What's in a name? First thing that comes to your mind is "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet" - a quotation from William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet, meant to say the names of things do not matter, only thing that matters is what things are. Correct? "No", is what I say. I have a very old story to share.
I was in my 12th standard. My mother was transferred to Devlali, a small town near Nasik in Maharastra. My father and brother were in Mumbai as Dad had his job there and Aditya was doing his engineering from there. I have always been close to Mom. So I went with her to Devlali.
We were staying in staff quarters. Ours was the first and the biggest quarter in the colony. Probably Mom being the Principal had something to do with it ;) It was the first time I was away from Dad and Adi. I guess, Mom was also going through the same sentiments. I used to remain upset there because I was away from half of my family and almost full circle of my friends. I met a nice girl in the colony, Tanushree. She read my mind somehow and decided to be a good samaritan.
One evening she asked me to join her for a walk. I reluctantly agreed. She started talking about Maya, our colony's maid. I was seriously not interested. I was asking myself- what were you thinking before coming here? "Maya asked me today, tumhein Raajma kaisi lagti hai?", Tanushree was telling me. I was bored to death with this inane story. Tanushree continued, " I told Maya: Raajma toh achche hote hai. Main aksar khaati hoon..chawal ke saath.
Maya: Arre woh nahin..woh joh abhi aayi hai naa..Principal Madam ki beti...Raajma..woh kaisi lagti hai aapko?"
Maya, apparently was slightly hard of hearing. She asked my name once and I told her conveniently "Garima". She made a strange face. When I asked her what is the problem, she smiled and plainly answered, "Kuch nahin". I ignored her smile at that time.
Tanushree looked at me for exact 3 seconds. At the 4th second, I was laughing my lungs out. Next morning, I met Maya and loudly and clearly told her, "Mera naam Garima hai, Raajma nahin." In my mind, I also told her, "Raajma is not even a name!"
Thank you Tanushree and a bigger thank you to Maya for bringing the smile back to a lonely 17 year old girl who lost all reasons to be happy in a new and different place.
Life always give you reasons to smile. Sometimes we ignore them, sometimes we can not ignore them :)
© Written by Garima Mahajan
I was in my 12th standard. My mother was transferred to Devlali, a small town near Nasik in Maharastra. My father and brother were in Mumbai as Dad had his job there and Aditya was doing his engineering from there. I have always been close to Mom. So I went with her to Devlali.
We were staying in staff quarters. Ours was the first and the biggest quarter in the colony. Probably Mom being the Principal had something to do with it ;) It was the first time I was away from Dad and Adi. I guess, Mom was also going through the same sentiments. I used to remain upset there because I was away from half of my family and almost full circle of my friends. I met a nice girl in the colony, Tanushree. She read my mind somehow and decided to be a good samaritan.
One evening she asked me to join her for a walk. I reluctantly agreed. She started talking about Maya, our colony's maid. I was seriously not interested. I was asking myself- what were you thinking before coming here? "Maya asked me today, tumhein Raajma kaisi lagti hai?", Tanushree was telling me. I was bored to death with this inane story. Tanushree continued, " I told Maya: Raajma toh achche hote hai. Main aksar khaati hoon..chawal ke saath.
Maya: Arre woh nahin..woh joh abhi aayi hai naa..Principal Madam ki beti...Raajma..woh kaisi lagti hai aapko?"
Maya, apparently was slightly hard of hearing. She asked my name once and I told her conveniently "Garima". She made a strange face. When I asked her what is the problem, she smiled and plainly answered, "Kuch nahin". I ignored her smile at that time.
Tanushree looked at me for exact 3 seconds. At the 4th second, I was laughing my lungs out. Next morning, I met Maya and loudly and clearly told her, "Mera naam Garima hai, Raajma nahin." In my mind, I also told her, "Raajma is not even a name!"
Thank you Tanushree and a bigger thank you to Maya for bringing the smile back to a lonely 17 year old girl who lost all reasons to be happy in a new and different place.
Life always give you reasons to smile. Sometimes we ignore them, sometimes we can not ignore them :)
© Written by Garima Mahajan
trust me even raajma is a good name... can try it as ur nickname :) nice sweet memories of life...
ReplyDeletenice one totally agree with my friend it not a bad name after all.South India hote hai aise name
ReplyDelete@Rishi: :) Memories is what I keep collecting everyday.
ReplyDelete@Nitesh: Really?