Next weekend
I and Shantanu dot Shankar visit
Bandstand. People were taking pictures of Mannat, the Shahrukh Khan’s bungalow. I did not find it cool enough to look at. Instead I saw the Bandra Worli sea link and felt awesome. Shantanu who goes inside ATMs just for enjoying the air
conditioning and had brought all the tooth-brushes, paste, shampoo and even the toilet paper from The Leela Palace to his room acclaimed that I was insanely obsessed with the sea link.
Magic bus
The most unpleasant chapter
of Mumbai is travelling. Travel by BEST bus every day is a pain in the foot as
people keep on stepping on each other’s foot. I came across a magic bus
which was not ever crowded and there was no conductor to ask for fare. Besides the
bus always went to my destination and usually all seats were occupied except one.
I gave the bus driver ten rupees each time lest he went bankrupt or shut the
service annoyed by my thanklessness.
Puzzled and curious I asked the seniors in
office about the white magic bus –Who
runs it? Without asking for money? Why don’t other people get on it? One of the seniors replied-“White magic bus? There are no such buses in Mumbai. There was one about
ten years ago. It was a private bus and fell from a cliff. All the seats were
occupied except one. Everyone died!!”
That day onwards it was no longer magic
bus. New term - Ghostbus. What baffled me was-Why does the Son
of a B***h ghost driver of the ghost bus accept my ten rupee non ghost currency
if he can’t spend it?
One week end (I have
lost the count of weekends) Shantanu and I stepped out with umbrella over our
heads destined for Matheran. We were compressed into a thin two dimensional
body by the fellow passengers. We got completely drenched before reaching Matheran, saw more
waterfalls in half hour than in our life till then, walked about 6 kms and gazed at white clouds and rains obscuring anything worth looking at. We returned at 6 PM in the evening the same way-holding the umbrella over our drenched head. The rains never ceased for a second. The waiter in the restaurant at Matheran shamelessly said “Sir paani nai hai”. We were awestruck with his choice of words.
Rasmalai friday nights were a high point during my intern stay at IIT Bombay. One Friday as the mess was about to close at 9:30 the mess people- err the nice and awesome mess people announce unlimited dessert at the end. One IIT Bombay dude said- "Aaj to itni rasmali khaaonga besharam type log dekhte reh jayenge..". He filled his plates corner with a lot of the dessert. As he was waiting for his friend to do the same I filled the main course region of my plate with rasmalais - nine or ten probably. The dude stared at me. I did my best not to grin. He murmured something unpleasant. We split our ways. The rasmalai nights continued for next two fridays. People don't believe when I tell them that I never purposely scheduled my office departure timings, adjusted it with the traffic from office to hostel so as to reach the mess at 9:25 precisely for three consecutive Fridays. I don't know what is so hard to believe in this! It's sheer plain destiny. The Almighty wanted me to eat unlimited rasmalais. Anyways after three Fridays the trend of unlimited rasmalais was stopped in the mess and I had to contend with one. I wonder what changed the mess people's minds!
One weekend when I was running out of cheap and fun places in Mumbai I decided that I must visit Navi Mumbai. Shantanu dot Shankar not being an enthusiastic traveller or explorer like me declined to accompany me. I searched for places to visit in Navi Mumbai and found an Iskcon Temple and a cool park called Central Park. I kept exploring various sectors for the temple but no one seemed to know about it. Somehow I reached a gate with Iskcon temple written on it and no sign of any temple in the premises. I asked why the website shows such a grand majestic temple while all they have built is a weird marriage hall with good smelling canteen and why do the sweets smell so delicious. They explained smilingly that the website only shows how the temple might look in 2015.
Bastards! I took a bus, travelled for about two hours, took another bus and then an auto rickshaw and after 3 hours they tell me how the temple might look in 2015?
They offered me some prasad. After visiting Central Park I boarded an air conditioned bus for returning to IIT Bombay. The AC was switched on so high that by the two hours I had become super restless due to super Siberian temperature and my bladder was not supporting me either. Ultimately it became so intolerably cold that I got down two stops before my stop, relieved myself of unwanted fluids and then had to take an auto. Not so memorable trip. Back in Jharkhand in 2 hours I would have reached my Nani ghar at Hazaribagh from Ranchi.
No comments:
Post a Comment