30 Short Stories

The fresh aroma of hot jalebis and pakodas was the first thing that struck me when I got outta the Dadar station with a huge guy aka Abhimanyu. And the second thing that struck me was Vinay Pawaskar ka stud looks. And then many things went for a notification. Smita aur Riddhi ke beech mein pyar (man both were fighting to unload their luggage from the taxi), Alpesh ka nerdy look, Sumit ka sab ke saath interaction (man's always in action), Natasha ka checking out men, Lakshmi ka getting outta her luxurious car. Gursimran ka entry with his guitar along came Zeeshan with his squash racket. Somewhere i saw an aged man, was around 27 then, i guess, i thought he was from Lowe, but later i learnt that he was our classmate, Neville De Souza. And the rest went for a toss, cos then i could notice me feeling weird (din know any of the 29 unknown faces). Seeing everyone gather around Swaminarayan Temple, my eyes were only hunting for Deepti Mehta. She was then the course coordinator for Northpoint. It was she who was to take us to Khandala, to our dearly loved institute.

Now that we were on-board, the bus choked black hot vapor containing fine particles of carbon (surely must have, all the buses in India choke that way). And the journey to Northpoint started. Oh by the way, we left in two different buses, so we split into two groups. Thus, my chances of knowing others was down to 50.

I still remember how Vidhi Mehta and Gursimran were trying to entertain the crowd. I was least interested, hardly knew them then. There was this guy sitting next to me and Abhimanyu. Said he wanted to make a film someday. He was then talking to me about movies. Abhijeet. Was nice knowing him. He was equally dis-interested, guess he was feeling the same. The guy was calm, composed and excited. All of us were. He would'nt let you feel weird. I was comfortable by then. We reached Northpoint, now we were in one group. 29 people, with different ideas. 29 different thoughts. Suppose to be 30 right, well Dasmeet missed the orientation, mate was unwell then.

The orientation got over, we got introduced to Mr.Prem Mehta, Mr. S.V.Siva, Mr.Rajeshwar Upadhyay and Deepti Mehta, got our id's and we were off to Country Side. The lovely motel where we were put up.

Deepti allotted rooms to us. Again we were split in two groups. The girls were parked in the main building and the guys were placed in some khandar (they say all spooky events happen in such kinda place). It was getting dusky, i was sitting in the garden with Deepti, what we saw was a lean guy, like me, dragging a heavy suitcase, right from the entry of the motel. It was Dasmeet, one of my roomies (this word was coined by the girls).

MAY 22, 2005 was the day when this unforgettable event took place in our lives. And here we are, tow years thence, a long journey we have traversed and nothing to regret about. Nothing to forget. No memories to dispose. We have learnt only to cherish the 730 days of blissfulness.

Amit Bisani

P.S: For the rest 29 short stories, get in touch with the other 29 PGPAMC'ists.