Happy Birthday Sameer!

Today is October 5 2005.

My best friend since school, Sameer Gharat, is celebrating his birthday. He is presently in Manchester, UK, on assignment.

Happy Birthday Sameer! Have a blast buddy!! Cheers!!!

Here's something nostalgic:

The handsome devil on the right is Sameer!

Please wish Sameer at: http://www.opti-mystic.net/blog/

And btw, Sameer is quite a writer. Here is something that he penned down. Being the eyewitness, I can vouch for the veracity of the article

Palmolive ka jawaab nahi

Today, the dials on the Time Machine are being set some seven years back. I was in my third year of engineering at PICT, Pune (and as an oft-told joke goes, Tired of Engineering). Now, anyone who has weathered the trauma of engineering studies, would agree with me when I say that the bane of engineering is a dreaded word... Submissions!! Submissions are the ultimate torture mechanism devised by the teaching fraternity. Fortunate is the engineering student who hasn't been singed by it!

But... as is my wont, I digress! So... where was I??! ;-)

It was, as I said, my third year in college and the academic year was drawing to a close which meant that the professors, ignored throughout the year, would extract their pound of flesh by being extra-stingy with their marks for journal-work. Anyways, marks are given to complete journals. And my journal was practically empty (and so... the most well-maintained! ... coz I had hardly bothered to even open it!).

"Tomorrow is the last date for submission!", these words came like a hammer blow in my solar plexus. Quickly I calculated the time that I had at my disposal. It was already evening and it had been an especially long day. But I had the night... ahh the night!! :-)

So, I ran after the guy who gave me the bad news... and demanded his journal, which he gave. Immediately, cancelling all other plans for the evening, I rushed home and settled down to copy the contents of my friend's journal, verbatim, to my empty journal. Twenty assignments is a lot of writing work! (especially for a slowpoke scribbler like me!). Not having the inclination to go out to the usual dining hall down the street, I skipped dinner.

The progress was slow and soon the evening turned into night and today slowly but surely slipped into tomorrow. I wrote on... and on... and on, till my fingers ached and the neck went stiff. I was paying the price for being a dumb fool and a distant voice in my mind cried out, "Suffer! you idiot!!... Suffer for your stupidity and laziness!". And suffer I did... as I heard the sonorous notes drifting in from the bedroom, where my friend, Saurabh snored in his peaceful sleep!

Finally... the final word of the final assignment was written! As soon as this happened, I cast away the pen and leaned back into the chair and let out a loud sigh! The impossible was done! Write-ups of twenty assignments completed in one night. "Bravo Sam!... You really are Supersam!!", I congratulated myself and to celebrate the occasion, I made myself a sandwich and ate it... at around four o'clock at dawn!! ;-)

Rather than take two hours of sleep, I switched on the TV and spent the next two-three hours mindlessly channel-surfing.

I reached the college very early that day, hoping to be the first in the line outside the professor's cabin to get his signature on the journal. But to my surprise I found that I was not the only one who had the bright idea of coming in early and I was relegated to the end of a long line, where I spent the better part of the day since the professor was due to come in later during the day. By now, I was yawning and the eyelids were beginning to droop... and I was feeling tired as hell! But what had to be done, had to be done!

Finally, late in the afternoon, it was my turn and when the prof saw that none of my assignments were signed, he looked up and regarded me with disgust. I couldn't care less if he had jumped up and down shouting my name interspersed between obscenities. I wanted the damned signature and then I wanted to sleep. Mutterring a few protests about how the students take advantage of his leniency, the professor shook his head and signed the journal. Smiling, I said "Thank you, sir" and was out of the room before he could say "Next!".

More than sleep, I needed something to eat, so I went, with my friends, to a fast food joint across the road from the college. As I sat there waiting for the snacks to be served, I leaned on a pole nearby and fell asleep! ... Later, having eaten the snacks, I found myself riding pillion on my friend's scooter as he made his way through the narrow lanes of Pune deftly manouvering through the crowds and traffic. He had to stop the scooter couple of times at the corner of the road because I fell asleep and started swaying gently, sitting behind him! ;-)

He managed to drop me home, somehow... and when he left, I threw my bag aside and plonked myself onto the bed and was asleep instantaneously.

I don't know when Saurabh came back from college and let himself in the house. But it was he who shook me and tried to wake me up for dinner. Only half roused out of the deep slumber, I looked around and dropped back to sleep. It must've taken a herculean effort, after that, on Saurabh's part to make me sit up in bed as he asked me to get ready to go out for dinner.

I was still very much in slumberland and one part of my mind kept telling me that it was morning. Another part reasoned that it must be very early in the morning because it was still pretty dark outside. And another part of my sleepy mind agreed with the appraisal of the situation and instructed me to get up.

So... get up I did! ... and walked straight to the wash-basin. Once I got there, it was out of sheer force of habit (of morning rituals), that I grabbed my toothbrush from the toothbrush holder and with sleepy eyes and a drowsy mind, squeezed some paste onto it! ... and started brushing!
Not all the alarms clocks in the world or even buckets of ice-cold water could have shaken me more completely out of my sleep than putting that toothbrush in my mouth did!!

The cruel eviction from slumberland brought me to my senses as I realized something was wrong... terribly wrong!! My mouth burned and glancing up into the mirror I noticed to, my horror, that there was an unnaturally huge amount of foam in my mouth!!

My gaze travelled downwards to my left hand which held a tube. And the next thought in my head was...

"Palmolive ka jawaab nahin!"