Where the party was that night, Part 2

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The day drew to a close, and a very happy Rahul congratulated me on making it through the prelims. The finals were a day later, and I couldn’t not win, he said. I smiled and nodded, as the butterflies in my stomach seemed to enjoy mating season. The new day dawned, and even the skies seemed arranged in some sort of devilish grin. I ignored my overactive imagination and went about my work. A small grin here, a smile there, I was even starting to become less nauseous… I could actually look at food by the time evening came round.

All participants were required to assemble in the barn half an hour earlier, so that the organisers could spit out all sorts of conditions while we still contemplated how stupid we were. I vaguely heard a disclaimer to the effect that they would not be liable to the mental or physical torture we may undergo after the event, but dismissed it as a bad joke. Turns out the joke was on me…

The interaction parties were pretty standard. I’d been involved in organising one, in fact, and there cant be two ways it plays out… People come in, music plays, a random event takes place, and people wait for the breaks between events, when the music plays and they have an excuse to jump around like idiots and bang into other idiots, and depending on the genders involved, giggle or grunt. The simplicity of the entire thing was pure genius.

I managed two rounds without getting too bashed up. In fact, I actually had some self respect left going into the final round, a surprise, we were told. I actually like surprises… they remind me of birthdays, and birthday cakes, and chocolates… the whole deal. I was pretty much spaced out, on a time trip back to my 8^th birthday with a huge bugs bunny cake, when the crowd went deathly still. Then there was chaos. I started, as a visibly shaken competitor informed me that we were required to dance.

I should have expected it, what with the numerous prophetical signs… but of all things Dance?!?! I can dance well enough to pass time in the room… deft foot here and another jump there has even got me a few murmured compliments. But all that does nothing to the fact that God, no doubt chuckling to himself way up, decided to give me two left feet. Or two right feet, doesn’t really make a difference… the fact was that I couldn’t dance to save my life. If ever I’m given a choice between dancing in front of my entire batch, and skinny-dipping into boiling oil, I’d go for the latter. It s only humane… the first option would kill a lot more people.

The next day dawned, cheery as ever. The whole world seemed happy. Videos of me onstage were already doing the rounds, and many were roaring for an encore. It was widely believed that I would be approached by the Press to clear the air on if what I did was a solo version of the tango or the salsa, but some popular actress had sneezed up a controversy and saved me the blushes, Bless her…

Where the party was that night, Part 1

I was just sitting there, minding my business. That means I was raking my way through some dude’s SMS inbox, or trying a ‘new’ hairstyle, or something similarly uninteresting, when Rahul walks in.

Now, Rahul’s this tall guy… and I mean that in the context of tall guys. He puts the others to shame, I tell you… apart from creating nightmares for the Civil Engineers in the group, and quite a business for these bruise ointments when he walks into a room… Once I counted him banging his head against the ceiling/stairway/fan 6 times en route to the mess. Which is no small feat, even in a place like Agate, where most wall fittings seem to suffer from acute vertigo.

Anyway, the point being, Rahul’s usually sober… not like the rest of us who go jumping around, getting high on sugar, SMS-es or CT marks. Or in a particularly drugged-looking friends case, getting high on boredom. This particular gentleman makes it a point to test my nerves in these moods… plays basketball with the
light, tag with my room door and ‘dodge-the-water-i-found-next-room’ with unsuspecting souls that walk around the corridors late night. Very becoming on an 18 year old…

But I digress. To recap, I was minding my own business when an unusually chirpy Rahul walks in. Now it is a testament to my powers of concentration that I didn’t notice him just standing there doing nothing but make small chirping noises. Finally satisfied with a thorough bulldozing of a friends credibility and leaving him to clean up, I turned…

“Hey da!”
“ehhh… Hi…”
“Listen… we have this thing coming up… called Mr. Freshie”
“…”
“So I was thinking… you know… you could participate!”
“…”
“So watchoo say?”
“…”
“Enna daaa?”
“I’m waiting for the punchline da… all good jokes have one these days”

Come on… you cant blame me! I have an excellent reputation of falling flat on my face in public. There was a time, when innocence and no small measure of enthusiasm accompanied my trysts with the audience. But that was a different time, when the world was one large playground, music was more than remixes, and there were no Bush jokes. After a particularly devastating outing in my twelfth, I decided to bridle my enthusiasm once and for all.

“Hey, I’m serious da… I’m sure you ll do good… in fact the prelims is a written round. Why don’t you attend that? I’ve already put your name in for it…”

By now, my friend had started to sound increasingly like those random advertisements on TV for a lucky charm, fitness belt or an extra brain. But old habits die hard, and alert as my subconscious was to the change in speech patterns, it found itself a silent observer to a question paper so mind-numbing, it would have been criminal to not attempt it. And if you listened hard enough, you could have heard the unmistakable sound of a nail being driven into a coffin...