Essel World

ESSEL WORLD

It was the fourth weekend for me after having come to this city……Mumbai! After a hectic six-day week at the office you are hardly left with the enthusiasm and the energy to go out on Sundays. So I have been just lazing around the home for most part of the last three Sundays, winding it up with three or four rounds of walking around a nearby park, after dinner. That seemed to have become the wholesome finale for my week! But this schedule was getting on my nerves and I went to bed this Saturday, determined that I will make this weekend a little more interesting and NOT stay indoors!
True to my determination of the previous evening, I woke up early in the morning and got ready, still not knowing what I am going to do all day! All I knew was that this Sunday will not be as the previous ones! I was finishing my breakfast while watching the TV, and in one commercial break I heard “…….Essel World mein rahoonga mein, ghar nahin jaoonga mein”. There it was! My Sunday-plan! It is going to be Essel World today! Merry-go-round, fun, frolic, junk-food…. I will have it all today. It might look a little funny for a thirty-something to go to this place, all by himself, but I couldn’t hire a family for me on a Sunday! If I didn’t have one, I didn’t have one! But surely that can’t debar me from having some good time on a Sunday!
It was such a pleasure to travel by the Mumbai local train on Sundays, especially if you are traveling to Borivali and not to Churchgate! Mumbai-ites couldn’t agree more! After that I took the auto-rickshaw from Borivali station to the ferry-ghat,  which passed through such undulating roads, I thought I was already in Essel World, and riding one of the game rides there!   
It was a little too early for Essel World I guess, there were only three others besides me on the ferry. We waited for a full fifteen minutes for some others to fill up the ferry, but ultimately had to leave because the ferry from the other side came and was waiting to be docked. It was then that I noticed my co-passengers; there was a couple, three boys in their teens and a young lady. The couple was too engrossed in themselves and the boys disturbingly boisterous and the young lady seemed to be traveling alone. So there were others too in Mumbai like me, I thought, who come to this place alone. I felt I was not alone! She stood by the railing, her back towards me, hence I could not get a view of her face, she had lovely flowing hair though, a rather perfect figure and she was wearing sun glasses. I wished she was alone and may be I will be able to strike a conversation once we reached on the other side! May be I could befriend her and spend the day with her here! The sweet thoughts in my mind must have put time on a fast-forward mode and we were on the other side already. All of us alighted and walked towards the ticket booking counter. The young lady seemed to be in no hurry though. She walked the distance as slowly as possible and stood in the line. I strategically managed my pace so as to manage to stand just behind her in the queue. Though the ferry was all but empty there were quite a few visitors at the queue. There was another approach to this place.
In one opportune moment when she turned to one side I blurted “Hi!”, which took her by surprise and she seemed to be rather intruded by my action. I felt very apologetic but could not have undone it so just gave a very foolish look and thought that she would forgive my intrusion and go her way. But finally, she did respond with a soft “Hi!” which kind of brought life back to my heart! I thought it was now or never, gathered a little more courage and asked her “Have you come here earlier?”.  She took her sun glasses off, “Yes I have, I am waiting for a friend of mine”, she told, as if asking me to leave her alone! I took the hint and asked her no more questions and went about taking my ticket and took the side of Essel World for beginning my exploration, carefully avoiding the way which she took! It was quite a bad beginning for a Sunday, I thought. I stopped by the food joint and ordered for a tea and began to regain my composure. I thought I noticed there was a tinge of sorrow in her eyes. They were beautiful, deep and kind of confident. It was too short a time and the turn of events so unexpected for me that I could not recall more than that. But yes, I noticed a little of the lips, reminded me of a screen idol, or may be she was better. Anyway, I tried to concentrate on the tea and wished no more of such goof up happened that day.
I paid for the tea and prepared to leave the joint and it was then that I saw that she was entering the place.  Our eyes met but I behaved as if I didn’t quite notice her. She seemed as if she tried to suppress a laugh by seeing my behaviour but I did not have the courage to look back at her again, even though I wanted to.
The place seemed to be coming to life with more and more people thronging the place by the minute. I decided I will take a complete tour of the place and then start with the games. So for the next hour I walked about the place and took stock of all the available facility. Finally I decided to take up one ride which seemed to be very scary. I guess I chose it more because of the failure that I had encountered in the morning than the thrill in it. May be I wanted to prove something to myself! It swirls you from one side to another, building up the crescendo and finally holding you up side down and then swirling you down! There were shrieks of ecstasy from the revelers each time the machine came down. I was not able to be a part of the crowd though. It was nice, yeah just nice, I was still thinking of the lady and nothing seemed to touch me. It was over in some time and I alighted. I tried to tell myself that it was just a chance encounter and a bad one so I should just forget it.
I walked across to the next game, it was the speed train which runs on a big undulating rail, sometimes up the slope at other times it comes down at break-neck speed, some times you are nearly upside down and at other times you are passing through a pool,  splashing water along the way! This will be fun. The only issue was the design of the train was such that there were two seats side by side and I was wondering if will be disallowed because I was not with a partner! I don’t know if telepathy works, but I was fervently wishing the lady of the morning were with me and just then I heard a woman’s voice from behind , “Excuse me!”. I was just about to explain to her that I was not shadowing her and that it was only coincidental that I was at the same game as her and that I will gladly leave for some other game! “Can I come for this game with you, if you are alone?”, she asked . I felt like paying obeisance to the Lord in the sky, just like some cricketers do after they hit a century! I managed to conceal my excitement and asked if her friend hadn’t yet arrived. He hadn’t and will take some time to arrive as he could start only very late from his home due to some reason which she explained but I was hardly interested and paid no attention to it. My day was made! “Come along, I have come alone.” I helped her to the seat and sat beside her, one of the organizers’ men came and fastened our seat belts. The machine gained speed in a few seconds and the shrieks of the riders echoed in the air each time it came down a slope. “I am afraid” she said, “can we ask them to stop it now?”. “Shut your eyes and give me your hand”, I told her. Eyes shut, she rested her head on my shoulder and I held her hand tightly in mine in reassurance. I was feeling scared too, but only until now. Her touch seemed to insulate me from everything else and I could only feel her presence and the bliss of her company. I did not want this to end. It eventually did and she opened her eyes, moist with tears. I felt I should kiss them dry.  “Sorry, I was very afraid, hope I did not spoil your fun”, she muttered. You made my day lady, I thought, “Not at all”, I said, “It does get scary indeed!” “Thanks for holding my hand, I was feeling I will fall off”, she apologized. Only then did I realize that I was still holding her hand and slowly released it, “Are you hungry, can we go and have some snacks?”, I asked in a huff, as if to conceal my secret which was revealed. We went to the snack bar and were lucky to get a corner table. Her name was Sweetie, Sweetie Pai from Mangalore. The name goes with the personality, I thought. Born and brought up in Mumbai. Works for an Advertising Agency. We kept chatting for God-knows-how-long and I fell more and more for her with each passing moment. I seemed to like everything about her. I told my story and she asked me if I had a girl-friend. I got bolder and told “I will know that by the day-end today!” “Such a gullible you are, you know me only for a little more than an hour now, how can I be your girl-friend?”  All those romantic lines from movies came to my mind but I just gave a wry smile. “Let’s go and you can enjoy some more games, certainly you have not paid for the ticket to spend time sitting in this snack-bar!”, she told  . “I will sit here all my life if I had you for company”, I thought. I didn’t say it this time though, the recent snub too fresh in my mind. She pulled my arm and we were out of the restaurant.
“Let’s try something which will not bring out the food we just had”, she told and led me to the ice-rink. It was really cold inside, I felt especially so with my half sleeved shirt which is perfectly suited for the hot and sultry Mumbai weather. “Aren’t you feeling cold, hold me by the waist” she told and slid her hand around mine. We were sharing each others warmth. It felt good. Am I reading too much into this, I thought. We did try skating too for some time, well actually she did, I tried. She was quite good at it. She used to skate regularly in her school. Once out of the rink enclosure she suggested we try the “giant-petal”, we could enjoy the game and talk too. She had made out that I badly needed to talk to her. We sat facing each other, holding each others hand, more for the company rather than the support. I don’t really recall who took the initiative for this but it seemed so natural at that point of time that I didn’t even think about it. “One of these days I will come to your place and set it, a home needs a woman’s touch”, she told, “My father will love to meet you. Why don’t you come over to our place next Sunday”, “I don’t like the stubble on your face”, “Don’t keep staring at me”, “You said you love plays, can we go for one some time”………
The sound got louder and louder and at one point I thought the “giant petal” was coming down and so was I along with Sweetie. I was holding her tight though, so was she, but the grip seemed to fall feeble. And slowly the noise turned into a constant knock at the door and I woke up to see the TV blaring away as I had put a timer to it last night for starting off in the morning…. “…….Essel World mein rahoonga mein, ghar nahin jaoonga mein”.

Seva Kunj, 23rd Aug 2007