Desi Train

Alcohol! The desire, the hate, the temporary nirvana, the stupidity, the behavior, the so many more things it offers or takes away from you, all rolled into one – Alcohol. Sometimes I want to divorce it forever, at times I want to drown myself in it, and at times it serves as the ideal companion in an event of happy get-togethers or even in moments dipped in sorrow. Alcohol, and my journey with it started in August……………

– Of the late 80s. My first year degree college results have just been declared. Pune rains. It is late evening. It’s dark and hard to read the results declared on the notice-board. Using a match, I and a few others are checking whether we have passed and moved on to the second year. “Yippie” goes one, leaps up and runs out. “Array main pass ho-gaya” (I’ve passed) screams another and runs off….my hearts now jumping hard and bad. I’ve covered three fourths of the results and my number’s not there. “Thank you God!!!” screams one of the last guys and runs off. It’s only me left with the match passed on to me by the last guy as a happy gesture of him having moved to the second year. Thanks, I nervously mutter. After about 20 minutes, I notice that I’m reading the entire notice-board for the sixth time. My number’s not there you fucking idiot.

And then it dawns on me. At 18 years of age I have accomplished a task never achieved before by me. I have managed to flunk each of the 10 papers of my final exam. I have failed. With shaky legs, shock enveloping me, I come out of the building. Rains pouring hard, I’m dripping wet, no umbrella, no raincoat…I start walking the streets with tears pouring down my cheeks. Fortunately with the rains no one notices that I was crying.

That opened the doors to my first step into alcohol-land….

A few weeks later, I found myself sharing an apartment with 3 other guys. It changed me, my world. “AD” like me, had failed too. So there was this bonding of two freaking failures. One evening AD goes – “Have you had beer before?” I go No. “Lets go out for beer. It will help you relieve the stress”. Hmmm, not a bad idea. I need a release from the pressure environment which of course your humble blog writer is the cause of.

Kingfisher.
I was hooked. There was no looking back. Wow. The light steps, lightness in heart and mind. AD and I are walking back and I find myself talking, releasing, opening my heart. Strangely AD is acting as the godfather of drinking (which he still is). Offering me suggestions and solutions to my problems. “Dude – forget about everything. You should have studied. You didn’t. So forget about it and correct your past mistakes.” – the next morning though, I realize that the suggestions by AD should be applicable to him too. I look up from my bed and see him snoring, his fat Bengali belly rising up and down with each snore. Idiot. Him and my other room-mates pulled my pants down while I slept and laughed hard. I thought I could hear them laughing but was too drunk to open my bloody eyes. I’m gonna get this Bengali Babu soon I promise myself. Ten years later, this Bengali babu refused to continue his wedding ceremony, until I (was running late) arrived at the marriage hall. I think he has this guilt of introducing me to cigarettes and alcohol. It’s deeply ingrained in him. And I make the most appropriate use of his guilt whenever the need be.

Haywards 5000/10000.
A few weeks later, our senior roommate PD takes both AD and me, well to what else but drinking and dinner. And that’s exciting now for me. Drinking has become an escape, a happy event, a joyous celebration of having fucking failed. Well, but it’s the first time I’m exposed to philosophy, ideas, more philosophy, more freaking ideas. We end up sharing our table with a single guy who was – what else – drinking. Slowly we start conversing with him. He’s a big shot in a big company. We talk politics; we talk engineering, technology, movies….little do I realize that I’ve passed my current beer limit of one bottle. I’m on my third. My leg’s feel like I’ve left them home. My head starts dropping forward and PD while talking and without looking at me, simply pulls me up straight – only to find me dropping my head forward again. This dropping forward and being pulled back up, goes on for sometime, until I have my first alcohol related emotion. Yes dear blog reader. The wonderful emotion, that something strange is going to happen. Something ready - to knock you out in an instant. I’m ready to “throw up”. I get up walk to the restroom. And all the three bottles of Haywards 5000 start rolling out. First I feel bad. But there’s a sense of relief when I hear throwing up sounds from the adjoining cubicles. Good. This is a normal thing. I go back to the table and order my fourth beer.

Gin and Limca.
I’m well into smoking – cigarettes, now. Good progress. Well, it’s the birthday of one of the guys and he wants to throw a party at our apartment. Well who are we to refuse. AD and I are “bekar” (worthless/penniless/jobless/morons), PD is a confirmed alcoholic (exaggeration) while AS our fourth roommate, a complete teatotaler and nonsmoker is out visiting family in Bombay. Ideal situation for a birthday bash. Enter Gin along with a couple of other drinks. I prefer something sweet, can’t take the bitter taste I say. Everybody looks up at me “Dude you are still a kid then. You need to learn a lot about drinking..”- they go on and on. “All right, give him gin with LIMCA”. Wow that tastes good, I think. Drinking gin now introduces me to the land which is much ahead of the land of philosophy and ideas. The land of poetry. And then the land of fights. In a couple of hours, a fight has royally erupted in our house among the drinking guests, AD pulls me down under the writing table and we both idiots are smoking cigarettes and watching the fight as if we are watching a movie from the lower stall of a theater.

Old Monk with Thums Up around Street Dogs.
There was this super filthy dhaba by the highway. But a beautiful location. There were beds made of rassi (coir ropes) placed in the back of the dhaba which was exclusively meant for us students to sit eat and drink. The back of the dhaba was our favorite, cause it gave us the view of open hills covered with lush greenery and about 20 feet away from where we sat were the railway tracks, where it was a pleasure watching the trains zip by while having our drinks. Who else but AD introduces me to that place. So AD and me, one late evening, walk to the dhaba, say our “salaams” to the dhaba owner and walk to back, sit on those cots which are fucking pricking my bottom really bad. “Relax” says AD “you’ll get used to it.” – I did. The mesmerizing hills, open scenery and those trains zipping by did have its magical effect. “Lets try something new today” I go and AD orders rum and thums-up. “Hmm tastes good doesn’t it”, Yeah, I like it. Completely drunk and sunk in Old Monk we start our walk back to our apartment, when we are exposed to our first ever encounter with…..street dogs. There’s this empty street and we two drunks are looking right at them. About 8 or 10 or them have grouped together about 30 feet in front of us, sometimes looking at us, sometimes looking the other way, sometimes exposing their freaking vicious teeth.
“Why don’t you go ahead, I want to pee and I’ll join you in a moment” says AD… even in the height of my drunkenness I am fully aware when I’m being screwed.
Well I want to pee too, lets do it and then walk. AD looks at me. “Damn” he thinks. So we finish our peeing business on the sidewalk, rub our hands on our pants as if they were some cleaning agent step on the road, and….the 10 dogs are still there collectively looking at us. One or two now move toward us.
AD, fuck what the hell are they doing.
AD, not taking his eyes off the dogs for a second goes “I don’t know, but whatever they are planning…it does not look good”.
Is there any other way to go home.
“No”
I guess then we are screwed
“Yes I think we are.” AD then tries something silly. “Shhh, chooo, chooo, go away” and throws a few stones at them.
What the fuck are you doing?.
“We used to do this in Calcutta. It works. Trust me”.
From that day till today I have blindly refused to trust any of AD’s “Calcutta ideas”. The dogs now had started to bark at us and dangerously coming forward.
AD WHAT THE FUCK SHOULD WE DO NOW I look by my side. AD is not there. HE IS FUCKING RUNNING IN REVERSE DIRECTION. I too start running, catching up with him.
“RUN RUN”
FUCK I AM- We look back. THE FREAKING DOGS ARE RUNNING AFTER US NOW. WE BOTH SCREAM AT THE SAME TIME “BACHAOOO BACHAOO (HELP HELP)”
After a few seconds, we watch two people running towards us from opposite ends. Help has arrived. No more old monk. FUCK NO MORE DRINKING. As we move closer to the two people running towards us – I can now see them more clearly – two guys – in uniform, cops. Two havaldars running with their dandas (sticks) towards us.
“What’s going on what happened” They are screaming to us
We just keep screaming “BACHAOO BACHAAOOO”
We reach them. “WHO’S AFTER YOU. WHO ARE YOU RUNNING FROM?” Go the havaldars.
Trying to catch our breadths, we look back. There are no dogs. None. Vanished. Sigh of relief.
“WHO IS RUNNING AFTER YOU” The havaldars have a worried look and screaming at us.
I reply meekly “kutta…” (dog)
Their concern changes to anger “YOU M* FUCKING DRINKING STUDENTS – COME TO THE POLICE STATION” They take their sticks and start beating our bottoms.
AD SCREAMS “RUN”. We start running from the havaldars now in the direction of the dogs. The havaldars close behind us, we see the 10 dogs out there in front of us now, they were sitting right in the middle of the street, a few now slowly standing up on seeing 4 people madly running towards them.
“WHAT THE FUCK SHOULD WE DO” goes AD
STOP THINKING, JUST RUN YOU FUCK, WE SLIDE BY THE GROUP OF DOGS. They do nothing and just keep watching the two of us running the Olympics with two fat havaldars trying to catch up with us…..

Whiskey and et all.
Old Monk kind of became the main stay if I wasn’t drinking beer. Whiskey would flow in now and then. But I didn’t like it much. Plus the hangover from Indian whiskey was bad. Atleast for me.

Glenfiddich
Well I got introduced to this nice scotch a few years ago while visiting one of my friends in California. It became a drink for special occasions.

American Bar Life
No one here knew what a “peg” means. My “dark rum” and coke was served in small glasses and it tasted ugh. Bars here meant shots or fruity drinks. After a long time I realized that the best way to get my kind of a drink was to ask for “dark rum with coke” in a tall glass. That solved it. Light beer, Bloody marys, Rum punch, mango martinis, or good old coors light is what I got used to. Well destiny found a replacement for AD in America. EG my American friend reminds me a lot about AD. Soon I got introduced to EG’s friends, their parties and binge drinking. I used to find many a woman attractive at these parties, but a few hours later their throwing up from all that drinking would simply put me off. But drinking with EG made me realize one thing, there was something called too much of drinking. I was getting too old for this binge drinking shit.

Alcohol and Gulzar/Ghazals
If you are filled with hate, anger and jealousy against someone, whatever the reason is, then, do this. Invite them for drinks at your place. Turn on Gulzar hits or the sad ghazals (I personally recommend the former) and wait. Simply wait and watch. Your target guest will soon be pouring tears in his/her glass. They will think their life is full of depression and sadness. They will even pour out some of their own shayari/poetry. Good. Now pack them up and send them home. The hangover of Alcohol mixed with Gulzar’s poetry should last not less than 3 days. But ensure you do not drink with your guest and you have ear plugs preventing you from listening to the songs. You don’t want to end up having the same depressing hangover as your guest over the next 3 days. Congratulations for pushing your enemy into the pits of low self esteem, depression and more self inflicted bouts of alcohol and Gulzarism.

Alcohol and Porn(applied to guys)
I am the king. I am John Holmes. Even Better. With a few hours of alcohol, the ugliest of woman on the porn film appears hot hot hot. Forget about watching Carmen Elecktra or Jenna Jameson. They would simply shoot your jism right out of mini-me. And all you did was look at Jenna and then just glanced at your mini-me. I can do it 10 times tonight. Yeah! Right. If you are completely drunk, exercising is an alien word and your belly blocks the sight of your mini-me, you should be ready to call 911 when you mix porn, alcohol and the confidence that you can do it 10 times in the same night. Try cumming once and you will be snoring till somebody the next morning wakes you up and questions you on why you slept without your pants on the sofa, the tv/video still running and what the smelly white stains all over the carpet are.

Mavrodaphne
Wine. I always hated it. Red, white, port, dessert, anything, anything at all. They simply needed 15 minutes after my sip to give me a splitting headache. I still keep away from wine except I found one from Greece. Mavrodaphne. A sweet, red wine which can be had as an appetizer or after meals. I haven’t seen it in stores, so I buy it online or when I go to Greek restaurants.

Alcohol and Girlfriends
Never ever combine the two. If you do, moderation is absolutely necessary. Cause you don’t want to let your tongue slip. Or else you may find yourself getting your ass kicked cause you spoke out loud to answer her own asked question. And your answer was Yes, you did think she smelt bad during sex. Please be prepared to get no sex for the next few weeks if you ever end up saying that. I know. I learnt it the hard way. When your wife or girlfriend asks you a question about herself it means she needs assurance that she looks good/smells good/her new clothing style is marvelous…no she doesn’t want any criticism. You know this during your normal state. Unfortunately alcohol has the tendency to dumb you further than what you already are. Lock that tongue up please if you don’t want “sex” to be struck off from the dictionary of your life.

Life without Alcohol
It’s just fine. Even better. I stopped with hard alcohol and then the beer. I do drink my favorite wine now and then, but I do believe my experiments with alcohol are nearing its end. Forever.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 2nd, 2005 at 10:19 am
Filed under Comedy, Life Flava
Tags : .

Views : 1,608 views
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.