Monday, May 23, 2005

Pitcher perfect friendship

A few days back, I checked into to this company on the first day of Summer Internship. I was assigned a cubicle and a Compaq that refused to run on Windows! I was asked to meet the administrator regarding my comp, in the server room. So off I went in the general direction of the server room and yanked opened the door.

This would be the last time in my short life that I open a server room without knocking. The scene before me was horrific. Leaning languidly against the wall was a tall and strappy young woman kissing a man who seemed halfway down her throat. She was pretty engrossed in chewing him but soon noticed my presence. She stopped mid chew, regarded me with great interest and spat out the poor guy who wobbled out in a jiffy. I retreated from the server room ashen and shaking.

1 pm: My computer was now behaving like a good comp and I was busy with the half done tasks of the last incumbent. Suddenly a blow landed on my back and I was eyeball to eyeball with the keyboard. I have never been so close to the keyboard, in fact I have never been so close to anyone. I collected my breath and looked up fearfully. The ‘server room woman’ was regarding me with an amused expression on her face.

“ Hi, I am Sunitha from Q&A . You the new Communications Intern?” Her face was friendly and I reluctantly nodded my head in affirmation.

This is how I met Sunitha two months back. Two months, that was to change my life so drastically that I once attempted……..immigration.


Sunitha was ( I am sure) a Texas cowgirl in her last life. She was part Coorgi, part Punjabi and part man-eater. She rode a Yamaha (or was it a Bajaj or a TVS?), weighed 150 pounds and was bright eyed and bushy tailed even after dunking a couple of gallons of beer. She lived life kingsize and smoked the same brand too. Sunitha drove at a break neck speed of 100 or 120 kmph on Bangalore roads. And red lights would see her sail effortlessly into the rear window of a BTS bus or the lap of the nearest software techie on bike. She would then flutter her lashes and act like the ‘maiden in distress’.

She became my self appointed guardian and friend and nicknamed me ‘billi’ that’s Hindi for ‘cat”. No, I don’t have blue eyes but a light brown that she said reminded her of her cat back home in Madikeri !

Friday nights turned to nightmare as she regularly landed at my room to drag me Pub hopping. I had trained my friends to thwart her when the door rattled at 7:30 pm every Friday night.

Knock Knock
Friend 1 tremulously: Who’s there?
Sunitha! Where’s billi ?
Friend 2: Gone to Kerala
Friend 3: Gone to Commercial Street.
Friend 1: Gone for a walk.

Sunitha would snort in exasperation and push open the door and glare contemptuously at my brave friends cowering like frightened mice behind the door. And I would be dragged willy nilly to the nearest pub. Over a period of time I kept a scarf and dark sun glasses near the door that I could grab while being dragged out. At the pub, Sunitha would demolish pitcher after pitcher of draught beer while I took tiny furtive sips from my small glass of beer. I would of course be wearing the scarf pulled low over my eyes and the dark sun glasses kept my identity a secret.

She would roar as I made ads describing the 'challenging environment" my company offered to prospective employees, and chuckle at the brochure I designed describing our spectacular first quarter growth and would roll on the floor laughing when I made product brochures that expounded their superiority over the competition's!

An outrageous flirt, she could have the best of ‘em weak on their knees and did her best to ‘fix’ us up with what she thought were ‘good bets’. The good bets were smooth, urbane and immoral creeps.
“But what the heck yaar, at least they won’t insist on getting married.”
Her wisdom beat me hollow and she soon realized that she would have to choose between friends and match fixing. She chose the former.
“What the heck yaar, I prefer friends to one night stands.”
To this day I haven’t understood what she meant.

Sunitha is flying across the seven seas to a job in the west and we are going to miss her vivacious presence terribly. Life seems much duller somehow.

24 comments:

Jake said...

ah. you are back.

"she stopped mid chew .." lol ..LOL!
i have had a similar experience with my roomie in college, er .. i mean .. i was the one who yanked the door open, to find two very 'engrossed' people, and unlike you I let out a loud guffaw!!

I will always treasure the look those two had on their faces to this day.

chupru said...

You never know what you have till you have it NO MORE; the episode of "oh my god i miss that nosepoking irritating idiot soo much" happens all the time; only few good people go through this so, count yourself a Good Person ;-)

Matter of Choice said...

"Sunitha drove at a break neck speed of 100 or 120 kmph on Bangalore road"

that surely makes her better qualified than narayan karthikeyan!!. is she going abroad to test drive for ferrari? :)

anish
ps: good to see u back!

Kraz Arkin said...

Gimme her number.

Pradeep Nair said...

A good writeup, on what I think, is a fact of life, which most of us experience but hardly realise. Your good copywriting skills are very evident.

Praveen said...

Thats beautifully written.

nestpa said...

I hope to God that I don't stumble upon such compromising situations. God knows I'll be more embarassed than the players. That's for sure.
As for Sunitha... she gives me the chills!

fobsie said...

Great writing.

silverine said...

@jake: Wish I could have also let out a guffaw.

@anoop: looks like u too had a "nosepoking irritating idiot" in your life.

@matter-of-choice: :)LOL

@Gerturde Plimlose: Why nannie, u wanna one way ticket to heaven?

@living_dead,Pradeep, praveen and fobsie: thank you and fobsie when you gonna let me peek into your blogspot?

@niel:I dont believe you. p.s for the sake of public decency I was forced to water down Sunitha's post.

zimblymallu said...

ahhh. server rooms. i miss them.

N David said...

The best described server room ever? That did make me smile.

Sinfully Pinstripe said...

Well well well! Interesting, I say!

And hillarious writing. Goodjob.

Kousik said...

Isn't a server room uncomfortable? Too cold for *any* purpose.

But hey, you'll sure miss her. I hope she reads this too :-)

Girl With Big Eyes said...

Good read Silverine. At least someone got 'served' in the server room.

:)

jay menon said...

well i guess shez the true Icon of new generation

zimblymallu said...

@ /<0USIK
what is /<0? and no. the server room is not too cold. the slightly lower temperature has interesting side effects.

@ jay menon. what new generation? i see we're stereotyping again.

i'm not allowed to make fun of comments or commenters am i?

Gnaeus! said...

Hmm.. for that matter who will not miss such a girl...;-)

Btw, may we know which company is she working in... (some of us are not exactly disinclined to work in such a 'stimulating' environment and with such a 'cooperative' staff...

Jake said...

zimbly mallu, i think you are, freedom of push button publishing and speech and all that jazz.

damn! why dont we have such server rooms where i work ?

Jake said...

and srinivas 'cooperative ' ugh.
not a tactful word. you could get lynched by the molays for that.

Sachin Dev T said...

For a moment, I had difficulty grasping that "Had a Man Half-way down her throat and was chewing him"..Wohoo !! Ain't that a lil too Gross way of describing ?
But Hey, Pretty Nice post.Musta been a terrific girl,Ms.Sunita huh ?
Neat blog.Keep Blogging.

Gnaeus! said...

Hey Sachin, you really had a difficulty grasping 'man half way down her throat...'??
But I am having a difficulty grasping what the hell was he doing out there 'half way down...'. I mean, he could as well have gone down a little farther down and have had some quality time out there...;-))

Matter of Choice said...

ahem..so finally u removed ur google ads!!!

why the sacrifice? why did you opt out of the millions of USD coming your way?? can we expect a blog on the sacrifice?? :))

anish

flaashgordon said...

I guess most of the readers got stuck at the server room !!!

Afterall; the image of Sunita leaning on the wall with the guy down her throat was so strong that I guess everyone read the rest of the blog in a daze

That ws a hilarious one Silverine; btw techies will fight to work in a server room from now on after that highly "romanticized" picture of it.

That apart; it was a touching ode to your friend.

Invite me too to the pub next time she comes down from the US.Dont get me wrong..Its the free beer that interests me ;-)))


cheerio
Flaashgordon
http://o3.indiatimes.com/jonagil

Unknown said...

good writing..You really have a good hang of it..keep it going