From the drafts in my mail..unedited

The perfect way of pretending to be working while Im actually blogging. Open a word document or a powerpoint, the better if it is the current project you’re working on, start typing somewhere in the middle in the same small font. When you are done, just open blogger, copy paste the post and publish. Whoosh! Important point is of course, not forgetting to delete it from the report / presentation you pretended to be busy with. Or else, it could lead to you being fired and your company sued. Ghastly a thought to imagine our clients reading the melancholic and sometimes downright cribby posts right in the middle of a feasibility study for a multi-crore real estate project. :D But I can’t help it. The new workplace I am seated in is situated right in the way of a busy walkway towards the pantry and the loo beyond, which makes it very easy for bored employees to just have a peek into my comp while on their way to another leak. As was proved by the senior from Bschool I chanced upon and who has since commented more than once on what I am doing. Searching for more seniors on Orkut??, she purrs coyly, while I am flabbergasted as to how did she see what I was doing on Orkut. Yeah, I was checking her out, among others. It was definitely easier in the Delhi office where I simply pretended I was drafting an email to a friend. The only raised eyebrows I had to encounter were those of Tania, who kept grumbling why noone ever wrote her so long mails. I finally had to tell her that it was in fact a post for my blog. That made her curious and she wanted to read me. I politely refused.

By the way, my new maidservant speaks English. Sis did warn me of it when she called to tell me that she’d managed to fix her up to clean the place and wash clothes. Next morning, a Saturday, a groggy me hears the knocking on the door (the doorbell doesn’t work). I get up and peer through the peephole to see a thinly yet cheery woman on the other side of the door. I open it up and I am greeted by a ‘Good Morning’. That drove half my sleep away, my Saturday morning. The next day she took out the newspaper from the latch and handed it to me on the way inside. Bade bade shehero mein aisi chotti chotti baatein hoti rehti hain.

I am enjoying the new house. It is, as written earlier, the first time I have a place to call my own. The cosy one room apartment is something I look forward to at the end of my day. Even as I right now have no means of entertainment, courtesy the broken Thinkpad, I still yearn to get back to it. I have yet to figure out the Internet and the daily newspaper, a fridge to keep milk, water, fruit juice and beer (in that order), a television sometime later this year and a music system. But it has my bed and sky blue bedsheets, the few books Ive managed to keep with myself and a few trinkets. By the next week I shall also have a few potted plants.
And as I stood by the window of my place, watch the rain beating down the tin roofs two floors down, a few words kept looping in my head.

Aazmaale aazmaale aaj khud ko aazmaale

Phirta hai kab se yeh dil sambhaale

Bol ye lab pe ruke hain

tere sajde mein jhuke hain

Pal pal bhikre hain kitne ujaale

Kya karoon kya sochta hai

chain dil ka dhoondta hai

Apni kismat ko jagaale

beech ka parda uthaale aazmaale

Aazmaale aazmaale aaj khud ko aazmaale

Phirta hai kab se yeh dil sambhaale

Bol ye lab pe ruke hain

tere sajde mein jhuke hain

Pal pal bhikre hain kitne ujaale

Apne gham se khelta hai, dard kitne jhelta hai

Sochta tu aur kuch hai, aur kuch tu bolta hai

Apne dil ko tu manaale

beech ka parda uthaale aazmaale

Aazmaale aazmaale aaj khud ko aazmaale

Phirta hai kab se yeh dil sambhaale

Bol ye lab pe ruke hain

tere sajde mein jhuke hain

Pal pal bhikre hain kitne ujaale

Kashmakash ko chhor de tu,

rukh hawa ka mod de tu

Khaali pe maana hai tera,

ho sake to tod de tu

Ek nayi mehfil sajaale

beech ka parda uthaale aazmaale

Aazmaale aazmaale aaj khud ko aazmaale

Phirta hai kab se yeh dil sambhaale

Bol ye lab pe ruke hain tere sajde mein jhuke hain

Pal pal bhikre hain kitne ujaale

Kitne ujaale, kitne ujaale, kitne ujaale

- Taxi 9211