Hyderabad style....

LAIDBACK…

Laidback is the inherent quality of a hyderabadis’. How laidback we are? …. Well, when Ganguly was axed from the Indian cricket team whole West Bengal protested. But when Laxman was axed no one from Hyderabad protested and what do we say for that? .. Well, we say when comeback king Jimmy Amarnath made those many comebacks to Indian cricket team, (guess how many times…... 18 times he made comebacks) why can’t Laxman? …

BIRD flu scare refuses to fly away….

Coming to bird flu… ever since we hyderabadis’ came to know about the bird flu we, stopped eating chicken (just gave a break….) why? (Take a wild guess …...) well, we know if we stop eating chicken, poultry federation people will organize chicken melas’ and will distribute eggs for free as part of a promotional campaign. Poultry business has taken a hit since the outbreak of bird flu. Assurances by the government have done little to win back customers. There was a chicken mela organized in the last week of Feb., people started standing in Q’s for more than two hrs before the mela started. And Chief Guest for that mela was chief minister of Andhra Pradesh. As gates were opened people attacked, the attack was intensive that the mela went out of stock within 30mins. Aur hamare pyaare CM saab ko kilaane chicken nahi tha. This should have given you a clear idea, why bird flu scare refuses to fly away from Hyderabad (the land of chicken biryanis’)

Georgia Tech may set up campus in city….

Hyderabad may be the next chapter of one of the most prestigious universities in the United States – Georgia Institute of Technology – popularly known as Georgia Tech. the reason for choosing Hyderabad, according to officials, is that the university is pretty impressed with the resources available here in terms of talented students and an established IT infrastructure. Another contributing factor is that nearly 40 per cent of students at Georgia Tech are of Indian origin.
Given the university’s image in excellent research and thus attract top research institutions around the world to the state. So students will benefit directly as well as indirectly with growing job opportunities and research openings.

FMs…

Hyderabad is blessed with another FM radio channel apart from regular Vivdha Bharathi. It is AIR RAINBOW FM. Today while preparing this blog was listening to one of the radio show of new FM channel in the morning. This was your choice show and we need to call them to request the song. Today was the birthday of legendary playback singer Satyanarayana, and RJ’s were attributing this show to him for his unforgettable songs he sang for us. There was this B.Tech final yr student’s call; when asked which song to be played for him. He says, “any song new or old, no problem”. Then this female RJ says, “as today is birthday of legendary singer Satyanarayana we’ll play one of his hit song from the movie ‘mayabazar’”. This caller says,” I wanted to ask a question to all RJ’s out there”. The RJ gets interested “yeah go on, please ask” . he asks, “have you all RJ’s seen rang de basanthi?”. RJ blushes and answers,” yeah we all saw that, very good movie.”
The caller tries to flatter the RJ’s saying, “this movie shows the importance radios and RJ’s, so why don’t u play a song from that movie.” The male RJ protests saying, “you already made your request for the song from the movie ‘mayabazar’, we are actually remembering him today”. The caller defends himself saying,” look we can remember him this entire day but for five minutes we’ll give a break and listen to song from RDB!”
Male RJ who was feeling defeated ends the call saying, “yeah that’s fine, this show is for playing your requested song so here we are playing a song from the movie rang de….. Basanthi!”
Last month there were two recruitment camps for two different FM channels, which are yet to go on air. One was Radio Mirchi FM other one was… I don’t know!

TRAIN 9 2 11 (continued)

“WHEN DID YOU COME TO KNOW ABOUT YOUR FATHER?”
“There was a message for me when I got home. I was having lunch with Sindhu.”

I looked down at the biscuits. “I’m not really hungry right now. I’ll get something at the station later.”

Rachana started eating biscuits, and I took one for tasting purpose. It was eight o’clock in the evening. Train halted at some remote station, which was not properly lit. The passenger who was sleeping on the opposite seat was waked by the halt. He looked at his watch. He walked over to the door and cautiously opened it. In the doorway stood a short man, with thick glasses and a thin, sallow face.

“Excuse me,” the man said differently. “You have a lighter”.
“No”
“Do you have matchbox?”
“No,” he said rudely. He started to close the door.

Fifteen minutes later, as the fellow passenger was trying to sleep, we began to smell smoke. The smell was getting stronger. I stood up to open the door. The fellow passenger pushed against it. It held fast.
“Hello?” he called out. “What’s happening out there?”
There was no response.
“Hello?” I pressed my shoulder against the door, but there seemed to be something heavy on the other side of it closed. “Mister?”
There was no answer. The only sound we could hear was a loud crackling noise. The smell of the smoke was becoming overpowering. The bogie was on fire that is probably why he left. He must have gone to get help. The passenger slammed his shoulder against the door, but it would not budge. “HELP!” he screamed. “Get me out of here!”

Smoke was starting to pour under the door, and we could feel the heat of the flames beginning to lick at it. It was getting difficult to breathe. The passenger was starting to choke, Rachana became unconscious. The passenger also was beginning to lose consciousness. I slammed my shoulder against the door with whatever energy left, door budged a little. I slammed harder this time; door budged little more, which was enough for a man to get through. With great difficulty, I fished out both of them.

I pushed my way through the crowd of passengers and bystanders and hurried over to the concrete bench along with Rachana. Three bogies’ had been engulfing by the fire.
“How did it happen?” a bystander asked me.
“I don’t know.”

At 20:30hrs, the station began to fill with official vehicles, fire engines, ambulances, and police vehicles. I watched as two ambulance attendants pushed a gurney carrying a body into the ambulance. The body was of the man who smirked with the co-passenger.

(to be continued.............)

TRAIN 9 2 11

IT WAS FIVE O’CLOCK in the afternoon when I woke up. I opened my eyes reluctantly, not wanting to let go of the dream. The room stank of cigarettes and empty wine bottles. I rolled out of bed and almost fell as I stumbled over Prashanth, my friend, sleeping on the floor beside my bed.

He didn’t move as I walked across the room, rolled up the shade and opened the window. It was raining, some of the rain hit Prashanth. It didn’t wake him; he merely rolled over on his side. I circled around him to go into the bathroom. I still had an hour to get over to railway station and meet Rachana, my girlfriend. If I rushed, I could make it.

Twenty minutes later, I was on my way out the front door. I rushed across the rain-swept sidewalk and got into the car.

I jumped out of the car and dashed for the train. I made it just as the train was about to leave in ten minutes. Rachana was sitting at the window seat. “For heaven sake, Avinash,” she complained. “Why did you come so late?”
“What do you think? I was out looking for a gorgeous.”
“Oh, yeah?” she winked. “It was raining and you stayed in the bed waiting for it to stop.”
“You read my mind,” I said, winking back to her. She smiled as she gave me the peck on my cheek. “Two years, been dating you this much I can understand.” She said, teasingly.
She looked up to me out of the corner of her slightly slanted eyes. “Hmm… where is Prashanth?”
I smiled at her. “He’s probably waked up by now.”

I got into the train. Prashanth was standing in front of me. He was dressed gawkily. He turned as I came in. “You forgot train tickets at home.” He blasted on me. “How careless you are?”
Without answering, took the tickets and turned to my seat next to Rachana. She was laughing, and to my relief the train started moving. Prashanth got down the train. Quickly he trusted a bag of water bottle and biscuits in her hands. She took it and we both stood there and waved at him. He gestured towards parking lot. “I’m gonna have a roll with the car,” he shouted.
“Hey—“I called as he went through the door to the parking lot. He turned with a big smile and waved at us.

Rachana was attractive, in her early twenties, wearing black jeans, and white sleeveless top that has a message in pink on it. ‘SHORT CHICKS ROCK’… long enough to be sexy, but short enough to remind you she was probably smarter than you were.

“Without love, everything else is meaningless.”
She nodded weakly. Lovely.

“Avi” her voice was soft. “I’m sorry to bother you.”
I looked up to her. “That’s not at all a problem; Prashanth will take care of the project work”. She was silent for a moment, and then she nodded.
We had the rest of the journey without further talking.

(Stay glued…... adventure is yet to start!)
PS: Rachana’s father met with an accident and he was in critical condition. She asked me to come with her to Vizag to meet her father. Well this was for story.
Rachana was my plus one crush, the best one of all the crushes I had. : D