The Bond Girl!

Nope.. not Hally Berry.

This is the plot.It was 1997. I was close to 138cm high(do the math, converting to feet and inches is too embarrasing) and I was this brown, very thin kid doing 8th std/grade. Prodiguous! mostly due to my size and appearance-so small that a 4th std kid would be temped to rag me. It was music class, for some reason that class room was inside chemistry lab! A physics lab would have made a cent's sense. At 4th grade, anything other than games was boring and carnatic music was 793rd on the priority list. My good senseless friend named prasanna walks by me with a smirk which I can still remember with very high resolution. He says "XYZ loves you da, she told me so".

Now for the 'Bond' part. We used to have this 'cycle test' for 20 marks. It happens roughly 8 times in a year. By the time the year was about to close, my math teacher Mr. Pandian who also happened to be our class teacher lost his mind and called Miss XYZ and read her cycle tests math marks thus far.. it went somehing like this 0,1,0,0,1,0,0,1 all out of 20 marks.
He said "like James bond 007 you are Miss XYZ 001. For all those who pity her, please do not, she wore a smile and though I was only in 8th grade, I could pick from her reaction that she felt absolutely no shame and that smile was infact a proud one. She liked the attention I guess.

Now for the tragic part.
"No matter what a proposal is a proposal#"(scroll to the end for a deviation). I clearly remember in 8th grade, for some reason, all the girls in our class if not most started behaving abnormally. 9th grade biology chapter "human reproductive system" clearly showed the reason. Because of the harmones acting up they started pairing up with "well built" guys in class. "well built" back in 1997 meant "anything but Vijay Kolappan". So being the poor side kick, I was a spectator in awe and I among with few other 'wannabe complan boys', we were the audience these 'heroic couples' where catering to. They loved being envied, we loved the 'thrill' of seeing a live Kollywood romance scene. Miss XYZ caught the harmone swing, so bad that within a year she had proposed (albeit an Indian version) to 15 other guys. Being the 'bond girl' she had to let go of the 'well built' constraint. My guess is that I was the 14th or 15th victim of hers.

Back then it was nothing. Its summer time now, CHI town is overflowing with half naked chicks. Mostly lip locked with 'abercrombie and fitch' vested guys. The same thrill of watching a live romance is no more. It hurts these days. 22 years of 'single' mindedness has its effects and thinking back about the bond girl, being the 14th now hurts like a low blow. The fact i heard that from a guy named Prasanna is a 100 mph bouncer.

P.S not intended to hurt anyone. If you are the 'bond girl' I'm sorry I can now in a way empathize!

Been there, seen that, done it!
Kaevy

#There is this difference in the interpretation of the word proposal. In India it means saying the sacred 3 words " I Love you" irrespective of the language you speak. The guy from bhopal who only listens Bhojpuri songs would with an accent say "hey gulabi, I Love you" and then go on to repeat it using any of the synonyms ishq, pyaar etc. So would a premamathil shikkiya mallu or a Kaadhal vasapatta Tam. Rest of the world thinks proposal is asking someone to be one's life partner. That is asking someone to marry him/her.