http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/21/is-american-nonviolence-possible/?smid=pl-share

a recommendation

I'm still young..

an incident today. the source of a tiny bit of annoyance, a little disbelief, a little of that "really???!!" feeling that talks for itself, and some post-analytical amusement.

me in my yoga pyjamas, a loose, larger than life t-shirt, cross-legged on a bench with my hardcover game theory book in my lap, reading and highlighting with my pretty orange cra-z-art pen. waiting for the yoga class, with its door in view, meaning to use the waiting time to finish off the last bit of this chapter.

i briefly catch the eye of a student who looks like he is marketing/selling something and i congratulate myself on how brief i made that contact last so as to communicate that i do not want to be disturbed. a guy comes and sits by me on the bench. i feel im being observed, i look up and catch him peering at me. weirdo. forgive him cos after all he looks like a desi, and all desis peer at all others, in a foreign land. i continue reading... the guy gets up, goes off, someone else comes and sits. hardly 2 mins of quiet reading, a voice next to me asks, "have you got a test or something coming up?". i look up, its the same guy. i smile against myself, at the question. and before i can retort with "what's it to you" or a "do i know you?", a "no" spills out of me.

"well then?" he actually bothers to continue. i want to say "really?? that's the best you could do to talk to a strange girl?" but i look at him one full glance. and then shut my book, and inform him "I am teaching this book" !!

i got up then and went to the yoga class. should have got a good look of his face but i just stopped enough to hear an "Ohh"