Citizens of a Paradise- Lessons Learnt in sharing a Room

Have you ever shared a room with five other complete strangers?

Did you ever believe that sharing a room would teach you lessons for life? (On a positive note )

I was first cynical about staying in a hostel. After a search which seemed like an eternity, I found this Royal Women’s Hostel in Nungambakkam(A better and safe place to stay- sarcasm at its best used here)

It was a Monday morning- and I had just started my hostel life in a 12*18 sized room, where there we
re five beds spread across in a fashion which reminds you of a hospital atmosphere at the first glance. It had an attached bathroom which had a western closet and I cringed at the sight of it. Yes, I had issues sharing a closet with four others. I was worried about my things and wanted to get a lock at the first chance.

I scanned the room once again, there were no locks on any of the cupboards. I wondered how the inmates trusted each other and left it unlocked. I quickly gazed at the photographs and other stuff which were on their shelves. The pictures conveyed all of them were happy people and seemed to be at ease staying here. I waited till evening for all of them to come back to the nest . And then it all started……

Since that day, I have seen people of different kinds in the same room. The aggressive kinds, the submissive ones, the one who would not nudge at all, the ones who always keep talking irrespective of whether you listen or not, the one who always snubs you, the cleanliness freak, the lazy ones, the calculative ones,the moody person,the one who is always on the phone, the one who screams over the phone when all others are sleeping, the one who would not switch of the light. And I have survived all of this.

There were a lot of extremes that I felt time and again.

I was hyper when I stepped inside the room, they wanted to get cozy on their bed after a hard day’s work.

I was thick skinned and wanted the ac to show 16 degrees throughout the day, they wanted it the “human way”.

I did not mind eating on the same plate/road side, they sulked at the very idea.

I hated to cook and wash, and they were sweet enough to even pack my lunch box.

I wore a new dress for everyone’s b’day and would be dressed for their cake cutting, when my friends hid me in the other room, so that I don’t spoil the surprise essence.

The was a person who would always maintain zen like calmness, which people like me would attain only after reading ten self motivational books and after attending twenty workshops on the just said.

On the brighter side, in spite of all these differences I have been one happy person there.

They taught me how to press my shirt, fold my kurti, make my bed neat after I got up,. They taught me that there could be other colors except for “brown “ in my wardrobe. They taught me table manners, how to cook, how to relish my food. They taught me how to share things and they understood my mood swings perfectly.

Till my last breath, I would hold my memories of all the surprise b’day parties, the lovely time spent window shopping, late night dance moves,screaming loud enough to scare the next room people while watching horror movies,fighting on who gets to use the bathroom and the mirror in the wee morning hours. They taught me how to tackle the strict warden,how a heart-to heart talk would be a solution for any difficult problem. I was fortunate enough to know all the hotels in Chennai through them and most of all they taught me how to use a kajal and mascara which I would not have known otherwise.

And not to forget gay(gayathri). There were times every time she spoke ,I would resist the urge to stuff an unwashed sock into her mouth or use her like a treadmill or break a bottle on her head or at-least break her nose. We argued and fought so much, that it would’nt have shocked people if we slit each others throat.But she taught me how a smile and a hug after a fight could set all things right.

I sensed sisterhood with them.

As I write this, I cant express the extent of my nostalgia. Such is the gravity of my thoughts.

I have no regrets till date on my staying in a hostel for last two and a half years. These lovely roomies have seen my peaks and lows and have made me a better person from what I was.

Finally I learnt a valuable lesson- Life is all about small compromises and adjustments, that would make it seemingly beautiful.

P.S : This post is dedicated to all the people who share their rooms. Now that, I am left with a new set of people completely and thrown in the sea of new fishes, I still look forward to have wonderful memories.

Till then,
Mel.

Randomness

P.P.S: People around c2 blogs have been saying nice things about my writing and for the person I am. I am not sure if I live up to even half of it or even deserve it. But my love to all you people around who follows my blog closely for some alien reason I don’t understand. Thank You from every bite of chicken puff.. uff I don’t know what that means…

P.P.P.S : P.S is missing? Yes, that was intentional.No, no, not another crazy blog. Fine, it maybe one.
I am addicted to randomness, so I’m going to be just random in this post .Okay? Okay.

1.Something keeps fidgeting in my nose and I have been behaving like Sudheep from Eega(naan-ee) in the process to sneeze. This drama has been happening since morning i.e for last three hours and have failed literally in every attempt to sneeze out that foreign particle. So after losing all hope, I googled on “how to sneeze” and resulted in getting weird ideas. It gives you super 14 ways to sneeze -out of which everything seems bizarre. Want to know what they are? I insist, even if you don’t  Ways to Sneeze
Also wikihow enlightens our mind by saying how to sneeze cutely. I still wonder how one can sneeze so cutely that you would not take your glued eyes from that person. *rolls eyes*
Hereon Sneeze Cutely

2.Some girl called Sahana has managed to woo 50 people ,got married to all of them and even coned them. How is it so easy for her, when I struggle here day and night and haven’t even managed to turn one male-head to look at my side? Shame on me.

3.My other friend who had gone for a vacation to Singapore gifted me a Gucci bag. Oh now wait for it, it’s a fake one (but who knows that ) Everytime I walk on the floor with my handbag swinging by my side with my hair waving behind my neck like in shampoo advert-people turn to stare with that soft question “ who is that girl?”. Whoo I simply love that attention

4. One of my colleague(no names disclosed for my security reasons) happened to put a mokka of the highest order,from which I haven’t recovered yet . So here goes the conversation
Me: need some part of an information
Coll: info
Me: what? *rolls eyes*
Coll: info-part of information.
Buddu buddu* wicked Laugh*
Me: *bangs head on the wall*

5. My roomies fiancé has got her an audi car as a wedding gift. I just gave a heavy sigh as my reaction. Anyways I get a ride on that brand new car next weekend.. vrooommm…

6. They ve blocked facebook again. No comments on this.

7. I ve started watching 7C, Saravanan Meenakshi and airtel super singer. Why? Because I have nothing better to do. Needless to say more.

8. And finding a good cup cake in Chennai is like spotting a polar bear in Sahara desert. Do you get the drift? Let me know if you could be of any help on that.

Am done for now.

SO everyone who snoozed, wake up and leave 

Till then-
Mel

Humor Contest

I was in my second year college then, fifteen minutes before my semester practical exams I realized that I had forgotten my labcoat. Coming from a strict college, I was very sure they would not let me do my practicals without a lab coat at home. My smarty friends asked me to rush to hostel(which is like 5-7 mins from the main building) and borrow one from the hostelites. (Will have to tell you here, that I was in the hostel in my first year but later shifted to my aunts home).

I ran to the hostel and on the way stumbled on one of my hostel friend who was walking to college. Explained her the situation and she happily gave me her room keys and instructed me that her lab coat would be on the top shelf of her wardrobe.

I opened her wardrobe and checked out the top shelf and picked the white lab coat. I panted for breath after the long run, while everyone was already inside submitting their records and picking their experiment sheets. I walked in as I tried to unfold the lab coat and to my horror,I was holding a pure white petticoat.Yes, I had mistaken a petticoat for a lab coat.

After a lot of embarrassment, I was let to do my practical’s without a lab coat for the first time in history of my college.

All I could react was to laugh sheepishly for the next one week till everyone forgot the incident

P.S: Not sure if it would count under humor category

Who doesn't take advantage of darkeness?

Who doesn’t take advantage of darkness? When there is a power cut, all I could think of is to pinch bums. The next moment after a power cut, I would randomly pinch someone’s(who ever is lucky to stand next to me) bum and run away. This continued till the dark day- I was there in some wedding reception in the evening standing besides my mom. At that awesomest moment, when it had gone dark, I happened to pinch my mom’s bum and there was a screech which I easily identified as not my moms. Disastrously, it was some other lady’s bum. Since then I have retained myself from this habit to save other people’s embarrassment.

I must have been eight or nine then, when my dad sent me to the nearby store to buy “1/4 kilo current”. The innocent me didn’t know that it was one of my dad’s stupidest game on me. Even now after so many years, the shop owner asks me “ ¼ kilo current venuma?”

And as days passed, I started entertaining everyone with my epic dance moves and lovely singing voice every time there was a power cut. Once my roomie, locked me off the room when she couldn’t handle the torture anymore. Such is the power of my love torture. Do you want some love too?

And I love power cuts for another one particular reason- which made my dad gift me a laptop. He couldn’t stand any of my nonsensical talks he had to bear during power-cuts. Love him for that.I think that must have been the reason why laptops were born.

And its fun, getting dressed in the dark. Select your favt dress in the dark and match it with your favt shoes.Put on your accessories, if you think anything would go well with it. Try a new hair style, apply masacra, lipstick,kajal and wait for the lights to come back to look at you in the mirror. You will be surprised to see the new you Haven’t you tried it yet? Trust me there is no other ultimate fun in this world.

Now that I have grown, how do I handle these power cuts? I make use of that time, to catch up with my friends and call back all the missed calls I had received since the last power cut.
And not to forget, this has been my conversation starter with people to whom I have nothing else to talk to . “ mine is 10-11..whats yours?” and its easy from there to keep it going.

So what do you do when it is dark? Tagging Kalyani if she isn’t tagged yet

Sorry for not adding links to tag-be kind on this lazy friend:-)

Getting High on Comments

So what makes you get high?

This minute if you ask me, comments on my blog post makes me go high that playing 1000 illayaraja songs on loop would fail to do.

Such is the power. Such is the bond I share with my blog.

I ve always wondered how a simple press on a radio button(Follow Button) could make my day. That defines my happiness here at office.

On the other news, I ve been beautifying PPTs(i.e changing background colors, changing dates) endlessly for last one week. I am so obsessed that I dream about PPT with slides shows. Yes,it is that creepy.

And on reading Aishus Blog, I was reminded of my problems encountered with Maths in my school days. You might call me strange, but I count with my toes too Toes come in to picture when I have a tough problem where I have to subtract any number from 11 to 19 with any other number. Say 13-9 , I always had to bend down to touch my toes to see how many are left over, to give them my answer. So pathetic I was. And my mom(Ramanujam of my family) came up with this bloody brilliant idea.

Little did she know that her precious daughter would get humiliated every time she started to count. I once wore slippers for my maths exam,since shoes made my task difficult. Anyway I digress.
This practice gushes in me every now and then. Recently, the keerai-kattu karan was startled to see me getting uncomfortable with something in my toes. Poor thing, how does he know about my counting habits.

So , Please tell me your weird habits and what all makes you high on my comments section