Another week draws to a close. Saturday and Sunday have suddenly become such sweet sounding words. Actually, Friday is the sweetest word - the thrill of having two whole days at your disposable is a feeling that only the expectation of it can bring. What did I just say? Ah, nevermind…

There was actually disappointment this evening. I went armed with begged and borrowed (not stolen) cash to buy a pair of Adidas shoes at Safina plaza, only to be told that my size is not available. Just yesterday, one of the jokers there had told me that all sizes are available for all models. Grrr…

To cool off, my collegue who was with me, and I had chaat. Trust me, food is such a mood elevator. I have become a regular at the chaat guy who runs his service-to-humanity business from beside Safina Plaaza. Just as I was polishing off the last spoon off my plate, I saw this guy who was walking by, turn around and approach me. Suprise of all suprises. It was Ajay who was standing before me. Now not in my wildest imagination did I expect to meet him of all the people in the world.

Ajay was my schoolmate in Chinmaya, just like Abhi. We’ve all been together since kindergarden, although I had never really been close to Ajay. The three of us probably started our music endevour together somewhere during 5th std., each trying to prove to the other who the biggest fan of Micheal Jackson on this planet is (yes, I have been there once). After I left Chinmaya I never really heard of Ajay until recently when Abhi (who was always in touch with him) updated me on his life. Quite a life he has been living too. Then I met him once around 6 months ago when I had been to Chennai, but nothing much except the fact that we have been living somewhat parallel lives came out of that meeting. Parallel in the sense that inspite of not actually knowing each other for a considerable period of time, we could still relate to each other and to the kind of life that we have been living after 7 long years. I guess that’s the thing about meeting childhood friends. With most other people, speaking after 7 years would be like “wha…?”

To cut many things short, its suffice to mention that Ajay has rejoined XIME this year. He has left Chennai for good and is here with his parents. I am not expecting him to really fit in with the Bangalore crowd. I rememberAbhi telling me once about how he thinks that Brigade Road on a weekend is like a still from a Linkin Park video I have my own thoughts about why I think the Chinmaya-educated-Chennai-crowd will never understand the Brigade-Road-strolling-Bangalore-crowd. Those thoughts would probably make a mult-part blog topic so evermind all that. As of now, you can make whatever you want of that sentence by subsituting Chinmaya with numerous Chennai schools and including 90% of Bangalore bred youth in that mention of ‘Bangalore crowd’.

Peace