I had been waiting a week to wake up from the dream. The dream that I won the first rank in Press Club. It had felt so good I didn't want the dream to end. I have never so felt so good. This was not like any other course or class. Here was the best of teachers and the best of peers.
And now a week has passed. No one has woke me up. No corrections have come in the newspapers.
Could this be true?
I was always the absentee student. Classmates liked me like they liked Maveli or Santa Claus. Came along once in a while. Had a good time and left.
Here I am telling myself again and again - it is true!
My heartfelt thanks to all our teachers who taught us what they knew (or atleast tried to).
But most of all to myclassmates and friends. I know (and you know) that this wouldn't have been possible without you - all of you. You gave me notes, encouragement, syllabus, reminders to assignment deadlines and what not. Our batch (evening batch) was the best here in ages.
I don't want to sound pretentious or cliched but - I dedicate my 'victory' to all my classmates - my friends who have always helped me.
This honour truly belongs to you.
Foreword: all places you see sniff-sniff, it is to be understood there is an element of sadness there. Other sounds of sadness in this post are: sob and boo hoo. Ah, also a lot of Malayalam 
It has been a year and 7 days since our classes started at Press Club – sniff sniff. Last year on 4 August I went for the first class which was by ONV Kurup sir. And today I wrote the last exam and reached home now – sniff-sniff.
That’s one whole year and [warning: I am showing signs of turning dramatic] and one whole world of experiences… [told you!!]
Today Anila, Divya (description: 2 friends who took the left and right seats next to mine in class:) – and I planned and wore Sari (it is our last day come on girls: when we are sad about something, we wear Sari, that is the rule!). Let us skip the exam-writing part. It didn’t have anything interesting to offer to my sentimental story. Oh this is a sentimental story, by the way. Lets just say I am keeping my notes intact - just in case.
Anyway, after exams the whole class went to the chaya kada next to press club to have chaya and kaapi. Don – (my third friend identified by long hair and 0-class-attendance) – was to pay for all of us. But for some reason the chechi at the tea shop kept thinking it is one of those Sari wearing girls who was to pay, not the mudi valarthiya boy. Chechi asked Divya and she screamed ‘Donnnnnnnnnnnn’ and ran straight to the next junction – the last nnnnn’s of ‘Don’ lasting all the way.
After the coffee we stayed and talked for a while – some of us realizing for the first time what the other classmates looked like and talked like. Anila said ‘ahh Don talks’ and Don said – well Don was advising Anila to quit her job – I lost some part of it so I didn’t catch his reasoning. But the gist of it is he is starting an unemployment agency that would start giving unemployment to employed youth, and in return he charged only a bottle of a particularly strong brand of – emm you know – water?
We waved bye bye to each other. Aneesh and Karthik, my fourth and fifth friends said tata – boo hoo hoo. They looked too happy and I am sure it is like they say in movies – the exterior santhosham covering the interior dukhams.
The boys went one way, the girls another. So us 3 sari-wearing sad-gloomy-depressed dukhithas [what? India is a free country and every Indian has the freedom to walk with their dukhams!] – started walking towards palayam, the next stop.
Chirping all the way – of sadness of course – Anila whined she had to go to office from tomorrow, I whined I had to wake up at 7:30 from tomorrow, Divya whined she did not have a reason to whine (always exaggerate when you are sad: second rule when you are sad). Divya, not able to stand it, left for the church. Anila and I took off to the library. A book-taking later, we were walking back – again sad and upset. Ok maybe I am overdoing rule number 2.
We reached statue and Don came to tell bye bye. Anila sadly and gloomily went to the hostel. The poor girl I am sure is telling her pillow right about now “Sob sob sob and a bottle of sniff, Mr Pillow”.
Donya and I decided to sing our sorrows (rule number 3 when you are sad is you sing). After many attempts we decided, singing was something we had to leave for the singers – no matter how sad we were. After some ronthu chuttals we decided to shake hands and sniff it a night.
Thus ended my kadana katha of one year and 7 days.
But really, there is a heavy feeling inside that I know will remain a few days. But these little things of singing badly together, of walking long for no reason, of talking so much about absolutely nothing, of accepting every invitation for a free coffee or tea, of sitting together in the night and looking up (hoping the sky was an atm machine and looking at it would eject a few good notes), of planning to do a number of things and messing every one of them, of cursing your friends cause they call you at 10 am and tell you its time to wake up, of reading your poems or stories to each other knowing they are the only ones who’d bother to listen (cause they don’t have a choice!), of always reaching late only to find your friends are not even out of bed, of making last-minute change-of-plans and somehow making it happen, of this and that and a lot of things that will only make sense to us loonies – it means the whole world to me. And like I say, a whole world of experiences.
