November 24, 2012

The Belated Durga Puja Story - Story 7 - Part 1

I set out for my once-in-a-year (in other words, annual) pandal hopping. Wearing a Reebok tee, a fastrack watch and a Nokia Carl Zeiss camera in my hand I was ready. First came on my way, Bosepukur Sitala Mandir. I entirely and overall hated it. In my mind, I gave it a rating of 0.5/5 (that's something you call grace marks.) By then, my urge to have fast food was suppressed. I kept my mind fixed on one sentence - "Junking the junk food" (but this idea is not too effective, though).
What do you think? Not good at all. Bosepukur's pandal.

Next came the Talbagan pandal and I came back from the place very happy, not because of it's decor or something but because of the awesome snaps I got. My time and critical angle is always to right.

Taj Mahal? God, no. It's Talbagan's pandal.


Yeah, me and my camera is just too awesome.


Some "tal" trees of Talbagan are still living.






October 22, 2012

Another Mr. Perfectionist (Father) - Story 6


The father-son duo currently residing was an exact copy of each other. Too pedantic. Too perfect.
It was an awesome Saturday morning – well until then. The Puja Vacations had just befallen and there was very little work for me to do. My father suddenly came up to me, looking as if he had just been fired for no reason and whispered to me in a sinister undertone, “Clean up the room, boy.” I looked up at him lazily. Then, his actual borrowed from a lion, roar-like voice spoke to me, “No storybooks must be kept in the study room. Stationeries must be kept separate from the books. All your gadgets must be kept out of the room.” And on and on and on……………………………….
Finally, when he finished reading or rather reciting his rules – I was practically dead. Well, not practically but literally. So, to re-peace myself, I went up to the refrigerator and poured myself a nice glass of Getorade. When I again felt like myself, I asked him boldly, “Can you repeat?”
He did repeat, only this time with some proverbs – which were maybe to gain my concentration but nonetheless I didn’t understand.  So, I started cleaning up my books. Arranging them and stuff. And that’s when – bang! There was I arranging the books with a Oxford Mini Dictionary at the bottom of the pile and a class 8 Maths book at the top. Obviously, there were hazardous results, well not that hazardous – I had to suffer a bookslide . Finally, after arranging all the books, I went to breakfast thinking – how much longer I have to work like a POW (prisoner of war) for this great duo.

October 13, 2012

Mr. Perfectionist (Grandfather) - Story 5


It was one of those rare occasions when my grandfather came to visit us. He was a kind of ultra-happy guy who had nothing to do on any day, except maybe going for a doctor’s checkup. He used to smoke regularly but after his sudden brain hemorrhage, he reduced it to 1 cigarette. And more or less, he used to have paan everyday. But as the world goes – everybody has their own uniqueness. He was too pedantic, as you call it. And often this character of him befell on me as a great calamity. Like one day, I wrote my Bengali essay in the best of moods so it was actually ‘kinda’ awesome. But my grandfather’s eyes didn’t search for all that. His eyes went up to the level of the misspelling and his face became a scowl.  His eyes seemed to be telling, “Hey! What the heck are you doing? Can’t you be just perfect? You are too imprudent.” I couldn’t stay there anymore. I just took my chance and blazed out of the room. There were so many of these events. But that’s nothing bad. He’s a nice grandfather and used to love me dearly.
I asked him, “Grandfather. Why are you so pedantic?”
“What does pedantic mean?” he questioned back.
But before I could answer, he had already gone up to the bookshelf and chosen a somewhat large dictionary to search for the word. Finally, he found it and continued the conversation.
“Well, yes I am, my dear boy. You see I always liked to be perfect. Call me, Mr. Perfectionist if you want. That’s how I could journey through and reach this stage of life. Extreme discipline and perfection, that’s what I believed in. Now, let’s go and have dinner. We’re getting late. Enough talk for today.”
I gave a lot of thought to what my grandfather said – and finally deduced that he was somewhat right.

October 06, 2012

The Varun - Story 4


It was a nice, average morning school period.  When suddenly, the kinda ‘geek’ of our class, Aadipta went in fits of laughter. Obviously, some of the guys needed to comment. So, they did.
Most of the faces in the class spelt the same question, “What happened?” Aadipta spoke with a weird broken voice, mixed with smirks, grins, smiles and whatnot, “Varun.  Just see Varun. His pants are torn. And even his shirt. Such a big hole. Whoa! Seems like leopard spots.”
By the time, I concluded that the ‘leopard spots’ joke was lame, the whole class was laughing including the teacher.
Finally, the teacher intervened and restored silence in the class with ultra-loud bangs of the duster on somebody’s desk (it was Pritam’s desk and as per his character he still kept laughing). So, this gala period is to be remembered by me, atleast for some days – after all this rocks.   

September 30, 2012

Oh! Damn it, my nose - Story 3


It was a fine, nice morning. Must be the second period or so. Ma’am had not yet arrived, so as usual, everyone was playing, chatting and doing whatever they liked. I was sitting and chatting with my friends. Suddenly, my concentration shifted to Pritam. He was playing all alone with a ball. I wanted to play so I politely asked him if I could and he agreed without hesitation. Suddenly, after about 5 minutes of play, I don’t know what struck him, he threw a pencil at me. And there it hit me – right on the nose, beside my left eye.
Instantly, the wound started bleeding (anyway, that’s what was expected).

The next part went pretty fast. First of all, my nose looked revolting. Secondly, the expert comments which was being passed around. Although, they weren’t disgusting, they were irritating. Third of all, my nose was paining so much (that’s usual, isn’t it?)
“Pritam’s gone. What punishment will he get?” somebody said.
“Ankit’s day is only bad,” said another.
“What happened to Ankit?”
“Was the pencil sharp or blunt?”
All these comments flooded my ears. But as usual, Pritam’s voice was the loudest in the buzz talk, “I didn’t do it purposely. It was an accident. I did it mistakenly.”

I was rushed to the infirmary with two of my friends by my side. So, I went there and the two nurses treated me commenting that I was so lucky to escape my eye and finally after 10 minutes of bandaging and stuff, I returned to class. By the end of the day, the topic of the buzz talks shifted from my nose to the consequences which Pritam received.


September 23, 2012

Dear Homework - Story 2

It was 20th September. Current time–9:05 PM. I checked my to-do list –
  • Bengali - nearly 12 pages of homework
  • Maths - Ratio - 10 sums
  • ISA Project Letter


I calculated the time which will be taken by each and came to the conclusion that it will be 12 o’clock by the time I finish everything. I was absolutely taken aback by the idea of even trying. Finally, I convinced myself that “I can do it” (doesn’t work too effectively though).  I worked like workaholic and wrote really fast but my handwriting was nothing – just merely legible scribbles. By the time it was 9, my whole body was joggling with the continuous movement of my hand. I realized I shouldn’t have been shirking my duties. I thought of the way I could escape doing all. But my brain clearly answered, “None”. So, there was I lost to the world; working as a loner with no means to escape. I finally broke my train of reverie with a jerk and again started to work. I finally had my dinner at 11 and went to work again. I reviled my brain for making me such a shirker. At 11:50, I somehow finished all my homework except Maths. But, by then I was so sleepy, I already felt like hallucinating. Before I went to sleep I just prayed to God that the Maths teacher was absent tomorrow. So, let’s see if God listens to the prayers of a small, gullible (ok, maybe not) child.

N.B. You will not realize the amount of work till the eleventh hour.