You have a visitor...

Unannounced, he showed up at the door. And thanks to the open door policy that I follow, he came right in. It was just a stroke of luck that I looked up from my work and saw him. After all, these creatures are known for their stealth.
Yes, you guessed it right - It was a snake. I am not an expert on snakes, but by its movement I could tell that it was a sidewinder. A sidewinder!!!... on a hill... in coastal Kerela.... aren't they found on desert sand??.... Yeah right!!! When you have a snake in your room 5 feet from you, you aren't really wondering if it belongs to that part of the country. You don't wanna know how it came in?? All you are worried about is how you are going to get it out. And when it roams proudly between you and the door, you don't even bother if it dosen't wanna leave; if it takes over the room. You only want to get out - let the damn thing stay! And, with your eyes fixated on that 'creepy','scaly' 'thing', you are only praying that the electric supply hasn't chosen that very moment to ditch you.

Well, that was what I kinda went through just past midnight after a relaxed Saturday evening which included a nice Grand Dinner in the mess and some cool songs by RJ Khadoos on K-dio. Our friend, who I still believe was a sidewinder (though Kalal sahab says that it was definitely a Krait), was 6 or 7 inch long, probably a kid looking for his mom(I am very glad she didn't come looking for him in here!), happened to wander into my room sometime around 1230am while I was busy working away at an Ethics assignment. So from a semi-drugged state, one sight of our friend put me into hyper-alert mode. Girls would die to have that effect on a guy. Who knows, our friend might have been a 'she' (killer looks... hmm...)

I had always believed that I didn't fear anything, but life at an IIM has other plans.

I finally did manage to get out, call the hostel 'chetta' and reclaim my room. Like they say in the ads, "Darr har kisiko lagta hai, muh har kisika sukhta hai(Everybody is afraid sometime, everybody has a moment when his mouth dries up)" and "Darr ke aage Jeet hai (There's always victory beyond your fears)".

Note: My only grouse is that I couldn't click a photograph as our friend chose to roll itself around my study table leg in one dark corner before it was removed. (All the animal lovers out there - our friend was not hurt or killed - it was just taken away :-) )