Sachinn Garg

It’s been three days since I touched down and to be honest the urge to blog has not been this high in many years.

Brace up for a long one, my journey from the third world to the land of immaculate legs: France.

The packing was in itself a diploma in making shopping lists. A total of twenty shopping lists and seventeen visits to the market later, I convinced myself that I am ready for the first world and the challenges of the exchange rate.

I had not had a peaceful minute for around sixteen hours when I reached the airport to meet my fellow travelers. Two of them. Two very very interesting and writable-about people. And that I must.

The first one: Boobla, no part of the nickname being any comment on his body part, is just a nickname he carries from his first college. Boobla had shaved his head and definitely worsened his chances with the French chicks.

The second one: Boobli, a name thats a distortion of the word Bubbly, an adjective that she totally personifies.

Also, a tribute to her awesome friendship with Boobla.

So my dad got to meet my travel mates and I m guessing his hopes of finding two typical B school students going with me were gone down the drain. He tried his best to feign confidence and hugged me Goodbye.

I had a clear cut list of things that I would do in the flight:

• read some French/
• write a blog post/
• read about France/
• read a book.

Of course, I spent the flight sleeping and doing nothing out of these.

To be honest the moment when I went to sleep at the end of the journey, that might have been my most tired point in last five years, seven months and twelve days. This is also the time elapsed since I went to Vaishno Devi, on foot.

So the first morning at IAE (pronounced EE AA UH) was naturally sleep deprived and I was pretty sure Boobla and Boobli would be oversleeping till afternoon. But at the precise hour, I found both of them standing at my doorstep, each flaunting as much legs as their gender allowed. Boobli, looking as elegant as ever and Boobla looking like an Iranian mundu.

I smirked, as I slipped into my neatly ironed jeans and the latest Benetton T shirt and Converse shoes. I was happy that I was going to win all the brownie points for Indian background and the French chics will found Boobla unpolished and unkempt in his brown shorts and yellow shoes.

So the first two days went OK and suddenly Boobli made an observation which I would have never believed two days ago. Where Boobli was the only female company I had seen in the last two days, Boobla was beating me black and blue. He was a total hit with the chicks.

On my way back to college Katerine, the Chec Republic (however you spell it) chick, who had been confusing beach clothing with classroom clothing, got hold of me and a conversation began. Somewhere in the fifth minute she made a comment: Don’t you feel hot in the jeans?

And instant realization stuck and a flash of the whole zipped through my eyes. I realized that a majority of students wore shorts to college and they were mostly the coolest ones. In fact, I realized that the only people wearing jeans were Indians and Chinese, two communities who have a tradition of being unfashionably geeky.

Next morning, I was standing at Boobla’s doorstep looking for fashion advice. That guy is a genius.