Hoogly and the Howrah Bridge...

There are times when Baba and I go to office together.  We cross Babughat. On the left, the river flows. If Hoogly was a woman, Howrah Bridge could easily be her crown.  

One day, I was checking my phone, as our car drove past Babughat. Baba snapped at me, “Sharadin phone niye ki khutur khutur korish? Jaanla diye baire-ta dyakh na!” (What are you doing with that silly phone? Just look out of the window and see.)

It was perhaps the n^th time, I was crossing Babughat. “What is there to see, Baba? I see this everyday! The same river. The same Howrah Bridge.”

“So? Just because you see it every day, does that make it any less special?”

True.

Also, that answers a lot of other important questions of life.

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A month back, I went to a salon. One of those unisex ones. The woman who was attending me smirked and remarked, “That guy there, Ma’am, is constantly staring at you.”

I turned around and saw him. *maan mein laddoo futa? Haan haan*

I feigned displeasure. “You must go and tell him that I am married and my husband is here. So he better be careful.”

The woman:  You are married!!! (She Google-searched the vermilion at the middle parting of my head and failed).

“Yes. Of course, I AM married. And, to that man who is oggling at me!” I started giggling (I‘ll tell you how. Say Farhan Akhtar asks me out. It was that giggle).

6 seconds silence and then, the woman said, “That’s your husband! You must have got recently married. Let your marriage pass a few more years, you will see how men change. They don’t stare at their wives like this.”

I did not correct her. I, in fact, did not say a word. One can’t blush and talk at the same time, no?

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In all these seven years of being married and the double-of-seven years of being together, we have given each other almost every possible DIY gift that can be given to each other (Okay, leave the baby part out of the DIY list). I have run out of ideas and hence breakfast was the only thing I could come up with. Silly juvenile things. They don’t fill the stomach. They just manage to fill the heart, nevertheless.

(This also reminded me of a childhood song. Our bus-conductor kaku from the school bus used to sing this: “Dekha hein peheli baar, Saajan ki ankho mein pyar. Dim pauruti. Dim pauruti”.…the last two words in lieu of the music.)  

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Anniversaries are like the last line of the “tiffin-prayer” we used to say in school before eating lunch. ‘Thank you God for everything’.  

In my case, neither is JD God, nor has he given me everything. So I may say: Thank you for being my food, clothes and shelter. (Ugh, “my food” sounds raunchy.) Therefore correction: Thank you for being home. (Now, that sounds perfect.)  : )

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