CHAPTER 4: SMS

I work as a telecom test engineer. I joined a Chinese telecom company called “Huawei” in 2006. At that time, I have heard one of my unromantic senior manager named Latchu saying –“ I had tested this feature, text messaging during its initial days in telecom. At that time, I had really wondered whether someone would really use this feature. The reason for this was, it is a hell lot of pain to sit and type the whole text. Then, we will send this and will have to wait for a response. I mean, Instead we could push the call button and exchange the information in our own voice, in real-time. But, now I feel that, what I thought was wrong. SMS is such a huge revenue for telecom operators. The people who mainly use it are you youngsters, especially the lovers” and then he laughed out loudly.

I winked looking at Jasmine and Prashantha. They smiled back.

I don’t know why, but when ever I used to see young lovers exchanging text messages in hurry, I used to remember these words from my old manager. But today, I was doing the text message.

“Bye…Don’t miss me too much” I texted to Asha that evening. She was leaving Bangalore today, and was going to Kannur, Kerala to visit her elder brother. I would go back to my solitude in Chennai in the night bus.

My mobile beeped. It was Asha’s reply. My heart felt a pain of joy.

“Oh no…I was about to msg you the same. Don’t miss me too much J “

“take care and keep in touch” I replied.

“Sure…and you too J”

The messages were going in and out too fast. And, I felt that we both were getting close to each other in the same rate. I thanked from my heart for this wonderful technology called SMS. At night 11 P.M, I got in to my bus to Chennai.

Next day morning, I reached my room at around 5 AM and slept again.

At 8, I suddenly got up and checked my mobile. No messages!

“Good morning. You reached ?” I texted immediately and waited for the reply.

“Hey..Good morning J! I reached and am with my brother now J. You J?” the reply came immediately as if she was longing for my message.

I was so happy to see that message and my heart was feeling light. Something inside in my heart was saying that, I am falling for this girl!

The days followed were the days of text messaging. I even took a special pack from Vodafone for 1000 free message per month. I even re-charged her pre-paid mobile for Rs.55, which would give her an unlimited SMS free option for a month. She had asked me to do this favor, as she could never think of asking for this recharge-favor with any of his brothers, since they would kill making fun of her, for being the kind of bold SMS-rebel she had been for years! . We both would message for anything and everything happening in each other’s life. I mean literally, anything. It would look something like this:

“ Hi..good morning! I got up”

“I am cooking now”

“I just took bath. Going to office now. Will message you from there”

“Hi..what are you doing?”

“I am eating my breakfast..u had?”

“I am eating my lunch..u had?”

“I am eating my dinner…u had”

“ I am feeling so lonely…Missing someone badly J “

“Oh..don’t miss me too much”

This is called the status update. Every time your status changes you inform each other. Apart from this, Ashzy had some very special messages. It was called “knowing-each other” messages! She would ask a question in the form of a situation and she would ask me to tell, how I would react to that particular situation. According to her, this would help us in knowing each other in a better way. I mean, Girls are girls!!!

Some of those messages would look like:

“How much percentage weight age you would give for your girl, in terms of beauty and character?”

“What would you do, if your girl fights with you in public?”

“Do you like to travel and see new places a lot?”

“Who is your favorite actor/actress?”

“How important is sex for you in your family life”!!! Even though, I was shocked for this question from her, I replied that it was “very important J”

We Boys!!!

Messages were going in full swing and I tried to convert those messages to voice calls soon. But I felt that she was not so comfortable to talk to me over phone.

 According to her there were two reasons for that.

1) SMS will help more in knowing each other, than the voice calls (which obviously was a stupid reason!)

2) She was feeling shy to talk over phone all on a sudden. She wanted more time (Which was of course the correct reason)

But, I was happy for one thing! This ‘Shy thing” she was feeling to talk over phone, was only with me. I mean, she would talk for hours with anybody else over phone without any shyness. So we were going in the right track, and our SMS continued.

Eventually, “I miss you” started to occur a lot during our messages. This obviously was a sign of falling in love. And we both knew it each other.

We miss a person, a lot, when we love a person a lot! I was feeling happy for it, and I felt that she was also enjoying this strange “missing” feeling!

 I was sitting in my office on a fine evening, when I got an SMS as usual.“ I am listening to a song now. Can you tell me which one?” She asked.

For no particular reason, the first song which came to my mind was “Na..hai yeh paana. Na khona bee hai….tum se hi”. The beautiful song sung by Mohit Chauhan, and composed by Preetham from the film “Jab we met”

I texted this song to her!

After few minutes I got a reply!

“I almost fainted. You won’t believe this! And I am still shivering now. I was listening to that song a few minutes ago when I got your message. I cannot believe this.I know, there is a strange connection between us”

I kept reading that message again and again! I felt a sudden rise of heart beat inside me and I was having this strange feeling called “being in love”.

“Yes! I was falling in love with this wonderful girl”

-Sreekant Narayan