A resident of Surat would consider himself/herself lucky if they get a shared rickshaw (known as shuttle here) without screaming the name of the destination to at least a dozen of rickshaw-wallahs on a busy Sunday morning. 'Central Mall?' I screamed to the second rickshaw that came to my sight. The rickshaw-wallah gestured me to hurry. 'Civil Hospital chaloge bhaiyaa?' I heard a sweet voice as I was about to enter the rickshaw and moments later, she was there, seated next to me.

The rickshaw-wallah took no time to switch the music player on and then moments later, we could hear a pathetic song from the 90's which involved the male singer express his pain of being cheated on. Ironically, I got confused whether it was I,or the singer, who deserved some sympathy. However, the rickshaw-wallah seemed to enjoy the song, occasionally singing some lines of the song in his cacaphonic voice. It's fun to see how the facial expressions change when one sings, which when complemented with occasional nodding made the rickshaw-wallah look like a pro. 

However I lost interest in him quite soon and decided to divert my attention to Whatsapp. Whatsapp always remains a good option to divert your attention from unwanted things like lectures and in this case, the song. I got my phone out from my jeans pocket after a lot of struggle, yes your efforts may be misinterpreted as a possible attempt to make use of the situation to do something indecent, by the girl sitting next to you. I finally got the phone out and looked at the screensaver. '38 messages from 4 conversations' it read. 36 of them were from my college group which was busy discussing the plans for the day. With nothing else to do, I joined the conversation. 

'Jasmine' my sense of smell informed me, as I realized that something like hair touched my face. As a reflex, I looked up to see her face in the rear view mirror. Very soon, I got clear about two things. One, she was older and more mature than me and second, if one could count, the number of proposals she would have got till date would obviously exceed my 10th and 12th board's score combined. 'Wow!' I exclaimed in my mind and smiled. She was clad in a blue kurta apart from an aura of simplicity. I noticed her ear rings and red colored nails. Frankly speaking, she was a perfect girl next door. Moments later, I noticed the rickshaw-wallah looking at me from the other mirror and smiling. 'What?' I gestured through facing expressions. Smilingly, he shook his head and focused back on driving the rickshaw, I reverted back to Whatsapping.

Exactly forty one seconds and thirty two micro seconds later, the rickshaw reached the civil hospital. She got off the rickshaw and handed over a twenty rupee note to the rickshaw-wallah. He returned eight rupees to her which unintentionally initiated this heated conversation:

She: 'Bhaiya, the fare from Station to Civil Hospital is Rs. 10, how on Earth can you charge me Rs. 12?'

He (in denial): Ma'am this is the standard rate, you must be new here.

She: I am a regular commuter, I know how much the fare is. Give me the pending money. 

He (irritated): Ma'am the fare to Udhna Darwaza is Rs. 10 and to Civil Hospital is 12, fares increased last week.

She: How many times a month do you increase the fare? I am in a hurry, give my money back.

He (shaking head): No ma'am I can't. Sorry.

She: Give my money back or drop me again to station, free of cost, I would rather come again in a rickshaw that charges Rs. 10.

The conversation went on for some four odd minutes. She kept on arguing and he kept denying. In the due course of conversation, her face color changed to nearly match her nail paint. I was following this conversation with a faint smile on my face. She seemed irritated from me noticing her and asked me 'What?' with a sullen face. I made a sincere face and asked the rickshaw-wallah to hand another two rupees to her, telling him I was in a hurry. He complied and handed back the remaining change. She smiled and thanked me. Soon he started the rickshaw again. 'You shouldn't support these people, what will we eat? Early morning such passengers irritate us' he seemed pissed off. I gave him a toothy smile in reply and immediately, my focus shifted back to the rear window as I saw her heading towards the hospital and moments later she was out of my sight.

During the rest of the journey, I kept thinking about our nature in general. We don't mind being charged more when we travel by flight but a giving away a couple of rupees more to the rickshaw-wallah matters a lot. We don't mind spending at McDonald's but we do mind giving a couple of rupees more to the pani puri-wallah. Spendthrift at times and miser all other times, that is how we are, that is what separates Indians from the rest of the world. And so she was she, a simple, decent, beautiful girl who seemed mature but didn't mind looking silly to get her two rupees back.   

   

On That Rainy Evening...

The weather on that evening seemed fine. The sky was clear and some last rays of the sun at dusk complemented the clear sky to make a beautiful Sunday evening. "Beautiful!" I exclaimed while I rushed on to the streets to reach Jay's place. Taking some time off to cherish the nature is always given much lesser an impetus than watching the tennis open final with your best friend, especially when you are late.

The evening turned out to be even more beautiful with beer cans in our hands and Rafa managing a win in the final. That evening was the perfect one to take some pressure off from my head especially when it was preoccupied with exam fever. Our hungry tummies forced us to spend some more bucks on pizza as we ordered one and as expected the pizza reached before 30 mins. "cheers!" We screamed to celebrate our God's victory while we opened the second beer can. Beer, pizza, a beautiful evening, what else does one want from life, but as usual, life always has a little bit more to offer.

While having the pizza, I heard the roaring of clouds. I predicted that it would turn out to be a mild shower. However, the rains continued for the next six hours and had a definite impact on the place where my hostel is situated, being one of the most low lying areas in the city. An hour later, I left Jay's place hoping the rain would stop soon and  took a rickshaw to station. On the way, the rain didn't stop and I soon realized that my prediction  had failed miserably. I now anticipated some water clogging in the hostel area as well as a traffic jam. The rickshaw wallah dropped me at the station and then I had a long struggle to find another one to my hostel. 

Finally, a generous rickshaw wallah agreed to drop me at the nearest chowk to our hostel. Sitting in the rickshaw, I mentally prepared myself for getting wet in the rain. On one hand, I could sense that ecstasy inside me to get wet in the rain while I didn't want to fall sick due to the approaching exams. I finally reached the chowk, paid the fare and started walking in the rain.

"Hey!" A voice called me from behind. I looked behind to find a tall guy in formal wear, holding an umbrella. He was like a messiah who had arrived to rescue me from this atrocious weather. "Come along!" he said and gestured me to hurry up. I hurried up and we started waking ahead. "Unpredictable this weather gets!" I exclaimed completely out of exasperation. "Yeah! But it gets beautiful when you have an umbrella along with you." he smiled. The first thing I was forced to notice about him was his composure. He seemed completely unaffected of a weather change. He looked so familiar, I had a strong hunch that I had met him before.  "Isn't it?" He raised an eyebrow waiting for me to speak up. 

"Look at the water man! My shoes are getting wet" I said as I necessarily wanted to rant about the rains. He laughed in reply. "Engineering student you seem to be" he said. "Yes! You predicted that out of my frustration?" I said and smiled. "Yes! Obviously" he said. We had a small chat on the way, he had to go the lane adjacent to my hostel. I always found that lane scary, completely dark, devoid of any street light. He had completed his Diploma in Civil engg. and was working at a leading cement manufacturing company.

While we were about to reach the hostel, he asked me something that shocked me. "How is Ankit? Is he still on with the one he was, six months ago?" he laughed and looked away. That laughter was predictable! It was him, Gaurav, my room partner who died in an accident some months ago. He was about to complete his Diploma and had also got a job offer from the same company. "Time to go brother, was missing you like hell! Take care" he said, dropping the umbrella on the ground and ran faster than even the best of athletes. He soon disappeared in the dark lane. I gathered some courage to look at the umbrella. It had a tag on it which read "Pinaki Acharya, 2011" . It was the first umbrella that I bought in my college life and soon lost it!. I had tears in my eyes while I collected the umbrella and looked at the dark lane. His words continued to echo in my ears.