Fags.....Cigarette......Bayinsi....Dhala Bayinsi......Smoke

Smoking....Oh! it would surely make me appear cool...in my otherwise nonentity status....that’s what I had thought as I had dragged on my first puff.  I had seen the other cool guys from school chewing tobacco and even boozing and they sure were deemed cool and the girls too were attracted to them. Me, I was the inconspicuous guy..the quintessential looser, who was average in studies but lacked in sports and extracurricular activities. Extracurricular activities for me, meant loaning another novel from the school library and reading it. Oh!! How much I wanted to emulate the success of these other chaps at school. I mean who wouldn't mind a girl or two in your arms during lunch breaks...lolz....Teenage is the age when I guess we try extra hard to appear cool...and this is the same trap I fell into....

I still remember that day or night I should say. We were returning from Mr. Dinakar's tuition at Tulsipur in a cold wintry evening when I was in class 10 and was all of 16 years old. I had a friend from SCB Medical School, named Chandra and both of us had been debating about the pros and cons of fags for over a month. Although we knew that the cons weighed more than the pro's we still headed for the pro...i.e. the decision to take a fag in our own hands. I guess, both of us had already made the decision in our minds. So that evening both of us were hardly paying attention in the tuition classes. We were just waiting for the clock to strike 8:30 PM...so that we could run out. Run we did...and Chandra took 5 bucks from me to purchase two fags and we headed to the secluded Indoor Stadium area. Without further ado, we lighted our fags and after the initial bout of coughing, tried out different styles of holding the fags...and blowing out the smoke....Satisfied that we had scaled the Mount Everest and were the two latest studs of our batches in our respective schools we returned home..... Maybe I was the nice guy, I don't know what…..but I refrained from smoking again...or may be with the paltry pocket money I got, I thought it wiser to spend on novels....Nevertheless my good boy behavior did not last for long. College came and with it came more peer pressure along with the freedom. Left, right and Center, everyone was smoking.....and that was too much to see. After all I had grown up now and I was in college and surely a fag or two won't do much bad to me. On the contrary a cigg in my hand would make it easier for me to jump from boyhood to manhood..... That’s what I thought....So soon enough, I picked back up the cool stick or "Bayinsi" or "Dhala Bayinsi" as it was called then as a code word. (Bayinsi stands for flute and Dhala stands for White).

It’s been 15 years since I first had a fag and it has stood by me through thick and thin. I have been through ups and downs of life and my fag has given me the company....Starting off with Wills Filter Navy Cut and progressing to Classic Regular/Marlboro, my brands have grown along with my status in life......But now everyone seems to be ganging up against the both of us, i.e me and my fag and trying to persuade me to stop sucking on it. Then, some dumbass scientist discovered Cancer and second hand smoke and ruined all the fun. Damn!! I don't want to leave my fags.....I mean why does the only thing which gives me instant happiness have to be so bad. But now I know, it’s not going to be easy to leave the habit. It’s now ingrained inside me, my body will revolt if I leave my fag. Like a spurned lover, my fag will cause my body to revolt against me..... I will feel ill and nauseated.....I will become fatter as I will crave for more food......But now I have decided to curb my habit.....But just that my lover understands, I am not going to entirely ditch her. I will smoke, but within limits....and only on occasions.....Let’s see if this World No Tobacco Day....I can kick off my fag.........