Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

-Robert Frost.

(I'm not a connoisseur of poetry. Except a dash of Odgen Nash, I've never really delved into the more profound verses of poets. But I stumbled upon this one when I was casually flipping through an old school poetry book. For the first time, I could relate to this poem. There is some connection, almost as if Mr. Frost is telling me these words personally. Call me cliched, but the hint of any connection with Literature whatsoever has now raised my hopes of perhaps getting some inspiration to perform better in my OE paper!)

Cul-ah '08

This is my second Cul-ah at college….and I can safely say that this was miles better than the last one. Agreed, our college now looks like Pompeii after Vesuvius erupted, the Union managed to pull off a fest that was spectacular….all the renovation ruins were nicely camouflaged in the theme Mardi Gras, the Spanish Carnival.

Some of the highlights of Cul-ah ‘08

1. The Bingo stall, which was hosted by a man wearing a pink shirt, a hand bag and shiny white shoes that were at least 2 feet long and pointy at the end. I’m not kidding, I almost got caught into playing one of the Bingo games because I was ogling at his shoes!
2. 
   The Pastry shop, which none of us could pass by without drooling. But none of us were willing to spend 70 bucks for a chocolate mousse either!
   
3. Speaking of chocolate, we did spend 15 bucks on a sinful Chocolate Honey cake drizzled with fudge sauce….aah…the best 15 bucks I’ve spent!
   
4. The Nescafe stall. If we happened to be wearing the official Cul-ah volunteer badge, we were given free cold coffees. I flicked a badge from my friend, but the Coffee wasn’t worth it.
   
5. The main stage events. All of them. We managed to get the worst places to see the events from. Every second was a taunt on how short I really am.
   
6. Indian Music, one college actually played Om Jai Jagdish with an electric guitar and drums! Amazing!
   
7. The dazed looks on fellow college girls. I was told that this dazed look was brought about by the countless number of guys suddenly invading our college.
   
8. Most of the girls had suddenly decided to dress up like Christmas trees or somewhat similar.
   
9. The boys were no less. Agreed that the sun was a little too bright. But that doesn’t justify the sunglasses being worn in the Basement for some Graphic Designing event!
   
10. Listening to snatches of conversation here and there…..we heard some stuff like:
    “Oh wow!! That sweater boy is just soooooo cute!!!”
    “Hey! That cotton candy you are eating totally matches your earrings!”
    
11. Watching the banana-eating competition. Urgh….one guy managed to eat 17 bananas in 2 minutes. Needless to say, we couldn’t find him when his name was announced as the winner!
    
12. The Big Fight. As a volunteer, I got to rule the microphone, even if it was for making mundane announcements. People looked at us volunteers as if we had discovered some rare element!
    
13. The dances! Both onstage as well as offstage. While the contemporary dance was un-comprehensive onstage, one group of boys danced to the same tunes with all porki steps offstage. In the end, no one bothered looking at the on stage event!
    
14. The cacophony of music blaring from all sides. While on one stage there was Rihanna's Umbrella being played, from another place came ‘Raa raa (remixed version!)’ and from some auditorium upstairs came a Carnatic music raga. Everything melted into one another and the results were actually pretty upbeat as well as melodius!
    
15. The bright splash of colors and music everywhere….not to forget the loud voices of everyone and the constant announcements being made…..everything was such a chaos….a rather elegant chaos, if I may say so!
    
    You know, I’ve always seen movies where college fests are shown. I thought these movies overrated the fests. But Cul-ah lived up to every one of my star-studded fest expectations!
    

Ew…Teasing!

Imagine getting up late on the first day of college in the New Year. And then you realize that the milk at home is over, so you run over to your corner shop in pajamas with a disgruntled look, only to be greeted by a ‘Haaaaai Baaaybeeee!’ at that sleazy shop corner. Ew. What a beginning!

It’s rampant and it is spreading in Bangalore like some epidemic. These are men who have no jobs, no ambition and no life, really. Ew Teasing, I call it. And they target women of all ages, shapes and sizes. The fact that you own one X chromosome more than them enthralls them, I think. Actually, the guys who resort to eve teasing wouldn’t even know the spelling of ‘chromosome’. This is probably why they continue to eve tease countless women even after reprimands.

Sadakchaap, suits them perfectly, down to those fake Nikes. Citizens of different cities react to eve-teasers react differently. If such men came across any woman who grew up drinking lassi and eating makhan parathas, they would be met with a shower of chappals. It is only us, who remain docile. Ignore- we say- it's the best way to stop them. True, ignoring these sidey chaps does help in discouraging them. But when the teasing gets out of hand, then all the anger within each of us will only result in a dastardly implosion.

The worst episode of eve-teasing that I witnessed was in Goa. Our college had gone there for a trip. True, 250 girls in one beach is bait for these hormonally super charged morons. But the fact that they walked around shamelessly holding their camera phones and clicking anyone and everyone they saw irked most of us to no end. We caught several phones and deleted the pictures and threw the phone away and screamed, ‘Catch’ at them! The cheap thrill they got at ogling at badly clicked 1.3 mega pixel cameras was nothing compared to the looks we gave them.

Munnabhai is probably to only ‘tapori’ that intelligent girls can fall for. Wearing clothes that can give even a rainbow an inferiority complex is just plain jatang, not attractive. Begging any and every female to ‘fraaandship them’ is not the best pick up line. When will such men ever understand? It is only in movies that women find rowdy romeos very endearing. And what happens in reel life is a big ‘reelu’. Stay away, please!