8. MAD HATTER!

Mom used to knit me these remarkably lovely and colourful woollen caps. Shillong was cold when I was growing up and on any other normal morning, I would be dressed up in warm socks, a pair of ankle length boots, a warm overcoat and of course one of Mom’s special knit caps! And off I would go to play with my cousins and friends from the neighbourhood.

I remember I bought my first official base-ball cap when I was working as a Senior Marketing Officer for East West Airlines. The city office was bang in the middle of the shopping area, Fancy Bazaar and I would just have the time of my life gleefully shopping to my heart’s content....bags, shoes, skirts, jootis, bangles, scarves, jewellery, clips, hair-bands and what not!

And there used to be this small shop at the corner of a footpath where they had these attractive caps. I just used to hang around the place first, just gazing at the caps. I loved doing that and then at the spur of a moment, I just picked up this really bright red and black combo baseball cap, which had a shiny rectangular sticker in front. I loved it. It was the smartest thing I had bought in a long time!

And now, over the years, I have an enormous collection of hats, caps, berets; you name it and I have it. There are a range of colour variants and some delectably different material. Of course not to forget the humungous numbers of scarves, mufflers, stockings and gloves.

But hats and caps it is for me! Whether I wear them or not, I just love collecting them. And the ones from Reebok are so cool! I have at least five of them!

 

On my trip to Canada in 2004, I just couldn’t help but bring home around five really smart caps. Black with yellow graffiti, black with green trimmings on the shades, bottle-green with black embroidery, a bright yellow and black combo and a white with red maple leaves all over. I have always worn them with great élan!

I got this bright pink summer floppy hat on my return from Canada and somehow had the opportunity to wear it during my stay in London. The weather there is just right to wear caps. Somehow, though I so want to wear caps here, but the humidity gets the better of me, not really allowing the fashionista in me be as stylish and fashionable as I want to be.



 

I also have two straw hats I simply love, more so for the fact that I got it from a village vendor in a local market in Guwahati. It has a very hip design and I often tie a coloured scarf around it to make it more colourful.

I love shopping in Shillong for hats and caps. They have quite an uber collection and it's pretty much comfortable to wear one there, more so because of the super cool weather.

I was in Mumbai the beginning of this year and I bought a red beret, which I had been searching for quite some time now and a fawn coloured felt floppy hat from Accessorize. They have a supa-dupa collection, I say!

And back in Guwahati, I picked up all the hats from newly opened Ayesha. I especially loved the purple one. Sadly, none of them are summer wear hats! So now I have to actually wait for winter when I can wear one out of my 20 odd hats, caps and berets that I have, without actually getting sweaty in the head and having to bear with sticky icky hair!

I have always had an eye for over the top things! So, I would someday like to go to the races with an outrageously eye-catching head-piece for a hat! Like I told you, I am nuts about hats!