The First Glass of Beer

There I was, sitting in a lounge bar, for the first time, and having a beer, also for the first time. I would have refused under normal circumstances, but the atmosphere was right(dark with heavy disco music playing, also filled with a smell of cigrette smoke), and my brother was offering me a glass upfront. Well, what did I have to lose? After all, I am an engineering student now, and engineering is never complete without learning how to digest beer, right? So, I went for it.

My bro went to get a cigrette pack before the beer arrived, he sid that beer ain't complete without cigs. And so the beer arrived while he was gone. I was happy for the darkness, for the expression on my face was one of nervousness, and I didn't want the waiter to see that. Then the beer was poured and the waiter was gone, and I was left alone with two full glasses of beer in front of me. Beer looks really tempting and delicious when its just been poured into the glass. The colour is golden, and there is a light froth floating on the top. But this feeling lasts only as long as the beer is untouched and in the glass... the moment you put it to your lips, you realise what it really is -> rotten carbohydrates. Once again I was thankful for the darkness, for this time the expression on my face was one of disgust and nausea, and it would have exposed the fact that I was drinking for the first time. Well, not exactly the first time, I've had wine before, but wine's kind of light and good tasting(certainly better tasting than beer), also its called a ladies' drink. Beer, on the other hand tastes rotten, as mentioned above, and I've seen it being drunk mostly by men. And so, I had to prove I was man.

My brother arrived with a pack of cigrettes, and now I was burdened with the task of drinking the beer with a straight face. I gazed around for sometime, munching on the few munchies that came with the drink(probably to drown the taste of beer). And then the dreaded moment arrived, my bother picked up his glass, and motioned for "cheers". I had to do the same, and so I did, and put the glass to my lips for the second time in the evening, and sipped. The same rotten taste filled me, but it wasn't so bad this time. In fact, I eventually managed to finish 3/4th of the glass, by having huge amounts of snacks between each sip, each of which was accompanied by a grimace. My borther had finished his glass by then and was watching me with a grin, maybe he knew of my plight. I finally couldn't bring myself to drown anymore of the vile liquid down my throat, and offered him the remainder of my drink. He accepted it and drowned it in two gulps. I watched him, somewhat wide-eyed. He probably had lost his taste buds in an accident which none of us knew about, else how could he have drunk that vile tasting fluid?

Well, the ordeal was finally over, and I smsed all my friends proudly "Chotte, aaj beer maara... bahut mazaa aaya!"

Ganpati Bappa Moriya

Evening, 5:30pm

I woke up suddenly... there was a lot of commotion going on downstairs.I Got out of bed lazily and looked out the window. There was this girl down there (one who I'm iinterested in) and I immidiately changed into something acceptable and went down. We talked for a while and I realised that the Ganesh idol was being taken away for visarjan. The truck hired by the society was filled up with a few people. I was contemplating if I should join them, when another of my friends came down. We decided we should go, after all it would be our first experience.

The truck was loaded with a few uncles and auntys and four of us guys. We left the building admist cheers. Down the road Mr. Yadav tried to urge us with cries of 'Ganpati Bappa..' but we were to lazy and concious to reply with a 'Moriya..!'. But the josh soon caught on, and now we were the ones giving out the cries and trying to shout the loudest. I was a nice sight to see many Mumbaikars going the same way as us... giving us cries of Ganpati Bappa Moriya without hesitation. Well, along the way, when we were trying to catch a few breaths the auntys started with the gossiping as usual.. "isne yeh nahi kiya... hum to aisa karne waale the... yahaan to koi kaam karne waala hi nahi hai...".. when it got too much for us, we started of with another string of cries... aah.... feels good when you can cut off the bakwass of the elders without getting reprimanded.
The journey wasn't too long, and we entered Borivali National Park soon, coining songs on the way. Well, it was time to get off. Shouting "ek, do, teen, char...." we got off, but realised we were barefoot. This was an experience in itself too, walking on gooey mud barefeet, somewhat a rarity in an urban city like mumbai. Finally, it was time to say goodbye to our "ganpati-ji". The cops wouldn't allow us down to the river as part of crowd control, but we pulled a senti on him, saying this is our first visarjan and so on... he finally let us down. Though I've never felt much towards religion and idol worship (though I'm a firm believer in God, a shapeless, nameless, uncharacterized God), I did feel an emotion of attachment towards this Ganpati, coming down here actually and seeing it go, and I for once felt the same as many others in Mumbai and Maharashtra do on this day.