My Fundays

Chetan Bhagat his books, one night at a call centre and five point someone have been national bestsellers. His latest book is The 3 mistakes of my life

As a child, I lived in a middle-income group flat in Naraina in west Delhi, with my parents and my younger brother. For a long time, my father’s two brothers and their families shared the flat with us, so it meant a lot of cousins living together in a cramped space. My mother had a government job in Delhi, and my father was in the Indian Army — he was posted out most of the time.
School used to be a lot of fun and still holds a very special place in my heart. I remember we had to wear shorts to school until class VIII. Now, it gets awfully cold in Delhi in winter and we used to shiver in the army trucks that used to come and pick us up every morning. I went to Army Public School, which was famous for everything apart from studies! It produced several batches of brave soldiers for the Indian Army. It also had a record for producing celebrities — my batch alone had stars such as actor Shiney Ahuja, model Manpreet Brar, fashion designer Ranna Gill and author Abha Dawesar.
In school, I was always involved in some kind of naughty trick or the other. Me and my gang of friends strongly believed that if we didn’t do anything naughty all week, it was effectively a wasted week! I blew up the chemistry lab once. On another occasion, I locked in an entire classroom of school kids that included the girl I had a crush on. I thought that would somehow make me cool in her eyes, but it definitely didn't.

Another special childhood memory is that of visiting a sports shop near my house. It stored all kinds of sports equipment and lots of good stationery, toys and stickers, all of which happened to be my favourites. I used to spend almost all my pocket money in that shop. But little did I know then that this would become the inspiration for the ‘Team India Cricket Shop’ in my book The 3 Mistakes Of My Life.
Competition is very high when you are young, which is ironic since you, as a child, are at the most fun age of your life. But I think the only way to live happily through it is to balance it out. Have fun, work hard. Don’t be serious, just be sincere!

AS TOLD TO ANIRBAN DAS MAHAPATRA