a Lahore of my dreams!

i snuck out of home to evade that endless, omnipresent boredom that lingers heavily on when you much against your will decide to spend a 3 day weekend there. i took a bus that carried me to the magical land of Lahore. soon i was inside a small cafe-cum-shamiana where a poetry reading session was about to take place. it was a prominent english language Allahabad-based poet's son. i ate a chicken steak suffused with herbs and made buoyant in olive oil. i looked around, in the dimlit room, a pack of Lahore's english speaking poetry enthusiasts sat, waiting. a bunch of speakers elicited a low jazz ballad that gave a background hum to the active, bumbling chatter of the people. wearing lavish flowing kurtas with exquisite intricate kadhai, a girl walked up to me to ask when the poet will arrive. i looked back at her clueless. soon there was some bustle and everyone said he was here. in the meantime, i found myself speaking with someone on my cellphone. it was the poet. he said that he won't come. and i repeated after him. he again said he won't be able to make it. i said okay, and hung up. selfishly i walked out of the cafe, tearing through the creme de la creme gathered at the entrance, waiting, stupefied for him. i did not deem it necessary to tell them that he wont make it. i thought i lacked the drama to inform them about such a travesty. outside the pregnant crepuscular skies pretended to go all ballistic with heavy rains but there just was a small mellifluous mizzle. the clouds hung so low that i could caress them as the cab rode up and through the flyover in the promising, deepink twilight hue. i splashed the makings of the cloud on the face on my copassenger who weirdly was this school friend of mine who i meet every couple of years or so. the whole ambiance of my moody blues dream was that of a coke studio season 2 music video, directed by rohail hyatt sans the crazy lights. and all this while i was very tensely trying to chill with a bunch of upmarket Lahore-ites who conversed in crisp Urdu only! a crepuscular violet Lahore, a Lahore of my dreams!