Meet my Mates

This post is due from October, 2015.

I will be back to my bed in some hours. People close to me cannot understand how is it that I am so chained to my room, my house. I do not too. Given any opportunity. Even with it being a small little place, I prefer it to glassy cafeterias (I have a sound coffee collection) and lounging publicly. Anyway, so the point is, I am headed towards the airport in sometime and will be home soon! Home to some cold white rice and hot mild fish curry. I will have unpacked and sorted out the things that need immediate attention from tomorrow. Tomorrow is such a tiring concept as opposed to yesterday. And I will miss my mates from the last ten days. So I thought last evening, as both of them dozed into each other's heads in the cab, they deserved a paragraph each, at least.

Elkay: She is a Marwari Jain. Her family has been residing for a very long time in Chennai, and thus she is now prrropppper Tamil, the spelling pronouncing her accent. I met her at Gandhinagar, Gujarat, at a Seminar. We clicked immediately. Some people do. To an extent that when I could not believe that we share the same birth dates, and demanded to see a proof, she, rather obediently, even though a good five year older than I am, brought out her passport for verification. She discovered a milk booth in the dry state when I was dying of the divine thirst. The rest, as they say, is history. Or, in our case, geography. Yes, we met next in Calcutta, after about four years, where she was attending a Refresher Course at Jadavpur University, uncannily and fortunately, just the time when I was attending the Department for my Coursework for my PhD. We attended many classes together, hopped to landmarks, and ate to our heart's content. Oh, she has some sweet toothaa. Enough to put a Bong to shame.

The next year I asked if I could visit Chennai during the Pujas to go and stay in Kodaikanal. She agreed. With my immediate excitement that I would be getting a drop in temperature, she dampened my spirits, that it would be on the contrary. So I asked her is she would like to visit Sikkim. She agreed. You see? No hitches. She added, "Lets add Darjeeling also, aa?"

"Why not?" the ambitious adventurous in me replies.

And the next day, just like that, came my question, "Elkay, wanna go to Bhutanaa?"

Pause. "Chhalo."

You know who is a perfect travel buddy? Someone who is a vegetarian, a teetotaler, a migraine patient, and yet asks you to have chicken, drink beer and take the front seat. Someone who understands silence and screams at waterfalls, and who slams me, when at night I am crossing level after level of Candy Crush. "Gossip illai?"

We had a hit trip, one remains my personal favourite, having travelled to Phuket, China, Dubai, Turkey and Europe before it. I owe it to Elkay, as much as to the mountains and the waterfalls. The next year, we went Southwards and had another mate. Here too, she had one and half litres of puuuuure cow's milk, making the entire bungalow smell of it and we were at our Elkay-Kents best -- scooping unknown fruits, taking random destination decisions and drinking water off waterfalls. I look forward to a hat-trick with her this year. That's my Elkay.

M: This one joined in the journey Southwards. Being five years younger to me, and hence ten to Elkay, she was scandalised when she had to bear us scooping unknown fruits with unwashed hands, taking random destination decisions with neither prior booking nor the possibility of finding one, and completely horrified when she saw us dangerously drinking off waterfalls while dancing a step or two! Introducing a borderline OCD woman -- M -- a friend I have known for a very long time. Ten, perhaps, eleven years now, yet someone with whom I could have never known a journey would be such a fun. Primarily because we bullied her. Respecting ragging rules, there indeed is a joy in bullying. And what a joy to tease a buddy on cleaning a knife with her hand-sanitiser, when water is not available. We bugged her to come out with her sad love stories, only to make fun of them, and were overjoyed to find her enthusiastically finishing thalis, when neither of us could. This one too, did not provoke a nose towards someone else smoking. You have a problem, you leave. Why ask the person concerned to leave? Between the insanity that Elkay and I shared, she was the balanced moderator. We have really benumbed her with walking backwards uphill, and laughing about silly things like sleeping in the car if no other place could be found. And oh yes, was she speechless when Elkay instigated me towards finding Magic Mushrooms, when all the while she was trying to make me forget about it. M is one person I would love more travels with, she is such a sweet caregiver. She is such a cute care-asker. Her luggage had more that the two of us had for Bhutan. You name it, she has it -- tissue paper, hand sanitiser, scissors, plastic bags, knife, band-aid, and oh lord, the amount of clothes -- enough to furnish us another vacation. I mean, being seasoned travellers, we do successfully, somehow, manage to forget essentials, like medicines. Trust me, she would not.

M is Hermione's Bag -- the least of unexpected things can come out of her -- anger, laughter, chocolate, coffee sachets, tea bags, safety-pins, optimism, and definitely, an endearing tolerance -- to be able to take the other two's in-sync insanity.

I am profoundly lucky when it comes to friends, and duly accept the phrase which said something like we are lucky to choose our friends, because we cannot choose our family.

Here's to Elkay & M. Here's to more travels. Oh, how I wish all three of us were here to clink on our glasses -- Elkay's with milk in it, M's with juice and mine with whiskey. That's tolerance, folks!