On the parchment

 This is about my ordeal of how my toe turned into a smashed potato! This blog is not for the light-hearted people and evidently I myself am one among those, so go ahead and read it anyway. For those of you who know me, I have a very vivid imagination so by means of this blog I will paint you a picture of how this exactly took place and then you can decide how funny my pain is to you. On a heavy-traffic-Wednesday morning, I was standing in the bus stop where the traffic had come to a stand still. I saw a bus trying to maneuver through two barricades that were tied together, and told my sister-in-law that we should move away from the curb to avoid getting our faces smashed when the bus driver succeeds to literally drive in between the two barricades, which he eventually did (Yeah I have a final-destination-level-imaginative brain).  Before any of you think, "Hey this is a blessing in disguise! At least you didn't get your face smashed!", I object to that superstitious logi...

Clutching her handbag on her lap, Revathi kept her wet umbrella near her feet and held on to the rail in the moving bus. She noticed that a lady got on drenched in rain, in the following bus stop. She moved towards Revathi in the crowded bus. That's when Revathi noticed her belly. It was big. She must be at least six months pregnant, thought Revathi. Not battling her thoughts of standing in the crowded bus for the next hour, Revathi graciously gave up her seat to the pregnant lady. The lady seemed confused at this generosity and politely declined the offer. Revathi insisted that she sat there and got up from her seat. Realizing that if she didn't take the seat, someone else would, the lady accepted and thanked Revathi. Revathi held on to the overhead rails and moved along the momentum in the crowded bus, content with her own gesture. The next day Revathi settled in the same seat in the same bus. The lady with the baby bump got on at her stop and stood near Revathi. Revathi stoo...

Wednesday morning, Revathi was waiting in the bus stop in her neatly pressed cotton saree, handbag on her shoulder, lunch bag in one hand and umbrella in another. She looked at her watch on her right hand and gave an exasperated sigh. Bus was late again. Just when she was about to sit, she saw the bus slowly making its way towards the deserted bus stop. Folding the umbrella, she got on the bus. She was tired already and was looking at a long day at work. She flashed her bus pass at the conductor, found an empty seat and sat there. She kept her belongings on her lap and looked outside the window. She squirmed in her seat as her back pain was acting up again. She travelled at least an hour to work, one way, everyday. Another lady got on the bus in the following bus stop and sat next to her. She was a foreigner, a white lady. She seemed British from her accent when she spoke to the conductor. Revathi turned back to the window and adjusted in her seat again.  The bus kept moving, bumpi...

Why do people feel entitled to something they don't have and the others have? Moving to Bangalore is by far the most suffering and sacrificial thing I have ever done in my life. The only good thing about this wretched city is my husband is in it. As if this isn't bad enough, travelling to work everyday doesn't make it any better. The bus journey takes over 2 hours one way.  More often than not, I get a seat to sit in the bus and I choose my seat wisely since the journey to home is long. Given my physical stature, people are drawn to sit next to me. Let me put it this way. People see me as a thin girl occupying a whole seat that I don't deserve. This is one of many such incidents. The bus was almost empty and a lady boarded. I could see her eyes scanning for thin passengers just so she could sit next to them and occupy two seats and leave the scrap to the thin one. As fate would have it, she sat next to me. The bus seemed to be taking in more people in the following s...

I was on my way to the bus stop near my house. It was 9 o'clock and I was already late. Luckily, just before I crossed the road, I saw PP19, the bus which directly goes to my project centre. I ran across the road and got on to the bus and the bus started to move. I made my way past the crowd, to the conductor and asked for a ticket to NIEPMD hospital. The conductor gave a sympathetic look and said, "this bus goes only till VGP-Injambakkam. Get down there and take the next bus to the hospital." and he handed over the ticket to me. So much for having run to catch a bus that crowded! I was already late to the lab and the fact that I had to change two buses added to my frustration. And the thought of standing there in the crowd for the next one hour, didn't help. I squeezed myself through the passengers and stood where I could at least breathe some fresh air. I had to kill time so I plugged in my earphones to listen to music. The bus reached the terminal after what...