coffee with shami.

A fine Saturday morning. Long time since bhOndOO met his advisor, and long time for the next meeting. bhOndOO is relaxed. No nightouts, peaceful sleeps, early wake-ups, and early comings to the lab; and so is today.

bhOndOO is alone in the lab. He is merry, whistling Dil tadap tadap ke kah raha hai aa bhi ja, reading Shami’s scrapbook on Orkut. His Orkut fortune today is Be tactful: Overlook not your own opportunity. He is expecting something nice to happen to him today.

Suddenly, he hears opening of the lab door. Wow! Its Shami! Shami smiles at bhOndOO while entering. bhOndOO does not notice it. He is busy finding and clicking on Home on the screen to get away from Shami’s scrapbook. Damn it! IISc proxy is so slow. While clicking on the button, he realizes that he should react to Shami’s greeting. He looks at Shami who is by now at a distance of five feet and greets (with fear), “Hello.”.

Shami walks past bhOndOO, casually looks at his screen, settles at a machine (not adjacent to that of bhOndOO’s), and starts typing her login. bhOndOO has managed his reputation using the most terrific key-combination of all times in the history of industrialization: Alt+Tab.

bhOndOO re-relaxes himself and notices his screen. Shit!, he exclaims. His Yahoo! mail is showing an advertisement of Bharat Matrimony with a lady smiling at bhOndOO. I hope, she does not misunderstand me.

bhOndOO is cautious now. He is hardly doing anything on his machine. His full concentration is on the girl seated three machines away from him. Shami is typing a reply. The lab bears sounds of her typing and the fan of AC. Will me not typing anything look suspicious? bhOndOO decides to reply to some mail. However, his Yahoo! inbox contains zero mails. No, no. Typing something is very important right now. bhOndOO opens one of the nine spams, clicks on Reply and starts typing.

bhOndOO’s concentration is at ultimatum. For typing thirty words, bhOndOO presses the Backspace button sixty-nine times. This is very bad. Why am I getting tensed? bhOndOO relaxes himself and starts typing slowly — now fully concentrating on his typing.

“bhOndOO, coming for coffee?”. bhOndOO is thunderstruck. Reasons:

• someone uttered his name.
• some lady uttered his name.
• Shami uttered his name.
• some lady is asking him for coffee.
• Shami is asking him for coffee.

bhOndOO looks at Shami standing beside him. “Sure.”, bhOndOO mutters involuntarily. He locks his KDE session and gets up. While getting up, he realizes what he saw on screen while locking the terminal: he was replying to Julie and the subject was Re: Cannot forget last night.

bhOndOO looks at Shami and notices no signs of disgust. May be, she did not see it. But what if she did?

They meet a junior on the way and the junior greets them with a smile. From the mocking smile of the junior, bhOndOO realizes that he is going alone with Shami! Oh my God! I never got this chance before! He recollects his Orkut fortune. bhOndOO adjusts his spects, sweeps his hand across his hair, and clears his throat. He is suddenly looking confident — confident to break the ice.

“Going home in Dec?”, bhOndOO asks.

“Ya. I could not go in summer because of the summer course. I must go now. How about you?”.

“No, I am planning to do some paper reading for my research in Dec. I may go home in Feb.”.

Shami nods. This small conversation boosts up bhOndOO’s confidence. Shall I talk to her? Lets get seated first. He remembers the slogan of Cafe Coffee Day: A lot can happen over a cup of coffee. They enter the Tea Board. I must pay for her coffee today. He inserts his hand in the pocket and feels a single coin of five rupees. One coffee costs four rupees.

Are yaar! Why does this happen with me only? They are 10 feet away from the queue and bhOndOO is searching for alternatives:

• I will not drink coffee.
• I will ask the shopkeeper for credit. If he does not agree, how about keeping my watch with him?
• Is there anyone familiar already in the queue?
• How about me paying for Shami’s coffee and she paying for mine?

Before bhOndOO could decide, Shami says, “I have two coffee-coupons. Don’t get into the queue.”. Though bhOndOO is relieved that the calamity is avoided, he knows that he has also lost the chance of paying for Shami.

They settle at a corner. bhOndOO is all set. He makes up the first statement in the mind: Shami, I love you. The statement gets rejected — by himself. He retries: Shami, I want to talk to you something. This sounds better. Now, bhOndOO is looking for the right opportunity to start talking, without phrasing what he is going to say after the first statement.

bhOndOO’s heart-beats reach ninety per minute. He is trying to talk, but is not able to utter a single word. Is it so difficult to say such things? He quotes to himself: Be brave, man dies only once. He clears his throat, and manages, “Shami…”.

Shami looks up, in astonishment. bhOndOO does not, but Shami knows that bhOndOO never utters her name. She stops drinking her coffee and is looking straight into the eyes of bhOndOO.

The rate is now ninety-five per minute. bhOndOO feels himself lost in the eyes of Shami. He forgets what he is going to say. When he comes to senses, he says, “Um…, the coffee is very nice, isn’t it?”.

Shami smiles, looks down, and nods. bhOndOO curses himself: If this is what was going to be her response, I should have asked whether she loves me.

“Generally, the coffee here is not good compared to the Coffee Board. The Coffee Board has maintained its standard. I heard that they import it from Kerala. However, this coffee (in Tea Board) is what we get in shops.”.

It drops to eighty per minute. After a lot of praise for the coffee, bhOndOO experiences the last sip of coffee, and sees a nice little dead cockroach at the bottom of the cup. Not to contradict his statements, he gulps in the last sip and keeps the cup away from Shami’s eyes.

While going back to the department, bhOndOO decides to do a full rehearsal before proposing.

Tags: alt tab, cockroach, coffee, coffee board, coupons, iisc, kerala, matrimony, opportunity, orkut, proposing, proxy, saturday, summer, tea board, whistling