25years later...

it's been coming fast n furious...and more often...that feeling of having turned old...really old!...last night, the class of '84 all met up...what a fab idea! don bosco's was dabba batli to the others but that was where we cut our teeth (among other things ;)
that was where i met amal...in class two! like he loves to say - he knew me but i didn't know him!! but twentyfiveyears later, some names n faces camebackinaflash just like it was yesterday...rahul rege, who's mother came to school EVERYDAY with lunch! i even remember her face!...sameera oza, my 10thstd partner i forgot n got roundly abused for that...rajiv bhatia actually came! i had forgotten he even passed the 10th...
most, like me, had grown paunches n lost hair...but not samir shah, piyush majithiya, bhavin shah -
the rich kid in class with the fancy magnetic compass box n whole lead pencils (which i used to steal)...so many gujjus then...so many stockbrokers now! was happiest to meet ashish...we'd dart across the wall when hunger panged to shovel yum tepla n chhunda in the middle of a football game!
anantha had finally grown tall but looked just the same...but nareen was a curious case of benjamin panjabi...jitesh shetty - the school captain is now a very successful make-over doc in lokhandwala...but i missed rohit, his cousin n my partner who'd buy me homi's samosapao almost everyday only because i liked it so much but could not afford it...some things you just cannot "repay"...
but where were baldy, paadhrya, chick, lamb, paper, kaania...n so many others? :(