The song continues...

I was in Jia sarai for the interview. I stayed with Rahgu and Ravi. Ravi is working with an upcoming internet site in the field of marketing. He sells a site called parikshaguru.com to the coaching institutes. He asks them to advertise on the site. With a name like that, I, for once, wouldn't if i ran a coaching institute. 

Raghu, an ex IBM employee is now preparing for civil services. He quit his job and came here. 

Ravi and Raghu smoke like chimneys. Sitting in their room, my nicotine level automatically increased to their levels as they smoked inside. I didn't mind. I smoked once and had now given up. 

Ravi is the leanest person i have ever seen. Bare bones and skin, no muscles. In the morning, he was flexing himself. As ravi is from Koraput in orissa, I took a dig that he is a living proof of the poverty level in his district. He countered saying that he is a karate expert. I bought it. Being lean is something many youth don't like (get some body yaar) but come to cherish it during their middle ages (and run marathon running age) Anyway, there was no reason to disbelieve. 

 I walked around Jia Sarai. I met some old faces. The shops were the same. The faces too. Just that somehow i was finding it difficult to relate myself to all that. It was difficult for me to believe that i stayed in this hellhole for so long. The stinking latrine in the building almost made me puke and the bath was not different. When i was here, i never cared. 

The filth on the lanes is the same. It doesn't matter to anyone. It didn't to me once upon a time. 

Ravi got me a bottle of baba ramdev brand hair oil and shampoo in the evening. He told me that it would help to arrest hairfall. Well, neat way to say that i am losing hair. We boozed the night after interview. Boozed a lot. Mishra ji joined us. With his stories of his friends who had succeeded in the previous years. Only that those friends do not recognize him any longer. 

Many of my friends who prepared with me have left the place. Some made it, most didn't. None died in the process though.

The song continues, the dark bylanes sing the blues. Of failures, of successes, of the hunt, of the hunters, of those who dreamt, those who aspired and those who still stay there. With the fire in their hearts, to warm those winter nights when chai suttas alone can't keep one warm. To urge one to go on with their preparations. To never give up. I was once there. Living my dream.