Monday, November 07, 2011
I saw her first at Jaisalmer govt. bus stand.
Waiting hopelessly as there were no certain bus to Jodhpur just after Diwali
morning. We also reached there as we had to travel Jodhpur as per our planned
schedule… But instead of gathering info on bus timing I was constantly watching
her. She was talking over phone. I watched her carefully. Bit childish and
confused!!!
The person at the inquiry counter told me, “11 baje bus to hai … abhi tak kuch
khabar nahi. Par aayegi jaroor”. It was 11.25 am then. For couple of minutes I
again looked upon her. Finally she stared at me with her confusing eyes. This
time there were lots of questions on her mind. But she failed to ask anything
and continued her chatting over phone.
Again I turned toward the counter. This time little bit louder, “Kaka, Waise kitna baje bus aa sakti hai?”
Without any hesitation that old man replied, “2 baje toh jaroor aa jayegi”
.
.
There were couples of old men sitting over there who were giving us lot of wise information. Like we can catch train at 6 pm. I ignored them and put my bag & tripod near that girl. Again gave a nasty look. She wanted to tell something. Again I ignored, found out one firingi who was also waiting for a bus. I started talking with him.
Now one army man (he was from Bihar & going to bhuj, later he told me) was there in the counter. And that old chap just repeated the same. The army man was in hurry. I talked with him & he gave me the proposal of hiring one cab to Jodhpur. Now we were searching for other passengers who can also join with us.
Then I turned to her & asked, “Are you going to Jodhpur?”
She replied, “Yeah. I need to catch train from Jodhpur. But I don’t know whether I’ll get any bus.”
We are going to hire one cab. Are you joining with us, I asked.
“How much I need to pay then?” A pretty obvious question. Now she was more confused. I was enjoying that. She was really beautiful. She was busy handling her hair though she failed to handle it. For fraction of sec. I was lost somewhere looking on her eyes.
“How much time it’ll take?” She asked again. This time I got my senses back. Even I also didn’t know about cab fare.
Those old men helped us, it was roughly 300 km. Then I replied, “700 bucks max. As we are 5 people (me with my colleague, firing, army man & the girl) traveling”. That army man along with my colleague went for hiring the cab.
.
.
.
Then we had some conversation between us. Now I couldn’t remember actually on which topic we were talking. I was just watching her. Anyway, after 15 min they came back with one car. I offered her the front sit. She sat beside the driver. Our journey began towards Jodhpur.
The driver told us he’ll hardly take 4 hrs. I was sitting behind her. This time I understood she isn’t feeling easy with us. She was hesitating for a conversation as we 3 (firing cancelled her journey on the last moment) were sitting behind. She became confused again. Sometimes she was looking through the mirror, sometimes through the window, sometimes sitting idle looking at the front.
We were going Jodhpur from Jaisalmer. The highway was in the desert circuit. You can’t pass your time by watching people around. After couple of minutes my colleague & army man slept. Even I was also feeling bore. No music system was there in the car.
I started taking snaps with my DSLR. There were beautiful landscapes of dunes. She was also taking snaps with her point shot. Suddenly I discovered her beauty from back. She was enjoying breezes passing through her hair. She wasn’t even trying to care anything. She became more childish.
I tried to capture her every movements and all those shadows & lights coming through her hair. I’ve never ever seen this kind of beauty in my life …
“Are you taking my picture?” She asked me. She might have seen me busy taking snaps on front mirror.
“Yup, have a look on these snaps”. I told and gave my camera on her hand.
She leaned over my camera for couple of minutes, then turned back with her drowse eyes, gave my DSLR back & replied with a very low voice, “Thanks”
… SHE REALLY LOOKED BEAUTIFUL FROM BACKSIDE
