2 August 2010
Today I had decided to be my very
best. Have you ever noticed green clouds in the sky, I mean clouds green with
envy? I did. It had drizzled the very first day in the year and gave a
chocolate coating to my new green Bata pair. 1c was unusually crowded today.
Gosh! The entire population of the world was packed in that small a place and
everyone seemed busy unearthing a real big treasure right in the middle of this
rickety bus. Just a small blow into the fragile framed conductor’s whistle, and
I would have been launched into a positive parabolic trajectory of a projectile
shot at an angle of forty five degrees to the normal and the flight would have
been recorded the most unimaginable embarrassment. Thanks to my three sixty
degree elbow that I somehow strained to manage at least half the portion of the
pink 2” x 1” piece of paper dear enough to be the passport of bus travellers in
the town. I must produce it to the grey beard, which would otherwise invite an
unremitting pour of not-so-beautiful words the vernacular contained.
Seventeen rotations of the minute
hand and the umpteen numbers of curses my bag would bear, it was Lawley Road,
which I presumed to be a highly modernised version of pronouncing the word
‘lovely’- soon to discover it was the highest priority event of the day. A
hasty stride on the narrow pathway five inches below the tar, and a four minute
choke of breath by the awful stench that would churn the internal juices. Phew!
The Golden Jubilee gate of 1995 – better life than all the elixir in the
universe could offer.
I was almost there, just a few
steps away. The wet breeze from the agri fields on my left had come to the
rescue of my ruffled hair to set every strand of my mine to a smart partitioned
concave across my forehead. At the countdown of the coconut trees that welcome
every soul on the yellow carpet of flowers, I was nearing that important
encounter of my life.
My mind would not ask – take the
right and keep moving - an open space, a phantom deep. Forty more careful steps
and there she was… A spotless face that would take eons to describe half the
features on it, a sharp smile up the cheeks outlining the slender nose and a
set of ten of the world’s most precious pearls on auction. Her mysterious eyes
that hide under the thick clean-curved brows carried all the charm of the range
of Alps. The yellow earring that twirled down her lobe, she sported a very
interesting design that no common man could cogitate.
I heard people speak of her
good-looks and charms and that the long queues of thousands awaiting her smile
back were all rejected at once. Her father who is a professor in the college is
a very strict man who has could not even tolerate a single crack on the wall
that could cause his daughter the slightest visual discomfort. He is a bigwig
in town, a genius, a perfectionist and a sensitive father. Goodness! I shall be
one lucky in a million to have spotted her right in the morning. And she glared
the million-dollar smile at me. Lost in the dreams I could faintly trace the
trinkets of her dupatta rush in a sequence into the dark corridor where she
sped. Thus began the routine of the thousand butterflies all talking off my
stomach at the same time. She would everyday wait for me behind the intricately
embossed pillar near the picturesque post office. Bliss! Just one sharp smile
and she would dash into the long corridors of the ultra-gargantuan louring
haunting enigmatic construction.
Life had taken one big turn.
Changes embraced me and everything of mine. The tiring walk down Lawley road
was now scaled effortlessly in no time and it was very important to be before
the stroke of nine else I put a hundred muscles of her face to frown. The
journey of the sun was magical…
It has been exactly three years
and seven flips of the calendar pages. There hasn’t been a single day we never
met. Sundays? Yes, the only day when her dad would not be around and she would
gracefully walk down the path of golden hue from the hostels road and run
towards this young chap holding a bouquet at full bloom. I would catch the same
rickety bus just to join the only other soul apart from the driver and race the
scorching rays of the sun else I disappoint her. From there we would walk briskly
across the empty corridors and count every step of twenty eight that would take
us to the first floor. And amazingly this magic number applied true to all the
staircases, four in the corners and the one in the main entrance. Late in the
evening we would stroll down the boulevard of brown leaves with the sun closing
his eyes after a wearing day at the backdrop of a peacock that dances
passionately on the Manchester made machine lying lifelessly in its late
sixties. She had become an inseparable part of my life, She – my GCT.
Two more months and we will have
to move on in life. The thought of separation sends a cold prick down my spine.
Yet unable to accept the separation I am bound in hopes, tied in memories and
the time we spent together will linger in my hearts for eternity. A degree is
just two letters they say, but the lessons learnt are numerous to lay down.
Love of a GCTian
Gowtham
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