Those were the good old days. No tension, except for ogre professors and huge syllabuses to be mugged all through the night before any exam. The five basic elements of campus were cricket, basky, movies, friends and computers…

Yes, it was him. Pradeep Choudhary. Batch of 2006. That goddamn Boods had said he has been an engineer in the Indian Navy and cast away somewhere in the Bay Of Bengal, ever since he passed out.

And I find him here. Los Angeles. My institute’s American alumni club annual get-together. A place where the alumni get a chance to boast – about credentials, honours, fame, and family while failures come to ‘meet old friends’ or that’s what their excuse is for improving their contacts with the elite.

Has he seen me? Can I avoid him? For a moment, I felt bad. Pradeep was after all a good friend in the old days. We were in the same wing of the same hall for three years. Of course, I never had the time to keep contact with him.

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I felt uncomfortable and looked across the vast hall at my wife. She was the informal ambassador of my business endeavours. Her presence always brings me extra attention. Today, her presence didn’t provide any extra comfort. Nor did I think she could help me tackle this situation.

I tried to hide myself in a group from silicon city talking about some American policy regarding outsourcing, hoping all the time that I wouldn’t have to meet him. He was the man of attitude among us. The eight of us from the batch of 2006… Suddenly, recollections started pouring in from all quarters. Pradeep, Boods, Rahul, Somanchi and… I don’t exactly remember the others’ names. There are more important things in life.

Boods… the real name is at the tip of my tongue. Never mind. He was the chat freak among us. It seemed he was made 4 yahoo and yahoo 4 him. We hardly had any girl in the campus, and the fittest survived in battles fought for each of them.

Chatting with gals from the city was the order of those days (must be these days also). After a few days online, a first date (to verify the profile photo) and many more if everything went on well. Many even went too sentimental with girls met in chat rooms.

Our eyes met, as I was absent-mindedly gazing across the hall, trying my best to come out from the ocean of memories. I immediately swerved around and lent my attention to a gentleman, batch of 1988, who was furious about the WTO policies on intellectual property rights and was fuming at an innocent audience.

Of course, I hadn’t missed the smile on Pradeep’s face, an indication – to my disappointment – that he recognized me. I threw a gaze at my wife talking to the wife of a Don of the automobile sector before my thoughts betrayed me again…

Those were the good old days. No tension, except for ogre professors and huge syllabuses to be mugged all through the night before any exam. The five basic elements of campus were cricket, basky, movies, friends and computers, computers being the most basic and indispensable.

One of the most popular campus legends says how once upon a time in the recent past, a demigod who had vanquished all Unreal Tournament players was defeated by a fresher. You can never be the best in the game. Yet some others like Boods utilized their free time (and class hours and sleepless nights) chatting online.

The profile photo had nearly thrown Boods off his feet. Some more photos and the whole wing was enchanted. Priya_mukherjee@yahoo.com was the ID. The real problem arose when she asked him for a meeting. Now, Boods hadn’t given a photo in his profile. To her queries, he had described himself fair, tall and more. Boods was short for Buddou, a Hindi word meaning old man. As the nickname suggests, Boods looked like an old man bent with age piled on his back (ok that was a metaphor). We wingies came to his rescue. Pradeep, roughly fitting into the description, was selected for the mission…

And so it started one fine morning. The whole wing went out to the city en masse, to cheer the first wingie on a dating mission. Pradeep’s welcome speech, short jokes and subjects to talk about had been properly tailored by an editorial board headed by Rahul. Boods had briefed him about her likes, dislikes, tastes, family and friends.

English being the weapon of every hep guy, Pradeep had to practice some artificial accent and rehearse the drafted jokes many times. And everything went on well. I mean that’s what he told us after the date, which seemed to take longer than expected. He kept us waiting at Howrah station longer than expected. The frequency of Pradeep’s visits to Kolkata increased. One day to a water park and to a birthday party of one of her friends on another.

I had to force my hand into greeting him, hiding my uneasiness behind a smile. But a handshake wasn’t enough for him. He hugged me the way a brother separated from childhood hugs the other. Man, he is a friend you are meeting after years. I took him to a side room and started talking about old days. Apparently, the chap had cleared civil services and was now a highly placed official at the Indian Embassy. At last, I got a guy who could help me in getting introduced to Indian commercial delegates. I enthusiastically responded, banking on the prospects of taking help from him. We talked about the old days, about friends – some still familiar while others I feigned to remember though the names hardly agitated any cord of my memory.

He also started talking about the Big Fight he had with Boods. In spite of my best intentions to avoid the issue, it did pop up. The roots of the Big Fight can be tracked back to a Friday night. A friend’s birthday treat. The subject of Pradeep’s ‘Kolkata girl’ popped up in the treat. We were bugging Pradeep when Boods suddenly said, “She is a slut. No one here knows her better than me”. We could certainly see green-eyed jealousy and hatred in Boods’s eyes. Instantly, Pradeep lifted a plate and hurled it towards Boods. In a fit of rage, Boods started abusing him and Priya. That was the end of a friendship of four years. The booze party, farewell party and the job treats passed without the two guys coming back to talking terms.

The Big Fight happened the night of the booze party. News came in that Priya had broken up with Pradeep, citing that she hated liars and Pradeep had cheated her with poems picked up using Google, letters composed by a friend and dates fixed by another and many other facts presumed to be our wing secrets. “How would she know what happens in this wing?” asked he as he broke into Boods’s room and grabbed him by his collar. Boods’s words that he had no hand in this went into deaf ears.

Each drunken individual seeing the combat took sides, but that was long ago and I don’t remember who finally punched me down that night. I knew Pradeep would come to her. Priya was the end that the Big Fight road took in all chitchats I had with classmates since that day. Pradeep still seemed too sentimental about her. How stupid!

“She was a real slut”, he grinned. “Woman is the evil behind every battle. You remember Draupadi from the Mahabharata? It was because of her that the cousins fought against each other. Boods was a good guy. He can never do that to me. He is such a good chap”

“Come on Pradeep! You talk like a frustrated loser. Forget her. Not one word about the girl”

“Ok I admit. She was different. I tried to trace her afterwards but could never find anything out. A friend of hers says she is married and settled here in America”

How dumb! Why can’t he forget her? How can I get rid of this guy?

“I wish I could meet her once at least. You know, how she makes me…”

“Don’t be silly”, I said, “A piece of advice from a good friend. Forget her. Don’t tell me you don’t have any other girl in your life.”

Hoisting a mischievous smile, he expressed, “Many, in fact. A bachelor civil servant always has many lady friends. Come to Washington someday and I will introduce you to my present fancy.”

“You haven’t changed a bit. I suppose you are the only one bachelor left out in our group. Have you heard about others?”

“Not all. Boods had an arranged marriage after all the goose chasing. Rahul married the daughter of the professor he was working under for his Ph. D. And you? You didn’t care to call old friends to your marriage.”

“Man, I had asked those whom I could contact. Not a single turned up. Boods was in India and Rahul in a German University. I called others, but no response.” I marvelled at the ease with which I made up the story. “I wish I could call you home but my wife is in New York on an NGO project. Why don’t we meet tomorrow at lunch at a hotel near my workplace?”

“That’s fine with me. Someday come to Washington with your wife. I would love to meet her. Well, I have to go now.”

His departure brought me instant relief. I could again sense the scent of party. My wife, as usual, had been successful in making acquaintances with wives of some influential people. She gave me a warm smile when I went back to her and wondered where I had been.

She is a good, caring woman. Her warm greeting smile at the door always alleviates me after every tiresome session at the workplace. Ok, she goes mad every time I pronounce excuses and drains heavily from my purse on each of her frequent shopping ventures. Still, she is worth deluding an old friend.