‘I’ AM HERE… Or MAIN CHETAN BHAGAT BANNA CHAHTA HOON

“Hey, I’ve updated my blog…check it out”

A while later, I am hit with a reply-

“Hoo…it’s ‘too long’ pal. I have better things to do”

This was one moment that made me feel proud of myself…I successfully held back from replying

“Yeah…go…do the ‘better things’…don’t forget to get a condom…”

Sirji…what a ‘self-control’!!!

Yuckkkkkk.

So is this what a ‘blogger’ gets? Hmmm…I’ll stay here…anyway.

Well this occurred few months back…January to be exact…when I stepped into the blogosphere.

Weeks back…

I scrolled through the preface of ‘Five point someone’…even before reaching the prologue, I said to myself, “Hmmm…one day…I’ll create ripples…write something…and I’ll be another Chetan Bhagat”. I bunked the day’s posting (well…folks…bunking ‘surgery casualty’ was not new…just that…now I had a reason…!)

Once I completed the book…I said to myself…

Hey there’ll be a day when people say…’Chethan? Did you mean Nithin?’

He he…fortunately, dreams are never taxed…!!!

For few days…I was mad…desperately trying to get hold of the next book that he penned ‘One night at the call centre’…I didn’t get it… finally I bought ‘The three mistakes of my life’…I stressed ‘bought’ since reading a book is something that I did on every blue moon night and ‘spending’ money to buy a book was a thing that occurred on days when all ‘navagrihas stood in a line’

I finished the book at a record breaking speed that made me realise that if I read Harrison’s Internal Medicine so fast I would master the subject in months and become the new big thing in class…!!!

“Main Chetan Bhagat banna chahta hoon”

Few days later, I heard that the writer landed in Kerala. I read the interviews that filled newspapers.

The release of ‘YOU ARE HERE’ by Meenakshi Reddy…blogger-turned-author was another major event.

'Oh! The time is ripe' I said to myself…

The days that followed saw a dreamer…who kept aside his textbooks…stethoscope…what more…even my mobile phone…!!!(Nithin minus his mobile phone is a rare sight…and I promise…if there’s a paparazzo with a shot of me sitting without holding a mobile phone, let him try e-bay, he might get quite a lot of bucks!!!)

I recalled one of the most wonderful books I had read, ‘The god of small things’…the book that made me proud of being a malayalee (kudos to Arundhati Roy!!!)

I forgot simple questions like,

“Hey what would you do if your mobile phone didn’t have a thesaurus?”

“Hey what if Microsoft never added a spelling and grammar check or the auto-correct option?”

Yes…I had decided to become the new big thing…though in reality I was a ’blogger-turned-dreamer-turned eccentric medico’.

What did I have to fear? After all it is Nithin…the pompous-swashbuckling hero…with an ever-fresh mind ready to take up anything!!!

It didn’t take such a long time to return to the normal mood…

The following ‘events’ helped:

1) The article ‘Half naked in the flat’…a review of ‘You are here’ by Lakshmy Venkiteswaran (the New Sunday Express, Sep 14,2008)

“….Chetan Bhagat’s appalling and irksome novels becoming record-breaking best sellers”

2) The article ‘Book,booker,booked’…by Meena Kandasamy(the New Sunday Express, Sep 14,2008)

“The beginning of the book can give you a sense of déjà vu.

But after40 pages, you may skip paragraphs and then pages…”

3) The medical texts that I had kept arranged on my computer table-to remind me ‘I had lots to learn’!!!

4) A telephone conversation: “da remember Chetan graduated from IIT Delhi, then got into IIM-A, and finally settled…and then he penned his book…and you have too long a time ahead to graduate your MBBS”

5) The ever increasing tummy (ahem ahem de single mega pack) that the sedentary times I spent in front of my computer monitor had gifted me.

6) A recent exchange that took place in my kitchen

Chechi: ‘da get the uruli from the shelf, I can’t reach it’

Nithin: ‘Chechee…my eyes can’t catch a glimpse of the uruli…!!! Where is it?’

Chechi:’OH!!! This checkan (checkan=lad)…da an uruli is the thing that is right in front of your eyes.Take it’

Nithin: ‘ooops….i was searching for the tool that we use to make chapathees’

Chechi:’eeeeswaraaaaaa…nee ethu lokatha?(oh god…are you still on earth?)

I realised that being logical alone isn’t sufficient…URULI in Malayalam referred (as I had thought) to something round…!!! ‘Reality’ was different.

FINALLY I STEPPED BACK INTO THE WORLD WHERE PINCHING WOULD PAIN…

So world…’REST-IN-PEACE’…for now…

There will be a day.

A day...when… Kalidasa or Shakespeare will book tickets back to earth to thrash the newly unleashed terror!!!

Mera number aayega…!!!

Nithin:" So howzzat?"

Xyz: "Wow, Nithin, that’s a cool write-up. But why the hell are you so excited?

BLOGGING ain’t such a biiiig thing…"

Fortunately…I COULD RESIST FROM REPLYING

”F*&*% you”

(PS:K...Im baak...an official 'post' after a long time...this time...i need u 2 shoot...
holidayz r almost over...
;(
wid lots of luv...yers Nithin)

thanks 2 Smriti Srivasthava
and Amooma)

(I am one huge fan of Chetan Bhagat...and I am one guy who wishes for
Chetan's dreams of becoming India's favourite writer come true...
in my post i never compared myself to him...ooo...this has been typed in after going through the comment page)