Love, sex and Bharatiya sanskar dhoka
My friend Aashiq is a hopeless romantic. A few weeks ago he was having lunch in Hauz Khas Village when he spotted a girl walking by. Tall, beautiful and slender, she was just getting into a car, when Aashiq walked up to her, smiled and handed her a napkin on which he had scribbled his name and asked her if she would like to visit his profile on Facebook to know him better.
A few days later she sent him a message saying hi. He wasn't exactly expecting it, but he was sure as hell thrilled. They chatted for a while. She works in an embassy, he's a graphic designer; it seemed too good to be true. They decided, in order to make this more meaningful, they should write letters to each other, instead of frittering away time on FB Messenger.
Each week, they decided, they would write a letter and hide it in some part of the city and then alert the other on Facebook, providing clues, where to find it. This went on for quite some while. Aashiq appeared to be enjoying himself. One day he asked for her phone number. She wanted this to be a game too. Each day she would message him one digit, on the tenth day he had her number.
They talked and decided to finally meet. After dinner, they went back to her place, had a couple of more drinks and fell on each other. It bothered him that it was happening a little too fast, even though it had been only two months since he had given her the napkin. The next day they lounged in bed and talked for hours. She lives in a big house in Maharani Bagh with an entire floor to herself. He lives in a barsati in Khirkee Extension. It surprised him that not only does she not keep a TV in her room, she also does not have Wi-Fi, yet her fridge is well stocked with foreign beers.
They began to meet frequently, but only at her convenience. He couldn't blame her, if one week she was driving to Ladakh for a quick getaway, the next she was in London for a conference. He, meanwhile, was about to quit his job.Last weekend, I met Aashiq for a drink. After a few rounds of beer I asked him how it was going. "It's over man," he said. "I called it off."
Aashiq had found someone else, undoubtedly. Sensing my surprise, he began to spare details. "What do I say, I like damsels in distress," he said, his eyes following the Arsenal game on the TV screen. "She was too sorted for my liking. It didn't work for me. I didn't feel like I was in control."
"So who you seeing now?" I asked.
"That is another story..."
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"What has happened to our Bharatiya sanskar?" My friend Nand Kishore asked the other day while driving. We were on our way to Vasant Vihar for lunch.
"What has got into you?" I asked, shocked. Shocked and surprised, because my friend is not a Modi bhakt/fan boy/or even a remotely right leaning troll. I can even go out on a limb and say he didn't even vote for the BJP. Why was he pulling an Alok Nath on me?" "Do you realise how easy it is to have one night stands these days because of this Tinder app," he groaned. "We are in the midst of a sexual revolution and it had to happen now."
My friend, a fellow journalist, is a year younger than me, and is about to get married later this year. I have known him for a few years and find him to be the oddest person I know. It doesn't help that he has all the quirks and mannerisms of an old and irritable uncle. Irked by his neighbourhood barber once for quipping that he will lose all his hair one day, he has developed a strange tick where he keeps rubbing his salt-and-pepper hair, as though if he doesn't make them stick, they will begin to shed. He is mostly bearable for one verily redeeming quality: his self-deprecatory humour.
Yet, when it comes to dating women, he has been far more successful than I have ever been. He claims he has been dating since he was 18 and has never been once single for longer than a month in these past nine years. Unbelievable, right? What's more unbelievable is that he is the only person I know who has the worst cases of break-ups. These are not break-ups that end with plain tears. His exes end up wanting to cause him harm. Throw things at his car or attack him with their bag. A few months ago, Nand Kishore met someone, fell in love and looks genuinely happy. It has also got him very paranoid about life and life's grave matters. He seems to carry a burdened air about him.
"So what about the app?" I asked, unwittingly. (My gay friends have Grindr and it is easier for them to hook up than it is for me to find an agreeable restaurant on Zomato.)
"My friend has lined up three dates this week, just by logging on to the dating app," he said. "Last weekend, he had two. One began at his friend's place and he didn't even need to step out for dinner. I am telling you, you can get laid with just a swipe of finger. How can getting it be so easy? What happened to our fucking sanksars?"
"Nothing is as easy as it seems," I said to pacify him. "There's always a chance of hooking up with a psycho."
"Screw sex… with strangers."
"Poor you," I told my friend.
"Poor you," my girlfriend told me when I told her about this conversation with Nand Kishore. "I bet you're missing out on all this fun, too... Aren't you?"