Rain, Rain

Here’s a kiddy nursery rhyme that makes me nostalgic:

Rain, rain go away.
Come again another day.

Little Arthur wants to play,
In the meadow by the hay.

Rain, rain, go to Spain,
Never show your face again.

Well obviously Li’l Arthur is not in Spain – he would’ve been called muchacho Aureliano if that be the case. Or even muchacho Maximus Decimus Meridius.

In any case, artist Denslow depicts him as a grumpy little Scottish laddie sporting a kilt, cursing (in rhymes too) at the rain to go to Spain, so he can have a go at the 9 holes mini – logically located somewhere in Scotland:

But experts are of the opinion that Denslow was a fraud to make him Scottish, declaring that the artist had a natural inclination to portray fictional kindergarten rhyme celebrities as Scottish citizens, citing the fact that the artist’s full name is William Wallace Denslow.

*** *** *** ***

That’s enough of nostalgic nuances and art house frauds. Now for the main story -
It's started raining here. Here = Bangalore , recently renamed to Bengalooru in an effort to preserve the prized local culture – that’s prized Kannadiga culture for the uninitiated.

I was in the company provided, luxurious, public mode of transportation (bus) on my way home from work last Friday, and it started raining for no apparent reason. Needless to say, I was occupying a window seat (aisle seat are for suckers).

A seat by the window in a cozy moving bus is the best place to be when it is raining outside. After a hard day’s work, the sight of Thor, the god of thunder, electrifying the endless skies with his proverbial lightning hammer is always a treat.

No.
Scratch that.

A seat by the window in a cozy moving bus is the best place to be when it is raining outside. After a hard day’s work, the sight of Thor, the god of thunder, electrifying the endless skies with his proverbial lightning hammer is always a treat.

A seat by the window in a cozy moving bus is the best place to be when it is raining outside. The rain drops come splashing down against the closed window, they combine to form tiny channels of rivers and canals, and flow down the glass pane into rain-drops heaven. While you sit snuggly by the window watching the rain fall down harder, tiny droplets of water squeeze in through the chinks and pinholes, and spray across your face along with the cool breeze making you giggle.
(Giggle? Well I can't think of anything else. So giggle it is)

All this while I was looking out the window with the retiring twilight adding a spark of romance to the air. Of course this romantic air's got nothing to do with the adjacent 5'7” fair brunette wearing a flimsy-getup-of-a-skimpy-sleeveless-see-thru brushing against me now and then. She is a complete stranger and you my dear reader, may completely ignore her presence thank you very much. I couldn't help but smile an innocent smile being altogether immersed in this rainy evening romantic continuance.

And looking out the window, I saw people scamping about running helter skelter in search of shelters, two or sometimes even three specimens embracing each other under single solitary umbrellas, a horde of bikers waiting impatiently under a flyover bridge, groups of homosapiens neatly arranging themselves under enery kinds of available road side shades – from coffee shop canopies to corporation bus stands and construction site shacks. I threw a few sympathetic smiles and glances at them to let them know I'm sympathetic towards their sympathetic circumstances which I believe they welcomed as a welcome gesture (Suggestive glances, I reserved for throwing at the girl next seat).

Now it's not too far from my stop and lo the road gave birth to a tight traffic jam without any warning, and it turned to be major-than-a-minor but not-quite-a-Major-major kind of jam (I'd give it a 3 out of 5). Cars, bikes and other sort of short vehicles had taken over the road; covering the bus from all sides – ahead, behind, left, right. I bet some of them even managed to get under and over the bus as well – just to annoy me tightly trapping me in a tight traffic jam.

Back inside the bus, people started calling up everyone at the same time. I can almost swear EVERYONE including the driver and the reacher-stopper-shouter-stopper-namer were on phone at that exact same time (If you are wondering about the brunette, I told you - Forget About Her. She doesn't exist as far as anyone else is concerned. Besides, I got there first).

Bengalooru, being kind of a metro, there were all kinds of people telling their mobile phones that they were stuck in a jam in all kinds of languages – kannada, malayalam, tamil, hindi, marathi, hindi, english. Perhaps even in swahili in an interior Burundi accent.

So finally, I reached my place more than an hour late because of the rain. Shared my sympathies using sympathetic smiles and glances with countless number of unfortunate people because of the rain. Because of the rain, I've almost learned to say this in all kinds of languages: “Darling, I'm stuck in a traffic jam. I'll be late. No, not at the pub. In the jam.”

And because of the rain, I had a good time and a promise for a date with a beautiful Brunette (YES!! and no, no details here).

(I also got something to write in this blog, because of the rain)

Post note: Two days later, as I was walking down BTM 2nd stage, it started raining suddenly and heavily. I noticed that the raindrops were falling on my head, and in considerable amount too, smart guy that I am. I started running towards a small shed a few hundred feet away, and caught sight of a passing bus which was passing by. I can almost swear I saw an idiot by the window with a sick smile pasted all across his stupid sadistic face looking directly at me with that sick, sadistic smile.