Aaiye sunte hain mausam ka haal

It's as old as the dinosaurs. The latter may have been wiped away from the face of the earth ages ago, but the Met office continues to function out of its prehistoric setting next to the defunct airport.
Essentially, the office makes do with three forecasts for the entire year. It can either be a
- partly cloudy sky with chances of duststorms/thunderstorms and squalls in some areas or
- mainly clear sky. Maximum temperature will be around 40 degrees Celsius or
- cloudy sky. Mist/fog in the morning, minimum temperature will be around 10 degrees Celsius
The temperature outside may dip to 0.2 degrees Celsius as it did on January 8 this year or soar to 44.5 degrees as it did only last week, but don't expect the Met department to forecast anything to that effect.
The day they forecast rain, you can be sure as hell, it won't.
So that the next day when you call up, they will always tell you that it was a 'sudden' development. Never mind, if the BBC and Yahoo websites seem to get it right weeks in advance, sitting a few continents away.
That, of course, happens only when they deign to talk to you. On an ordinary day, you will have to call up those bunch of semi-literate paan-chewing men at least five times before you can get through to the duty officer (their names are more secret than state secrets and are not to be revealed). The perennial favourite among DOs is Mandola ji (Sorry ji for making your name public). DOs don't drink water. They only have chai. "Madame, yahaan canteen nahi hai. INA jaake chai peeni padti hai, itni thand/garmi hai, kya karein,'' is the usual response. By the end of it all, you are left wondering if the man has a couple of gallons of tea each day.
On some really exciting days, I actually get to go there. It's nothing short of a pilgrimage. It always starts with the weatherman (Mr Singh, I swear to god, we love you) smiling at me and showing his golden teeth. That always leaves me wondering about them for the rest of the meeting - does he paint them? Do his teeth have gold caps or is it just Babool toothpaste gone bad? (I secretly wish he sits and explains this mystery to me some day). Just as he has painstakingly told me about western disturbances and upper air cylonic circulations, which are apparently the only two meteorological phenomena that occur in India. In winter, everything - the cold, the rain and the fog is thanks to the WD. And in summer, everything- the heat, squalls and storms - is because of the saisar (short for cyclonic circulations, bet you didn't know that!) . For everything else, it suffices to say that the weather is a very dynamic phenomenon. What it certainly isn't is scientific coz these people have only one run-down comp and all the work is done manually.
Of late, however, things have not been too great between me and sweet Mr Singh. On Holi, we carried a story on rain and one of my bosses added a 'notorious' before the weatherman. Mr Singh is fuming. He thinks notorious is a gaali so what if he can't even pronounce the word properly (notororious is how he says it). Two months later, he still isn't talking to me.
So these days, I go by what my instinct tells me. If it's slightly cloudy, I go for the first forecast and if it's sunny, I go for the second. I am glad to report that I am as (in)accurate as they are because as you know by now, the weather is a very dynamic phenomenon.

Men and dogs not allowed

There are several apocryphal stories related to the legendary rivalry between St Stephen's College and it's so-called poor cousin across the road. Each year, around the admission season, they are back in circulation. One of the annual favourites is the story about how when Stephen's put up a notice which said dogs and Hinduites not allowed, Hindu responded by saying dogs allowed, but not Stephanians.
Though I am no great Stephen's fan, I am beginning to feel an urgent need for carrying a similar placard around wherever I go. Men and dogs, stay away.
Since it's quite cumbersome go gallivanting around the city and meet sundry sources while carrying such a placard, alas, I am unable to convey my feelings to the world at large and to men in particular.
So this past week, everybody - from colleagues in office to perfect strangers - have thought it their moral duty to ask me about my marital status and more importantly, my plans of acquiring one.
Starting with a senior colleague who SMSed me last Saturday telling me that a fellow journo, who happens to hail from the same state as I, wanted to meet me. But we met at a colleague's wedding, I said. That's why he wants to meet you, explained the colleague. Verrry nice guy, decent too and from the same state. Thanks, but no thanks, I said. What followed really got my goat. Shaadi ke liye fit hai...You must give it a thought coz I am telling you and I think well of you...
A man saw me at a wedding in December 2004, exchanged one line of conversation with me and then proceeeded to puff away and 18 months later, he thinks he has (but naturally) progressed to becoming The Chosen One. Anyway, I managed to wriggle out of this somehow.
Only to have another colleague ask me two days later when I was planning to get married. Not right away, may be a couple of years later, I said and thought the matter would end there. But no, the said guy, who happens to be four years older and is still nowhere close to getting hitched proceeded to lecture me on how when I want to get married, I will find only dirty, old men.
That night when I got into the office cab, an acquaintance who works in the same building, started telling me about the spanking new car that he's bought. All downpayment, no EMI, blah... So when are you getting married? Well, hello, I thought we were talking automobiles. I was completely exhausted by then and had absolutely no reply to offer. So I pretended to look out of the window and act as if I am deaf in my left ear... I am glad to announce it worked.
It didn't end at that. I was on an assignment on Friday and needed a doctor's help to get into a ward. Said doctor also turned out to be from the same state. Helped me get in, I got the details, thanked him and was about to leave when he started off... Actually, the guard was asking me about you, so I siad you are my fiance, he declared. Dream on, bastard, I felt like saying, but couldn't (my sense of propriety crops up at the most inopportune moments). What followed was a nightmare. Are you married? No, I screamed. Why don't you have some coffee with me? No, I have realllly got to go, I said and hid myself behind some OB vans (Thank heavens for Aaj Tak and its huge vans).
Is it a surprise then that I want the men to stay away, miles and miles away?
And oh, about the dogs - I think I am allergic to them. But lesser than I am to men.