The Touch

Maya kept looking at herself in the mirror looking at the 40 year old women with long hair wearing a sari.

She kept looking at her, wondering what he saw, when there were so many young girls he could choose from.

There was a knock on the door, Kaun hain (who is it?). One of her girls came in and said "Aap ka Deewana aaya hain. Aapke liye pooch raha tha" (your admirer is here & he is asking for you). "Usko bol agar khud ke salamati chata hain toh katle" (tell me if he does not want harm to come in his way then he should leave).

"Arre kyu itna gussa karte ho, aakhir pooch toh raha tha dekhi nahi isliye" (Why are you getting angry? He was asking for you only because he did not see you today). "Tu jaa yaha se" (you leave).

It was a few months back when Lalit visited her brothel with his friends. They were choosing from the girls standing in a line. I want her pointing at her when she mistakenly stood beside them talking on cellphone.

"She is the madam of the brothel, you choose someone else" the girl said. "Ok. If I want her, will she be available" He asked. "Are you mad. Stop wasting our time. Choose from the girls or leave"  He selected a girl and left with her.

From then on he would always come look at her, try to know and ended up with a random girl asking about her. He was warned, beaten up but still he would persist.

His pervasiveness got her attention. She later on came to know that he never slept with any of her girls every time he paid a visit.

One day she called him to her room. As he stood there in a corner, she looked at him and said "Tujhe mere saat soona hain?" (You want to sleep with me?). "Aisa nahi hain jaisa app samajh rahe ho" (Its not like what you think) he said. "Toh kya hain, mujshe shaadi karega, ghar basayega tujh jaise bahut londe aaye aur gaaye" (You want to marry me then, start a family? Many a guys like you have come and gone) she countered.

"Main un jaisa nahin ho. Aapko pasand karta hu" (I am not like them. I like you) He said looking into her eyes. She gave it a laugh and said  "Tu dhandewali ke paas aaya pyar dhoondne? (You came to a prostitute to find love?).

He stood there in silence. She walked towards the door, bolted it from the inside. Took his hand, walked towards the bed and then started removing his clothes as she made love to him.

"Chal nikal yaha se. Aur yeh le paise, maaza aagaya. (leave from here. Here take some money, I enjoyed it) as she threw the notes on him.

It had been a while, since she had felt the touch of a man...

The Motorcycle Diaries

Its been more than four years now that I have owned a bike. Wondering how many years its gonna add up.

It seems like yesterday when I decided to get either a bike or car mainly for commuting purposes. I will be honest here that I prefer my mode of transport to be walking or traveling in BEST buses.

Thought of buying a car but given the Bombay traffic and that it would be extensively used by me, bike seem to make more sense.

Since this got resolved. There was another problem. I did not knew how to ride a bike. My friend from my school days and me had driven his father's bike. That was like ages ago.

I & my other friend decided to get a second hand bike and we thought of using it as our practice bike before we got ourselves a new one. Then again things never go the way we want.

We scrapped the plan and then tried to find someone who could teach us riding a bike. Can you imagine that? Apparently you can find a lot of people/classes teaching you drive a car but a bike is a big no.

However I did manage to find one. I used to wake up at 5 am in the morning catch a train and get down at one of the stations where they used to teach to ride a bike. After my session, I used to get back home and leave for work. This went on for two weeks after which I decided to get my new bike.

Getting a new bike was not a problem but riding one on the roads with traffic is quite a different experience. Post getting my bike, I used to get early in the morning and go for rides in the morning till I got all my strength together to ride it on the road.

The first three years I would clock only 9000 kms. Often the service center guys would ask me you drive your bike too often? What was I suppose to say that I use it only from home to office & back.

Then the day came when I took it out for my first long ride along with my friends and what fun we had riding on the bike. So many memories!

It was towards the end of 2016, I took a short solo trip to Nashik and that really turned out to be an adventure. Given that air was leaking from my tyre but it was not a puncture. Reached Mumbai late evening and it was pitch dark given the yellow lights of the bike was not bright enough to lighten the roads. What a nightmare it was but thankfully reached home safely.

It just only got me to do a few fixes on my bike so that I don't face the mentioned problems again. This I had to take as I had planned to take 2000 km solo ride.

I took this trip last year and it was worth every penny. Every ride has its hardships and mine has always been when I am coming back home. On the way back to home, my will really got tested to such a level that I was not sure if I am going ride a bike on longer distances again. You can read all about it on this link.

Biking is a fun experience especially when you are exploring places. The experience is very different when compared with traveling in a car. The wind gushing on your face when you move ahead and in control of the ride. It just takes you on a whole different level when you are surrounded with scenic landscapes and greenery and who can forget the ghats and its corners.

For me the journey has just begun... What about you?


P.S.: You can check out the photos of my journey on the link

Whats in a Name?

"What's in a name? That which we call a Rose
by any other name would smell as sweet."

These are the lines from the Shakespeare play Romeo & Juliet. I guess it hold true decades ago. In today's world one's names matters a lot and can make a difference or give an edge.

I was one of those people who wanted to change their name because it sounded funny (at least when I was small) and no one else had such a name. I wanted to change my name when I was small. Often my name used to change as I moved up in my class. I was very strongly contemplating to change my name to put an end to all this. Somehow I did not do that. There was no new variation of my name in college. Thank God for that.

I thought I was the only one who had to go through this, just because my parents kept a name that no one else had. As I moved into college I knew I was not alone. There were others who had wackier names than me. One of my friends name was Blasco, one of our professor used to call him Blossom. 

As I moved in my work life, I find more interesting names popping up. Like the name Shalaka. The first time I heard the name I thought poor girl who had to live with such name which I thought was a name of a demon. I have one of my friend whose name is Mariadas. The better was yet to come, one of my colleagues in office was getting married. He told a name which I cant even pronounce and it sounded manly. Thank God after marriage the name got changed and a shorter name was adopted. All this made me feel better :) . After all I was not alone anymore. 

I even ended up doing a Google search for my name to see if I was the only one with such a name in the planet. To my surprise I had found three people with my name. It was good to see that people who shared my name were doing good in their life.

One might have heard how actor/actress names were changed as it was thought that the names were not cool enough. For e.g., Dilip Kumar, Mahima Chaudhary. Today its a fashion to have the letters of a name changed to change one's fortune. All thanks to Ekta Kapoor who started the trend by changing the name of her daily soaps by adding an extra "K" or starting a soap with the title starting with "K". After that every actor started to change their name by moving a letter of the name here and there. So now Vivek became Viviek and so on.

Shakespeare did not see this coming or else he would not have made such a comment. In today's world a lot depends on a name. As for me I have dropped the idea of changing my name. After all, I am not alone :)