The Great Indian Family Drama!

It was an indeed nice evening. Nice because there was nothing not-nice about it – I was having a great cup of self made coffee, the Wi-Fi was working at good speed as I was chatting over whatsapp with my bestie watching Chandler proposing Monica over last episode of Friends’ 6th season. So you see, life was indeed going good. Till I heard my mum announcing plans for the dinner about going to a get together at her friend’s house. My saturation was still intact; rather I was little pleased because it meant house would be entirely mine for a few hours and so I can dance around and have a late dinner stuck before my P.C.

Things would have remained nice, until I heard the lateral part of mum’s announcement, “You will be coming along too, Alefiya!”

Wait. What? Me?

“But I don’t know any people there, Mummy”, I said in disgust.

Actually, most of my mum’s friends’ kids were in their schools and those older than me had nothing to discuss about except their sweet ‘dates’ with their fiancé/fiancées. I usually prefer staying at home at social occasions and going out meant going with my girl-gang, that’s it.
Of course, my mother knew that too.

“Alefiya, you need to be social. Not every time you will have people around you whose company you find perfect. Have you seen Nafisa auntie’s daughter? How well she mixes up with everyone and in fact she is of same age as you. Its time you start accompanying me at social occasions & meet new people.”

I made a final attempt by giving an innocent look to dad seeking for some help from that zone. Finally I succumbed seeing he was equally contented with mum’s decision upon this matter.

With the last dumb excuse left, I asked “But I don’t have something good to wear; will jeans and this shirt go well there?”

“Are you crazy? Wear something ethnic. Wear any of your new suits and come down quick. It is already 8:00pm. Ask your dad to hurry up too.” she replied dismissively.

Soon enough we reached the house where the get-together was organized. Beyond my expectations, I actually found hell many people buzzing around. Kids playing.
Aunties chatting.
Uncles enjoying the T-20 IPL match. A few people seated in corners with their cell-phones. The faces were recognizable, nearly all of them. A few formal smiles were exchanged. Soon I started scanning people. Finding no interesting girls around I started gazing at boys, worthy enough to converse a little. Truly speaking, to flirt around (it was more of a live-Tinder session sort of for me, hell yeah!). Finding none, I went near my mum and stood discussing the same old boring topics of my college-branch-studies-future plans with aunties around. I have actually lost count of how many a times I have said them all these things. Far there I could see my dad enjoying every single wicket in fact I must say run, by the KKR’s. He was enjoying being with people who respected his much beloved game. Soon enough I decided to stealthily hold a corner myself too with my cell phone. To my horrible delight was the same famous ‘mixes with everyone’ girl smiling from far at me.

“Hey, you are Farida Auntie’s daughter, right?”

“Yeah.”

I forced a sweet smile on my lips.

“We never get to see you around much.”

“Yeah, I don’t really come at these events.”

“So what are you doing these days?”

I knew this was coming.

“Final year of my engineering from IET DAVV in Electronics and Telecommunication, with results of this semester not yet announced.”

That was pretty scary, by the way I spoke and the still expressions on her face. But I really was in no mood of any series of boring questions from her and so, found it better to sort out all her curiosity in one shot.

As was expected, she too soon disappeared in the crowd being highly affected by the warmth I showed.
This horrid meeting was followed by the much awaited part i.e. serving of the food. With starters flooding in, I satisfied my taste buds, with my eyes constantly wandering so that none of the dishes are missed. Yeah, call me uncivilized! I was literally stuck to my mum to not appear separate, to be true I did so to irritate her to the extent that she never ever thinks of asking for my company at these crap social dramas.
Then arrived the delicious food, and to my added discomfort, even the stupid questionnaires by people accompanied with the food.
A few of them considered IET same as IIT, which I never bothered clarifying. Remaining pondered whether Telecommunication branch was in any way related to journalism. I didn’t bother to clarify that either.
Yet others were gleaming with pride telling me about their far-far relative’s daughter working at Patni Computers (To those who don’t know; it is next after Microsoft in computer industry! Seriously.)

Although my sarcasm was desperately waiting to come out at every question that followed, I stopped it.
Come on, I didn’t want to be debarred from these yummy-food-filled-get-togethers next time!
So good food came flowing in and finally, the desserts arrived. The gathering officially ended with kids sleeping in their mum’s laps and uncles grumping over KKR’s defeat. “Gambhir could have performed better, huh.” complained my dad to me. ‘Whatever’ was my expression. It was already 11:00 p.m. but my mum’s conversations seemed unending. I don’t know where she gets so much energy to talk.
With every moment seeming like an eternity, I & my dad waited with utmost patience for my mum to grace her presence so we could finally leave. After about half an hour, I found myself entering our house. With clothes spread all over my room I resorted to sleep with sweet reminiscences of a festive Evening, indeed it was (eyes still rolling -_-).

**The events described here are completely real. No offense to all the names & characters used here that definitely bears resemblance to living people around me.