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Chapter 2: Plant response to elevated CO2 - DRUM - University of ...

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dog‐eared pages. All I had <strong>to</strong> do was just erase the mark, and it would be clean,<br />

smelling new, <strong>to</strong> be put back again with the others in the Fiction and Literature<br />

shelves. The book said: “Success is not an accident. It is the result <strong>of</strong> our attitude and<br />

our attitude is a choice. Hence success is a matter <strong>of</strong> choice and not chanceʺ. Yes, I had a<br />

choice, just like Pi Patel had a choice. I had a choice and I exercised it <strong>to</strong> be<br />

noticed, <strong>to</strong> be heard, <strong>to</strong> be the girl <strong>to</strong> have long lunch breaks with.<br />

So I started out with working on my “self‐esteem”, I convinced myself<br />

and Deven Sir that my HSC exams (I finally applied for it) were worth a one<br />

week paid leave; I no longer felt guilty <strong>to</strong> be the first one heating up her food in<br />

the microwave line during the lunch hour; I looked in<strong>to</strong> cus<strong>to</strong>mers eyes as I<br />

spoke <strong>to</strong> them, made small talk as I led them <strong>to</strong> the right aisle for that book, I<br />

“motivated” myself by joining a bunch <strong>of</strong> different classes: an Egyptian dancing<br />

class where a bunch <strong>of</strong> hippie people (an old Dutch dancer, a kind Parsee, a<br />

bored housewife, a pretty girl who wore rubber bands on her wrists, a depressed<br />

socialite, and our teacher a sensual, ageless Iranian lady) would meet every<br />

weekday evening in Prithvi and would shake the floor, gyrate our hips taking<br />

small steps forward and backward. I joined the e‐group <strong>of</strong> Bombay Natural<br />

His<strong>to</strong>ry Society and learnt <strong>to</strong> identify a peepul leaf from a banyan leaf, a hawk<br />

from a vulture, a koel from a mynah. Out <strong>of</strong> my window in the Virar local, I<br />

37

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