The Midnight Scene

After a tiresome Saturday evening of Shopping and sightseeing, I hit the bed much earlier than usual. I guess around 9.30ish. While I was in deep slumber, I heard a siren go on. It was absolutely loud like there was an orchestra playing right there in my hotel room. Totally miffed I woke up to figure out what it possibly was. There is a night club right opposite to the hotel and I was quite used to strange noises and drunken shriek in the night. However this was unusual and the sound was a thousand folds louder. I managed to grab my specs and I looked at the time, it was 12:43. I opened my hotel room door to find out what was happening. That was when it hit me, that it was the fire alarm. I watched a couple rush down at an alarming speed in their bath robe. Absolutely cheesed off knowing I had to go down too, I grabbed my jacket, mobile and my room access card and headed downstairs. And yes, elevators were a total no-no during a possible fire situation. I was in the seventh floor! There were firemen on my way down who directed me to the fire exit. With no signs of fire, I was hoping that it was not a lame fire drill! In minutes I was at the fire assembly point – which was right in front of the hotel. When I reached the ground floor, there were at least around 100 people gathered – semi clad. Most of them were either in bath robes or a towel draped around them and shivering in cold and some couples wearing outfits upside down. What fear of life and death does! I glanced through each one of them with a smirk. I observed one lady screaming at her daughter who supposedly was a bride-to be; for sleeping with her fiancé. It seems it was a sign of bad luck since it was the night before the wedding. Phew! I am sure the bride-to-be never expected a twist such as this! About an hour later we were called inside the hotel. After a ineffectual speech of apology the guests were allowed to enter their hotel rooms. The next morning there was a notice at the door – The Hotel Manager’s apology for the inconvenience caused due to the false fire alarm. I couldn’t help, but smile at the note! 

Inked !

A little more than a year ago, I accompanied my friend to the Tattoo parlor. Until then I had no clue what it was to get inked, although I had seen people with some real crazy tattoos like rangoli, some arbitrary design, their names, their lover’s names, pictures of god – what not. To be honest all this seemed quite amateurish to me only until I witnessed my friend get a professional one done. I thought it was remarkable. I guess that sparked off my interest to get inked too.
Sixteen months later, here I am in a tattoo parlor to get inked. This time on me! Although I had made up my mind on what I wanted to get inked. I was contemplating if I should get it done on my back or arm. I was very particular of the fact that the tattoo would be such that I would flaunt it only at will. My friend suggested that the first Tattoo should be in a place where I could see for myself. I thought that made sense. Today, I am so glad for that suggestion, otherwise I would have lost the opportunity to admire the Tattoo . I got inked on my left arm and it reads “Om” in devanagari script (Hindi). It wasn’t as painful as I thought it would be. It was bearable and pain totally worth it. Russell was the man with the needle gun on the mission. He took not more than 10 minutes for completing the design and shade. While I am in awe of my first tattoo, I am thinking of a second one already!