Saying goodbye...

As you grow up, there are very few people who grow up the same way as you do. Most of the time, you and your childhood friends grow into different people, with different interests and they stop becoming your best friends.

I transferred to a new school when I was twelve, where most of the people belonged to the Jain community. As a result, people were more comfortable speaking in their own language (Marvadi). I didn't know this language and was finding it very hard! I also had a new language to study - Kannada, which I had never studied before and was doing an advanced version of this. Let's just say, there wasn't a lot going for me.

In a Kannada class, the teacher made me sit next to a girl from a different section (The school had each grade/standard divided into 3 sections. I was in Section B.) so that I wouldn't talk. I sat next to this girl who's hair was cropped as short as a boy's and we didn't talk the whole period. After the class, she introduced herself as Swathi. I introduced myself back. Did I know that this was the start of a lifelong friendship? Nope!

We were made to sit together in the next Kannada class and this time, we talked. We found out that we were the only people in the whole school that watched Friends and one of the very few who watched English TV and movies and were fluent in English. Friends became the base of our conversations and our friendship.

There are so many memories, like getting out of Kannada class by going for yoga practice (She was as flexible as I was, so we put that into good use!), competing in various inter-house competitions, competing in Dumb-Charades (We actually won a few inter-school competitions!), her playing table-tennis while watched disdainfully (It was only because I sucked at it! I had no eye-hand coordination!), sitting at the back in Kannada class, memorising passages that we were supposed to read so that we could sound fluent in them, watching a couple of boys go wide-eyed at a copy of Cosmo that they had bought and playing tricks on the poor unsuspecting teacher (Remember the "dandruff" and the jamming of the bolt?)!

Some of my favourite times together are flicking paper balls at my friend Nikhil at a bowling alley, her coming over and me making her watch b=Baywatch (Yes, I was obsessed with it, and till today, I don't understand why!!), her waking my mum up at 8am on a Sunday because I was never at home, her playing the accordion and my dog going behind the sofa whining (Oh that was hysterical!), my grandmum and her cracking jokes and laughing at my expense and most of all, our Goa trip!

It's hard to believe that it's been more than ten years and we're still the best of friends. Swathi's literally been adopted by my family as my sister, and sometimes, especially at various family events, my mum actually prefers her!!

I love that I can say that I taught her not to be afraid of dogs and she taught me not to run away from the ball while playing throw ball! I still remember Gypsy racing through her garden, literally tearing it apart! I'll never forget her holding the 6 week old Gypsy going "Saromaaaaaa" and then being totally comfortable with the 6 month old Gypsy jumping all over her!

She's off to London to study and this is the first time where I can't pick up the phone and meet her randomly to discuss my latest boy issue or whine about how hard my life is (not). It's going to be strange not having her here, but I think we'll survive!

Here's to an awesome year ahead, where we're both gonna go through some serious adventures and here's to a LOT of Skyping! Like everyday!