Neeta sipped her coffee. She was not nervous. But there was a strange feeling about this meeting. She had never been in a situation where she was the decision maker. Somehow this meeting seemed big to her. She looked at the group of Chinese tourists, as she sat in the large food court of CNN building, Atlanta. This place always fascinated her. This building represented state of art technology with a better vision in broadcasting and communication to her. She had visited this place at least 10 times in her last one year in Atlanta. She checked her watch once again and went back to the book she was reading "The Google Story".
"Hey Neeta" said Sahaj as he pulled the chair to sit with her. Neeta looked up from her book and gave a warm smile.
"What are you reading? Oh Google story. Nice! Did u like it so far?” asked Sahaj.
"Yes Larry and Sergey amaze me as much as you do. Isn’t Google amazing? The world's best search engine" said Neeta as she made a round with her hands to form a globe.
"Oh yeah Google used to be good. Not anymore. Dogpile does a better job I think" smiled Sahaj.
Dogpile combines search results from all the search engines like Google, Yahoo and Alta Vista.
Neeta had learnt her lessons in the last 5 months of knowing Sahaj. Sahaj always knows more.
They had met in the Airport parking lot when Sahaj had helped her pull a large suitcase till the airport shuttle.
"Thanks for all your help. I would have freaked out with that suitcase" she removed her jacket from the seat and made space for Sahaj.
"Well I should be thankful. I get to help a beautiful girl. I am Sahaj by the way. Nice meeting you Neeta" said Sahaj sitting beside her.
Neeta smiled and asked "So did you enjoy going to University of California, Berkeley"
"Indeed! I am heading for my graduation ceremony there."
She looked at Sahaj completely for the first time. He was lanky, smart guy with good features. His mouth looked as if it was set in a permanent grin.
Neeta liked intellectual people. She wanted to study in IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) herself. When her dreams shattered she developed a fascination for intellectual people and interesting technologies. She dint mind to be a back bencher. She just carried this admiration with her. She used to go to the IIT Chennai campus and sit hours together in the library. Apart from reading, she enjoyed looking at the books and the students like a small kid in a museum. No wonder Sahaj impressed her. But she did not want to be too obvious. She never asked his contact details.
She was surprised when she got an email from Sahaj 10 days after the first meeting which said "I thought I should be in touch with you. After all you can read my car sticker as much as I can read your name plate. Our cars reveal too much about ourselves. Don't they? .I got tour email address from myspace.com" with a signature which obviously revealed his phone number. Neeta had responded to that email in next 30 seconds.
Soon they were meeting each other at least once a week.
What amazed Neeta was that, Sahaj can talk anything from srimath bhagavatham to subprime losses, Mani Rathnam to Mayan civilization, Kelly Clarkson to Kambodi, objectivism to atheism with equal ease and clarity.
"I spend most of the time reading Wikipedia and searching the things Sahaj said. If I had read like this in school I would have been in IIT" she would tell her friends. When she was not reading she would picture both of them in a beautiful lake side reading her favorite book "The Alchemist"
She always would work hard to impress Sahaj and prepare for the meeting every time as if it was an examination. But Sahaj always seemed to know more. This did not disappoint her. She just had fallen more for him.
When Sahaj did propose a month ago, all she could do was panic and ask for a month's time.
And she scored very low in GMAT :P
Acknowledgements:
Thanks to my beautiful roommate for the title.
Thanks to "Know it all" guy for MS word version.
Thanks to sunny for the last line !
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Mona and Her Questions
The fateful phone call had come on an early December morning. I began to recollect the fun days we had with Mona as I walked the cold snow covered streets of Hoffman estates,Chicago.I began to sweat in -5 degrees.The very proximity of Mona's house brought in spasms of fear and sorrow.
When I say We its me and Jaish.The two cool guys from Illinois Institute of Technology.If anyone says "happy go lucky" I would say it is more like us.We both met in school and it dint take to long to figure out that our frequencies matched to the last possible decimal hertz.We both loved Chicago ,Nickelback and hated girls.Girls are the emotional clutch on this society Jaish would curse in a drunken drivel.
If 302 pond forest apartment was our country then swear words will be our language, hard rock will be our anthem , alcohol will be our water and Breaking rules will be our first rule.I was good
at drums and Jaish was good at Guitar.
We had never imagined this daring duo to become a trio until Mona came to sing in our college band.Jaish opposed it.
"Why the hell do we need a girl in the band" he would shout.
I couldn't go to his rescue.After all Mona had a magnetic voice.We dint know when we started talking so well but eventually Mona had become a part of 302 Pond forest.Unlike Many Indian girls Mona would never say No to alcohol.I cant count the number of times we were thrown out of the local bars because of Mona.Even then Mona would sit in the road and say
"Lets change our Moods..lets go to Moody's" Moody's was a popular pub in Chicago
The night never seemed to end. Me being the most sober of the 3 would have drive Mona and Jaish back.It seemed all the more fun.
I had my drums set up in the private balcony facing the woods.There were days when I would play the drums ,Jaish his guitar and Mona would sing all night.
We missed Mona when she went on a vacation to India. There was a weird change in Mona when she returned.Most of our phone calls went unanswered.She always had one reason or the other to avoid us.Me and Jaish were slightly worried of her strange ways.That's when we decided to go to her house.
She opened her door after 3 bells.
"Hey Guys " said a preoccupied Mona.
"What have u been doing all night.U look tired" asked Jaish
"I was reading this book on cosmos by Itzhak Bentov "
"Itzhak who??? What the @#$%%^&%&$$&" said an angry Jaish
Jaish left to the balcony after claiming a head ache from Mona's speech.
"You must be Crazy Mona..Wat's going on? Did we do something wrong?" I asked
"No ..No Everything needs to be in its constitutional position and I have decided to be in mine.I have zillion questions about life. Where did we come from? Why do we live in this world temporarily.If this isn't real Wat is real ? Are our bodies mirror of this whole universe?"
She went on and on.I had stopped listening long time ago.I watched her speak animatedly.At that point I wanted to believe in spirits and they possessing people.The change in Mona killed both of us.
"So what do u say Mona?" asked Jaish before leaving
"I need some time to understand this universe.I ll come back if I ever believe the way we had fun was life "
She seemed all the more stubborn now.There was a sense of peace about her.I am not sure if I imagined that We reached the driveway.I wanted Mona to run behind us and say "It was a joke.Fools u believed it".I dint mind to be a fool at that point.But that never happened.
Its been 3 months.
Today I got the fateful phone call of Mona's death.I reached her house at end of what seemed to a long walk.She had died in a Heart attack.
"She had heart problems when she went to India.But I dint know it was so serious.Her parents are flying in today" said her new roommate I have never seen.
I somehow was convinced that Mona knew about her Last days when she returned from India. I looked around .There were lot of books strewned and an Open page in a book which read
"Asothama Sath gamaya
thamasoma Jyothir gamaya
Mrthyoma amrutham gamaya"
and a translation
Let us move forward
from untruth to truth
from darkness to Light
from death to immortality"
Tears rolled in my cheeks as I said a silent Prayer,one in many years.Mona's death left me with many questions.I hoped Mona found answers to her questions
When I say We its me and Jaish.The two cool guys from Illinois Institute of Technology.If anyone says "happy go lucky" I would say it is more like us.We both met in school and it dint take to long to figure out that our frequencies matched to the last possible decimal hertz.We both loved Chicago ,Nickelback and hated girls.Girls are the emotional clutch on this society Jaish would curse in a drunken drivel.
If 302 pond forest apartment was our country then swear words will be our language, hard rock will be our anthem , alcohol will be our water and Breaking rules will be our first rule.I was good
at drums and Jaish was good at Guitar.
We had never imagined this daring duo to become a trio until Mona came to sing in our college band.Jaish opposed it.
"Why the hell do we need a girl in the band" he would shout.
I couldn't go to his rescue.After all Mona had a magnetic voice.We dint know when we started talking so well but eventually Mona had become a part of 302 Pond forest.Unlike Many Indian girls Mona would never say No to alcohol.I cant count the number of times we were thrown out of the local bars because of Mona.Even then Mona would sit in the road and say
"Lets change our Moods..lets go to Moody's" Moody's was a popular pub in Chicago
The night never seemed to end. Me being the most sober of the 3 would have drive Mona and Jaish back.It seemed all the more fun.
I had my drums set up in the private balcony facing the woods.There were days when I would play the drums ,Jaish his guitar and Mona would sing all night.
We missed Mona when she went on a vacation to India. There was a weird change in Mona when she returned.Most of our phone calls went unanswered.She always had one reason or the other to avoid us.Me and Jaish were slightly worried of her strange ways.That's when we decided to go to her house.
She opened her door after 3 bells.
"Hey Guys " said a preoccupied Mona.
"What have u been doing all night.U look tired" asked Jaish
"I was reading this book on cosmos by Itzhak Bentov "
"Itzhak who??? What the @#$%%^&%&$$&" said an angry Jaish
Jaish left to the balcony after claiming a head ache from Mona's speech.
"You must be Crazy Mona..Wat's going on? Did we do something wrong?" I asked
"No ..No Everything needs to be in its constitutional position and I have decided to be in mine.I have zillion questions about life. Where did we come from? Why do we live in this world temporarily.If this isn't real Wat is real ? Are our bodies mirror of this whole universe?"
She went on and on.I had stopped listening long time ago.I watched her speak animatedly.At that point I wanted to believe in spirits and they possessing people.The change in Mona killed both of us.
"So what do u say Mona?" asked Jaish before leaving
"I need some time to understand this universe.I ll come back if I ever believe the way we had fun was life "
She seemed all the more stubborn now.There was a sense of peace about her.I am not sure if I imagined that We reached the driveway.I wanted Mona to run behind us and say "It was a joke.Fools u believed it".I dint mind to be a fool at that point.But that never happened.
Its been 3 months.
Today I got the fateful phone call of Mona's death.I reached her house at end of what seemed to a long walk.She had died in a Heart attack.
"She had heart problems when she went to India.But I dint know it was so serious.Her parents are flying in today" said her new roommate I have never seen.
I somehow was convinced that Mona knew about her Last days when she returned from India. I looked around .There were lot of books strewned and an Open page in a book which read
"Asothama Sath gamaya
thamasoma Jyothir gamaya
Mrthyoma amrutham gamaya"
and a translation
Let us move forward
from untruth to truth
from darkness to Light
from death to immortality"
Tears rolled in my cheeks as I said a silent Prayer,one in many years.Mona's death left me with many questions.I hoped Mona found answers to her questions
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