Rs 199 - that was the cost of Masala Lemon Soda at this chic cafe with green pastel colour tables and ashwood chairs. Or was it hard maple, I think white ash perhaps. God knows. Anyway, who sells nimbu paani for 199 non-inclusive of taxes? If a single lemon costs Rs 10 and of course, cafes and restaurants buy in bulk so even cheaper and please don’t tell me that shakkar is expensive, then how does a delicious staple drink end up being this expensive * insert crying emojis *
I ended up ordering iced tea because well, you got to sit somewhere right. And while paying the bill extremely friendly cashier looked at me, when I said, “The menu says 180 and you are charging 200”, and said feebly, “Ma’am taxes”. Could just have had nimbu paani * insert another crying emoji *
Let me clarify something before you get bored of my little rant. This is definitely not a blog about expensive drinks that you can just make at home for free but about this insanely cute young couple in a bookstore. Nothing like this I have ever witnessed IRL (ironical of me to use IRL since I am legit old to understand any slang)
Have you ever witnessed anything that can only be described as cringe, corny and OMG I STILL LOVE IT? The most random thing that forces you to smile like an idiot and think at the same time `what is happening’ happened today. Well not to me. But to someone. For holy sakes, it’s a country of ~1.3 billion, how can it not happen to anybody? Surely someone is living their Pinterest aesthetics no? Anyway, this 19yo — I remember being 19, naive and so full of enthusiasm and energy and life. God knows what happened after. Anyway, this 19yo enters the bookstore — a small squeazy lane with lines and lines of books piled on either side. They go right up to the ceiling. Just tilt your neck up and a completely mysterious world presents itself in all its glory. Does anyone ever climb the ladder to get those books, I wonder? Someone must na? Anyway, this 19yo girl with eyes that only a to-be adult whose innocence is not shattered by the world (yet, and I hope that yet only remains in a bracket forever) stands at the foot of the entrance and kneels down. I couldn’t understand what was happening and neither did the guy to whom it was actually happening. LOL
Imagine someone asking you to be their best friend for their entire lives on your b’day. CUTE STUFF no? Even cuter if it’s in a bookshop with a mini-garden and flowers laced all over the place. My afternoon habit is to scroll Pinterest and wonder who are these people, and where are they. And well, there they were. Right in front of me. I am smiling like an idiot even as I write this. Have you ever had a crush on someone and felt these little butterflies in your heart saying MYGAWDMYGAWD please remove your cute face away from my eyes or I’ll die. I obviously didn’t feel like dead but my heart is all glowed up and warm and titillating thinking about it. Thank God romance is not dead! Actually, not thank God (apparently God is dead).
Thank all these over-extra cheesy people that romance is still thriving. I have a friend who started dating someone recently and man I tell you he has gone all ballistic on poor cheese. Maybe I am a romantic myself and that is why all of this just seems please-keep-melting-me-heart nice to me.
Oh before I forget, the guy said, “I want to be more than just best friends” and the girl looks at him, rolls her eyes, and just because she was in polite company refrained from saying, “what a complete moron did I get”
It must surely be a feeling where the ones feeling it are climbing that ladder to reach the highest pile and pick out a teeny-tiny version of Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair by Pablo Nerudo(a)