The City Girl

When was the last time you took a day off to stay offline? Staying online is a lot of work. You check your messages every hour or so, look for emails from various important places, try surfing for music or movies. There's just so much going on inside those gadgets you carry around all day or plug into at the end of the day. In the last decade life has gotten fast-forwarded. Its been us, running around, trying to keep up with the internet and all the innovations around us. If you'd just peek over your phone, you'd see it as I say it. That old lady in the house next to you is desperately trying to call her son who lives in Australia. The man in the road is going about listening to music. When you're travelling in the metro you'll see almost everyone is on their phones. I've even seen a couple on a date, constantly taking pictures of their food and posting stuff online, without having said  a meaningful word to each other the whole time. Its rather ...

For as long as I remember, I have changed schools and met new people. It was fun for a while to change lives back and forth... until it wasn't anymore. When you're the "new girl" everywhere you go, there isn't much that people know about you and suddenly you have the power to change something about you or be someone entirely different from what you were before. Nobody would know. Thing is, how long can you carry on being people you're not and living lives that aren't yours? At some point you get tired and then try to find your way back to when things were simpler and you could be you. Except, you no longer know who "you" are anymore. I was lost for sometime back there. Me trying to please everybody, got me into a whole big mess. Of course, certain people, certain promises and certain circumstances kept me going, but the real struggle was within. You know those people who have everything figured right from day one? Yeah, I've neve...

You walk right out of bed, with your hair looking like a crow's nest and your feet lazily tucked into your slippers. You're not even fully awake yet, but you're habituated enough to perform the routine without even opening your eyes. So you just rub your eyes, get your cup out, hold it out under the water filter, till its filled to the right level and then stick it into the microwave and shut the door to it. When its warm enough you can spoon in just the right amount of coffee into it and then just stay there, enjoying the aroma of pure black coffee. The Key to a Perfect Cup,... Is to not add sugar. Any sane person who loves Black coffee knows this. Sugar isn't good for your coffee. It entirely suppresses the bitterness of strong and pure coffee. Before you tell me, that's the whole point of adding sugar...hear me out. Take a sip You won't like it. For most, its an acquired taste. For some, you take right to it.  Its too bitter whe...

Open Day at Loreto College is a food and fun Fete. The students raise money by selling homemade food and articles and the profits made, are given to NGOs as charity money, or as clothes and food to the poor on the streets. As the name suggests, Open Day is open to all. People from different colleges, friends, family and colleagues all step in to buy items, have food, dance to their favourite records and have fun at Loreto. This Open Day Mahasweta and I decided to step out of the "Loreto students' entrepreneurship", and step into "Independent entrepreneurship". So under our Principal's "Young Lady Entrpreneurs" innitiative, we set up a stall with other companies and establishments, to not just start our new venture, but to also check out our standing. MENU!!! (Snowy Simmer) We had  Choco Ridges (chococolate cake with dark chocolate icing, sprinkles and cherry on the top!) Chocolate Cakes (A loooot of chocolate cake with choco...

Saturday morning began with my daily routine of groaning, whining, rolling in bed and getting back up to get ready for class. We Loretoites do have college on Saturdays and believe me, I'm tired of reminding my own parents about that. Justice League had been my daily cartoon/ panacea/ drug for most of my childhood and then Marvel was able to come up with a MOVIE on it, but most of my friends had bailed on me and my sister was too far away then to drag her along. So, I did the one thing I could do ... I got ready for class. What was normal about the day I got late. Now our class has this special system of recording latecomers and devising ways of how to stall the professor so we (the latecomers) can arrive by the time the "attendance register" comes into the scene.  So as is usual, I dropped in a message on WhatsApp in our class group saying "LATE". I missed the metro Nothing unusual. Every single time I am in time for my auto ...

There comes a day when you wake up and all you want to is to go back to sleep. Reality isn't what it used to be and doesn't mean as much to you anymore. Even heaving yourself up from the bed seems like a job. You just throw your right arm over your eyes and stay there wondering for a minute: "Do I really need to wake up today?" Life doesn't stop though and wait for you to come up to speed. It just goes on. Life has a momentum that is unnerving sometimes, irritating many a times and hard to keep up with most times.  The Routine Instead of actually talking to someone or clearing out issues, you just fall into your monotonous routine. Get out of bed Get that coffee going Pack your bags Pull out your clothes Cram in a sandwich Pick your stuff and rush  Somedays you wonder how you got through the day. Other times you feel this crushing weight of impending doom, that you can do absolutely nothing about. It isn't depression, it isn't about...

Unfortunate circumstances make the best of stories... I shrugged on my baggiest top and heaved my roomiest satchel up one shoulder and looked at the mirror. "Will do." *ping* Priya: You coming? Me: Just leaving home. "Bye MAAA!" And then I shut the door. (*bang*) Smirking on having managed to irk my mother even at 10 in the morning, I started hurrying down the road. No autos, just walking.  Back Story: I hadn't met Priya in a while. We were going to meet Suvechha at the hall and even her and I simply exchanged half-hearted "hi's" and "hellos" at college. None of that mattered though. One of us was in trouble, so all of us were going out. The Movie (...) Judwa 2 is not Judwa 1, but Judwa 2 is almost Judwa 1. Get it? No? That's alright. I grabbed the popcorn, Priya got our tickets....and Suvechha came in late. No surprise there. Once we got into our seats though, Priya felt th...