‘The Bad Girl’ at the interview

They were just about to let me go when, may be for lightening up the mood, the epidemiologist in the interview panel asked me “What are your hobbies?”. True to my soul, I replied “I read a lot and I love quizzing”’. 

Suddenly she asked, “Tell me the name of the last book you read”. 

 I wracked my brains for 5 seconds and stammered the only name which came to my mind at that point of time, “The Bad girl”, I told. 

“Who is the author?”, she persisted. 

I was in the dilemma of my life now. I told,  “Mario…(Vera? Varga? My brain hit the search mode with no luck)…...ehh, um,... I’m not getting the rest of his name”. 

Pause. 

Not one to give so easily, I blabbered, “He is Argentinian, He’s a Nobel laureate too. He’s actually a contemporary of Gabriel Garcia Marquez… I’m sorry, I don’t remember the rest of his name”. 

The bibliophile in me would never pardon me if I got his name wrong, so I could not and would not lie about it; that would be blasphemy. But I would not back down without a fight, so I thought it better to give pointers about who the author may be by mentioning his whereabouts. May be the interview board would have thought that I would go on with his biography if they din’t stop me right there and then. So they told me politely, “You can go now.”

I came out. I took two steps in a disoriented fashion. I had let myself down by not remembering the name of the author. I was a shame to the quizzer community of the world. Screw the rest of the interview.

Suddenly, in a flash, it came to me, “Llosa. Vargas Llosa. Mario Vargas Llosa ”. “Yippee…!!” my mind did a small somersault to itself. I turned back to go to the interview room. I had to redeem my pride, I had to tell them that I knew. 

Just then, one of the panel members emerged from the room. He din’t look like he cared. He hadn’t blinked when I mentioned the book’s name. There was no flicker of recognition when I mentioned Argentina or Nobel prize or even Marquez… For him and the others in the room, The Bad Girl could have been just another Mills & Boons book for all they knew, as the title seemed to suggest.

But for me, it mattered that I could remember, that I did not forget. I had redeemed myself in my eyes. I walked out feeling good, thinking of the actual Bad Girl that Llosa wrote about, about Marquez, One hundred years of Solitude and Love in the times of Cholera….




PS:It also didn't matter that later Llosa turned out to be a Peruvian and not from Argentina as I had claimed!




 

The Different colours of Spring

Spring has announced its arrival in Bangalore by breaking out into a melange of colours. The few trees that have managed to survive the onslaught of man;s greed as well as that of the metro rail construction have trumpeted the turn of time by bringing forth the colours they were harbouring in their bosoms around the year.

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The yellows and pinks of Spring

This is just outside my office. The trees are almost bare , no leaves, only flowers adorning their squiggly branches.

The entire ground has become carpeted with flowers...

Floral carpet

The Emergency Exit

I was waiting for my check in on the flight out of Bangalore. I couldn’t help but notice the middle aged lady checking in at the next counter. (She will probably thrash me for thinking about her as ‘middle aged’.) Well who wouldn’t notice a well dressed, well made-up lady? Then suddenly I heard her requesting the man at the counter, “Emergency exit please”. I got confused, ‘does she want an exit out of the airport pronto’?  Quickly I corrected myself, ‘ she might be requesting a seat near the emergency exit’. As much as I tried hard, I could not fathom what could be the motive behind this strange request. People request window seats, aisle seats, seats closer to the loo, the door etc etc, but an emergency exit? In what kind of an emergency could it possibly give you a head start ? Yeah, the plane is taxiing on the runway at the lowest speed possible and the tail catches fire. Or the plane has come to a standstill but the regular door fails to open?

 I am not sure how much help it will be in other major accidents like a mid-air crash or such needless-to mention tragedies. But then people are given in to their quirks, she might have had some kind of a situation in her mind where it helps to be near the emergency exit, or probably it just makes her feel secure. After all, security or the lack of it has nothing to do with the actual ground situation; it is all up there in your head.