As I was wading through the Monday evening traffic on my way home, I happened to notice a simple yet beautiful moment at a traffic signal. To my right, was a kid sitting on the back seat of a motorbike, holding his new bicycle.

In that brief moment, as we all waited for the signal to change from red to green, I could see the glint in his eye, the anticipation, the eagerness to reach home as soon as possible and ride his new bicycle. That one look brought about a flood of memories of the good old times.

Have you ever noticed a fly caught in a spider’s web. The harder it tries to free itself from the sticky mesh, the deeper it gets entangled in the web. Most of us face similar situations at some point or the other of our lives. If you haven’t then either you are too young, or you have surrendered to the situation without even realizing you have. One time that most of us go through such an experience is when we have completed our studies, and are a couple of years into our job, and we have just had our first promotion.

Hindu mythology says that there are only three major events in a person’s lifetime: Birth, marriage and death. And it also says that since you are fully conscious only during one of these three events, you better celebrate it with all possible grandeur and make it memorable.

But in the life of an Indian ‘ex-teen but yet-to-be-called-uncle’ youth, there’s one other event that’s as eventful and memorable as the other three, and this one occurs when that person is fully conscious too. Wondering what I’m talking about ? Yes, its the first trip abroad/overseas for ‘higher’ studies.

There was this story I read a number of years ago, wherein two gentlemen wait for a third to join them at eight o’clock in the evening for a meeting that would become the crux of the story. A few minutes before eight, one looks out the window, sees no carriage stopping at their door and says, “I don’t think he’ll turn up.” Of course he had valid reasons for doubting the man’s word.
The other says, “He will. He is an Englishman. He will be here on the dot, at eight.”
Sure enough, midway into the clock’s chime, there is a knock at the door and the landlady announces his arrival.

Since as back as I can remember Mr. D, our neighbor, I have seen him strolling with a newspaper at 7am in his verandah, after which he would go inside, and then emerge an hour later, fully dressed, lunch in one hand, and rush out of his home and keep running till he found himself inside his bus. A chartered bus. Then at 5:30 pm he could be seen walking back to his house, at a much more relaxed pace than in the morning, after which he would shortly appear for a game of badminton.