My parents have been together for over three decades, while my relationship seems to come with a shelf-life of about three months. How were my parents so happy spending their lives together, while my generation runs away from commitment as if it were a jail sentence?

A Diwali preparation is incomplete without a trip to the old city market. In Mumbai, it’s Dadar; in Delhi, it’s Chawri Bazar. This is the time of the year, when every mother across the country trots out their bargaining A-game.

Today socialising is what we do on the days our internet is down and bailing on people has become an inherent part of modern life. But to cancel on someone at the last moment is an art and it needs a lot of planning.

They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions. There is no better illustration of it than abusive parents, convinced they are only looking out for their kids. Of course, it takes an especially abusive kind of parent to screw someone up as thoroughly as Patrick Melrose, played by Benedict Cumberbatch in Hotstar Premium’s latest Emmy-nominated show

From confiscating phones, threatening to tattle on people smoking outside the campus, refusing entry to students, and making up rules on the fly, the college watchman is more powerful than the principal.

I’ve been jostled in the crowd, groped by a stranger, covered in cheap gulaal, and sacrificed at the altar of the DJ wale babu. But no trauma compares to the ordeal of attempting visarjan from the deck of a ferry in the middle of a downpour.

I think the teachers who prepared me for the real world were the ones who never needed things like textbooks, or actual teaching skills. Without them, I’d never have learned how to flirt, crack bad jokes, or break my diet.

As Opposition parties staged an all-India protest, a crowd of angry Mumbaikars gatecrashed the scene demanding a holiday. “The whole point of a bandh is to sit at home while protesters burn down the city. Is this what we pay tax for? What is the government doing?”

At 12, I was convinced that music was my calling and Rock On!! was the closest I could get to the ultimate rockstar experience. But today, as the film turns 10, I find nothing redeeming about the film, except its music.

That ’70s Show turned 20 a couple of days ago. In a sea of F.R.I.E.N.D.S. and Two and a Half Men, it depicted universal adolescent boredom. The basement in That ’70s Show, represented a sort of safe space for countless teenagers like me, who lived with their parents and had very little privacy.

The first season of The Big Bang Theory was unlike anything we’d seen on TV: A group of loserly science nerds headlining a show. But 11 years, 12 seasons, and a spinoff later, The Big Bang Theory is a show we can’t wait to bid goodbye to. The show comes to an end in 2019.

Following a rough patch, I went to Auroville to connect more closely with nature. Three days later, surrounded by raving firangs and vegan pizza, I realised this brand of spirituality was not for me.

We might have complained endlessly about school Independence Day celebrations back then. But it was the only phase in our lives where we truly understood what it meant to be a patriot, without the layers of nationalism and political stances that colour that notion as adults.

Ever since my little sister was born, it feels like she’s strolling down a path I’ve had to gruellingly blaze with my blood, sweat, and tears. My younger sibling’s arrival was bad news, as I was going to be held up as a role model whether I liked it or not.

Everyone’s favourite texting service, WhatsApp recently announced a special tag for forwarded messages, but it could do with some more attractive upgrades. From a sexting-only version to a bot that finishes annoying conversations for you, here are our ideas for a newer, better WhatsApp.

It was only in 2014, when all of India was talking about the saffron wave, India’s millennials were lost in Snapchat’s simple world of disappearing pictures. Four years on, after Kylie Jenner’s deadly tweet and a much derided interface update, it is finally time to bid the app farewell.

“Are trains in Mumbai working?” “What about Uber?” “Should I stay put or head out?” Here’s all you need to know about the Mumbai bandh.

I thought my innovative ideas and work ethic would land me a job as a creative professional. But the only difference between me and the office boy is that one of us is neatly dressed in a uniform, and the other one is me.

The civic body said that Mumbaikars should be grateful to them for not repairing potholes. How else would the city get its anthem: “Mumbai, tula BMC var bharosa nai kai?”

In a sea of formulaic youth-oriented films like Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na and Wake Up Sid that sugar-coated the lives of the youth, Delhi Belly stood out for how rooted it felt to reality. In real life, bachelors don’t live, they survive. And Delhi Belly accurately represented it.

The most interesting part about FIFA World Cup screenings is the eclectic people that make up the crowd. You’re guaranteed to run into the Rain Man who has memorised every team’s strategy, and confident druncles who last watched a match featuring Pele.

For some people, nothing screams single like voluntary third-wheeling, or hanging with couple friends. But, for a commitment-phobic 22-year-old, there’s nothing more convenient than living vicariously through your friends’ relationships.

Once the monsoons arrive, Mumbai starts to resemble a disgusting swimming pool, and the BMC can’t seem to do anything about it. From flash mobs to launching an app, here are some methods that haven’t been tried yet that just might work.

Don’t ruin your appetite by filling up on soup and salad, but don’t be the person with 15 paneer tikkas on your plate either. Here is a bhukkad’s approach to winning every round of man vs food.

From the annoying friend who will only pay for what he ate and nothing else, to the eternal debate of cash vs card, there’s plenty of fuel for conflict after an evening out with a bunch of broke friends. Splitting the bill might mark the end of the meal, but it’s the beginning of an argument.

For students who’ve just got their results, Open House Day or the final PTA meeting is that time of the year when the teachers snitch on the students. This dreaded occasion goes by many names, such as Dard-e-Diwas, Yellallympics, or, as Terminator fans would say, Judgement Day.

I played wingman to a kleptomaniac friend. I distracted a bar waiter, as my buddy Pranay lifted a couple of beers. Unlike him, I was filled with guilt, making me wonder if it was his affluent upbringing that absolved him of regret.

There was a time when cameras would be kept away in our parents’ closets until a special occasion arrived. Today however, our cameras are perpetually out capturing everything from our morning grump to our Swiggy meal.

Despite what audiences demand, I believe it’s better to leave people wanting more than to die serving horrible seasons in the coming years. This is exactly why I fear that, with most conflicts resolved, Brooklyn Nine-Nine might return with a horrible Season 6.

With privatisation, BEST buses are due to undergo a Pimp My Ride-style facelift. A swank new fleet will be introduced this month. But without the badass drivers and rude conductors, riding a bus will be like having a vada-pao without garlic chutney.

My mum and I are locked in an endless deathmatch: She’ll continue to ask me what I want for the next meal, before rejecting my suggestion outright, accusing me of making “kingly demands”, and serving us lauki for dinner anyway.

Where are the days of puppy love? In a horribly adult age when most relationships are easily labelled “complicated”, I long for the kind of love driven by impulses, immature promises, and the constant blip of hormones.

American TV portrays real, challenging careers as vague backdrops in the lives of their characters. Some of us fall for this mirage. Hank Moody’s effortless spewing of punchlines and black T-shirts has succeeded in convincing so many of us that writing is our true calling, that we must fashion ourselves as budding Bukowskis.

Friends with benefits is an amazing concept – in theory. Everyone loves sex with no strings attached, but in reality, it rarely works without leaving its scars on your emotional psyche. By the end, you’re left with way too many harrowing questions and no one left to answer them.

Hope and faith are the bedrock of lottery. Champaklal Patel has been buying bumper lottery tickets for the last 56 years, hoping to build a house in Surat – even though the retired peon with failing eyesight is yet to win a single prize.

You’ve been chugging haldi milk and using Vicks like a body moisturiser, but nothing has worked. It’s finally time to visit the doctor’s clinic. Consider yourself warned – the people you meet here just might make your condition worse.

Being a young adult on a vacation is like trying to finish multiple bucket lists at the same time. Things like making it on time, missing a train, covering all the popular spots, getting killer pictures, exploring hidden spots, and hopefully not blowing up all your money are constantly running through your head.

In a country full of professional scamsters and students who hide chits in their ties, write answers on their bodies and uniforms, create distractions in class, the Paper Leaker is the hero we deserve.

We all have that friend who asks for a bite and finishes your frankie, or who is always ready for a beer but is never ready to pay. This specimen, driven only by fulfilment of selfish needs, goes by the name of The Moocher.

The silent kid in school is like that chapter on trigonometry. He is forgotten in less than a year after passing from school. I was that kid.

Urinals aren’t places where people should converse or make eye contact. For someone who doesn’t like doing his business with an audience, that means weird situations are pretty common in here.

You don’t really understand the value of life unless you’ve had a few bad experiences. Such is the case with a mobile repair shop. Its people, walls, posters, all teach you to be grateful for what you have.

One of the most serious problems of living in a city as busy as Mumbai, is finding a parking spot for your car. Here’s a list of four elusive spots in Mumbai where this problem miraculously ceases to exist.

Very few things get the action going other than the sight of a 20-litre Bisleri can on a dispenser. Eavesdropping on a watercooler conversation can teach you important life lessons that no shrink or ageing grandfather can offer.

Earphones aren’t just about commuting or powering through your workout. They’re no longer an accessory, but an essential. You need a pair to block out everything that doesn’t matter – and a little bit of what does.

The student protest at TISS is out of character for Mumbai’s colleges. The sloganeering, picketing, and kurta-clad protesters seem transplanted from JNU or Delhi University, hotbeds of student protest culture in India.

We open the fridge thrice a night, and it still doesn’t have what we’re looking for. What are we hoping to find in these cold confines? The meaning of life? A bag of fucks?

Pregaming is the secret to every epic night out. Thou shalt pregame to party hard and thou shalt do it well. Here are the rules of the game.

For adults the general consensus we have all seemed to have arrived at is that cheating is a really bad thing to do. But it turns out that we’ve all been bad students at some point.

The idea of dining and dashing seems dangerous, yet everyone I know has tried it once. This wholly needless but adrenaline-boosting stunt is a rite of passage before you get your act straightened out.

A scientific report titled “Signals v/s the People of India (2011)” gives us extensive insights into the mindset of jaywalkers. The top reasons attributed to this disorder are “pretty girl on the other side” and “Father’s Property Syndrome”.

We millennials bore witness to the lives of our parents and the evaporated dreams they once had. Somewhere between sprouting our first pimple to driving our first car, we went from respecting them for their choices to deciding that that would not be the life we would be living.