The lull before the storm.

AC had my train ticket.

Three of us, Chandrashekar, AC and I were going together, and he had booked the tickets. I had just transferred the money to him through the internet, thanks to ICICI.

Actually I wasnt quite sure what his name was. Even in the mails he sent to the IIM-A egroup, he signed off as AC. So, by some sort of intuition, or probably some supernatural power or just by dumb luck, I guessed that his name is Arvind.

I later discovered that there were 10 others who were going to IIM-A, some of them with their families. Needless to say, there was quite a bit of bond-building in the train. The journey was pleasant and completely uneventful, as even the eunuchs were not allowed into the AC coaches.

I have had a lot of experience with eunuchs on trains. They usually hunt in groups, in any number from a pair to half a dozen, and their favorite target is the young, especially the student.

First there's a clap, then before you could swivel around to face the origin of the noise, someone jumps right in front of you. And in that split second, if you think that its one of your friends trying one of those childish tricks to scare you, you'd be mistaken, especially after you are touched 'lovingly' on the face. Of course, once you have had the chance to completely take in the man/woman dressed in female grab, there's hardly any room for doubt.

Chances are, the very apperance of the eunuch is enough to scare the shit out of the student. He (its always a he.) is especially terrorized when the eunuch puts her hand over different places on the student's body.

If, despite this, the student manages to maintain a stern face and push the probing hand away, the eunuch turns to the next strategic tactic. A view of 'Taj Mahal', as they call it. Which is accomplished by standing right in front of the student and lifting her saree or skirt high enough, to reveal... umm, well, to reveal 'Taj Mahal'.

I havent seen a single student who's able to resist 'rewarding' the eunuch after the final 'revelation'.

When students go to BITS from Chennai at the beginning of a semester, there would be so many of them, that the whole train would be full of students. Eunuchs have a field day on those days, and I have a nagging suspicion that some of them have even invested in real estate after a few such ventures.

You see, some of my friends keep saying things about their landlords...


The best part about the train journey was its prompt arrival. And it was only about half an hour when AC, Chandrashekar and I found ourselves in a taxi merrily purring along a straight road towards Vastrapur.

Chandrashekhar noticed that there were quite a few posh localities in the city. AC noticed that Ahmedabad had its share of billboards too. I noticed that the gujju girls were very pretty.

In under an hour we reached the IIM-A gate. We took the taxi beyond the gate and a little further into the campus, and got our baggages out. After I had unloaded the final piece of luggage from the taxi onto the road, a heavy suitcase, I rose and stood erect to see what lay in front of me.

We liked what we saw.

Between the tall green trees, stood buildings designed in a brickout architecture, the color perfectly complementing the rest of the view. And in between the nearest two buildings, lay a magnificent ramp, which as we would later come to know, is known as the Harvard ramp.

The following day, I registered myself to the program, and completed a lot of other little settling-down chores. I met a lot of people, and started getting cheeky with the few people I knew for more than a day. It was pretty cool.

One problem though, was remembering the names of the hundreds of people I met. I'd see a guy whom I'd have met a little while back, and enthusiastically start saying 'Hi....', and then the realisation would strike me that I dont know his name. Trust me, the average brain retains just about 25 % of the names it learns. In my case, its about 1 %. I remember the names of people who have the same name as me.

But I've discovered ways of getting to know the name again without feeling embarassed.
One of the ways is to ask him the full name. The other is to ask him for his email id. Yet another method is to ask him to spell out his name, feigning ignorance(with a stupid face).

I was sitting opposite this guy with whom I had travelled on the train from chennai.

'Hey, you got a sim card ?'

'Yeah, I did.' he said.

'Give me your number'.

I type in the number into my phone book as he dictates it. After I did that, I paused at the next screen. The phone was asking me for a name to be put next to the number in the diary. I thought. and thought. After about half a minute, I asked him how he spelt his name.

He gave me a blank look. 'What ? Its the same as yours right ? You dont know to spell your own name ?'

I guess I have to revise my retention estimates.