People who surround me

Every day, we meet hundreds of people of all kinds. From them, we cautiously select a handful, to be called as our friends. Of the handful we select, some years down the lane we lose them for one reason or the other, some have to leave and some wants to. And although at that time, we do have to let go of them, their memories stay forever, good and the bad alike. I just want to go ahead, grab this opportunity and pen down a little about them, to remind me in the future years what actually made me who I became.
Accepting the rudeness of this fact, I divide my friends list in 3 circles, each one with its own special space, but with world’s difference between all of them.
To start off, the people I met at my tuitions while doing my o/a levels. This group of people I met, included my own teacher, and who ended up calling themselves as “ludhars”, a term whose meaning is unknown to date, just the macho-ism of the word is enough for them. It had a whole bunch of people in it, of which one married off (dada, as we call her) and now is expecting a baby (which am really excited about) from one gem of a husband (aki, like dada calls him), a few others who just disappeared in the thin air, whose name I don’t want to put forward, but still a few stayed. These few, I had lost touch off, appeared in the starting of the year 2009, just capturing all of my working day’s evening hours, Sunday being an off day thanks to the driver of this person, who has to be one of the most wonderful person I have ever come across, who has the painful responsibility to pick and drop a fool like me every day, really appreciate whatever she has done for me. With this person along with “dada” and her husband, I have to admit, I have done the craziest of things. From riding a horse and a camel for the first time in at least 10 years, to listening to these weird old songs at the highest volume which made me tone-deaf for an easy 24 hours, to sitting in a parlor listening to this whining off a song watching the person get a blow-dry, to stealing flowers from garden of different houses. Good times, good stuff. I have to also mention my mentor and my teacher, who has been the most “chilled” teacher to be around, smoking during his classes, drifting in his car at midnight in front of an ice cream parlor after sitting at the open rooftop of a hotel on a seriously chilly night, with no warm clothes on, or just sitting admiring the new soft sofa in his office while sitting on a rug on the floor in the hopes that we leave no marks on the sofa. Boss, as I call him, has seriously been the single reason for my interest in accounts, the sole reason I ended up going into ACCA. I just simply adore these people, all of them, without them my evenings will be pathetic, which I had to unfortunately bear a couple of days back due to some issues.
This group, recently joined by few cadets from the northern side of Pakistan, have breathed a more exciting and weird life into the group. I have my fair share of funny memories with them, one which happened today only, which I might just never forget. These 2 cadets, and I, were rudely left stranded on the streets, by our ‘transporter (please don’t kill me for this=p)”. But, seizing the moment, and trying to show that we don’t really mind sitting on the street divider (which we did!), we took a few pictures, adored the scenery ahead of us and saying a few weird movie dialogues about being left alone and stuff. Sadly, my data cables fried, so won’t be able to put them up.
Another addition to this group has to be my friend since class 6. Really fun to be around, I have known her for decades, although sharing more troubled memories than good ones, still, her addition has been a good experience in its own.

The other group, which spun off and joined another, started when I joined this place “lecole”, at the start of my ACCA. That time gave me 2 friends, out of which one I am not so much in touch with, but our ways keep crossing each other and we happen to know about each others’ basic routines. The other one is who I came to call as a really close friend of mine(H.A.S), and ignoring the tiny differences about us, his life’s experiences are carbon copied to mine. We both lost our serious relationships at the same time; we have had the same problems over the years, and we both share the same thoughts on major of things, especially our love for our beloved city, Karachi. He has launched his own business a few weeks back, and I wish him well. From this same person, I ended up getting into another group. A group which amazes me. One can fail to explain how intellectual yet fun these guys can be. Being very successful in their own fields, I came in contact with them just a few months back, and have been literally amazed by their discussions. It makes me really happy and proud to see, people of their words are still alive, people with principles and a surprising level of respect for every human being, and that I know them. It is magic, when around them, discussing about all kinds of things, and this makes the time fly. The flying time has been a problem, because late home coming is really not my dad’s thing, and has landed me in a few messy situations. But I think it’s worth it, u give when u get.

The last, but equally important, is the group who am mostly in touch with my cell or my msn. Out of this, a few live countries away, while the rest being just streets down, yet with no physical interaction, and whose faces I may have clearly forgotten and vice versa. This includes 2 of my oldest friends, “dany boy” who I know ever since I joined my prep classes, and the other, “aunti” as I call her, who I’ve known since class 8. Dany boy has been around ever since I can remember, and we somehow are always in touch, and know almost all there is to know about each others’ lives. He lives a few blocks away, yet we fail to meet as much as we could, thanks to our schedules and commitments. The other, aunti, also living a few blocks away, has known me for ages now. She too, knows everything there is to know, thanks to being constantly in touch through SMS every single day. Not a day has passed when we haven’t been just yapping about the most useless of the stuffs to each other.
This other person, who as well, was with me in class 8, had disappeared when changing her country. But, thanks to facebook, we got back in touch around end 2008, and ended up being, probably, the most retarded of the people on net. We have crapped about any and every famous personality, and made the lamest jokes ever, and laughed loud enough to even make the neighbors shout! It’s never boring talking to her, and I mean NEVER.
Other then these, I have also managed not to lose touch with the people I grew up with, or even went out with, who had been really important to me and who I might never be able forget no matter what, no matter how.
These all are the people, whose faces I might have forgotten and whose birthday dates I may never remember had there been no facebook/orkut reminders, I respect them all, and they have played their own parts in making me who I am today, and have played it rather well.

This ends my tiny list of the close friends and people who surround them. These are people I am ready to take a bullet for, happily, and knowing them, hopefully, is something I’ll never regret to the date I live, for one thing is sure, I’ll never be able to forget any of them.
Once again, shout out to all the friends, thanks a ton, something I don’t really say as much as I should. And sorry if I have left anyone’s names or nicks, it is kind of late at night right now and my mind is rather tired from an exhausting day. So,Peace!
Syed Muhammad Raheel Nabi Shah.