Gudi Padwa
Gudi Padwa at our house in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s was a grand affair. My mother would wake up at the crack of dawn, meticulously tying the Gudi outside our balcony with a precision that could rival NASA engineers. The fragrance of fresh neem leaves, mango blossoms, and steaming shrikhand-puri filled the air. It was meant to be a spiritual and cultural celebration. But for us youngsters? Oh, it was something much more exciting.
My girlfriends would “casually” land up at my place, eyes twinkling with mischief. “Aunty, the Gudi looks so beautiful this year,” one of them would say dramatically, placing her hands together in a respectful namaste. Another would chime in, “Such a sacred festival… sigh let’s just soak in the divine atmosphere.”
My mother, of course, was no fool. She would glance at us knowingly and smirk, because she knew. She knew that the only thing we were admiring from that balcony was not the Gudi, but the group of desirable bachelors who had moved into the opposite building—the ones from Bharati Vidyapeeth College of Engineering.
These young men were everything we had seen in Bollywood movies and more—carefully gelled hair, faded jeans, and an effortless air of confidence that made them seem like the Sharukhs, Amirs, and Salmans of our little Pune society. Our mission? To "coincidentally" be on the balcony whenever they stepped out.
“Arre, arre look! Blue-shirt-wala is coming out!” whispered Neha, her voice quivering with excitement.
“Shh! Don’t look all at once! Casually glance, okay?” instructed Pooja, who was an expert in acting uninterested.
Of course, we failed miserably. We’d either pretend to adjust our dupattas, twirl our bangles, or dramatically fix our bindis—all while stealing obvious glances at them. The guys, on the other hand, seemed to know they had an audience. One of them would stretch unnecessarily while yawning, another would dramatically run his fingers through his hair, all in the name of "casual" behavior.
Fast forward a few years, we went for a movie night and found ourselves watching Kuch Kuch Hota Hai. The moment “Rahul Juice” played on the screen, we exchanged glances and BURST into uncontrollable laughter. Because wasn’t that exactly us?! The balcony scenes, the sighs, the not-so-subtle admiration—it was like Karan Johar had bugged our conversations and turned them into cinematic gold.
We laughed so much that the auntie in the row ahead turned and shushed us. But how could we stop? That was our Rahul Juice moment, our youth, our golden era of admiration from the balcony.
Looking back, none of us were conventionally beautiful back then—awkward hairstyles, oversized clothes, and the innocence of youth. We felt like Anjali before her glow-up, but the best part? Nobody ever wanted to be Tina. We knew we had something special, something raw, something real. We knew that one day, every caterpillar would turn into a butterfly. And until then, we had our balconies, our Gudi Padwa celebrations, and our Rahul Juice moments to cherish.
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