Effing with a capital 'F'!

There’re bad days and then there’re days like these!

10:15 a.m.-Have to wake up, thanks to the helpful ant who took refuge in my bed sheet last night when I was having cookies for dinner and never left. He felt that it was his responsibility to stop me from bunking college. And I might add that his way of bringing me back to my senses was pretty rude.

10:40 a.m.-Get ‘ready’ to face the water-logged streets I’ve to brave to reach college. Pack my Data Interpretation papers in so that I can drop by my friend’s place to practice them after college.

10:45 a.m.-Someone informs me that the form I was supposed to submit for not doing the soft skills training from college isn’t what we had expected it to be. It’s practically my professional death certificate signed by me and my parents. Had an argument with mom regarding this since she always wanted me not to declare a war against college and go along with whatever I’m told. Rushed out of home in a bad mood.

12:30 p.m.-Reached college after a lot of difficulties(It usually takes me one hour but thanks to the rain and traffic, I reached so late). Found out that there was a blackout and the generator wasn’t working. Also, I needed my guardian’s signature to submit the form. Called my father and asked him to come down there. And trust me when I say that he WAS NOT happy!d

2:10 p.m.-He reaches college, gives me a piece of his mind, meets a registrar-cum-chemistry teacher-cum-sales executive who, very convincingly talks my father into the training ‘explaining’ why I need to go through this bullshit and how it’ll help me in every step of my ‘career’ in future and how they only have my best interests at heart! Amazing, no? The multi-tasking people!

2:15 p.m.-Get into a bus amidst heavy downpours. The bus gets stuck near airport for wait-for-it, forty minutes and then again, for an hour near the terminal! The whole journey was supposed to be of one hour, you might remember. And did I tell you the breakfast story? We ran out of cereals which I discovered this morning. The bananas weren’t my type and the jam looked so yucky! So, two pieces of stale bread were the only thing I had for my breakfast(and it was the only thing I was to be content with till 5:30 p.m.,as you'll later find out).

4:00 p.m.-With the rain showing no chances of slowing down, and the people inside the bus increasing exponentially, we requested the ones sitting near the windows to open the them since it was getting really stuffy inside. Of course they weren't ready to get wet. After a few minutes, I had difficulties breathing. The body odor of so many people around and a few middle aged men trying to dry hump me weren't helping at all! I threw up on the road once, got down from the bus and started walking. As far as I could see,there were cars and buses and trucks and bikes stuck. I tried walking down the pavement which was practically nothing but a mud slush by then. And that's when a bike lost its balance and banged right opposite me. I was about to skid but since the bike was the only thing near me,I didn't fall on the mud, I rather fell on the bike. My shoulders and legs still hurt, thanks for asking. Needless to say, I couldn't reach my friend's place and it took me forty more minutes to reach home only. My D.I papers were all soggy for no reason.

5:15 p.m.-After 'discussing' with other 'responsible' people around, my parents decided to enroll my name for the damned training though I've already missed more than fifteen classes and won't be able to attend even a single class from now on too. Icing on the cake,right? So, let me just sum up the whole situation for you-I was determined not to let college talk me into a shit training that I don't need at all just so they can make a profit.At the end of the day, I'm the poor little loser who lost her battle, had to enroll anyway and pay the same amount therefore and still ending up missing half the classes. I almost had an accident and threw up once. I had a fight with my mom. My D.I papers're so soggy that I won't be able to solve them later also as I can barely read the digits! I had a bad hair day and my internet connection was down till 1 a.m. Does it get any better than that?

Shorts-New Market,Beige shrug-Metro Plaza,White tank-Westside,Pink pumps-Shreeram Arcade

P.S.After such a day,do you really blame me for taking out the happy pink pumps and clicking myself in my shabby room?

DOWN THE MEMORY LANES-I

“Do you remember the day, Miranda?” Do you remember me?
I used to walk down the road, with a faded backpack, worn-out slippers and ALL the acne scars in the world. I was one of those many girls who used to walk past your house, always hoping to catch a glimpse of you. You were super busy, pampered, only child. Girls were your hobby, like rowing. And you never touched anything that you had used before. You were easily bored. You wanted new hobbies every other day.

But I didn't know any of these back then. I was just thirteen years old, desperate to get a little attention, to feel a pair of rough lips, smelling of smoke, brushing past mine.

I wasn't pretty, I never topped in my class, my parents never gave me fancy things like yours, I used to take the bus to reach school. You, or precisely men like you, were off limits for me.

But I didn't know any of these back then. I was just thirteen years old, desperate to get a little attention, to feel a pair of rough lips, smelling of smoke, brushing past mine.


Remember the day I cried in front of you, for the first time? Not that I had never cried before, I just had never felt that helpless before. I couldn't feel my senses, I was numb. But still, my cheeks felt flushed. I was humiliated, embarrassed, angry with myself. I wanted the earth to part, I just wanted to disappear anyhow. But I knew, it was my last chance and I had to try my best. I did, to be honest. I just didn't know that you had already taken your decision. 'I'm sorry re, there's nothing I can do about it. Trust me, if there were any other way, I'd have done it. It just wasn't meant to be.'-Your parting words had meant so much to me! It felt so real! I just didn't know that it felt so convincing because you had the scene acted out in your head a thousand times. You just didn't care. I didn't have anything new to offer to you.

 But I didn't know any of these back then. I was just thirteen years old, desperate to get a little attention, to feel a pair of rough lips, smelling of smoke, brushing past mine.

Remember your mom? She was the center of  your world, or so you made me believe. I still don't know why she hated me so much. Maybe because she knew that I was too honest. Maybe because she knew that I was ready to go to any extent for you. Maybe she was afraid that one day, you might have to choose between the two of us. She should've talked to you first. That would've spared her many a sleepless nights. How proud she'd have been of you! Because you never planned to choose. You were just playing.

 But I didn't know any of these back then. I was just thirteen years old, desperate to get a little attention, to feel a pair of rough lips, smelling of smoke, brushing past mine.

Remember Princep Ghat? Remember the way you used to play with my hair? Remember the way you used to whisper my name between those shy kisses? Remember you promised to write a song for me someday? Guess so many girls were already in the queue, so, my turn hasn't come yet. As a matter-of-fact, you never lied to me. You always told me when you 'didn't feel like talking to me' or 'had a good time' with someone else or were 'lost for a reason to keep this relationship going.' I sometimes wonder if you did that purposely to hurt me or because you were really honest. I don't know what your obsession was with my tears. You just never seemed to have enough of them. What makes you think that you deserved it? You were just another Engineer, studying in a very ordinary college, you were anything but good-looking, you weren't into books, you had two left feet, you stammered when you were nervous, your dressing sense was worse than Sunny Deol but still I loved you and many more girls did. I don't know why. Maybe it had something to do with your rustic charm and 'tough guy' attitude. Girls just love falling for badasses! And as far as I'm concerned, I toh always have had a thing for people who were bad influence in my life. But I don't blame you. You never made any promises, let alone breaking them! I just was too expectant. When I finally realized that you were like north wind and you'll never be able to stick to one girl, it was too late. I just wonder sometimes, do you remember me at all? Do you remember our evenings? Do you remember our escapades? Do you remember those moments in the backseat of the cabs? Do you remember that I curl my fingers in my sleep? Do you remember that my throat becomes dry whenever I've a nightmare? Or was I 'just another fling' for you? I'll never know.

LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE

I've had a love-hate relationship with the sun all right but all these raining is making me kind of sad.I've already started missing the bright,sunny days.I've almost forgotten how it feels to walk at a speed more than two meters per minute and still not get splattered with a mud pack!So,thought would share some old,'sunny' pictures.

AHOY,MEN,STILL REMEMBER MY PROMISE,DO YOU REMEMBER YOURS?

I’ve been getting complaints from various sources that my blog is too ‘girlie’ and most of the time, I talk about nothing more than my nail paints. So, this post is dedicated to all those who wanted this space to be more manly, all those who used the feminine side of my blog to skip reading and still claim to be my friend, all those who turned up in college wearing floaters and sweat pants or something equally disastrous. I know very little about male fashion apart from Rajesh Pratap Singh, Raghavendra Rathore  and Sharbari Datta. So, I’m freaking nervous. As this is a start, I’m not gonna get overambitious. I’d rather keep things simple and basic. The problem with men is that whenever they’ve a hard time acquiring a skill, they term it as ‘girlie’ or ‘stupid’. I had friends in school who used to smoke more than ten cigarettes on the night before exam because they had to ‘study’. I always told them that we girls’re studying the same syllabus and we’ll be getting the same question paper. There’ll be no reservations(or ‘quotas’ if you please) for us. If we can study without getting high on nicotine, so can you. You just chose not to. Then there’re those men treating the streets like the public urinal. I always asked them that if women can control their urge to urinate any time, any where, why can’t they? There’s probably no special technique involved with the structure of female bladder. Then there’re moms who teach their baby boys to remove their shirts and trousers as soon as they reach a relative’s place and wear a pair of shorts that’ll serve as both the underwear and the shorts(and it’s a habit those ‘baby boys’ will adhere to even after they’re grown up). The same moms will slap their daughters if they want to wear a bikini because being a ‘girl’, you should always be ‘covered’. Ironic, isn’t it? Ditto goes with fashion. Most of the men don’t understand fashion. What the heck? They haven’t discovered shoes yet, let alone dressing sense! And as usual, just because they don’t understand it, it’s not art, it’s ‘a wastage of money’ and ‘stupid’ and ‘girlie’! Anyway, my point here isn’t picking up a fight with men(though I know I’m really good at that), I’m here to give tips to men on how to be presentable. Can you imagine? My grandfather’d have been so proud of me! LOL!

Anyway, let’s come to the point.

#1)WHITE SHIRT-This is something I swear by. I kinda have a thing for men’s white shirts. And that’s probably one of the secret reasons of my current relationship status(It’s single, if you’re that curious). Waking up the morning after sex, slipping into your boyfriend’s oversized white shirt and YOUR boxers, making tea and having breakfast in bed…Ooh, these’re the stuff my dreams’re made of. Get one with no prints, no patterns, no stripes. Simple white, as clutter-free as it gets.You got a crisp white shirt, you got a Soumi in your pants, dude! :P

#2)Khaki shorts-For those who’re a little surprised if I got the ordering right or not, I’m perfectly fine. I’m as much a fan of Khaki shorts as I’m of White shirts. They both’re comfortable, classic and super stylish. But unlike the shirts,I think I’d like to wear my own shorts only, not my boyfriend’s. I’m not really a fan of the very short ones. Get a mid-length one, with pockets. You can either wear it with your easy breezy White shirt, tucked in or polo necked tees. But please try to keep prints as far as possible.

#3)Suit up-Yes, I’m a big fan of Barney Stinson(and his suits) and I’d have probably lost my virginity to Neal Patrick Harris had he not been gay.*Sigh*

Coming back to suits, get as many as you can. Black and white is the classic combo. But you could also try blue and white, white and purple, steel grey and white and what not.This is one area where nothing but floral prints can go wrong. And DON’T FORGET THE TIE.

#4)No smelly undies-Bad news, boys. As much as you love wearing the same undies for weeks and make your dorm rooms a safe(and stinky) place just with the help of the smelly socks and undies, it won’t help you get lucky anywhere else. Clean up! Get a pedicure, use moisturizer, wash your hair and wash your undies too! It’s so damn disgusting, trust me! And try colors other than powder blue, red or yellow ochre while buying them. Seriously, are you people color-blind?

#5)Wear shoes-Lemme teach you something, boys. Whoever taught you that shoes were discovered to cover your feet, was a liar. Most of you people assumed that if you’d cover your feet with newspapers or rags, you’d be wearing shoes. There’s actually something called Leather which is super sexy and lends its name to shiny shoes. You need money to buy them and then you bring them home and WEAR them! As simple as that!

With that, I hope I’ll get to see better dressed men in college when our campus interviews start next month. Rumor has it that the dates’ll be somewhere around 12^th Sept. So, readers, please don’t judge me if I’m not able to post regularly. It’s not that I don’t miss you, I just can’t do anything about it. Love.

                                                                                 Soumi.

BAN THE BANNERS,OR NOT?

The breaking news these days? Kolkata’s gonna be hoarding-free! No ugly hoardings raising its head between lovebirds near Dhakuria Lake or Beleghata Lake, no sari ads distracting my super boring dad on his way to work, no finger lickin’ good chicken wings to make my ‘friend on a strict diet’ feel bad… I guess I might be risking quite a few followers(not that I have many)when I say this out loud-I don’t think I hate hoardings that much. You see, I’ve never really seen a hoarding free Kolkata. They say it’s more beautiful that way but doesn’t the beauty lie in the eyes of the beholder? Kolkata is beautiful to me for its scenic beauty and for the lack of it. I love Kolkata for the dust-a-thon near Shyambazaar five point crossing, for the fish smell behind New Market, for the water logged roads near Hazra, for the very considerate crow near Vivekananda Road crossing who decides to poop on my hands instead of my hair because I was on my way to somewhere other than home and I couldn’t shampoo my hair in the coming ten minutes or so but I had enough water to wash my hands. So, Kolkata’s beauty, for me is incomplete without those ugly hoardings. I think Kolkata, without them, won’t really be the Kolkata I’ve known. It’ll just be another perfect and posh city I’ll think twice before getting out in. I happen to share a personal relationship with hoardings. There’ve been instances when I learnt the spelling of a word from one of the hoardings or spent a good twenty minutes reading the hoardings when my bus was stuck at a busy crossing and there was no PYT to envy or no hunk to check out nearby. I used to go to school on my dad’s bike when I was a kid and he made me read out all the hoardings to him and I used to get free chocolates if I made no mistakes. I also remember a tuition near Tala tank which was a maze in itself for my ten years old brain. I had to walk down two typical north Kolkata lanes with a minimum of fifteen turns with identical old fashioned houses with identical saris hanging from the roofs. It started around eight in the morning. So,my dad used to be already out for office. My mom had Arthritis and couldn’t get out of home. So, I had to go alone though I used to have friends on my way back. I was lost many a times. But I always found my way, thanks to a hoarding explaining why we should use only Cookme ground spices(‘Cookme guro masala’ for all you bongs) in our curries. I came to know about my first audition from a roadside hoarding. I often come to know about sales, new restaurants, exhibitions, crafts fairs and the premiere dates of certain TV shows from hoardings, even now! I’m all for turning Kolkata into London(as our Chief Minister has promised)but is it such a bad idea to leave certain parts of Kolkata the way they’re so that some other ten years old doesn’t get lost on her way to tuition?

NOT DONE YET...

A quick post to say that I've not disappeared.Something was wrong with bloggers yesterday.Only my pictures got posted,my texts didn't.I don't know why.Okay,I'll 'officially' be an Engineer(that too in Computer Science only)after April.Go,sue me!Who cares?Anyway,back to the point,I'm just busy searching my super cute and very,very intelligent verbal teacher online.Just got to know his last name today.Needed a lot of courage to ask.So,if any of you happen to have a Sanket Chowkidar from Kolkata(working at IMS)in your friend list,please let me know.How would you know it's the same Sanket I'm talking about?He's really into UCB tees and wears a branded but worn out pair of sports shoes all the time!And he's fair(FIY,I'd have preferred him darker and tougher),with pink lips and all,and very soft-spoken.

GIMME RED!

I just discovered a positive side of having bad days-having more bad days(and weeks and months)means going on more shopping splurges!So,thanks to all the frustrations going on in here,I went shopping again!Though this time,I had a perfectly justifiable excuse to-it's my didi's b'day tomorrow!I had bought a gift for her long back but it didn't work out.So,I went to buy something else for her today.And I had an exam from 5 p.m.So,a little de-stressing doesn't hurt,right?Here's the bag I bought for her,it's so damn gorgeous that couldn't help clicking a few pictures!Guess I'm slowly becoming notorious for using gifts before giving them away for once and for all.You remember Moumita's sling here(that I posed with before giving it to her),don't you?So,you probably won't be surprised to know that I made my chair pose with this bag.I love the happy crimson,totally perks my shabby room up!

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You know me,the shopaholic by now,I guess.

So,no wonder I bought a few things for myself too.A ruffled top and a pair of shorts came home in my backpack(yeah,I had a dance class which I ditched,so,obviously I was carrying a heavy salwaar kameez and ghoongroos,so,I had to carry a backpack).And for the first time,I actually found the corn-spring onion momo at the 'Wow Momo' stall!Every time I go to a 'Wow Momo' outlet,they run out of corn-spring onion momos!I've been chasing this one for a few months now!The search finally ended.And it wasn't that great actually if you ask me.For vegetarians,the mushroom momo is much much better!And if you're looking for cheaper options,even paneer momo is better than this one!And the chicken,fish,prawn momos are always there toh!Another failed attempt to find the perfect white shirt resulted in me buying a not-so-perfect white shirt again!But more on that later.And last but not the least,our college'll have its first fest since 2004 this year!Yay!So,stay tuned for more pictures.Till then,happy reading!

P.S.If you'd rather like a depression-heavy post and some info about what had been bothering me for the past few weeks(not to suggest that I'm over it now)tha the happy(and shallow)posts,do mention it in your comment.If I find more than one people interested in my depression talk,I might actually share it with you(though I personally don't believe in promoting my petty issues and bothering everyone under the sun with my daily tear count updates.I learnt this very valuable lesson from Tanvi,one of my blogging idols),who knows?