What a compliment!

Today I woke up late and so instead of walking the 3.5km route to my office, I decided to try for some public transport, and as luck would have it, the moment I reached the bus stand, the bus came. I was dressed in a blue jeans, a well fitting white tee and a sporty looking jacket on top, and was wearing my usual running shoes. After I sat down, another fairly pretty woman came and sat next to me. And the normal response for me would be to fantasize about talking to that woman, or if we in some way managed to connect or something like that, and the normal situation would be that nothing would happen cos I would not really start a conversation. But today something different happened - she started a convo with me! At first I could not believe it, I mean come on, this is India. Women do not start conversations in busses. But this one for some reason decided to start a convo with me, and that was such an amazing compliment for me.

She asked me if was going to the sports club (my sporty look paid off!). I asked her about her destination. We exchanged professions, backgrounds, where we stay etc, and then my stop came. I may never see her again, or I may run into her again cos she lives nearby. Maybe I should've given her my card, but it didn't strike me at all then. Its not that I found her to be terribily attractive or something, but well, she was a single woman who started a conversation with me on her own, and for that reason alone I had a smile on my face for the next 4 hours :)

Now there's something for me to be learned from this experience. I didn't start a convo with her, I did not do anything to encourage her to start a convo, and yet when she actually did, I felt really happy about that. And this is exactly what I need to be doing with woman I find attractive. The fact that she does not initiate contact does not mean that she does not want me to initiate contact. Maybe from within she's hoping that I will initiate contact. What do I have to lose but my izzat. Which is the whole blody problem. My izzat. That is what I am afraid to lose despite all the show that I put up about not caring about what the world thinks, I do care. Why else would I not be more free in initiating contact with women I find attractive?

Catharsis

I think I’m going through a process of catharsis forced by my condition as an entrepreneur.

I met Satya on Monday, and that man has always been a sort of a role model. He told me that I need to face up to my desires. I need to be able to choose. He told me somethings about having a choice. I did not understand that fully, but I did understand that he was trying to say something profound to me. He told me something like how entrepreneurship strips us down to the bare bone, how it forces us to look into the mirror and forces us to recognize and acknowledge who we are.

But man o man. If I survive this phase somehow, man o man, I’ve got it made. I’ve learned my lesson many times over. I need to give feedback more openly to my faculty. I can’t extract my money’s worth out of them without that feedback. I need to give feedback to all my employees. I need to stop being afraid of giving feedback. If it hurts them, then it has to hurt them, there’s nothing I can do about that. And like a fool I still haven’t spoken to all my faculty till now.

I hope I can make it out of this somehow. I hope I can make it out.

Guilt

This is something that’s been writing itself in my mind for some time now, but just haven’t had the timwe to sit down and write it. Its been a terribily busy week, my business was on the verge of shutdown on Monday, and it came back to life yesterday (Thursday). One more week. That’s pretty much how the business is surviving – one more week after another. But I’m quite upbeat about sustainability now.

Now coming to the topic, recently M called me her hero and I was instantly reminded of this.

I was probably in class 2nd or 3rd or 4th. We were assigned seats by the teacher where we had to sit everyday. Her name was Ali. She used to sit next to me. We were good buddies, the way a boy and a girl can be buddies without any attraction coming in between. Of course we were probably too young to know better. If I try to visualise her, I see someone with a darkish complexion, and a mature face. Not a looker or anything. I remember we used to share stuff like pencils sharpners etc, and also we probably helped each other in studies, though I honestly do not remember much of her except for that incident.

As was bound to happen, our friendship started getting teased by our neighbours. I don’t know if they teased her or only the boys teased me, but I do remember feeling embarrassed. And that day, after the school had ended and we were boarding our buses back home, I remember walking alone to the bus back home. I think I must’ve been mostly a loner at that time too. And then I saw Ali sitting in her bus. It was not the normal big sized bus, but a smaller size one. She was sitting on the window seat. And I don’t know why, but I picked up a stone and hurled it towards her. I was some distance away from her bus, and for a second or two nothing happened. And then I heard the sound of glass shattering, and she screamed and a couple of other children also screamed. I don’t remember what happened next, but it seemed that I had thrown the stone quite accurately and she narrowly escaped getting hurt. Ali was not the type to get hysterical or take something like this lying down. She immediately complained and accused another person in our class – NB. NB apparently had threatened her and had been troubling her for a while and she assumed that it must’ve been her. She could not even think that it might have been me. And finally as the buses were pulling away, I saw that NB was being dragged screaming and kicking and crying to the principal’s office. His parents were called, and he didn’t come to school for a day or two. I think his parents were of the cruel variety and would not have believed his protests of innocence and he must’ve been terribily punished.

Later that evening, as I was watching TV, there was an interview of a Cop, I think it was Kiran Bedi, and I got terrified. I thought that she knew about my crime and she would come to arrest me tonight. I think I have been a bit afraid of cops ever since. From what I remember, our seats were changed a few days later, and I never maintained any sort of friendship with Ali. And Ever since I’ve also been carrying this guilt over what I had done, and have always felt bad because of it

Companionship.

I discovered the pleasure of companionship thanks to my sister. My sister Priyanca (isn’t that a beautiful name?) was in town during my holi vacations, and it was my good fortune that there was no one else to spend time with her and so me and her went around Delhi like a bunch of typical tourists. And I had such a good time, and more importantly I discovered what I would like in my companion for life – my jeevan sathi so to say. Here some things that I liked about Priyanca and I would like in my life partner.

We started out with doing some clothes shopping together and that’s where the connection began. She gave me really good feedback on what looked good on me and what did not, while at the same time weighing practical aspects (difficult to maintain etc). But she was not pushy about her views at all. If I was attracted to something, she encouraged me to go for it telling me the pluses of it. That was something I really liked.

What I really liked about her was her willingness to rough it out, to experience things fully without any cushionification. She had no objection to travelling by autos, to walking around rather than going by car etc. And she was game to try anything. She walked around the crowded streets of chandni chowk, she even got wet when some kids threw some balloons at us, but she took it quite sportingly.

I also liked the fact that she was quite a physical sort of a person. We were almost constantly maintaining physical contact – our shoulders touching, arms rubbing, at times she would hold on to my arm when she was very excited or nervous. And yet at the same time it was not over the top the way you would see two lovers with interlocked hands etc. I liked that.

She was great to talk to. She was really curious about India, wanted to learn and get more knowledge about stuff. She was a good listener, while at the same time was also interesting to listen to. She was genuinely interested in getting to know my thoughts and views about different things. She had a great sense of humor and an easy laugh. I really like that – women who laugh easily.

And last but not the least – she was also fitness conscious. She liked to eat healthy and get good exercise. This part is really important, because it is really difficult to eat healthy or take out time for exercising if your partner is not into all that stuff. You feel like you are not being a good team player if you suggest doing things that your partner does not like. And you somehow lose motivation if you have to exercise by yourself while your partner is sitting and watching TV. It’s a different matter when I am alone – then I can exercise with dedication. But I can’t exercise vigorously when I go visit my family because of this reason.