Here goes the sequel, for this year’s wall mag 
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Since my revered predecessor emosanal.gongaforing’s novel efforts on this very wall to lay down some customized ‘Pyaar ke superhit formulae’ for the typical ISI-an (almost by default a guy), it’s been more than a couple of years. Things have improved from teaching She++ to Charlie’s Angels, confusions about the paternity of a certain Tejendranarayan (aka Ghunchu) or ‘ei shono, tumi aj begun kheyecho?’-type floor-wise lovegurus, I can tell you. Of course it’s not that lovebirds are suddenly raining out here (in pairs, that is), but the so-called meye-independent purists have surely been in for a jolt.
On recently being asked by gongaforing senior, I couldn’t find any new ‘confirmed’ couple since his departure about a year ago. But of course, it’s not what it seems. Sparks have been flying for sure, because ‘love is in the air of ISI’ (no pun or cliché intended, but one of the freshers wrote these very words in her questionnaire). In fact you can blame the inference of there not being any new couple to being short on information and update about some of the transitional and confusing cases, and I am NOT referring to the New Zealanders (surely you’re fit to be one if you can’t get it).
Although guys out here still don’t have the money for Castrol GTX to feed their bikes, it seems desi isn’t doing a bad job. They were advised a couple of years back to follow the much trodden path – the excitingly filmy ‘love comes out of contrast and conflict’ funda. But, needless to say, one needs to customize the advices to make them fit and feasible for a bhosteller. My advice is, follow the middle path, and as you look around you can easily see examples. It’s imperative not being direct because almost surely the ISI-an guy inside you will lose confidence and will have two options : either meekly try to ‘defend’ your point and receive a lecture from her, or back off and plain go dumb after saying ‘not entirely …’ when she asks you ‘… so was this all a joke ?’. Don’t be totally inert as well, like not go talk to her because of sheer confusion as she sits alone near you in a near-empty mess. Just be confident, balanced, and you’ll soon find yourself talking to her in unspoken languages, or at the receiving end of weird requests like letting her know how alcohol smells.
One more thing. Be on either side of the line … either pursue her consciously, without caring a hang about what people all around are speculating about you two, or be a devdas, finding ‘dark’ solace in death metal music, or learning break dance alongside that very guy who is your nemesis. But don’t, I repeat, DON’T be a platonic lover … it sucks. Why care about her when it’s of no use, eh? It’s just a theory for losers. There’s one more downside of this. Suddenly you’ll see you’re at the center of unwanted attention from some aggressive samples of the fairer sex, irrespective of age, looks, or, for that matter, ethnicity. You’ll never know when you’ll find one of them in your room doing bhaat with you about some B-grade English movie or some trip. And be either fully in or out of the ‘love league’. It’s one thing if you’re not tuned in to the frequency, but for God’s sake, don’t send e-mails asking her to accept your friend request (yes, in Orkut), or do things like vying for her attention with a certain M.T. during DJ in the annual fest and getting it videoed, or making a Treasure Hunt as a gift for your friend’s significant other, hoping to meet (and …) some of her friends during the party afterwards. Believe me, these kind of cavalier ideas scream of desperation. Be patient, yaar … remember, sabr ka fal meetha hota hai, and these things will only make a bunny out of you if they come out (and inevitably, they do).
As Mr. gongaforing originally asserted, I’m not a loveguru as well. You can do the ‘Hitch’ comparison to some extent if you want to, but I tell you I’m a novice in this myself, otherwise I won’t be writing this, because it is more a ‘not to do’ list than a ‘to do’ one concerning the theory of love. Anyways lovegurus can initiate things, but at some point you have to take over, and from then on intuition rules. Apart from the fundabaazi, if everything else fails, just tell her … of course you can make it interesting by doing it through Dumb-C (concept courtesy Dasvidaniya). In short, don’t be content with a mere share of the taxi-fare, as people used to say !
