Nothing haute couture in this one

Jeez, my last post was more than ten days ago. The last few days have been really hectic for me. Last week, there was this international conference hosted by my college on development communication. Then there was ‘Fresher’s day’ were we seniors ‘welcomed’ the first years to college. A boring affair actually. And to top it all I have been having this really bad cold. What irritates me the most is when I feel like sneezing and am all set to go through with it, the feeling disappears at the last moment. Hate it!

There was nothing international about the conference except maybe one Thai guy I can remember. Rest were all Indians. I guess it did not even qualify as an ‘Asian’ conference. It went on for three days and numerous sessions, of which I attended none. So what was it then that made my week ‘hectic’? Well, there was this fashion show that ‘showcased the different ethnic cultures of India’, to entertain the delegates. What is a fashion show doing at a conference meant for intellectuals? I don’t know, to be honest. There was also a western music show and a few dances as well to go along. Unfortunately or fortunately I was among the many who were ‘picked’ for the fashion show. So there I was, ‘walking the ramp’ for the first time since 9th grade back in school.  Me and my partner, a chick from first year, were designated the state of Haryana. But when the costumes arrived and I put it own, I realized that I was no Haryanvi but Jawaharlal Nehru. Did they lift the kurta-pajama from Nehru’s memorablia? All that was missing was a red rose on the chest. During the practice we never got the pose right. We were supposed to pose in opposite directions but somehow we almost always managed to screw it up. Finally we did manage to get it right, and we told ourselves, ‘first left, then right, then again left’. Apparently someone forgot to remind the same to us before the final show. So just as expected we screwed up the pose. To add insult to injury someone clicked a picture of the pose and put it on facebook, and in it there I was ‘ogling’ at her. Brilliant. To add to the woes, we almost forgot to make the exit from the stage on time. I promise to never again to appear in a fashion show, NEVER!

Fresher’s day is supposed to be a time when the seniors ‘get to know’ the juniors. But this time around, I already knew few of them thanks to the above mentioned tragedy. There was nothing much to talk about the day really. The emcees, with their lame jokes and same lame dance performances from the juniors, there was nothing really in it.Just like every year, the professors made it to a point to spoil the fun by telling not to ‘harass’ the freshers. Apparently one fo the first year GIRLS rides an Apache RTR-160 to college. I was scared. In case you don’t know, I still haven’t got a drivers license. I was expecting at least the food to be something more tolerant.I remember for last year’s freshers day we had got a packet of maa and samosas as refreshments. No such luxuries this time though, for all we got was what a bhajji the size of matchbox and some tea. Or was it coffee. I don’t remember.

ONCE AGAIN, REMIND ME NEVER TO ATTEMPT A RAMP WALK.

Peace.

Skitter and me

Skitter will always be remembered. The 5 odd hours I spent with him/her (I choose to call ‘him’) are probably never to be regained.  For 2 odd hours, Skitter was more than just a pet to me, before being gifted away to a friend. She was the one who christened him Skitter. If you’re wondering what kind of species  Skitter was, well he was what you might call a Praying Mantis, all but 3cm long and green in color. And a bug.

I found Skitter majestically seated on the vast hairyness of my friend’s head. I placed my finger next to him and he immediately jumped on to it. He was there, making his way between fingers and both my hands. Mantis religiosa as the scientific world prefers to call his kinsmen, became officially my ‘favorite living organism’ almost instantly. I loved the way he held his two forelegs and ‘prayed’. Enough proof that even animals believe in God; Atheists can go fuck themselves.

Once in the classroom my friend decided she should take care of Skitter and that’s exactly what she made sure. And so tiny Mr. Skitter jumped from my hands to hers. Even when he was not active he didn’t bother leaving behind his new home. He just sat there, occasionally moving, quite contrary to what he was on my hands. He was still seated on her forearms when we were munching away Dahi Bhel Pooris and Paneer Parathas at a chat shop 5 hours later. Skitter even managed to survive Sarah’s lectures, something even we barely manage to.

My friend walked away towards her home and along with her, Skitter. Few hours later her facebook update pops up, “Skitter is missing”. I felt my heart being shattered into a thousand pieces. Yes, a BUG broke my heart. After all, not everyone is lucky enough to have a Mantis as a pet, even it is for only 2 hours.

Farrah Fawcett, Michael Jackson and Billy Mays. You may add Skitter the Praying Mantis to the list too.

Unkept promises

About 3 weeks back I made a promise that I would be updating my blog regularly. But Layla is making the life of the blogger in me rather difficult. A week has passed since college reopened and also its been exactly a week since my last post. See what I mean.

There are times when I wonder on what basis India Today named Layla the no.1 college in the country. They say my college has the best Vis Com dept. in the whole of South India. But just imagine Vis Com without a subject on Copywriting.  I had chosen Copywriting and Photography as my first and backup choices respectively for one of the major subjects. But apparently someone forgot to remind me that this is Layla and anything can change without a warning, for worse. They decided to scrap Copywriting citing lack of faculty. If this wasn’t enough, one of the professors gave the lamest possible excuse – Copywriting doesn’t have any scope. Has the guy lost his senses? Ironically, a new Dept. of Film Studies has  been started as a sister department. When you’re in Layla, it becomes evident to you that Cinema is the only synonym for Media.

But everything is not bad in final year. A couple of posts back, I had mentioned about the professor whom I loved to hate becoming one of my favorites this time around. I seriously thought that this guy had absolutely no future whatsoever as a teacher. But the way he has been taking classes this past week, you’d never feel its the same guy. Guess, four semesters of NOT handling my class helped him. Other subjects like ‘Visual Asthetics’ and ‘Development Communication’ has also so far proven to be interesting.  Also, today first years joined. I’m told that there is a cute mallu chick among them. A daughter of a prominent actor as well as a former child artiste are also among the crowd it seems. Unfortuinately I was not among the group who were asked to ‘show’ the first years around today. Ah, who cares, its not very long until Freshers Day.

That’s all for today. Guess I won’t be able to keep up the promise of regular posts because of college.

Ciao