How to test positive

At first, put down the tightness you feel in your chest down to the regular occurrence of a nightly doob, right around the time known as "Dhal gaya din, ho gayi shaam". Which in advertising is between now and never. 

To counter that, you leave on your 20km round trip sprint on a cycle. This cycle has dust collected on it equivalent to the congestion in your chest. Perfect partner in crime, you say, wiping away the grime. 

Then, when you cant finish your miles in your regular time, it only re-enforces what you knew(ed) all along. The lifestyle Karan. But what to do, this is my life, and such is the style. Nothing a few sessions of bhastrika to blast out the phlegm in your alveoli. 

A shoot in Srinagar beckons, and all the more, the client will be much at peace if people from the agency can be there in person. So what its a shot for shot remake of their previous international film. I mean Priyadarshan became PRIYADARSHAN by remaking his makes and getting paid for it. 

So ofcourse, I go. 

I even share photos from my 6A seat of the panorama but it gets mistaken for New Bombay, so i let it slide. 

Travel regulations in Srinagar require an RTPCR test on arrival or they will jab your nose themselves on your arrival. I have forgotten that i maybe took an RTPCR in Mumbai already. So, me, a veteran of nose jabs and quarantine travels by now and the recipient of the first (and only now??) vaccine dose, volunteer to have my nasal passage probed again before disembarking onto the land that's "Heaven on earth". 

In hindsight though, the man who stuck this stick, plucked it out and put it onto a  test kit, requested me to move on and something to the effect of 'We'll let you know".
I will have you know that they never let me know even later when I very desperately did want to know because they probably didnt know in the first place, I was told by my driver's guide, who did seem to know these things. 

A day was spent driving past the Dal lake, few lovely photos were clicked during this drive that strangely never made it to my phone memory. An hour and a half was spent in a hotel lobby hearing client extoll virtues of their biscuit over a call to us. Us, understanding that they just wanted one of the best jingle makers in the business to put a jingle behind their product catalogue but hemmed and hawed for an hour and a half because we are paid to (apparently). 

I left this hotel, running low on battery and finding my producer's line dead. The same producer who had invited me to this lobby on the promise of further camaraderie on the rocks. 

I left fuming, maybe more "gasping and running on fumes." I decided to take this matter up once my and my device's batteries were recharged. 

I come to know around 5am next morning that the shoot cannot happen as scheduled as a road that was there for our equipments truck to get to Srinagar was found wanting on the count of being a road, so it was being blasted into a better road. For the time being there was no road, hence there was no equipment leading to no shoot on this day. 

Feeling vindicated with karma on my side, I sat with the same mis-communicating producer on the breakfast table late that morning, telling him of my vagabond existence due to a lack of proper communication. He recalled it feeling like being reprimanded by his school principal, which gave me quite a satisfaction even though he looked more street smart than he would have wanted to let on. 

Right then, this happens. 

In any case, we did another test in Srinagar to be sure and sure enough, it was positive. 

Its been 10 days since then. Lots of nasal passages have been violated since then, courtesy me. I infected no one that I know of. And I checked high and low.  I is sorry! 

Now, with my conscience cleared and my lungs congested, I sit, swinging between fever, body ache and loosies. Asymptomatic my arse, All symptoms of the C'vid, I'm told on my third consultation with our empanelled doctor. What I am truly grateful for is how this producer, the hotel (so what if they put the food outside my door, ring the bell and run away), my agency and our client have supported me through this ill-timed but maybe matter of time incident. I'm also grateful for not losing my sense of taste and smell. Otherwise, wouldnt have been able to taste the pancakes CC got sent and the hotel would have found their 4th floor room window glass and one hotel guest missing. 

And since I did, let me tell you, they tasted exactly how you'd expect pancakes in Srinagar to taste. Like parathas.
Though the jam grafiti of the sender's name was sweet. 

In this time, I've managed 1 and a half letter in the devnagri script ( the pro and con of writing in Hindi is this, if you think its taking you long to write, it takes even longer to read, so win win ), a 5 day drawn test match equivalent of a fight with my girlfriend, this above storyboard and sound sleeping to the audible retelling of Yuval bhau's Homo Sapiens (thanks for this one Ganesh). 

Now you, I and the pandemic are all caught up. Bless you and stay safe.