Life’s little surprises

Life can throw surprises at you along the way as you make your journey- some nasty and some pleasant ones. These surprises are what make this otherwise dreary journey somewhat interesting. The last week this life threw a surprise at me- big time. Let me convert that into a blog while the freshness still remains.

Bunny:

11^th and 12^th were the worst years of my life till date- I will dub them as 'The shit years'. I have no much clue about what went on. Those were the years of my transition from a teen to early years of adulthood. So I had to grapple with my psychological changes as well as studies. The life was uneventful but for the early rise @ 5am, journey to tuition classes, from there on to school, back to tuition and home.

The school was too big for me. The tuition classes were too crowded for me. The only good thing was I met people from different schools. St. Thomas was one of the famous schools in the city. The girls were beautiful and hot in red skirts, the guys handsome in their grey trousers.

Bunny was stout. His friend, Nebu, was taller but as stout as him. They studied together, went to same tuitions. I was surprised to learn that they were my neighbors. So many a times we travelled together in the same bus back home. The only difference between Nebu and Bunny was that Bunny had lesser grey matter and so ended up in my college.

Zara:

Well this is going to be an interesting story. It was the initial days of Orkut. Orkut became a rage in college. We rushed madly to get maximum number of fans, scraps, and friends. Orkut Buyokokten was an admired personality in our circles.

In one community there was a small game being played. It was like completing a story from where the previous person left off. It was a religious community and so others were acting pretty decent. I and this girl were coming up with horrific ideas (like bishops and priests as Mafiosi going to Italy to assassinate someone). Later everyone else dropped out of the game and we became friends.

I still remember the display picture she had put on- her Labrador. We used to exchange thick scraps. She was a jolly good girl and since she was doing her literature, had a good language.

Bunny:

I was quite surprised to see him again at college. He was in different branch though. Anyone's first impression of the guy was a show-off with a beard, slight stoop and a cigarette. At that time there started a prayer meeting, run by a few NRI girls. Bunny was experimenting on religious beliefs and since the girls were good looking, he went for the meetings. He was the favorite of the prayer organizers. If he was to come for a prayer meeting 3-4 girls would come too.

Zara:

That was a time when cell phones came cheap and connections started coming cheaper. Everyone started getting a cell phone of their own. Zara got one cell phone from her brother. (I got mine after I joined my first company). She send me her number through mail (as Orkut started losing its privacy).

So one fine afternoon I called her. It's the first (and till date the only) time I heard her voice. I don't know what got in to me. I started stammering and sweating. I messed up the whole conversation. Zara thought what a nerd I were and threw me out of her life. Meaning she deleted me from her orkut account. (Later it turned out that many girls deleted me from their life and so I got used to it)

I didn't complain but felt pity on myself.

Bunny:

There were a handful of guys in college who did politics to make their ends meet. I am not blaming them because they had no one to guide them. So the wise stayed away from their surroundings.

There were two rival gangs and had regular fights with each other. Soon after the fight and head-smashing and bone-breaking there was ritual of filing a case in the police station. Every one with a small scratch would file a case against anyone whom they had slightest suspicion of enmity.

The first mistake Bunny made was hanging out with these useless guys. Hanging out literally means sharing a cigarette or a bike or small stuff like that. But enough for the other gang to look on with suspicion.

The second mistake was to hang around when a fight was going on. The opposite gang members filed a case against him for no apparent reason. But case charged was in the name of attempted murder.

Now the sad part is the useless guys had the right people in the right places. They negotiated their way out of trouble. But Bunny was left behind.

His dream of flying to US right after the studies never materialized because of the lone case. He had to wait a long time to resolve the case. Meanwhile he turned into a heavy smoker.

Zara:

Some six months after graduation I joined my company. My folks brought me a mobile, my first one. I was elated. It had been a dream for some years. I remembered someone who had been a friend long ago. It was a mobile that broke our friendship. I had written the number down somewhere. With some difficulty I found out the number and send a message. There was no reply.

I felt a bit sad. But what if she had changed the number. I searched for the old mail in my inbox and send out a mail apologizing for my odd behavior.

Months passed and I forgot about it.

I was adjusting myself into new phase of life with new friends, new office, new principles and values. One fine evening I got a SMS.

'Checking if this is Jon's number.' I was quite surprised and send a replied back asking who it was. That was not a local number and soon got a reply back.

That was how Zara entered back into my life.

Bunny:

Bunny too joined my company. He was not very lucky to get into a not so good project. The night shifts coupled with smoking led to high blood pressure. He took up to jogging and passed through my street often. So we renewed our friendship. He was trying to kick out smoking too. After a long time the case was mutually resolved.

I guess he never thought he would work in the crap company. No one knows where our fate leads us to.

Zara:

It was reunion for me and Zara. She was gracious enough to admit that she had goofed up a bit too.

This time around we switched our chat to SMSes. We had a lot of catching up to do. She had lost her mother long time back and a few years back lost her dad too.

She moved into with her brother in Bangalore and is happily engaged to someone. I was happy for her.

She was into movies and since it was a matter of mutual interest most of our chats were on what we saw this week. And sometimes it turns to the books read and even philosophies of life.

Once during such a chat I asked her plans for the weekend when she said her cousins are coming over. It went on and on about shopping, costs and so on when she said that Bunny and his mom are coming over next week. I was a bit surprised 'So you people are close to Bunny and his family?'

'I thought you knew we were engaged to each other.'

Engaged!!! The guy I met so often near my home or office is engaged to a girl with whom I chat often through SMS. I was stunned. It all happened a few years back and their family is happy with it seems.

This is what I call a pleasant surprise. Two persons from two phases of my life are getting married to each other.

Zara and Bunny may you two happily live ever after.

Afterword:

Zara challenged me when I told her that I am going to blog about them that there is no big story to write about. Well, there is a story in everyone's life. A story worth telling.