This weekend was surely a memorable one for me. It presented a great chance to catch up with my past life and relive those fine moments of childhood fun and pranks. The mad scramble for career and lifestyle had detached me practically from strengthening my friendships. It was great to meet up with the likes of Tikoo, Amish, the Dixit brothers Samir and Hiren after a long long time. These are men who were boys sometime ago and grew up with me. We played together, fought over “wrong” umpiring decisions and even stopped communicating with each other for a while but that did not dent the spirit of our relationship at all. The place where I live had a good amount of females which also gave us an opportunity to play outdoor games which today’s youth might find hard to compete. The common issues that plague our apartment ensures that we forget our miseries and unite in the favor of a solution. In such circumstances, nothing else matters to us than the protection of our “motherland”.
The weekend’s impromptu meeting was a nostalgic one. It was heartening to know that the members of our team are progressing by leaps and bounds in the society. Most of them married and settled in life but some still strongly focused on their careers. Many are making inroads into the IT and Telecom industry. TCS, Wipro, Infosys, Reliance InfoComm, they are all planted there. Nishit has been abroad for a long time now serving his IT company there in software solutions while Amish is the future of medical science for us. Samir works in shifts but finds time to take his son and family out. We caught up with him on Saturday while he was returning from one of his trips with his little angel Hrishikesh who’s bewildered look at being introduced to me, reminded of the touch that I have lost with the families and friends around.
As evening fell on the day, it was time to meet another set of friends from the school days after 18 years! It all seemed unbelievable. The Internet helped Yogesh to meet me and then we networked and got some more friends to bunch up. Finally only a few showed up but the absence did not dampen the charm of nostalgia with 4 of my trusted buddies. We decided to hook up at a restaurant owned by another of my batch mate Sudhir who was a fine cricketer and had represented our school Sheth Gopalji Hemraj in many inter-school tournaments.
I recognised the podgy Yogi and the lank Rajesh but many were surprised when Sandeep entered the scene. They were noticing the change after a long duration. After the food and drinks were partaken, we stood outside for hours on the chilly roadside gossipping and making fun on the tid-bits from our past life, relishing it with the sweet paan. Our crushes on our faithful teachers, the fun that we had ragging a certain classmate, the love stories of our childhood, the period bunks, our mates who have settled abroad and the huge fights. I did skip a heart beat reliving that time just when my buddy’s phone starts ringing, the magic spell breaks and I am brought back from time. Realization dawns that we are no longer those naughty kids. There are other important things that have taken precedence in our existence. Just like my “chaddi” buddies back at my house, my schoolmates have progressed equally strong over the years. Yogi does a good job managing his print & production business, Sudhir’s become a smart restaurateur, Sandeep has been working for an MNC bank while Rajesh has become a Homeopathy doctor with a faithful list of clientele.
Amit, Ninad, Suhas and Kamalkant could not make it for various reasons but we do hope to arrange a grand event sometime in the future and have them show up for sure. Now that we have bonded in 18 years after the unfortunate split, we must not say goodbye just so soon.
