No Alarms, and No Surprises. Please.

It is around five in the morning and it is raining. I haven't slept all night, which is unusual for me, and till a few minutes ago I couldn't get to sleep because I'd stayed up reading Persepolis. Come to think of it, this always happens to me as far as sleeping is concerned, this seven-hours-or-nothing tendency. But my head always buzzes a little when it happens, and now that there's a storm outside the feeling is incredible.

At Science City they used to show really good documentaries at the domed amphitheatre, I forget what it's called. We once saw a film on the Serengeti migration in Africa, which stays with me till today because of this one shot. After all the wildebeest have exited the screen, there is a lion in the far horizon. It is running towards the camera, which is positioned on the ground. It runs faster and faster, and gains momentum, and right when you think it will step on the camera and smash it into smithereens, it launches itself into a great leap and flies right over the lens and out of sight. When you're a ten-year old watching this happening right above you, and all around you, craning your neck up for the moment when the lion will finally pounce and take you with it - for it cannot possibly miss, it is too huge and too ferocious and too fast and too strong - just when you think it is all over it jumps right over your head and is gone, and your heart recovers from its first death.

It is around five in the morning and there are hordes of lions frolicking around near the horizon. Great big tawny-haired cats swiping their paws at each other and letting out growls of annoyance, even fury. About a hundred of them. Nothing else explains this sound, this constant rolling rumbling thing. It cannot possibly be thunder. From my window there is a sea of grey sheeted water and then blackness beyond, it cannot be five in the morning either. No lights. No colours. Nothing but this sound. It cannot possibly be only my head buzzing; there are definitely lions out there.

First vote as an adult citizen today. Or yesterday, whichever way you look at it. There was a yellow building and a queue, and a room out of which a mother walked out with a wailing kid. The little girl wrung her hands and spread them out in front of a policeman on duty, and screamed, "Amar haathe kaali lagaye ni!", extracting a half-grin from him. He walked back into the room and took the girl with him, and a minute later she emerged with a beaming face and a purple thumb. My mother turned to me and said, "Remember when you were little and would make a mark on your finger with a felt pen so that it would match ours?"

It is around five in the morning and the world is ending. Any moment now it shall contract into a ball of energy and coming rolling down the sea of buildings outside, a mass of running lions covering miles in single bounds, and it shall crash into my window and all that shall be left of me is a purple-stained finger. It will happen. The curtain just twirled around and whipped me in the eye, and there is a spray of water flying in, and when the apocalypse comes I want to go first so that I am well-rested and ready for the rebuilding of the world.

My head is still buzzing, and I shall hit the "Publish" button now.

It is around five in the morning and I cannot think why I am still in my room writing a blog post when I could sneak down for some time.

Exeunt.