Sabse Chota
So yesterday evening, I headed to Metro Plaza after an assignment at the ICCR where I watched a stunning wadaiko performance. Something about them reminded me of anime cartoons… the martial arts type stance, the intense expressions, the very hypnotic beats…(unfortunately that’s all I understood of their music and thankfully I didn’t have to write anything beyond a 30 word caption). Down the lane was Metro Plaza, where I was supposed to meet colleagues out shopping.

I wouldn’t buy anything, I planned. And I held off for quite sometime. There was a nice lacy sleeveless top that screamed ‘buy me’, but I looked away. There was a plain black round necked T that, I swear, I needed desperately (it would go with my long sleeveless white tunic, my fab India skirts, on every fat day…) But I decided I needed the money in my wallet more. There were peep toe ballerinas that I decided were far too cute for me. I can’t do cute, I told myself. And then, I fell for a corduroy, calf length A-line skirt in pretty grape. It was languishing behind a lot of hideous mini skirts and was on sale. I had to rescue it. Except that the shop had no trial room. And the waist looked a wee bit big for me. So I tried it over my jeans and T. Fits fine, I thought. "If it fits over my jeans it’ll be loose emni, na ?" I asked my colleagues.
They nodded. "Bhaiya isse chota size nahin hoga ?(Doesn’t this come in a smaller size?"I asked the shopkeeper.
"Yahi sabse chota size hai" he shook his head.
"Haan?! Maine kabhi bhi sabse chota size nahin pehna (Really?! I’ve never worn the smallest size in anything!" (Yes I know the Hindi is wrong, but this is Calcutta). And…well…bought. Sigh. Things I do to feel thin!

P. S. the skirt looks fine if held up with a belt. Without it, it rides dangerously low.

P. P. S Does anyone know an inexpensive tailor who would alter clothes they haven’t made? In Calcutta that is.