Author: Tejas Rao

Yesterday, in class, we received word that one of the faculty members who was teaching us had been appointed as an Additional Public Prosecutor. We were overjoyed. As with any good news my class is greeted with, we began to use it as an excuse to get a free period – which we managed. Today, we went one better: hounding the faculty sufficiently to get some celebratory chocolates. He very kindly obliged, something I take to be a sign od how well he could relate to our class, but also his own joy he wanted us to share in. Either way, we got chocolates today. Free chocolates, which we consumed in class. The usual suspects of such fun followed: people trying to get their hands on a second piece, some exchanges, laughter – and another free period, with a little bit of educational engagement.

This was the last period of the day, and walking back to my room with the sweet taste of success in my mouth, I wondered how many times I had enjoyed free chocolate thanks to someone else’s good fortune, or whatever reason they had to celebrate. Birthdays, promotions, they’ve all led to me consuming chocolate in some form or the other: cakes, toffees and the like. In primary school, we used to go around delivering chocolate to all the other classes in our Grade on our birthdays, and we were allowed to take one friend with us to roam around. Being that friend for someone was a great privilege reserved for your true “best friend” – because it meant a valid excuse to miss at least one period of studying. If you were truly smart, you’d both meet in the morning and conspire about which class you wanted to miss for the day. No teacher would ever deny you the opportunity to celebrate your birthday – so you were pretty much given a free pass to walk around the school with your chocolate. I used to go up to some senior classes my teachers used to teach to share in my joy with them too, and distribute some to my friends as well. Good fun.

It did, however, bring back memories of this one birthday where I definitely overdosed on the amount of chocolate I consumed. The day before my birthday, my parents used to take me to Lulu to figure out which chocolate we were going to distribute. We’d always try mixing it up – they never let me take the same chocolate two years in a row. For my birthday in Grade 4, we bought Toblerones – three whole boxes of those huge bars for every single person in class, and then some. I returned home with a whole box left, and even after giving out some chocolates in the building, there were several chocolates leftover. I loved chocolate as a child, but I had recently had cavities filled, so my parents made it abundantly clear that I was not to consume these chocolates quickly.

You see, when you’re a naive child, you think you can get away with eating these chocolates. At least, I thought so. I had good reason to believe this. First, there were enough Toblerone bars that it looked like there were a fair number left even when you subtracted some bars. Second, my parents didn’t count how many Toblerone bars there were. Third, I wouldn’t be throwing the wrapper in the dustbin directly – I’d be taking it straight to the bigger garbage chute we had in the apartment complex. All of this meant a happy Tejas without evidence that I had eaten the chocolates at all. Alas, this was not to be. My greed got the better of me rather quickly and I consumed too many Toblerone chocolate bars. There were only 4 left the next day, and I tried scattering them around the box so it looked like there were more left but I couldn’t do anything to reverse the damage. I didn’t have the money to replace the bars, nor could I hide the entire box from my parents and blame anybody else.

My parents found out that evening when they returned, and I got a good firing from both of them. I smiled cheekily, and I remember thinking to myself: they’ll never catch me again. I didn’t think I wouldn’t be greedy again – just that I wouldn’t get caught. Maturity is a gem though, and honestly, the memory of overconsuming Toblerone bars meant I didn’t eat a full big bar till very, very recently – when my mother purchased one for me in Dubai Airport on our way back to India.

I returned to my room this afternoon craving a big Toblerone bar, but also wondering what it would be like to OD on chocolate again – till I fell asleep to chocolate filled-dreams.

That is an experiment for another day.

I was fortunate and privileged enough to travel with one of my University faculty today – to a common destination. While the economics of having a free journey to and from where I needed to be was extremely comforting, it was enjoyable to be in the company of a junior of mine and someone I shared a rapport with even outside of the classroom. While we traveled the 35km one-way distance we were navigating, I spent some time day-dreaming about all the times I’ve had the good fortune to be in the custody of people from my educational institution whom I trust.

Our school had these two school cars: two Innovas, which carried out a ton of official business – transporting dignitaries to and from functions, transporting school officials to other schools and business meetings. Sometimes, in the case of emergencies, those cars transported injured individuals to clinics or hospitals where the treatment facility on campus was inadequate to deal with the nature of the injury. [I’ll get to my own harrowing experience in a bit – this is foreshadowing].

We were a tiny school. Everybody knew everybody – especially when you were in middle and senior school. Our administrative and support staff were so phenomenally large-hearted and kind, that they ensured you were happy to walk into school each morning. They’d carry out conversations about the school at the end of the corridor we walked past while going from where the buses parked to our classrooms, and ever so often, they’d take breaks from conversation to comment on students generally, or make conversation with us. It was one of my favourite parts of the day in school. I turned off the music on my phone and pulled my headphones off as we clambered off the bus, just to hear what they had to say. I’d get a “Good Morning Mr. Rao”, every single day, with some fun remarks attached to it, including the observation that I had bought new headphones, or that my shirt was a brighter shade of orange than it usually was. It was just – fun.

Building that rapport was entrenched in the fabric and culture of my school. I was in the minority Kannadiga population on the senior side of our school – as a consequence of which my equation with several individuals, especially the multitalented staffers who helped keep the place running, doing every odd job imaginable, was just different. I developed several relationships with people on campus I’d do anything to help out if I could, just because of how easy they made our lives during our time there. I visited school with a friend of mine last June, and we met one of our friends there – he literally stopped his work and came to help speed up an administrative process that had kept us waiting for over an hour (the creation of an alumni ID card). It got done in 5 minutes.

A large part of building this rapport – and sustaining it, came from the fact that school – especially when you were on the senior side, and you were deemed responsible enough to represent the crest you wore on your chest (or you were on Student Council) ended up sending you on official business to other schools. A large part of this was inviting people for things – it’s pretty much the only kind of official business I remember doing. This involved going on a day trip. A collection of students, one of these incredible support staffers acting as our guide + driver, since we had no transport, and a packed lunch to sustain through the day.

I did one of these trips alone in Grade 11. Oh, it was far out – a day trip where I wasn’t sure whether I’d return to campus before buses left. I must’ve visited 7 schools that day, all to invite them for this production we were putting up. I remember visiting these schools and meeting their heads of department, introducing myself, and going through the rigmarole with great clarity, the tone of my voice and all that. But, what I remember more vividly is the car ride: to the far ends of the city and in-between, and eating from that lunchbox that had been so kindly packed for me. One of our incredible multi-staffers was with me, and Sir very kindly played out some kick-ass Kannada music through the car ride, and ensured my energy levels didn’t dip once. It remains a fond memory.

The other time I was in the car was when I had to be taken to the clinic because I had cut my lip open and needed stitches. Blood was everywhere. It was grotesque, and I couldn’t look at myself because I could see my teeth through where there should have been lip. While the numbness prevented me from feeling much pain, I’m sure they recognized I was in deep pain – because all I can recall from the entire journey to the clinic is Sir sitting in the driver’s seat telling me they’d stitch me back up in no time.

I’m so grateful to have met these people on “official business”, and the highlight of my life as I’ve grown to become a senior in the educational spaces I’ve held is this rapport I’ve built with individuals who started off as being faculty, or support staff, or playing a role in my life that is outside of the kind of relationship I now share with them. That change – it means so much. Realizing and recognizing this in my final semester is something I’m holding onto dearly, because I’m hopeful that this rapport is not one that I lose even when I leave campus.

Earlier this week, a friend and I were trying to figure out how to move closer to the ideal day: the day you have in mind at the start that doesn’t quite get completed. That conversation sparked off another conversation about motivations, and today, on a Sunday where I felt a wee-bit lazy around the afternoon, I needed a reminder about it myself. Its safe to say, that’s good enough reason for me to make this blog post a little motivational – something to read when I’m struggling with motivation, or generally trying to figure out whether an endeavour of mine will yield results.

I began to run a little more seriously this year. Again, I’m three years late to the party. Most of the things I’ve been trying out in my life are things I’ve been trying to make a habit of for three years, but things I’ve struggled to do on the daily. An advantage of having time on my hands as I prepare to catapult myself into the real world is the fact that I’ve got the opportunity to diligently and religiously put myself into the habit of formulating these habits. As part of this running gig, I decided to employ the Nike Run Club application on my smartphone a little more. I had used it previously, but never really exploited the full functionality that the application possesses. Over winter, when I met with a friend, he told me about the guided runs on the app – which I began to use once I got back to campus.

On one of those guided runs, there’s this entire 3-minute stretch where the Coach, Coach Cory, talks about looking for the little victories even when you think that what you’re doing is going terribly. He explains that running is one of those things that is a continual process – and so, seeing results is not something you can expect instantaneously. Just because you ran once, doesn’t mean running tomorrow is easier. You need to go through that entire process of starting a run and putting in the hard yards all over again. That means some days will be good days – where you find runs easy, and you’re able to go long, but some days will be bad days – shorter runs, tougher runs. On those off days, Cory basically says that it’s important to find those little victories: the fact that you got a run in – no matter how long, or how short, how slow, or how fast, is a victory. Thinking about it in that manner, and tuning your mind to think about it in that way changes the way your brain perceives the activity. It stops looking at the event of the day – in this illustration, the run, as a failure, but begins to look at it as a success.

Throughout this semester, and arguably something I want to do throughout my life, is to ensure that I search for those little victories. This doesn’t mean that I’m scared to admit my own failings, or be realistic about when things go awry. I’d just like to be in a position where I continually acknowledge that small, tiny silver lining, or that victory in something I’ve done, irrespective of how badly it’s turned out.

I was struggling a little today because I couldn’t identify where the hours in my weekend had passed by. I started off the weekend with this massive to-do list, and I seem to be ending the weekend with the same number of things broadly left there – which was horrible. Breaking it down though, I found those small things I used my time in, which gave me some solace.

Gotta look for those little victories a little more.

One of the things I wanted to get better on in 2020 is my ability to articulate my views on pieces of media: movies, television shows, and books. Even if they aren’t necessarily in the form of reviews, this appears to be a form of writing I struggle with. The more I thought about it last evening, I recognized that perhaps a large part of that stems from the kind of pressure I put on myself: because I treat it as writing that is distinct from my ordinary writing or blogging. Naturally, the solution to that, I felt, was to make it a part of the blog. That’s the context to Tejas’ topical take for today. Welcome to my story. I’m glad to have you here.

Bojack Horseman premiered in 2014. Netflix launched in India in January 2016. In the interim, I ran through Grade 12 and joined University, and was introduced to a lot of websites that allowed me to access pirated content that I enjoyed for quite some time. I only heard of Bojack Horseman in 2017, and people told me it was a good show – one worth spending time on. I was quite lazy though. As with everything else, I had several other pieces of media I wanted to get through and I prioritized though ahead of the show. I also couldn’t find an excellent print of BoJack on all the sites I frequented, and at some point, I gave up.

In December 2017, I spent one month on campus with 4 friends and several puppies working on a competition I was devoted to at the time. I couldn’t work on it all day, and I decided to indulge in Netflix that month. They had a one-month trial period, which I activated the day I came to an empty campus, and I binge-watched shows and movies like it was nobody’s business throughout the month. All to keep myself sane and to give me some time away from thinking about work. I cooked macaroni in my kettle, made a bunch of noodles, ordered several snacks – and every evening/night, I’d get cozy under my comforter, and binge-watch shows till I felt like sleeping.

The first show I took up was BoJack Horseman. I remember watching the first season and being super-confused. I hated the protagonist, and everything cheerful ended up going awry almost instantaneously. Every single character had traits I enjoyed, but also traits I detested, which irritated me because I could not point to a favourite character or personality, nor could I point to what the show was moving toward. What kept me going at that point was the plot progression, and how the reviews raved about the show. I stuck with it in the hope that it would grow on me.

The second season was when it actually did. There was so much plot progression, and the grey-ness of the characters who had been introduced already was explored so much more that I began to enjoy it. I recognized that this was a show that was fully revealing the layers to their characters, and while the puns and the anthropomorphism was enjoyable, these were things that helped reflect how grey the human species in itself is. The plot itself took quite a few twists and turns in the second season that I did not anticipate, so I opened up my mind to the show – deciding to expect nothing except entertainment.

Season three was the beginning of when I started to be floored by the show. It reflected human society in so many ways, and the producers and directors began to experiment with the format of each episode. So I latched on for the ride, and decided I’d follow along for every single season that came henceforth.

Each time a new season released, I binged it on the night of its launch. I binged through it knowing that I wouldn’t relive that experience of watching those episodes for the first time again, but that I’d be better off for having watched them. Each time I watched a fresh episode, I found myself more educated than I was previously. This was especially true across the final three seasons, when it opened up my brain to the kind of spectrum that mental health sees. It got me to begin reading about mental health more generally. To become more conscious about the things I said and did in a lot of ways that unbeknownst to me, might be impacting people. It got me to reflect.

Watching the “Free Churro” episode last year changed a lot of things for me. It was effective in its acknowledgment of grief and the process of being confused about why you grieve over someone you dislike, or have only unpleasant memories of. It gave me a sense of gratitude for several things I needed to be more grateful for at that point in my life. On a broader level, I had begun to develop a lot of affection for this deeply problematic character who was struggling to get his act together – and I cried when he spoke about his mother, who clearly meant so much to him.

Which is why I loved the beginning and middle of the final season. BoJack begun to take responsibility for himself, and genuinely followed through on it, unlike his half-assed attempts from before. I watched that season and that part at a point where in my life, I had genuinely messed up, and I was trying my best to piece things together. Really trying to understand them, to prevent them from happening again – to act responsibly, to the standard that I held myself to as a person. It was disappointing to relate to behaviour and people who I classified in my head as problematic, but I was super conflicted about how I had love for this person. How was it that I could appreciate someone who kept spiraling?

It was probably just the attempts to take responsibility. To push himself to be better – and despite failing, on multiple occasions, and being worse, just trying again. It was also the supporting characters who tried to get him to do better as a human being.

The last part of the last season, therefore, confused me more than ever. He took responsibility in private, but chose not to in public – and then self-destructed, by taking responsibility in public(?) if you could call it that. It left me conflicted.

The last episode, though, gave me some closure. It was a great last episode. I found BoJack at a good time in my life, and he helped through a not-so-great time in my life, and I am holding on to the thing that BoJack taught me: that you can, and you should, be better every single day.

If an animated show has left me with that, there’s not much more I can ask for.

There were several titles I had in mind for this post. Ultimately, I chose to go with this because it did two things: first, it reminded me of the phrase “cutting chai”, and second, it was premised on the fact that you could point to an individual taking decisions on whether load-shedding was necessary – a fact that in the moment that electricity turns off, is not something you think of.

I was introduced to the concept of load-shedding on my vacation trips to India. Invariably they gave me angst, because it meant the television would turn off (which I am grateful for – since it cultivated my reading habit), or that the fan would not work. In Bangalore, my grandparents had a small diesel generator that powered essential supplies even when BESCOM decided to carry out these exercises. In Pune, we didn’t have one till recently – and on the warm days that sometimes came by during the monsoons, I detested every bit of it. Living in a country that thrived on its large power source (oil), we never had electricity shortages, or cuts of any kind. It was a privilege I grew to appreciate.

Things sort of normalized for me when I relocated. I was fortunate that the community we stayed in had a diesel generator, but even when the power went – for an extended period of time, I don’t think it aggravated me as much as it used to when I was younger. There was more information: what the purpose of the load-shedding was, how long till we had mains supply back. There was also a lot more awareness about how non-renewables were being utilized to produce electricity, and the finiteness of everything. It made sense to reduce, or step back from heavy consumption for some time, if we could.

I didn’t really anticipate that these would continue at University.  This was largely because I felt like a University – an educational space could not function without electricity in today’s age. That is a presumption that is flawed in its own respects, but the first power outage I experienced on campus definitely shocked me (yes, I see the irony). I remember being in the night mess, having just ordered some food – when the power went out, and our campus was enveloped in darkness. In the distance, I heard some crazy screaming from the boys hostel – and I didn’t really understand how so many people could be united in their ability to yell into the void without any “guide” so to speak. There was no “leader”. No call & response system. Just a cacophony of people screaming “OOoooooooooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOo” into the darkness.

I laughed. The power came back within two minutes, and things returned to normal.

Then exam season struck in second semester. That was when I recognized the power that anonymity vests within an individual. In the darkness, it is impossible to see who instigates something. With the kind of pent-up anger people had against the examination system and against the University at large – not anger I could relate to in my first year, I heard some of the most colourful insults, the source of which was definitely deep-seated. Oh, how I howled from my room. I was still too scared to venture forth in the dark – but I listened intently for the new slogans that my seniors came up with and the kind of responses they received. You could distinguish pretty quickly between chants that were received with universal acclaim – they produced the highest decibels, and chants that were centered around inside jokes, or things that only a particular group would understand, which led to sound being emanated only from one part of this oval we reside in.

I’ve previously argued that you could use all that sound energy to power a generator in some way.

Last night, the power went out for some time around 11:45PM. I sprinted out of my room immediately – running to the center of the hostel so I could get a better listen of what rage people would choose to let go of. We didn’t have exams, nothing stressful per se has been happening pan-campus.

Which provided opportune moments for comedy. Last evening was arguably one of the funniest nights this campus has seen. The rhyme schemes were inventive, they were relatable, and they got random juniors who had no idea what the fifth years were screaming about to join in for the choral response.

The wardens roamed around using a torchlight trying to find the source – because the comedy poked fun at them after a point. But when they shone on one set of people, the chants began from the other side of the oval. The synchronization was lovely. The outage lasted about 20 minutes at most, but when I met one of my batchmates after, he quipped that, just for pure entertainment value: living the darkness was worth it.

I hate to say it, but I agree with him.

There’s this entire practice I feel like I’ve written about before, but is worth repeating. In Flogsta, students scream out their woe every evening at 10PM. Every single day. It’s remarkable.

I sincerely hope & pray that we have a few more this semester. Some during exams. They shouldn’t last too long. Just enough. For the entertainment value.

While I have a preference for Nesquick and Milo, and University provided me the option and love for Cavin’s, I am a true believer in Bournvita. We bought it several times at home, including the 5-star special they had come out with once. My introduction to Bournvita was at a friend’s house. Him and I stayed in diagonally opposite flats, and I visited his house daily to play cricket for a few hours in the evening. Over the years, he became my elder brother, giving me French tuition when I needed it in Grade 5, and teaching me several things about standing up to peer pressure. He inculcated in me a strong love for reading – because that was all we used to do on several days in his house, and a true love for barf ka gola. Most of all though, he taught me the delight in revelling in a cold or warm glass of Bournvita – and soon, that became a part of my routine at his house as well.

When I arrived at University, I learned a couple of things in my first few days. First was the fact that we had a strict firewall on the internet that was difficult to bypass (Psiphon’s efficacy was coming to a halt), second, was that my seniors were extremely cynical about the University, and third, that every single day at 6pm, they would play “Hum Ko Mann ki Shakti Dena” on the loudspeaker above the girl’s hostel. This would happen religiously at 6pm every day. Without fail. For five whole minutes. It would require most conversations taking place outside the hostel to be carried out at a volume higher than normal – to cancel out the overpowering sound. It was irritating at first, because my earphones and headphones were defenseless to the music, but also because it was extremely shrill, and unnecessary. I didn’t understand it at all. Of course, I understood the lyrics and the kind of empowerment it sought to spread, but I did not figure out why on Earth we were being subject to this on a daily basis. That too on loudspeaker.

It felt cult-like, to be frank. I was, and remain, on the questioning side of belief systems – where I question, relentlessly, and read, as much as I can before I formulate opinions and beliefs. Then I hold them personal. It’s very rare I speak about anything I believe in: either in conversation, or for oratory purposes. I’m not entirely sure why, but it’s how I operate. I’ve been raised as a religious person, but my parents have given me the opportunity to be inquisitive and understand what I want to believe in, and the freedom to discard beliefs that I feel do not meld with the identity I wish to cultivate. That’s been liberating. It was how I entered this University. I also entered with a deep-seated dislike for the ruling Government party, which was backed by a religious fundamental organization. Listening to this song every day at 6pm, I associated it with religion immediately – it felt like we were all being turned in some way to believe what it said. You’d see this in behavioural patterns while roaming around at 6pm. If the loudspeaker didn’t start, people would converse about it – not several people, but a few murmurs would definitely be audible. When the song came on, outside the mess especially, you could hear people humming along. And I wondered: is this not how organized behaviour and conditioning begins?

As time went by on campus, I got used to it. The song evoked no feelings in me, except for the realization that it was 6pm. On most days this meant I was pleased because we’d have dinner in about 2 hours: and news of any meal gave me happiness. On some days, it’d mean I’d step out of the library for a while to look at what was happening on the cricket field. On other days, I’d carry on with whatever I was doing. I remember being on a video call with a friend once, and making them listen to the song in its entirety so they could experience some part of my day. At the end of my fourth year, I told my roommate that we wouldn’t have to listen to this on the daily ever again after we left. It’s almost improbable that any other University or organization plays this song as an anthem, almost. To me, any GNLU alum ending up at such a University or organization would beg some serious questions about the mysteries and ways of the Universe at large.

Over the previous semester however, I began to not hear, but really listen to the song. To understand the depths of its secularism, in a lot of ways. Arguably, there are shades of grey in the lyrics: of religion and a sense of greater purpose, but, for the most part, I would argue, the song’s almost about screaming out into the void – a war cry, a battle chant, to help you navigate through the day. At several low moments, I heard the song every day at 6pm and realized I had made it through another day, another 24 hours. That I was alive, and I was fortunate to be exactly where I was, and that it was okay to be where I was. That was a comforting realization. Then there was the realization that it almost mimicked the last verse of the prayer I used to say at my primary school: God, Grant me kindly thought. The sense of nostalgia notwithstanding, the one realization that donned on me at the time was that in all of these songs, prayers, we seem to seek out desires that our heart reflects, or wants. Belief in self, a desire to be and do good, and other such things. Things you could express quietly, or loudly, or however else you want. Or things you don’t need to express at all.

And each day I listen to the song at 6pm in my final semester, I recognize that when I leave this University, there will be no daily expression of the things my heart wants but refuses to perhaps express and say out loud. There will be no automatic brain realization that it has become 6pm, for I will have to seek out a clock, or some other mechanism to recognize what time it is. Absurdly, starting out from where I was: I will miss hearing this song. I will hope that it stops – for I still feel it is quite unnecessary to be playing this out loud, and in the deepest pits of my heart, I know that I crave for some adventure where somebody steals the loudspeaker, or the CD that plays the song, or some other device. But I also know, in equal measure, that this song, this, shrill, loud, piece of music, whose lyrics I know by-heart, is what makes this University what this University is. While arguably this University would be this University without this song as well, it’s an additional layer of identity.

What I also know is that I will probably leave University and go back to drinking Bournvita out of a glass at some point daily. For I know, now, that sometimes you need an external manifestation or representation of what Mann ki Shakti means, and the Tann ki Shakti would be an added bonus.

You guessed it, I’m writing about food again. Yep, it’s about fast food as well.

There is a lot of fast food in this world that brings me joy. Taco Bell is perhaps right at the top of that list, apart from the burrito I consumed on my solitary visit to Chipotle. Now that I typed that out and realized how many fast food brands I’ve discarded with that singular statement, I must admit: I keep offering superlatives and rankings of all the fast food I consume, but I love all the fast food I eat equally. There is something about it’s greasiness that gives me tremendous joy – joy that is incomparable to much else. Over the summer I really hope I can figure out how to make these things healthy; not just by consuming them in moderation, but in the manner of their preparation, without compromising on much taste. However, that is a project for much later. For now, I must revel in Taco Bell.

As with several other components of American culture, I was introduced to Taco Bell in Grade 6, by my American classmates who were astounded that I had never consumed a chalupa. I was amazed by the fact that this was as popular as McDonalds, because in my mind – Ronald Uncle was the epitome of fast food popularity. It was dumbfounding for a while, till I logged on to the internet and discovered all the advertisements and the amazing Cool Ranch Doritos Tacos, and so much more. I knew I needed to have it. I was fortunate – because within a year, on one of my trips to Dubai, I discovered they had opened a Taco Bell location there. My mother and I took an excursion, quite literally, to Dubai Mall – and she gave me company throughout my consumption of this foreign food. I was in love, immediately. The food was fantastic, without a doubt – but what I absolutely adored was the brand itself. The branding on the sauces, the product names, their fillings. It was delicious.

My tryst with tacos, however, ended in tragedy, because a year later, I discovered that Taco Bell was shutting down in Dubai. That was one of the only locations I had access to, and to see it disappear made me quite sad for some time. Life, however, moved forward.

Within a couple of months of the Dubai location shutting down though, we found out Taco Bell was entering India – and better yet, they were inaugurating it in Bangalore. I was uber-thrilled. Despite how far away the location was from my house, I didn’t mind the travel. I made a singular visit till Malleswaram and got to dine on that Mexican-American cuisine like a champion. The good news machine followed that up by informing me that they were opening a Taco Bell in Whitefield in some time. Two years later, that dream came true as well. To make things even better, it was right next to my mother’s workplace.

My mum knew I loved Taco Bell. I had professed this at home on several occassions. She was also cognizant of the fact that I would be leaving home in a couple of years; and so, in her own inimitable way, began one of these traditions that I look back on so fondly. Maybe once in two months, I’d finish school, and instead of going back home, I’d go to her workplace, hang out with her – grab a bite (a large bite, I might add), at Taco Bell, and then head home. She couldn’t eat too much cheese, but she loved the nachos, and began to understand why these Americans wouldn’t stop talking about the brand. The free-fill cup and how economical everything was – it was absolutely awesome.

The Bangalore Taco Bells mean a lot to me. I met people I fell in love with, and lost, all over Taco Bell. I met friends from a life in the past, over Taco Bell. I was introduced to mutual friends, and new friends, at a Taco Bell. Whenever I visited the city, it became a pilgrimage destination. On one of my trips, I wanted to meet a senior of mine, but he didn’t have enough time to step out of work. I was on my way to the area his office was in, and I delivered tacos to him. The joy on his face is something that was imprinted in my memory almost immediately. Similarly, a lot of my closest friends – on their off-days, are people I will buy tacos for. One of my best friends & I make it a point to eat pretty much only at Taco Bell every time she visits the country. So much so, that this time, we ordered Taco Bell to my house when she came over to chill.

My travels and internships have taken me to two other Taco Bell locations. I visited the Taco Bell in Delhi with an alarming frequency, because it was on my way home on several days; exactly one stop away from the PG Hostel I was staying at. When I was fortunate to secure a trip to the United States of America, I was lucky enough to stay at an Airbnb that had a Taco Bell 2kms away. It was the first thing I ate in Washington. I didn’t enjoy it as much – their understanding of vegetarianism is slightly confusing and limited, BUT their free-fill cup was absolutely massive. It remains one of the highlights of my trip to that foreign field.

Earlier this week, I discovered Taco Bell had launched a location in Ahmedabad. This fact was revealed to me by an instagram story. I did not ever anticipate that they would open up a location here. I immediately sent photos to two University seniors who were understandably jealous that this was not available during their time here. One of them is visiting campus soon, so we made plans to go there when she does come. I couldn’t wait that long though, and last evening, when I was out in Ahmedabad, I met another senior of mine at Taco Bell. It was delightful.

Nay, it was otherworldly.

You see, Taco Bell gives me warmth on a cold evening because I have a standard order when I go there. When I eat their burritos (and I eat them each time), I feel like I have been clothed in a warm roti. Chewing on a cheesy double decker taco, and appreciating the textural variance that brings it fame – I feel transported to a land of adventure, with each bite bringing me a new flavour. When I close my meals out with a chocodilla, I feel like Remy, from Ratatouille – this amalgam of cultures and flavours that only ever leads to an explosion.

And so, I knew I had to share this with people. I texted my roommate and figured out he had never eaten a taco. One of my friends asked me to get him back some. I returned to the hostel with a bag of Taco Bell feeling like Oprah: tacos for you, tacos for you, tacos for everybody.

I have one semester left here. Not even one full semester. Just three-quarters.

Taco Bell Ahmedabad, we shall meet again, you have my word.

I’ve blogged elsewhere about my roommate and his hard work, his dedication to his craft, and things about him that inspire me. However, this is my last semester: my last opportunity to witness that up-close. No time in the future will ever be like time in the present, and while that isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it is something that deserves acknowledgment. My roommate and I got around to acknowledging this a little more intently last evening when we realized that we’re almost one month into our final semester. That leaves us with three more before we graduate. Just three more months of living together. When we sat and charted out our paths and what we’re hopeful of doing once University comes to a close, we came to the realization that it is unlikely that we will meet for some time. Although the refrain was, “we’ll make plans to meet”, and “I’ll come visit you”, we both acknowledged the truth of it – first, that it would take some effort for us to meet (unlike how things are today), and second, that even if we do meet, we’re unlikely to interact in such close quarters – the way we have as roommates. That impacted us both, so we shut down our laptops and spoke to each other for the remainder of the night till we fell into a slumber.

Prior to arriving at University, I had never shared my room with anybody. I am a single child, without siblings, or cousins who are my age – and consequently grew up with the privilege of having my own sanctum. A room that I lived in alone – that I took decisions about, of my own accord. Aside from my mother’s usual interruptions (to prepare me for the noise that the hostel would bring, she claimed), not much really interfered with how I lived my life. It was one of things I was definitely a little intrigued by before I came here. Who would be my roommate? Would we get along? How would two individuals live with each other in such a small space?

I arrived at University to be greeted by this boy – this marvel of a human being who has been with me ever since. We’re from very different backgrounds, him and I, but we’ve managed to become close friends. That isn’t because of too much conversation, or too many shared interests: in fact, we speak to each other very little as compared to others, and I think we share a concrete interest only in cricket. Yesterday, however, as we took a trip down memory lane – to what our last four and a half years had brought us, a couple of things became clear.

Perhaps the biggest realization from last evening was that there was nobody on campus who had seen us the way we had seen each other. When you stay on a residential campus, it is difficult to have any sense of privacy at all. Perhaps with intangibles you’re fully in control of: like information, but tangibly, it is tough to find space when you need it most. You’re constantly surrounded by the same people, you share a washroom with several individuals. Then you return to your room, and you’re never really truly alone, even though you might want to be. Which is when you become used to having your roommate around. An acceptance of the fact that he is a part of your world, that this is as alone as alone gets, and that it is okay to be vulnerable, to let down any guards you may have, in front of a third party. It takes a lot of trust – a lot of which develops through things unsaid and small gestures unnoticed, than the bigger things. But it happens, and so it took place with the two of us as well.

My roommate has seen me break down several times on campus. He saw me struggle with a back injury few people knew about in my second semester. In my fourth semester, when I was angry and I refused to attend classes for some time, he helped me piece myself together and energize myself for the rest of law school. When I celebrated accomplishments in my sixth and seventh semesters, he celebrated with me – in the room. In my ninth semester, when I cried, he offered me water – not so that I would stop crying, or feel comfort, but because I needed more water in my system for the tears to fall out, so I could let go of everything I was feeling. I’d like to think that I helped him in some ways too – and he’s acknowledged this publicly, but what makes me the happiest is that this boy, this wonder of a human, knows where his worth truly lies. That isn’t an overnight discovery, it is rare that any discoveries are. A lot of that discovery has taken place in this room: and although several people see the final product, not many can speak and attest to the kind of self-doubt that arose through that process of discovery.

There are few human connections I value more than the one I share with my roommate. He has taught me to think more critically, to acknowledge my privilege, to acknowledge my ignorance. More importantly though, he has taught me to share. To share a piece of my soul with him in a confined space, not through words, but through routine, and habit. To share a piece of my world, not because he wanted it, but because we needed to be able to understand each other better in order to live with one another. There are so many things I feel like we still need to say to each other – and I’m glad we’re both aware there’s only so much time to do it in. It’ll force us to let everything out, to leave nothing unsaid, to leave no bit of gratefulness unknown. It’s why I’m so lucky that we shared that realization yesterday evening. If nothing else, it’s made us recognize that we both need to go out to McDonalds together soon.

I don’t know if I’ll have roommates in the future. Only time will tell. Whoever enters my life though, the bar is set pretty high.

I’m dreading writing this. I’ve been thinking about it for hours now, and it was all I could think about while sitting in class today – that there are these words and feelings that are bottled up inside of me that are begging to spill out, and I am unsure of whether I’ll say things correctly, or convey things appropriately, but they need to be said.

I was awake last night when news of Kobe Bryant’s death was first broken by TMZ. A friend of mine, a former basketball teammate sent me the news: and I broke. I couldn’t believe it at all. Earlier that evening, LeBron James had overtaken Kobe to go third in the all-time scoring chart, and Kobe had tweeted out a congratulatory message. I saw that tweet, and then saw LeBron’s post-match tweet and interview about the kind of player that Kobe was, and what Kobe represented to him, and to the game of basketball, and I was pleased. Kobe got to play a few seasons with people who picked up the game professionally because he inspired them, and I imagined, for some time, what that must be like. To be able to communicate with people who made life decisions because of you: without you knowing, without you trying to create that impact on them. In these circumstances, to hear he had passed away on his way to a basketball game was devastating. Then more details emerged, the fact that he was with his daughter, and that he was with another family, and with a basketball coach. Nobody can tell us what all of these people thought, or said in their final few minutes: but Kobe was with people who loved a game he lived. Before I say anything more, my thoughts and prayers are with his family – who have lost two people, and with all the other grieving individuals, who must cope and make it through life without people they loved truly, madly, deeply.

I first heard of Kobe Bryant in 2008. I had never taken an interest in basketball before that, and never really cared for the sport, or for the people that played it. I read the Sports section in the newspaper daily, but glossed over anything that wasn’t football. This was till I was introduced to basketball: a gradual introduction that took place in the worst of ways. I sucked at sports – all truth be told. I had no talent, no stamina in any sporting arena, just a lot of passion for sporting activities. My introduction to basketball first took place culturally. I was surrounded by American students who followed basketball, baseball, and American football, and I heard about these franchise sports – being able to compare it only to the IPL at the time (which was still young), and spent countless hours on Wikipedia trying to figure out how they worked. How were league databases maintained, who were the leading franchises in the history of the NBA? What was a “lockout”? Each time my classmates mentioned a new, unrecognizable name, I remember lodging it deep in my memory, only to retrieve it when I went home and had an opportunity to Google it without shame. I used to remain silent, not contribute too much to the conversation surrounding the sport – because I’d be mocked with “not being from the area”, or being a “glory hunting supporter”. These are not phrases I care for too much today, but they stung at some point in my life. I did my research, meticulously, and I understood what the Lakers franchise represented, and how odd it was that they were still going strong in 2008. I decided before the 2009 Finals that I wanted the Lakers to win, having followed them for the season. That’s how I became a Lakers supporter.

I still sucked at the sport though. Oh my goodness, I was woeful. I’d get hit on the head by the ball, fail to catch it, commit some violation or the other every time I received it, and genuinely, from under the rim, fail to make the ball go into the net. Naturally, I was picked last when we played, and I often lost in games of “Around the World” that we played during lunch. I still loved playing. My mom got wind of the fact that there was a coach coming to teach basketball in our community. As with every other time my mother has heard about any coaching facility, I was signed up. I was told that I was at a “developing” age, and that basketball would help me grow taller if I played regularly. While I didn’t care too much for that, I think I was really pleased that I would get to learn the game – from a Coach, my Coach. That I would be taught, not mocked for my inability. One particularly rough day, I remember thinking I’d be able to play competitively with my friends. I enjoyed that though.

My Coach taught me several things: skill-based especially. However, if my passion for the Lakers and for Kobe Bryant was at the surface, with him, my support of the franchise, of this individual became something innate, something visceral. I’d become super-defensive if anyone critiqued him. I watched the NBA YouTube channel religiously and tried to pick up how he thought about the game. One day, after Kobe had hit a buzzer-beater, I remember asking my coach how on Earth he had done it at the wire. It wasn’t that there weren’t great buzzer-beaters in basketball already, it was just that I couldn’t understand how people were gutsy enough to take the shot – and what happened if they missed. My coach told me Kobe had hit that shot enough times to know how to hit it in his sleep, and know that it would go in. I knew I wanted to be able to practice to a level that basketball became muscle-memory that day. It drove me through Grade 7. Kobe dropped 61 points at Madison Square Garden that year – a scoring record that blew my brains out at the time – before I learned that Kobe had an 81 point game too.

When I moved schools in Grade 8, I was surrounded by a crowd I was way more comfortable with. Basketball was something I carried with me, and it was pretty nice to see that my friends, my classmates, whom I spent 5 years with were people who were open to playing pretty much any sport on any given day. When we played basketball, it was all super fun, and we all had our own pockets of understanding of the sport – our own little ways in which we played. It was around this time I bought my first pair of basketball shoes. I asked my dad if I could have them, because I had begun playing a little more seriously – I was going for coaching twice a week, and playing every day at school. When we went to the store, I saw a pair of basketball shoes with the Laker purple and Gold, and an NBA logo on them. We couldn’t afford a pair of Kobe’s, or any of those signature shoes – but to be able to wear a franchise I supported on my footwear for 3 years made me incredibly happy. I wore those to my first tournament win, my first-ever interschool basketball tournament, and to pretty much every interhouse tournament game I played till I outgrew them.

Moving schools introduced me to another basketball fan – the same person who sent me the news of Kobe’s passing. I poked a lot of fun at him for several reasons, but him and I got along on the Court, and off the Court really well. Basketball helped us bond. He called himself Jordan, something we all laughed at. I laughed too. In my head though, if he was Jordan, I knew I wanted to be Kobe. I yelled “Kobe”, as did several of us, when we threw random things into the dustbin from afar. We kept talking about the “Mamba Mentality” in school, especially on the basketball court. We were a terrible school team, honestly: just a few talented individuals off of whom the rest of us piggy-backed our entire school careers, but we had SO much fun playing the game – loafing around the court calling each other Kobe whenever someone made a good shot. Everyone was Kobe. Except my friend, who was Jordan.

As I grew older, I started to read up more about Kobe Bryant – to understand why some people didn’t take to him the way I did. I learned about the complaint of sexual assault and adultery, the charges that were brought, and the apology that came about. I remember being uncertain of whether that was post-facto responsible behaviour or whether I anticipated more, and trying to figure out where I stood on the incident at large. I thought then, as I do now, that this man I had placed on a pedestal was still, human after all. That he had caused trauma, and that he would have to take responsibility for it in some way.

I learned about his bust-ups with Shaq, and prayed that they’d be friends again (something I was supremely pleased about). Reading about that bust-up taught me about what an “ego” was, and how competitive individuals thrived on building that. I wasn’t sure who I placed more blame on for the subsequent poor years the Lakers had, but I definitely knew Kobe was responsible for a lot of it, which made me sad.

When the Lakers began performing poorly after 2012, a lot of the news was centered around how Kobe needed to go. He was the perfect scapegoat in a lot of ways, ageing, becoming plagued with injuries, and preventing the rise of what the media labeled as precocious talent in a similar playing position. I could not care less. I wanted Kobe to play for longer, to have one more good season with the Lakers. To make it to the playoffs, to the Finals. Dwight Howard and him fought – which was upsetting because it affected the team. I remember seeing Howard & him make up at a game this year, and then seeing today that Howard wanted Kobe to help him out at the All-Star Weekend Slam Dunk contest – a public acknowledgment that the beef was all done with, that they had grown past that as individuals, as adults.

Howard is robbed of the opportunity to do that.

When Kobe announced his retirement through “Dear Basketball”, I cried. I cry quite often – or atleast have tears streaming down my face, or get choked up when I read things that affect me deeply, and you could see that it pained him to go. I couldn’t believe this man wrote poetry to say goodbye. Kobe allowed me to discover The Players’ Tribune: and so many stories since. His last game, those 60 points versus the Jazz? Peak Kobe. Beautiful.

I tried to follow Kobe post-retirement the way I had followed his career. We didn’t see him at Lakers games too much – he wanted to spend time with his family, with his daughters. His poem was animated into a beautiful short which won an Oscar, but whose greatest achievement will remain that it made me cry. The Oscar means that the Academy will feature Kobe in the In Memoriam section in a fortnight, and I’m not sure how people will respond. Last evening, at the Grammy’s, which took place at Staple Center, Alicia Keys said that they “were standing, heartbroken, in a home Kobe Bryant built”. She could not have said it better.

Kobe Bryant introduced me to Kobe beef, because I was a vegetarian who did not know that there were different grades or qualities that beef could have. Kobe spoke Italian and I was shocked that he had an upbringing where he was a foreigner: I wondered how he endured racism. Earlier this month, when racism in Serie A (the football league) was at a high, I remember reading an article where he called for education to combat the issue – and I agreed with him.

When LeBron moved to the Lakers, Kobe welcomed him. Kobe, post-retirement, just spent time coaching his daughters team – he was with her at a Lakers game, coaching her in a clip that went viral. He was supposed to go on to own a team, or become a General Manager, or coach a team in the NBA, or the WNBA. He was so fiercely proud of everything his daughters did, and it stood out every time he spoke about them in public.

I don’t play basketball as frequently anymore – not at all, in fact. I play when I go home, back to my home court, and when I’m asked to join in for the intramural competitions that happen at University.

This morning, I woke up really early. I had a disturbed sleep. I checked my phone first, and saw that everything had been confirmed, that last night wasn’t a dream – that Kobe was actually dead. I saw the outpouring of grief, the fact that players weren’t sure how to play, but knew that Kobe wanted them to play. My roommate was asleep, but I wore my shoes and I walked down to the basketball Court on my campus.

I stood in front of the Court, in the dark, just looking at the markings – replaying this one sequence I have of Kobe that’s absolutely stuck in my head from a game versus Toronto where he received the ball at the 3-point line, drove in, faked, and hit the perfect layup – right from the corner of the little square above the net. That epitome of what I was taught a layup needs to be. It’s one of the only things I can still do half-decently in basketball, and Kobe was, and always will be the yardstick I hold myself to.

I came back to my room today after classes, and before writing this, threw out some scrap paper, right from one end to my room to where the dustbin lay on the other end, instinctively yelling out “Kobe” like we did as kids. I felt like I channeled his spirit, but I missed the shot. That was when it hit me that he was gone.

Too soon, God. Too soon.

My grandparents and I have a weekly conversational schedule. We speak week-on-week, mostly on Sundays, and for the most part, this is how it’s been all of my life. International calling used to be expensive when I was a child, so calls were quite short, but I remember dialing their number on occassion and hearing the cheer in their voice that basically made the money immaterial. It was why we were so pleased when video calling over the internet became a possibility in our lives. I don’t recall communicating too frequently over Skype, or GTalk, but I do know that the possibility existing made for more real-time communication, and my maternal grandfather and I spoke on IM for quite a while.

Anyway, I’ve always spoken to my grandparents most weekends. As I’ve grown older though, I think there’s lesser I’ve spoken about: I’m not entirely sure why, but I don’t give away too much. Just the regular – I’m doing okay, I’ve eaten all my meals, and yes of course, I will dress appropriately for the weather and not allow myself to freeze. This is even when I am unwell. In fact, I genuinely believe that my grandparents have found out that I have been sick only through the blog. And then I’ve not heard the end of it on call over the weekends.

I spoke to them today evening. My paternal grandmother is with my parents at the moment so we speak more frequently, but I called home to Bangalore. It was a short call, but it clearly meant a lot to my grandmother that I had called at all. We hadn’t spoken for two weeks, and I had spent a little bit of time last week wondering what stopped them from calling me – before realizing communication works as a two-way street, and that I would take ownership to speak to them over the weekend. I didn’t really talk about anything special. My grandmother asked about my results and I deflected, refusing to answer anything marks-oriented. She asked about an internship stipend and I told her I wouldn’t be discussing anything financial with her. Finally, she told me about happenings from the extended family that I had followed on our family group: her gossip, and I acknowledged it. I didn’t crack any jokes or poke jibes at her. Yet, she chuckled in amusement anyway.

I spoke to my grandfather – him and I don’t speak and have long conversations unless he’s telling me a story or I’m telling him a story. We prefer texting or e-mailing to much else, and face-to-face interaction has always been the highlight of speaking to him (because of how expressive he is). I got to catch up on his health though, and then he relayed messages my grandmother wanted to relay (but knew that I’d get upset if she asked about them), which is always enjoyable.

I’m not sure what it is about these calls that make them special. There’s no khaas khabre, so to speak. They’re just ingrained in my routine and in my life: they always have been, and they always will be. Family, man, some things are just inexplicable with them.