Social Suicide: I
It took me fifty six minutes to reach Bandra today, add another fifteen to find parking. Sometimes I think the whole idea of driving anywhere is quite stupid in Mumbai because the roads were clearly not meant for cars, I don’t even know if they were meant for humans but that’s a story for another day.
You know how excited you are when you find parking in Bandra?
You are fucking joyous.
And baby, I was joyous. It was like averting a terrorist attack in my head.
It was my fucking moment, I had secured the best possible parking spot in Bandra.
Glory.
As I left the car pondering if I will ever want to take out my car from this beautiful spot, my thoughts were interrupted. I heard somebody calling out my name, assuming I was just hearing things, I decided to continue walking. Three seconds into my walk, I could hear somebody calling out my name again, as I looked around, I could see a guy across the street waving at me.
He was waving at me.
Seriously.
Like a proper waving-thing-was-happening-there.
What kind of people wave Who are these people? I mean shouting my name from across the street is still passable but there are people out there who still decide to communicate using gestures? The whole idea of learning a language was so that you could communicate in an efficient manner without the need of hand gestures because you know, we have WORDS for that.
WORDS. MOUTH. SPEAKING. TALK. USE.
What is the purpose of waving when you are already calling out my name on a completely deserted street? I mean you are obviously audible enough, right? That’s why I even bothered looking around, don’t you think? So why would you do this? Why would you raise your hands up and do this hand motion thing which really isn’t adding any value to what you’re currently trying to accomplish?
I decided that I won’t wave back because you know, I am a sane person but instead I will just give him the ‘sup?’ nod.
You know the nod. It’s the nod you give to people with whom you don’t want to actually have a conversation with. You give it to a lot of people everyday because you don’t obviously want to stop doing what you are doing and talk to these people on a regular basis, you probably don’t even like them and the only reason you’re even bothering with the nod is because they started doing the nod. But essentially, the whole idea of this particular nod is so that you can go ahead and give the nod and walk away. No emotions are hurt, no words are required.
It is a three step process:
1) Somebody says hi/gives you the nod.
2) You give the nod.
3) Both of you go back to whatever you’ll were doing.
But this guy seemed to be in a mood to talk, which was quite evident when he crossed the street and wanted to shake hands for no apparent reason.
I didn’t want to shake his hand, mainly because I had already given him the nod and plus the handshake is never just a handshake, somebody always has to speak after the handshake, I didn’t want to speak to him.
The handshake to me, is a complicated procedure, it’s got way more steps than the nod and it is just something you are not always in the mood for. How is shaking hands socially acceptable anyway? How is this regarded as hygienic?
Why don’t soap manufacturers come up with a pump of some kind that will literally just squirt your hands with soap whenever somebody shakes your hand?
(Design-wise, think something like an implant in your body, obviously.)
First the wave and now the handhshake? What are we, cavemen? Do we draw shit in caves and shit whatever we want to express instead of just saying it outloud?
Twats.
To be extremely honest though, I think one of the reasons, I didn’t want to talk to him was because I had absolutely no clue who he was and it didn’t seem there was a chance I could figure that out anytime soon but it didn’t seem like he gave a shit if I recognised him or not. Some people are so selfish, it astounds me. I was even being nice and dropping hints but he didn’t seem to be phased by them.
He started talking about the good ol’ days or some shit. In my head though, I was too busy to listen to most of the things he was saying because I had to place him in the phase of my life he belonged to. Was he from mid-school, high-school, college or grad school? Who was this guy and what did he want? Usually when I think about people, I actually do end up coming up with something not-generic enough about them, but this time I had nothing.
Nothing.
Zilch.
After about 90 seconds of trying to figure out who he was, I had to give up. So I gave him the ‘wait-who-are-you-again-look’. You know the look, it’s the look you give somebody when you have abso-fucking-lutely no idea who they are. Now in my personal experience, people tend to pick up on that look and ask you stupid, embarrassing and juvenile questions like “You have no clue who I am, do you?” to which you smile and make a funny, lame and a retarded excuse about why you don’t know who they are, after which they tell you who they are and everything is norma. But he obviously didn’t even bother. Dude was not even giving a shit when I was standing there andgiving him the same look for 30 seconds.
Is he even a human?
What kind of a person does this?
Not cool bro.
This is outrageous.
I really wanted him to ask me if I didn’t remember him because this would be the first time I could actually tell somebody on their face that I had no clue who they were but it didn’t seem like it was meant to be.
I was disappointed.
Self-absorbed prick.
Since it didn’t seem like he was game and I was already late, I did what any rational person in this situation would do. I told him I had no clue who he was and I walked away.
I don’t think he liked that.
But this is what you deserve when you don’t understand the ‘wait-who-are-you-again-look’.
There is no excuse for not picking up on that look.
“Who shakes hands if you just got the nod? I thought the nod was a standardised thing like the metric system.”
“Well, maybe he was from America.”