Cheap Hang-outs

Once upon a time I knew a guy called Chadda. The first time I saw him, he was outfitted in a rather ill-fitting jeans, white shirt and a bright red tie. The tie looked like something he wore to school not so long ago. "I wore this tie to school not so long ago", he said. He was 17, tallish but not quite, stoutish but not quite - overall seemed like the kind who had a lot of growing up to do but didn't know into which direction. I was 20 and all grown up (or so I thought). Initially I didn't know his name, but guessed that he was from the prosperous hinterlands of Punjab and I was right.

We were at some sort of boring IT convention which was to run into several days. We were supposed to choose course-buddies and Chadda and I almost simultaneously sought each other out. (My reason is that he was the only remotely good looking bloke around - plus I had this weirdly odd and oddly weird affinity to Punjab). He later said that he chose me coz he liked the Daku-style bindi on my forehead. I don't remember much of the convention, except that we had a lot of fun during the breaks over endless cups of tea and biscuits. That's what conventions are all about... tea and biscuits. From the time we were paired up, we were teased that we were a couple, that we knew each other beforehand and we pretended not to, etc. We used to laugh and joke about this during the tea breaks. Over the course of the convention the joke got a bit too much and I couldn't see the humour in it anymore. So I told everyone (including the guy who was conducting the convention) to back off. Finally the convention ended, we exchanged emails and numbers and that was the end of the friendship... or so I thought.

Those days I used to conduct lectures at an institute in the university campus. One day as I was walking out of the campus I bumped into Chadda waiting patiently for me at the bus-stop. Apparently he had been there since several hours in the hope of spotting me. Why didn't he just call - those were not the time of cell-phones and I guess my landline was out of order - as was the norm during the monsoon. We chatted and caught up. The kid was obviously infatuated and bristled when I pointed it out to him. I told him he would grow out of it. He sulked a while and then brightened up. His 18th birthday was coming up. He invited me to visit his house that day. He stayed in Virar with his mom, while I stayed at Kalyan - a good 2.5 hour journey away. Although I agreed, I didn't really plan to go.

However, I found myself taking an early morning train to Dadar and onwards to Virar on his birthday. He had invited a few other friends and we chatted away while he plied us with samosas and sweets. His mom was out to the market and was expected shortly. I had given him a card that said "It's great hanging out with you. Happy Birthday" and it had a picture of a few shirts drying on a clothesline. I thought it was quite funny. As soon as his mom arrived, he showed her the gifts, including the card I gave. That is when the fireworks happened. He was called into the kitchen and given an earful for inviting a "cheap" girl home, etc. I didn't wait to hear the end of it and walked out. That was the end of our friendship. Sigh!