Saurabh Sharma - TEENAGE DIARIES The Days That Were

TEENAGE DIARIES

THE DAYS THAT WERE

Saurabh Sharma

ISBN 978-93-52017-26-3

MRP : 325/

Copyright Saurabh Sharma, 2016

First published in India 2016 by Frog Books

An imprint of Leadstart Publishing Pvt Ltd

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Disclaimer: The Views expressed in this book are those of the Author and do not pertain to be held by the Publisher.

Editor: Akanksha Vaishnav

Cover: Suhail Mathur and Gaurav Kanoria

Layouts: Logiciels Info Solutions Pvt. Ltd.

Typeset in Palatino Linotype

Printed at Repro

Dedicated to

The rocking teenage life

Contents

About the Author

After living his school life in Baroda, a glimpse of which you will get in this novel, Saurabh Sharma did his engineering from NIT, Allahabad and pursued his MBA from Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies, Mumbai. Considered life of any party, he can pluck the strings of a guitar as well as your heart by telling stories of his life.

You can reach him on his Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/The-days-that-were-761949260559209/ that has 20k followers. He currently resides in Bangalore and is working on his 2nd novel.

I would first like to thank my wife, Romil, for accompanying me in this journey of writing the novel. This would not have seen the light of the day without her.

Leadstart publishers for believing in my story and helping it reach my readers.

My mom, dad, brother and bhabhi for standing by me throughout.

My friend Aabhar Dadhich for being the most useful critique and shaping the novel.

My brother-in-law, Rohit for all the healthy inputs

My unofficial editor, Swarna, for helping me to trim down the manuscript.

My friend Gaurav Kanoria for his immense help in designing the cover

My friends Rashid, Hemant, Anu, Harshita, Shraddha, Pranav, Ian, Middha, Shubhankar, Butool, Sharan, Anshu, Vivek and Abhishek whose feedbacks have kept me motivated.

My cousin, Yogesh, for his kind words.

All my school friends who gave me those indelible memories

My 20,000 friends, through my Facebook page The days that were, who have inspired me throughout this journey.

O lle, Olle!! Whaaaat are you doinggg?? my neighbors screeching voice bombarded my eardrums.

Snuggled up in my dads lap, I opened my droopy eyes. It was difficult not to fall asleep with dads mind-numbing humming in the backdrop. Though my dads humming was a lazy Indianized lullaby that I had grown to dread, I was vexed at being jolted out of my sixth slumber of the day.

Im sleeping, you moron! And why the fuck are you making this monkey face? I thought.

As he scared me for the next fifteen minutes by making weird sounds and faces, I literally had to pee my way out of that situation. Also, it served as a mark of retribution.

Though being a kid in an Indian middle class family has its own perks, it is mentally and physically taxing. While you will be celebrated and adulated for a few days or weeks, the onus of looking cute all the time sans any make-up lies on your tiny shoulders. Being the cynosure of every congregation, you become the sole touchstone of happiness for adults.

In retrospect, you should enjoy this phase while it lasts, as two inherent traits of Indian parents eventually challenge the shit out of you.

Firstly, they compare your behavior vis--vis the behavior of every kid of your age that they have ever known (including themselves as kids). And secondly, they like to show your behavior off in front of others (to advertise their parenting skills).

Consequently, the expectations from you to conduct yourself in a certain manner skyrocket. It is most likely that youll fail to meet these expectations. And before you can even blink your eyes, your adorability plummets and irritability shoots up.

Now, my friend, you are a chore.

One of the chores is to give you a name, an identitythe crisis of which you will probably keep fighting for, for the rest of your life. The importance of naming a kid in any Indian middle class family can be manifested by the fact that though there is no birth ceremony, there is a naming ceremony conducted with much fanfare. Tired of the atrocious sounds that people called me, I remember being excited about my christening ceremony. Finally, I hoped that people will associate me with only one sound, the sound of my name!

The deal was that after a brief ceremony, the pundit, on the basis of the planetary placements and the time of my birth, would announce a letter. My parents and fifty other witnesses would then decide a name starting with that letter. As I was sitting bored on my moms lap, the pundit finally declared, Bachhe ki Rashi mithun hai. Bachhe ka bhavishya ujjwal hai! (The childs sun sign is Gemini. His future is very bright!)

Come on! Say it! Whats my name!!? I thought impatiently.

Naam ka pehla akshar Gh achha rahega! (The first letter of the name Gh would be nice!) He dropped a bomb.

What! You crazy fraud! Check again! There must be a mistake! I thought wide awake with this ominous revelation.

When I looked at others in the congregation, I saw unfortunate danger looming as nobody seemed unsettled.

How about Ghananan? an aunty exulted. I jerked my neck towards her to shut her up.

Hmm... How about Ghananand? dad said.

WHAAAAAT? Would you really do this to your own son? I wanted to scream.

Hmm Gha... Ghaseeta my grandma pondered.

LADY!! SERIOUSLY?? I thought.

No, I dont like the sound of it, mom said. Thank god.

I cried my lungs out that evening, hoping to make my parents realize how agonizing it was to hear the juntas suggestions. But they were oblivious to the hint.

I was mercilessly christened Ghanshyam.

My parents justify it now by saying that probably I am the only Ghanshyam of the modern era. I immediately get tempted to compare myself to the last dodo of its times.

Putting aside the issue of my name, during the brief sightings that I had of myself in a mirror while moving around the house in my pre-formative years, I realized that I was a plump lump of cuteness overloaded. But my confidence took a bashing for the first time during my parents anniversary when I was about to turn one. To begin with, just to make me fill the shoes of a missing female child in the house, I was made to wear a red and white polka dots frock and sport a ribbon stitched with the same fabric.

Ma! You wish Id wear this to my first public sighting! I attempted to say through a wide-eyed expression with my tongue smacking my lips. She probably mistook my countenance as that of animated acceptance. The last nail in my plucks coffin was a red bindi slapped on my forehead.