SITARA, I have been rather late with this call but better late ever always than never. Was busy 'arsing' (borrowing Dannanymous's phrase) around on the golf courses up north. And the weather let me down massively. :( They've a saying and it goes something like this: UK ko mausam ra keti ko bharosa hundaina! :) Now not sure about 'keti' but the ukhan couldn't hold any truer - on its 'mausam' count at least! I have long given up counting on the BBC weather forecast! The last two days were horrendous, absolute bugger all (excuse my French!) - passed without any attempts at a decent shot on my part! The combination of both wind and rain proved a little too distracting, mind you, leaving me with one easy choice: dash back to the bar for those endless rounds of mochas/cuppas sipping over bites of short bread and croissants! What else! Stop press: the word 'keti' has an express company of a noun (viz UK) which precedes it hai - I thought I said this before those with hyper-gender sensitive temperament felt a crushing stab and started hurling equally crushing verbal fireballs my way before long! So no offence but hey, I said - UK ko keti, not Amrikaa ko or Nepal ko! :) Good to be back to Sajha - I must admit that I did miss Kurakani really sorely - was 'always on my mind'! Okay enough about pleasantries. Now on to the story. An edifying read, as always. I found the variation of the narrative structures at the end of the story rather striking, and I think, this is what adds much flavour to the unfolding plot and its delivery achieved through an intimate choreography of language and the imagery it engenders. Your realist approach to the style of delivering the overall story line becomes more crystallized with the meticulous description of the surroundings; the setting has a more atmospheric feel to it. The good old Henry James (another Anglicised American) would have loved the story, I am sure. The story has all the hallmarks of the Dickensian tales with classless characters who, in spite of their identities being confined to the periphery of a given social landscape, often find expressions in their battle to face the scourge of society's worst ills - the poverty and the squalor - as well as in its contradictions, exemplified in this case by the rich sable jacket/suede gloves wearing socialite - the hapless 'anticipating' narrator's voluptuous Friday date. This is SITARA prose at its most eloquent. Lovely. On a lighter note though, why did your narrator have to dash back to his 'lonely apartment'? Sad old sod! :) Or was his date so ugly that he felt uncomfortable being seen with her? The male ego and all! But ugly or not, I would have definitely gone into the restaurant with her and would have gorged all those mouth watering Italian delicacies on offer down the gullet with sips of cianti. If I were him! Then the 'pre-prandial' activities that would have followed back in my place would have made my apartment not so 'lonely' after all. How about that? :) Okay, enough woffle. I better get back to checking a few hundreds of email that have piled onto my Inbox. Hope you had a lovely Tihar - my belated greetings if it is not so belated! Carpe diem.