Scent of a Woman

The Mall
It was around 8’o clock at night that our auto finally halted in front of our last destination for the day- the biggest mall in Cochin City, situated midway along the MG road.

Before I proceed further, the ‘we’ above included me and my friend KB, who went by the reputation of being the one point reference, example and proof of all of Murphy’s Laws.


KB: I love this city dude. It has a disc, a multiplex, a mall, scores of coffee shops and hell lot of foreigners. I wish they would have made the IIM here.

I wanted to say something, but decided to just nod my head and stay silent.
Two minutes passed and he started again.

KB: I’d say we achieved what we came for. We did manage to go to all the places and market ourselves. Wot say?

I: As much as two great souls can achieve in a single day in an unknown city.
We literally went to everyplace where anyone was willing to lend us a ear, give us a place to put our posters and willing to buy tickets for our fest!

KB: Yup….And we also managed to finally get a glimpse of her maaan! The MMG!
I always knew she exists. We were just in the wrong place for the last two years.

The one in CCD was quite cool, but the chick in Subway was real hot maaan- navel rings in Kerala! that’s a first time for me!

Wait! I have to charge my phone! Let’s go to that cake shop round the corner and do that. In the mean time we can also pitch to put our posters there. I can see a lot of hot chicks seated in there.



Two Years Earlier (Yes Flashback)

Have you ever experienced this? - when you are standing in the middle of a busy crossing or shopping mall and suddenly you turn your head in the exact direction from where a beautiful looking girl is coming your way or perhaps just plainly standing and looking at you and for a flicker of a second your lines of sight become one?

I know what most people would do in such a situation. They would just turn their head away and never think about it!

But what if it starts happening with you again and again- on roads, in college, in Durga Puja Pandals, everywhere and almost everyday?

You would probably enjoy it and still never give it a second thought as to what signals your brain is giving away to you? I also didn’t.

There is always a mismatch between what we seek or desire in our subconscious and…..What we actually want or rather made to want in our conscious self?

I was lucky to get what I wanted in my conscious self pretty early in my life, academically/professionally.

But something was missing. The sudden achievement of what I wanted made me all the more aware of what I subconsciously seek or desire and missed.

It was not that I was very sure about what exactly that was? I was as confused as a 23 year old would be.

She was still taking shape, just a silhouette and certain broken images-


The Myth of the MMG and the Prophecy

I had heard a lot about the beauty and grace of Malayalee women, and should say also witnessed among the limited sample of Malayalee population in Kolkata. So as I was packing my bags, perhaps another dream was taking shape in my mind, of finding my MMG (Mythical Mallu Goddess) in my next two years in K.

But all my hopes of finding her ended abruptly, within a week of landing there.

The average girl in this city had more body hair than the sardar in our group, got dressed in strikingly fluorescent color salwar/saris, and soaked herself in coconut oil.

Yes! Coconut oil- from banana chips to chicken tikka to girls, everything had just one thing in common- coconut oil and its odor, which didn’t just put me off, but also made me feel like puking.

Now, I was not the only one in search of that ‘mythical mallu babe’, there were others in the club as well, who had come with a similar expectation and were left heartbroken within weeks of landing here.

It was about that time that our sorcerer- the resident wizard on everything mallu came up with the prophecy-
That K was not exactly the place where the MMG dwells; she lives a bit down under in cities like Cochin or Thiruvanthapuram. Go there and Thou shall find Her!

But there was no practical hope of us going there, neither was I game for it.


The next two years were both short and long. Short because it all happened so fast, as if time just flew by. And long because of the things which I was involved in or just simply happened.



Things happen and people change. By the time this incident happened, I was no more turning my head looking for that ‘someone’, my sixth sense had stopped working and I was no longer on the chase of that subconscious dream.
That dreamer in me had died many months ago, a long way from here….somewhere outside a busy and dirty railway station, on a gloomy and wet Saturday afternoon.



Back at the Mall

We both were standing outside the cake outlet. We had somehow managed to get them put our posters on their wall and help KBs phone get some much needed charge before it konks off !

There were only a few people in this part of the mall by this time, just a few tourists with their backpacks roaming around and checking out stuff, and a young couple seated on the table by the cake shop & getting cozy. The shop across had a large Adidas signage put on the entrance and side bars, with a couple of kids checking out new sports gear. There was also a leather apparels outlet just next to it, but from where we were standing, we could just see one half of it.

I turned around to see what KB was up to? It was already late and we had to go and catch the bus. I walked towards him and just as I was about to tell him that; he grabbed my hand and literally turned me around 180 degrees.

KB: Dude! Don’t miss this one!

A couple of girls had just walked out of the leather outlet across the alley. One of them was dressed in low cut hipsters, had streaked hair and a nose ring (I am sure KB meant her when he said that)

The other one was just in a simple white salwar with a blue dupatta, had dark long untied straight hair, the perfect complexion which made her face glow even without any visible sign of makeup and had big expressive eyes. The perfect feminine Mythical Mallu Goddess!

KB: Let’s go and talk. I am not going to be just a spectator this time. (Grabs my hand and starts pulling).

Suddenly I was feeling alive again, as if I was looking at someone I always knew. As if I had met her somewhere, watch her run after a local train in a busy platform, watch her smile at me with her palm above her eyes to beat the sun and then seated by the window and tying her hair as I stood and watched her go away.

As if God just pressed the slow motion button that minute inside that mall, my vision was foggy- I could just see her and only her, smiling & walking towards me ……….and hear some faint fumbling sounds (which I later realized was my friend KBs)


KB: Hello! I am KB and this is my friend Pratik. We are from…….

KB pretended to talk to both of them, but kept looking at the other girl with streaked hair and the nose ring.
His words kept reaching my ears; but I was just mesmerized, watching her as she stood next to me, slowly running her fingers through her hair until suddenly she pushed her hair back and a whiff of air went across my face.

Wait a minute! I know this smell. What is it? Why am I suddenly feeling so dizzy!
Why is she smelling like Coconut Chips?….No- Coconut Oil!
And why is the smell becoming so intense?

I looked at her hair for a second time, trying to kill my doubt and saw/smelt something which I had missed in my mesmerized state.

Coconut Oil!

3 minutes later we were walking out of the mall.

And an hour later we were on our bus back to K, with KB talking to his gf on the phone perilously close to my ears and my thoughts running back to another crazy night many months ago in another unknown city.