Normal 0 21 MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Tableau Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} Understanding Kritika   It was a cool evening of a hot summer day. The highlights of the Pepsi-Cup was about to begin after an hour. The match was between India and South Africa that I missed. The fan was spinning at the top of its speed. I slowed it down turning the knob of the regulator from 5 to 3. Of course, one cannot feel the same excitement watching the cricket highlights if it is already known that which team will win, who is going to make the century and the number of wickets that each individual bowlers are going to bag. Despite the fact, highlights have their own value and mode of entertainment. But the hazy-ghostly image of Doordarsan on the television screen made me uncomfortable. Perfection was what I needed; I mean a perfect clear picture for the cricket match.     My hurried feet soon climbed up the stairs and my hands move forward to clutch the vertically standing metal pipe on the top of which was mounted the largest Yagi antenna in whole of my neighbourhood. I rotated it and aligned it carefully so that its narrow end points the north-east direction. The rotation had no effect on the picture quality but rather the hazy picture was accompanied by an irritating hissing noise.   Realizing that the cables might have come off, I again climbed up to the roof. This time carrying a wooden chair, a screw driver, pliers and a black insulator tape with me. The weakening red sun was behind the coconut tree and the moving leaves would sometimes let its rays pass through them. Bats were squeaking in the nearby mango orchard. It was time for them to spread their wings and fly around in the search for food.   But before I could install the chair under the antenna and climb up to check the cables, I saw Kritika on the roof of her house. We are very old neighbours since the time of our grandfathers. We have been as a family not as neighbours. Let it be small puja, birthday parties or marriages they never miss to invite us and we don’t either. We almost know every relative of theirs and it would be fair enough to say that in this matter too they aren’t behind us. Just a couple of feet away from our house their house stands.   Carrying a note book on her left hand and chewing the tip of the pen on her right, she was moving around on the roof. Her eyes were fixed on the note book and her short hair covering up her left profile. I walked towards her.   “Kritika, exams again?” I shouted.   My voice made her to divert her concentration from the note book towards me.   “Yes.” She replied still biting her pen.   “Enjoy it. You like to study, don’t you?” I teased her.   “You will enjoy too when you will have one.” She made her face.   “So, what are you studying? Monkey, frog, rabbit or potato, radish, cabbage?” I cried aloud.   “It’s not so funny ok. It is biology and is difficult. It isn’t easy like reading poems and stories.” She replied. “For your kind information it is called literature and it is not so easy too.” This time I told it slowly and clearly taking up my time.   She pretended as if she didn’t hear me and continued devouring up her notes. I found one of the cables to be broken, fixed it and tied it firmly to the aluminum rod of the antenna with the tape. Before leaving the roof, I again looked at her. She was focusing hard, trying to remember, closing her eyes. Clearly speaking, she was mugging up the things and I could see her lips moving.   Kritika is just one year younger than me. Though our college was same, the different faculties and the shifts; morning for her and day for me, made it almost rare to meet her in the college. The passed two years had provided me with a lot of insight and experience to be comfortable and well adapted in Mahendra Morang Campus. I was a BA in final year with major English and Kritika in first with her Biology.   Many writers have attempted to portray the woman’s psychology. It has never been an easy task. To know what actually is going on inside a woman’s head is not so simple as to predict that whenever a woman comes across another woman, at a glance she observes her from top to the bottom and after, one of them might say to herself, “The colour really suits her complexion. Where did she get that nail polish from?” or she might wonder, “Won’t her husband mind seeing her in that exposing outfit?” But, the real challenge is to understand the woman’s pattern of thinking under different circumstances rather than making guesses about their thoughts.   Understanding the woman’s or in general female’s pattern of thinking was what I was after. I chose observation to be my guide for exploring the vastness and complexity of a female psychology. But later, I realized that observation was not in itself a sufficient way of achieving what I wanted. I needed someone for my observation and on the top of all, there she stood Kritika regarding her age and the openness she had towards me. So, in her biological term she was going to be a specimen for me.   The teacher’s strike at the college gave me a day off. But rather the day turned out to be empty and dull; nothing in my mind and nothing interesting in the available two or sometimes three television channels. Most of the time I used to call Ritesh to rescue me from the situations like that. So, I called him. Sitting in the veranda we started to play cards. But soon we lost our interest and I began to yawn and Ritesh began to doze.   “Wake up, let’s move our body.” I said.   “What?” Ritesh demanded with his drowsy eyes.   “Cricket.” I answered him.   The three years old, grip less cricket bat was leaning against the wall behind the door of my room and the black rubber ball was resting silently under the study table. The sun was still hot and the plastered porch of my house was well heated. But the heat couldn’t deter us playing the two men’s cricket. A green wooden stool on the batsman’s side and a standing brick on the bowler’s were our wickets. The first ball from me was rather slow. So, Ritesh with the full swing of the bat made the ball fly up in the air until it landed on the roof of Kritika’s one-story home. I knew he was too lazy to go for the ball, so before he would say it to me I moved my feet.  To be continued.....