Veggie Pains!

Like most people, I am a foodie… I eat for the pleasure of eating, and everything around me stops to accommodate the most important event of the day…. Yes, the whole Maslow’s hierarchy funda….But most unfortunately, I’m a vegetarian… one of the several iyer heritages that I am not very proud of… That slams like a lot of doors at yer face!!! Not that I haven’t tried…. Just that I start hearing small lambs cry whenever I stick a fork in my friend’s dinner plate…..Being a lover of small creatures, puppies or lambs, the prospect is not very attractive…

It was the pinnacle of my two years stay in bschool when the most beautiful girl around buzzed me…. Half an hour and an endearing conversation later, I was about to ask her if she wanted to go to mess….with me obviously…. My fone rang…Oh, thats nothing.. just airtel again… no one else called me for like a year now…
“dude, we are all going out to celebrate josey’s bday… come to bodhi in 5 mins…”
my best friend on the line… talk about timing….ok, now what excuse do I give him??? Ah, exploit his biggest weakness. The guy just cant wait for food….
“da, gimme 10 mins… am chatting with my uncle here….” “OK”…
now, did I hear him straight???? Did he just say OK???? Aargh!!!! Its ok rishi, they’d leave…. U r not quite that important for even a big bunch of morons to wait for u….. 10 mins later, the fone rang again…..Now I was getting desperate…
“er… da, temme this… I’m a veggie… will I get anything decent in the place yer goin?”
“yeah yeah… derz a big menu exclusively for veg”

Great! Now what do I do? Horny and single on one hand….. versus a good friend on the other….. like all mortals, I yielded to the devil’s temptations….. said bye to the hot chick and headed off to bodhi to spend my perfect evening with the clowns!!! Still, all was not lost… at least I had some good food to look forward to…. Besides women, that is number 2 on the charts when it comes to men’s priorities…. Closely followed by AoE, movies, booze and cursing bald professors….

We got off at the tiny shack my friend clamed to be the best Chinese restaurant this side of the great wall…. Like any self respecting adult male, I asked for the menu leaving the petty rituals of settling into a seat to the lesser mortals… ok, first section… soups.. hmmm..
“I’ll have an egg noodle soup please…. 1 by 2 with Kamit over there…”
okie… now to the main course…. Chicken…. Pork…..goat….. snake…..duck…..hmm, no luck there… finally, I spotted the famous “exclusive veg section” sandwiched between Duck and Prawns…My best friend was happily ordering the entire gamut of the animal kingdom, oblivious of my misery…

The soup arrived… er… calling it a soup would be an exaggeration by any standards! I just saw carrots and cabbages in the bowl with some hot water…. “hello….er, boss? I don’t see any egg around… I ordered an egg noodle soup…” Kamit wasn’t too happy at the prospect of sacrificing the soup…. Soon, the same stuff arrived, this time with a bunch of hitherto unseen floating particles…I pretended not to take notice of kamit’s angry glances… The big fatty (I have stopped referring to him as my best friend) leans across and whispers, “Rishi, the key is to just drink the liquid…. Leave the floating particles alone...” FYI, the liquid is nothing but hot water, u moron!!!!

Soon the dinner table was laid with some rocks they claimed to be chilly paneer… don’t be mistaken, my friends had sympathy in their eyes….. once in a while…. But mostly it was hunger and greed! 7 inconsiderate pricks munching on, while I watched an entire zoo disappear from the table…. As we split the bill, someone muttered, “da rishi, bishudaz closed today…. So u might wanna wake up early morning if u want to catch some food at da mess….” Grrrrrr….you might be bigger and fatter than me.... but i can kick yer butt any day when u r distracted with food, and i'm attacking from behind!!!

Hey, but on the brighter side, I always get invited to booze parties…. Coz they know I wont touch their stuff…..food or booze….. @#$%