of midnights.

There is also the joys of the inebriate's walk, as I have named it. All it involves is finding the oddest and the narrowest of by lanes, and taking random turns whenever possible, making the way home more circuitous, more adventurous and more beautiful. The prettiest of homes, the oddest of colours, the brightest of gardens, all seem to be tucked away in hidden corners, unseen by people who come looking for them, awaiting to surprise walkers in search of a reason to keep on walking, and desired by the very people who plan to move to Antartica given a chance (Onnesha, take a bow).

The bare truth is, I have fallen in love with these walks of mine. They do not harrow my soul any more. They do not seem to do my blobness any good, but they soothe the frayed nerves of mine after an intense mathematical session. My soul is a walker's soul now, and I will never be able to find delight in the joys of driving. Then again, a walker never killed a stag. Walkers just remain walkers at bay.

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