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Stop 3 DILLI 6…..
Finally the all famous chandni chowk. The moment you get down the station you start getting the true color and fragrance of chandni chowk. I wasn’t bothered about how closely will it resemble the chandni chowk of Dilli 6.
The greatest thing about being here is that everyone portrays a different image of chandni chowk, as if everyone is having their own canvas of colors. Its so colorful out here that 164million colors of your cell phones seems so few. The life here moves at its own pace. The crowd never seem to be in a hurry but still the scene is like a river raft, rapidly changing the colors and the context. For the foreigners it is heaven. Poor India, hungry India, crowd, dust, etc etc.
So our caravan started from the metro stopped at red fort. The fort looked grand. The biggest fight was not to see the fort but to cross the road. With iron chariots waiting eagerly to crush form the four directions, you feel like running is the only option. Actually nobody cares. The pedestrian thinks that it is the car”wala” who will hit the brake. The car”wala” thinks that it is the pedestrian’s responsibility to save himself. And the most dangerous among them is the Blue Line buses. With plywood roofs, rickety body, thunderous noise from the engine you sure wanna avoid the vehicle of death. The drivers are perfect for F1 race. Mr. Mallya you listening???
Well the red fort was awesome. Two days back the whole consignment of our political dictators were here. Listening to the great economist. Red fort: built by a muslim, our PM who gave the speech: A sikh, our next PM who prepared the speech: A Christian. And rest of us Hindus. Gosh that’s why it is India……
Next stop: Lajpat rai market of chandni chowk. The motivation for buying: it is next to pallika bazaar. Famous for counterfeit CDs, DVDs, dirt cheap computer hardware and software worth millions of dollars at cost of some rupees. If Bill Gates visit this place he will get a heart attack for sure. 6000 worth of windows XP CD @ Rs 40. Gosh I love India. Our final shopping list: 6 pen drives of 64 GB each @ Rs 240. Legendary.
After much of shopping roaming running with the traffic we finally reached the final destination the hugely famous “Paratha Wali Gali”. 25 parathes or the oily Indian bread as some say, under one roof. Name it and they have it. Right from the all time favorite “Aloo paratha” to highly unique “Rabri Paratha”. These guys are genius. A perfect business model. After much of appreciations we too started our journey to the nirvana. The Estd. 1972 shop had that wonderful smell that we couldn’t resist ourselves and literally dived onto the servings. With aloo to bhindi to rabri to mint we tried every god damn thing that was available there. My favorite the Mint one. The smoky flavor of mint is heaven. Finally we finished close to 25 odd and the bill whooped our eyes out: Rs .750/-. But it was worth investing. Some people cribbed some were just silent. Like the typical “tourists” some pictures were clicked some memories were stored.
With this our journey to one of the beautifully preserved historic area of India came to an end. One line for it: If you have a canvas, buy colors from here……
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Stop 3 DILLI 6…..
Stop 2: CP
We finally landed over CP after some zip zapping through hundreds of barricades bearing “Delhi Metro” emblem on it saying “Caution Metro Construction going on”. Ohh yeah we can see that buddy with huge heavy cranes and long stretches of pillars on middle of the road anyone can make out. Gosh when is it going to get over? Eagerly waiting for that day when Delhi roads will get some space and Gurgaon some connectivity.
With Manish’s newly installed woofer system trying to break the window with “Kaminey” song being the hammer, we reached CP. The plan was to board metro from here and reach chandni chowk as it is very difficult to park your vehicle over the already overly and pretty oddly parked area of Chandni chowk.
With nothing much to do at CP I insisted on going to Kavenders for a bottle of chilled flavored butter scotch milk. After circumventing the inner circle we finally spotted the shop. By then hooligans travelling in Raj’s car arrived. They were late as Raj had bought a new car so accelerating beyond 60Kmph was a strict no no (The thing which I realized pretty late and that almost deprived me the pleasure of NH 8)
I was made the cashier and thus suddenly I was richer by almost 5K bugs. I felt like fleeing the place. But when you are surrounded by 9 more persons you can think but can not act.
Finally we boarded the metro to chandni chowk from Rajiv Chowk station. CP station: an engineering marvel. With two metro trains running perpendicularly one above the other, you wonder gosh doing CSE was crap mechanical and civil engineers are the best. Hats of to metro.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Delhi 1 to India Gate Via Delhi 6: The Journey Begins........
The Journey Starts:
As the night of 16th august approached we all were excited. The Great Barney road aka south ex ground floor was showing its true red colors. For me things were simply AWESOME. With my trip to “valley of flowers” being canceled due to some blessings from the rain god because of which the mountains on the way to valley paid their esteem in form of huge boulders over the road, I had only one option left and that was to join the gang of hooligans all the way to the great Indian city DILLI, as traditionally it was known. The plan was as straightforward as the Jaipur -
16th night was also special as on 17th were the last papers of the awesomely creepy 4th term. With 3 months of syllabus squeezed into 2, thanks to the people like Manish who go on exchange, we almost got killed by the 30/7 schedule (30 hours weekly and 7 subjects, 24/7 has been abused too much). So not to everyone’s surprise we were excited and were really looking forward to the trip.
Date: 17th august
Time: 6PM (Almost)
Place: MDI Parking
Finally the C Day arrived (C for celebrating, CP or chandni chowk, whatever you feel like including), for me it was the Phewww day…… we were 10 citizens of MDI ready to board our F-16s, 14s. They were in alphabetical order: Chaudhary, Guja, Great Barney , Maniss, , Maheshwari, Mee , Raj, Sharma, Sweetu and
Yes it is the “killer” highway. It kills you instantly. With 140 kmph ticking on Manish’s car it felt like we were on the runway and soon will take off. Yes that’s why it felt like F-16 …………….
Thursday, August 20, 2009
For Your Birthday..........
Friendship day passed and as usual nothing special, other then couple of mail exchanges, happened in my life. But as 22nd August is approaching I feel a great gush to write something for someone so unusual. Imagining the day one @UIET I can still figure out the gal with the red colored scarf walking down the pathway. Her body slivering the mist engulfing the road to the fluid mechanics lab. Once in the lab I wondered “Gosh!!!! Scarf??? Now that’s too much”. Ignoring her completely the 1st day was one big fluke. Who could have known that the same girl will become such a great friend? Now that’s providence. Who could have guessed no one neither I. Passing of the 1st semester happened with the declaration of the results. We three: me, Satyen and Sid, like the triode of DCH, were pretty much cheerful about the expected upshot. But “Kafur!!!” our cheerfulness blew out and there we were standing seeing the list and still analyzing it. 12, 13, 14 not our roll number but our rank in the class. Crap we said and look who has topped on all of us: The same girl with the scarf in the lab. The same girl who is destined to be my pal soon. Sid’s faced seemed familiar: Some what similar to the scarf, as red as the clouds on the canvas of the sky when 1st light of the sun touches the earth during the dawn. With this sadness our 1st term ended but the reflection of the girl with the red scarf over the road to the lab, moving the air around her with her mystique aura made the everlasting impression. If not for all, for three of us atleast that too because of different reasons. As I scribble this ‘thing’ I do can imagine the air around me taking her shape. The air full of happiness and liveliness. And gosh here you are sitting in front of me. So close yet so far. Want to grab you and say “hey please don’t go away!! I miss you and will miss you always!!!” but alas its just air. You can feel it but cannot own it.
To be very honest I really don’t know when I met you, what we talked, and how you became one of the more beautiful women in my life. And to be true I don’t want to know. Why should I be bothered about such things when I can just sit back and enjoy the reminiscences of the time I spent with you. Things were to happen that way and they happened. Moving around in same group and performing every practical together, well almost, the red scarf image slowly and slowly got faded losing its color and brightness day by day.
With endless encounters and incidents with her stored in my grey cells that I can write a whole book on it. From the sahai’s incident to endless gossiping sessions. To calling her baby elephant and teasing her every moment. I wish I can write…………
As things progressed from 2nd year to 3rd to 4th I never thought that at some moment of time I’ll feel so sad. The day someone close will move away. Still remember the morning some one was about to leave. The day was colored the same way as was her scarf the very 1st day. As if the nature too was saying good bye. With the advent of same red color in the sky the whole 4 years flashed in front of my eyes and I felt so much burdened with tons of things I always wanted to say to her. It may sound really cliché “but I always want her to be with me, somewhere close not far away so that I can always call her meet her and say hey motu you are still the same, loose some weight”. With the auto starting and about to leave, I really wanted to stop her hug her and say “you were the best buddy I ever had. Don’t leave us, stay for few moments.” I knew It wasn’t possible. The red and green thing started and with moist eyes I could only say two words “good bye, good bye adi. Will always love you and miss”. Okay more than two words but who cares.
On the 22nd of august an angel was born. The angel which was liked by everyone. Some times I envy her. How can a person have so many friends around her? I really wonder even if I am not around her will she miss me. Will she ever notice me in her vast ocean of friends? She is like the pope standing on the heights at the Vatican and we are like the crowd standing at the bottom. We can see her but she can not.
I really wish that I could find someone like her, if not her…… ooohhh she is simply perfect
Saturday, August 8, 2009
To one of the very important lady in my life:
Dear shishter,
As the great Indian bondage festival of Rakshabandhan approached I eagerly waited for Rakhi from all my sisters. Anxiousness turned into disappointment when I received only one that too from Gunjan and I thought “sigh!!! A festival away from home and that too in this way?”. Anyways the day arrived and with half of the excitement already lost, I woke up early to attend the class of sales and distribution @ 8:30 am. By the time lecture got over the charm attached with tying Rakhi had almost vanished. After that gunjan called and asked about whether I have tied hers or not? With heavy heart I said “No”,” haven’t taken the bath yet but will tie soon”. She hanged up and I could feel her disbelief. I could see many hands around me with rainbow of colors. But mine was still that same grey and white. Lunch time passed and with half empty half full stomach I came back to my room. Already in bad mood I decided to have a short or ya may be long nap before the next class @ 5:30. Morning class itself is like the deadly sleeping pill. 5mins passed and I was almost about to enter the last stage of sleep from where it is impossible for anyone to bring me back, when suddenly one of my friend came shouting “Pandu!!!!!!! You have got a letter”. I almost woke up with the sudden burst of sounds. It seemed more like shock waves after a deadly missile. I took the letter and with heavy eyes read the address. Indeed it was for me only. Written with beautifully crafted alphabets, the name spelled “Arpit”. I wondered what it is? But soon I realized it was “Rakhi”. The weight of the letter told the whole story. I could have guessed earlier also but remember I was still half asleep. Who could it be? Is it Aditi? Awani? my cousin sisters or someone else? Thousands of small bubbles of thoughts were bursting inside while trying to collide with the wall of sleep which was still residing in my body. I turned the letter and with great surprise saw your name written in golden sizzling words. “Gosh!!!!” my heart suddenly jumped and I was wide awake. Suddenly I was missing someone whom I loved so greatly and it was you sis. At that time I had no words to say. I simply imagined you in front of me. Imagined an aura of you around me. Slowly and steadily the air started taking your shape and gosh you were there!!!!!!! My heart was pouncing, my heart was beating and my heart envisaged you in front of me. I hugged you, kissed you and said “Thank You Sis!!! Thank you so so much”. “thank you for remembering me!!!”. “Thank you for caring about me!!!!”.
With heartful of flowers of excitement, I opened the envelop. What I saw in front of me were two stunning red colored threads wrapped in a piece paper. With the crafted writing any body could have guessed it was yours. And since I was totally into my senses I too J. Keeping aside the rakhis I started reading the letter. With the your panorama still floating in front of me, I could hear you whispering the contents of the letter as I went through it.
Someone always used to say “There is something very lovable and magical about her letters” and I used to wonder how can a letter be lovable. You are but your letter? For the 1st time I finally got the chance to sense that magical moment around me. There was something very unique about that letter. I could feel the words, the sound while you spoke those words, could feel you breathing while you wrote those words, the mystique of thoughts that surrounded you that time. Everything was so real in front of me yet so far.
For me loving someone so greatly requires a great effort from the other side. But being one of the beautiful and gorgeous ladies in my life you always have a great place in my spirit. Missing you, loving you is not by choice but was by destiny. Being a brother I have one thing to say to you, it may sound too cliché but that’s so true “ I love you sis. And I wont let you down at any point of your life. People say that things move on and we tend to forget the relationships. But I promise you it wont happen with us. I have full faith in you. Whatever you do whatever you think, whatever you decide I’ll always support it.”
Sisters are always the weakest point of any boy. He can abide anything but words against her sister. And I am glad to accept that for me too my sisters are my weakest and strongest point. You are part of my family sis. And I wont leave my family alone at any point of life.
I too wish you were here. I too wish you could tease me. I too wish you could see me laughing like a giant. I too wish……………………
About Gurgaon, it is still dusty, dusky with full of carbon mono oxide surrounding the air. Away from the fast paced life style of malls our MDI campus still is surrounded by some serendipity of not having all these.
The aura is melting away and as it melts I miss you more. Things will change but one thing wont and that’s my love and care towards you. Will always be there to protect you and be with you.
Always want you to be happy in life.
Enjoy sweetheart. Love you. And miss you. Muuuuaaaahhhhhhh…….. An everlasting hug and lots of kisses XXOO……….. hope you’ll always be the chweet and golu molu sis ever…..
Your Bro
Arpit
8/8/09,Gurgaon
