Its been some time since I wrote a cheerful blog(there arent many things in my life at the moment that I can be cheerful about....)....
But Friday night is one night, the memory of which I shall cherish for as long as I live.
It so happens that I am a sports buff: an ardent admirer of ball sport of any kind(whatever the size or shape of the ball).... I have been criticised, yelled at, pleaded with and even cursed by my family members when I went on one of my "GOLF-TRIPS", where I would sit for hours together trying to figure out the nuances of the game.
But as we all know, watching a game LIVE in the stadium has its own charms. I for one would go any length to watch a game live(Any match that comes to the Chinaswamy stadium, Goldflake open at Chennai,local hockey matches...ANYTHING...)
So I was thrilled to bits when I heard that the world famous Harlem Globetrotters were going to play on Friday night at the Kanteerava stadium here. I had read a lot about them but had only seen them on TV(that too in documentaries on NatGeo and Discovery).
Sadly, I belong to a race which is on the brink of extinction. It was very hard for me to find someone who would like to invest in a pass. I must have asked 15 people who all had "better things to do"....Though I did eventually sucker someone into coming(on the basis that I bought her dinner), I was disheartened by the general awareness or rather, the UNawareness of this famous troupe.
By the time I reached the stadium(which by the way, was more than half empty), I had forgotten all that. The next 2 hours will probably play again and again in my mind like a broken video player for the rest of my life.
Those guys were AMAZING....though I have played a good amount of basketball in my life, I have never seen anyone physically touching the rim(leave alone doing a slam dunk)..... Let me just say that the shortest guy in that troupe was 6'2"(so you can all use your imaginations and guess how much slam dunking I saw for the rest of the show!!!).
The show included a game between the GTs and a New York based professional team. The result ofcourse didnt matter but the entertainment that was provided by those guys is unparalleled. The teams mascot,Globie (a character with his face as the globe)did a great dancing gig but the loudest cheer was reserved for Globie's elder brother `Big G', who had his own version of dance and tumble during the interval. And then there was basketball which was almost inconsequential!!! At the end of the show there was an autograph session. Its only when I got to the play area did I realise how MAMMOTH these guys are. One of them (Kevin) was 6'11".........Vertically challenged!!!!
All I'd like to say is, if ever you get an opportunity to see the globetrotters perform anywhere in the world...please...do take it....like I said earlier...its an INVESTMENT....:):):)
Monday, November 27, 2006
Thursday, July 13, 2006
KRRISH
Not seen the MI series? Missed out watching Crouching Tiger hidden dragon? Were you out of town when Matrix was playing in theatres???? FRET NOT PEOPLE, JUST WATCH KRISHHH....
It was heart warming for a Hollywood buff like me to see a whole lot of my favorite movies, all put into the blender and churned together to bring out this story of our young hero Krishna(er...back home in the US of A, thats KRISHH folks...so kindly adjushht)
Apart from the above-mentioned movies, the director of this film has successfully mooched off the creations found in several other famous Hollywood flicks (flicks??? hahaha….how appropriate)...here are some that I could identify immediately... Spiderman, Superman, Batman, He-man, Cat wo-man...(ok ok basically all English movies ever made with a suffix of "man"), Robin Hood, Notting Hill, Ghost, Rambo, ET, Twins, flashes of Tom and Jerry, Total Recall, Close encounters of the 3rd kind and last but not the least, Rainman (this being attributed to the fact that Hritik Roshan acts like a juvenile delinquent for 3/4th of the movie...readers please note that the remainder is comprised of songs, Priyanka Chopra's pretty face all over the screen and of course the best part of the movie, the 15 minute interval).....
P.S. This is an incomplete list…
The plot…..
Inspired by Shaktimaan, this flick starts of in a small little hole-in-the-wall-outfit village amidst sprawling countryside in the middle of Nowhere-ville(North India P.O. 666-666). Within the confines of a well furnished room, an evidently overfed kid of around 10 years, bulging at his seams(lets just call him Chubbs ok?), is answering advanced calculus questions posed to him by an interview panel comprising of an equally overfed Headmaster and other overfed fillers...I must laud the casting crew of this movie because at this point of time, instead of being mentally tortured by the pathetic screenplay, most people in the audience were watching in amazement as to how the kid was able to balance his large orb like figure on a tiny bench, holding a pencil in one hand and even look remotely intelligent at the same time.(I hope they nominate the kid for the Oscars and I hope his parents don't read this). Anyways, the panel which our young Chubbs is facing just cant believe it either as everyone, is looking dazed in this scene.(maybe they are wondering why they have stooped so low as to accept the role….but that's just a maybe!)
The scene ends abruptly as an old Rekha (oxymoron??) comes running into the scene, crying her eyes out.(yes people…a record 4 tonnes of glycerin was used in the making of this film) She pulls the boy, her grandson, away from his chair (which heaves a silent sigh of relief) and runs away from town for some reason I couldn't catch (no people, I'm not kidding…this really happens).
In a span of 10 minutes after this, Chubbs who also happens to be strong like his cousin (superman), transforms from a "ball" of energy into strong young man with a bulging 6 pack (was it 8? I didn't count…looked like plastic anyway), muscles oozing out of his ears and other special effects.
Enter Hritik Roshan:(Note: girls and gays in the audience started whistling here… most guys had passed out in boredom by now). Our man enters the movie dressed not very differently from Rambo is Afghanistan, only difference being he is challenging a malnourished horse (painted white for the movie) in a "who-do-you-think-will-gallop-home-first" sprint. Crouching tigers, hidden dragons, a malnourished black horse painted white, birds in the back ground, Hritik Roshan…all wonderful beasts of nature in this scene…really well done…kudos to the computer animation team. Since this a Hindi movie, I won't waste everyone's time in saying who wins the race to Hritik's house where daadi darling has just cooked him breakfast.
The scene at home is a pleasant one. Rekha by now is an older woman(hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha……) and she just loves her darling ( formally introduced as chubbs…I would have renamed him "Hulk Hogan" but the bovine look, which never seems to leave his peach for the next 2 hours made me change my mind)…the movie moves along painfully for another 10 minutes in this fashion pushing the audience to believe that this could just be a grandma-grandson saga.( Note: Everyone in the theatre was getting really fidgety when the director unleashed yet another of those cards from under his huge sleeves.)
WHAM…Enter Priyanka Chopra, a young, pretty, ambitious Indian girl on vacation, "flies" into the picture (literally) (Note: the above mentioned "almost dead" guys in the audience were all up now….bring out the pop corn boys!)
For some reason, the director has made Priyanka (aka Chumpa, aka Priya) live in Singapore.* Thankfully, Priya's father in no more (one character less…hip hip hurrah) and the only people in her life are her mother and her inseparable best friend "Honey" (take this with a BIG figurative pinch of salt here).
Back to the scene, Priya and "Honey"(the very thought of that character makes me grimace and shudder) are down in Nowhere-ville for a trek with a whole other group of sidekicks including a mentally retarded Chimp of an instructor who's only role in the movie is to act like an idiot. There is a lot of fun and frolic, songs, games and dancing around trees in the next few scenes much like other Hindi films worth their salt. There is also a whole lot of leaping from mountaintops, fishing with bare hands, "playing ghost", volleyball and tug of war unlike other movies for no extra charge (please don't fall for the bait)
I apologize to my readers here but at this very moment, I blacked out. For the next half an hour or so, I was unconscious. But when I came to, the whole scene had moved to Singapore. My friends filled me in with what I missed after the movie ended (much against my protests that I DIDN'T want to know). Here’s what I missed… I believe Hritik falls in love with Priyanka (surprise surprise?) but she has to get back to Singapore cos mummy lives there…
That's when Honey's real role begins and she being the bitch that she is, manipulates innocent Priyanka, who is oh so confused, to trick our beloved village bumpkin into coming to Singapore, by making her say that she loves him.(visions of Julia Roberts' famous Notting Hill lines come floating to memory)
As a net result, Hritik drops everything including Daadi, who tries all the tricks in the book starting from emotional black mail to bribing him with extra Gulab Jaamoons for dessert, to dissuade him going to that evil place(i.e. Singapore). Alas, her thick skinned grandson is too deep into Priya’s web now so one ton of glycerin down the line, he dons his deceased fathers suit and heads for the airport just like how George of the Jungle moved to New York.
Our man reaches Singapore (much to the delight of the Singaporeans, who declared a national holiday in his honor)…Here the director runs out of Hollywood movies to copy. So he dabbles with something he has never done before…INNOVATIVENESS…(let me NOT mention that he makes a complete mess of it…) So with some neat kung foo, great biking and AWWWWWWWWWWESOME stunts(did I overdo that?) he pushes the torture for another 30 minutes…Then FINALLY….after 2 hours or cranial damage, something happens…. He becomes a cartoo…er….SUPER HERO…..whopeeeeee!!!!…..like all self respecting super heroes, our man saves a little girl from SURE death. He rescues her from a circus fire (apparently someone in the circus audience couldn’t take his clowning anymore and set himself ablaze so that he could sooth the pain he was going through….May his soul rest in peace) In no time Hritik (can I call I'm riTHICK?) becomes a NATIONAL HERO (not in real life of course) …and since all heroes wear a mask, he too starts sporting a cool one**.
And when you thought that it JUUUUST CANT GET WORSE, it does. Out of nowhere, references to Hritik’s father, also acted by Hritik, who was believed to have kicked the bucket long ago start coming in. (so instead of one retard, we have 2 now) (Note: This is when realization dawned and I figured out that this movie was actually a sequel to another disaster by the name of Koi Murr Gaya(was it Koi Mil Gaya? Whatever…), which unlike this subtly done movie(yeah right!), was a DIRECT lift from ET. At this stage, people at the theatre started moving out in disgust…some of them made it to the door by foot while most of them fell half way to the door. Some loved ones were carried out while the others in coma, were stretchered out later )
Epilogue of KMG: Hritiks father who was equally powerful as him (read EQUALLY MIND NUMBINGLY STUPID) was stupid enough to be kidnapped by the movies saving grace (Nasir u din shah) , an evil scientist who wants to rule the world. He captures Hritiks Sr. just after KMG ends and asks him to make a machine that can help one see into the future…defying all laws of physics and making flicks like Star Wars look like bad mistakes, he actually creates the machine. Its only then when he sees into the future and sees how cruel the big bad world is…infact, one of the dialogues are so funny, even I laughed…He calls his mummy(Rekha Daadi) up weeping saying “maa yey duniya bahut burraah hai maa”. The tears in my eyes were genuine though!
In his quest to procure a machine that can see into the future, Shah(whos screen name I cant recollect now) has kept Sr. HR in captivity to preserve his retina and heart rate which is used as a password to access this machine(One wonders that if technology has reached such a stage, where one can see into the future, why worry about a bloody retina scan!!!). The machine is as large as the room and has cool digital displays and Total Recall type hand dials. A very famous quote comes to mind here…someone once said If you steal from one author, it's plagiarism - if you steal from many, it's RESEARCH...if you take the analogy to movies, our director has done TONS AND TONS OF RESEARCH!!!
Anyway…back to the movie…Being the model bad guy whose butt has to be kicked in the end, Shahs wait for 20 years comes to an end, and he finally logs into the machine. Much to his dismay, he sees his butt getting kicked in the future and doesn’t like it one bit. So to counter that, he goes around killing people who he suspects to be Krrish (remember that mask I was talking about?...THATS what saves the real Krrish)
From here on, it becomes a normal Hindi movie again. Jealousy, betrayal, hatred, love, melodrama, glycerin, evil, revenge and stupidity are the key words that come rushing to mind… The climax of the movie is dramatic. The good dude kicks the bad dudes butt, rescues his father, saves the world and everybody lives happily ever after…
The movie ends in a desperate attempt by the director to prolong the agony into a part 3. Apparently he was not happy with the number of people that died watching his earlier film in theatres. This(he admits) is a good attempt but this never say live director will never give up! I would just like to say that I am thankful to my friends and relatives for being so supportive and by my side throughout the film…had they not have bought the ticket for me, I would have definitely jumped off the balcony myself!
* Why Singapore? Because in a closely contested bid for "we want Bollywood in our city", Singapore edged out most European Capitals, American cities, Sydney, Melbourne and Shanghai…(the list is endless really)…for this prestigious event. Apparently, the free entertainment for the people around the sets of Indian films in these cities is being promised in election campaigns these days!
** 10 Advantages of wearing a mask
1) He doesn't look as stupid any more
2) He doesn't look as stupid any more
3) He doesn't look as stupid any more
4) He doesn't look as stupid any more
5)His promise to daadi to remain as anonymous as possible(perhaps because she is ashamed of him) is taken care off….)
6) He doesn't look as stupid any more
7) He doesn't look as stupid any more
8) He doesn't look as stupid any more
9) He doesn't look as stupid any more
And ofcourse
10) He doesn't look as stupid any more…
It was heart warming for a Hollywood buff like me to see a whole lot of my favorite movies, all put into the blender and churned together to bring out this story of our young hero Krishna(er...back home in the US of A, thats KRISHH folks...so kindly adjushht)
Apart from the above-mentioned movies, the director of this film has successfully mooched off the creations found in several other famous Hollywood flicks (flicks??? hahaha….how appropriate)...here are some that I could identify immediately... Spiderman, Superman, Batman, He-man, Cat wo-man...(ok ok basically all English movies ever made with a suffix of "man"), Robin Hood, Notting Hill, Ghost, Rambo, ET, Twins, flashes of Tom and Jerry, Total Recall, Close encounters of the 3rd kind and last but not the least, Rainman (this being attributed to the fact that Hritik Roshan acts like a juvenile delinquent for 3/4th of the movie...readers please note that the remainder is comprised of songs, Priyanka Chopra's pretty face all over the screen and of course the best part of the movie, the 15 minute interval).....
P.S. This is an incomplete list…
The plot…..
Inspired by Shaktimaan, this flick starts of in a small little hole-in-the-wall-outfit village amidst sprawling countryside in the middle of Nowhere-ville(North India P.O. 666-666). Within the confines of a well furnished room, an evidently overfed kid of around 10 years, bulging at his seams(lets just call him Chubbs ok?), is answering advanced calculus questions posed to him by an interview panel comprising of an equally overfed Headmaster and other overfed fillers...I must laud the casting crew of this movie because at this point of time, instead of being mentally tortured by the pathetic screenplay, most people in the audience were watching in amazement as to how the kid was able to balance his large orb like figure on a tiny bench, holding a pencil in one hand and even look remotely intelligent at the same time.(I hope they nominate the kid for the Oscars and I hope his parents don't read this). Anyways, the panel which our young Chubbs is facing just cant believe it either as everyone, is looking dazed in this scene.(maybe they are wondering why they have stooped so low as to accept the role….but that's just a maybe!)
The scene ends abruptly as an old Rekha (oxymoron??) comes running into the scene, crying her eyes out.(yes people…a record 4 tonnes of glycerin was used in the making of this film) She pulls the boy, her grandson, away from his chair (which heaves a silent sigh of relief) and runs away from town for some reason I couldn't catch (no people, I'm not kidding…this really happens).
In a span of 10 minutes after this, Chubbs who also happens to be strong like his cousin (superman), transforms from a "ball" of energy into strong young man with a bulging 6 pack (was it 8? I didn't count…looked like plastic anyway), muscles oozing out of his ears and other special effects.
Enter Hritik Roshan:(Note: girls and gays in the audience started whistling here… most guys had passed out in boredom by now). Our man enters the movie dressed not very differently from Rambo is Afghanistan, only difference being he is challenging a malnourished horse (painted white for the movie) in a "who-do-you-think-will-gallop-home-first" sprint. Crouching tigers, hidden dragons, a malnourished black horse painted white, birds in the back ground, Hritik Roshan…all wonderful beasts of nature in this scene…really well done…kudos to the computer animation team. Since this a Hindi movie, I won't waste everyone's time in saying who wins the race to Hritik's house where daadi darling has just cooked him breakfast.
The scene at home is a pleasant one. Rekha by now is an older woman(hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha……) and she just loves her darling ( formally introduced as chubbs…I would have renamed him "Hulk Hogan" but the bovine look, which never seems to leave his peach for the next 2 hours made me change my mind)…the movie moves along painfully for another 10 minutes in this fashion pushing the audience to believe that this could just be a grandma-grandson saga.( Note: Everyone in the theatre was getting really fidgety when the director unleashed yet another of those cards from under his huge sleeves.)
WHAM…Enter Priyanka Chopra, a young, pretty, ambitious Indian girl on vacation, "flies" into the picture (literally) (Note: the above mentioned "almost dead" guys in the audience were all up now….bring out the pop corn boys!)
For some reason, the director has made Priyanka (aka Chumpa, aka Priya) live in Singapore.* Thankfully, Priya's father in no more (one character less…hip hip hurrah) and the only people in her life are her mother and her inseparable best friend "Honey" (take this with a BIG figurative pinch of salt here).
Back to the scene, Priya and "Honey"(the very thought of that character makes me grimace and shudder) are down in Nowhere-ville for a trek with a whole other group of sidekicks including a mentally retarded Chimp of an instructor who's only role in the movie is to act like an idiot. There is a lot of fun and frolic, songs, games and dancing around trees in the next few scenes much like other Hindi films worth their salt. There is also a whole lot of leaping from mountaintops, fishing with bare hands, "playing ghost", volleyball and tug of war unlike other movies for no extra charge (please don't fall for the bait)
I apologize to my readers here but at this very moment, I blacked out. For the next half an hour or so, I was unconscious. But when I came to, the whole scene had moved to Singapore. My friends filled me in with what I missed after the movie ended (much against my protests that I DIDN'T want to know). Here’s what I missed… I believe Hritik falls in love with Priyanka (surprise surprise?) but she has to get back to Singapore cos mummy lives there…
That's when Honey's real role begins and she being the bitch that she is, manipulates innocent Priyanka, who is oh so confused, to trick our beloved village bumpkin into coming to Singapore, by making her say that she loves him.(visions of Julia Roberts' famous Notting Hill lines come floating to memory)
As a net result, Hritik drops everything including Daadi, who tries all the tricks in the book starting from emotional black mail to bribing him with extra Gulab Jaamoons for dessert, to dissuade him going to that evil place(i.e. Singapore). Alas, her thick skinned grandson is too deep into Priya’s web now so one ton of glycerin down the line, he dons his deceased fathers suit and heads for the airport just like how George of the Jungle moved to New York.
Our man reaches Singapore (much to the delight of the Singaporeans, who declared a national holiday in his honor)…Here the director runs out of Hollywood movies to copy. So he dabbles with something he has never done before…INNOVATIVENESS…(let me NOT mention that he makes a complete mess of it…) So with some neat kung foo, great biking and AWWWWWWWWWWESOME stunts(did I overdo that?) he pushes the torture for another 30 minutes…Then FINALLY….after 2 hours or cranial damage, something happens…. He becomes a cartoo…er….SUPER HERO…..whopeeeeee!!!!…..like all self respecting super heroes, our man saves a little girl from SURE death. He rescues her from a circus fire (apparently someone in the circus audience couldn’t take his clowning anymore and set himself ablaze so that he could sooth the pain he was going through….May his soul rest in peace) In no time Hritik (can I call I'm riTHICK?) becomes a NATIONAL HERO (not in real life of course) …and since all heroes wear a mask, he too starts sporting a cool one**.
And when you thought that it JUUUUST CANT GET WORSE, it does. Out of nowhere, references to Hritik’s father, also acted by Hritik, who was believed to have kicked the bucket long ago start coming in. (so instead of one retard, we have 2 now) (Note: This is when realization dawned and I figured out that this movie was actually a sequel to another disaster by the name of Koi Murr Gaya(was it Koi Mil Gaya? Whatever…), which unlike this subtly done movie(yeah right!), was a DIRECT lift from ET. At this stage, people at the theatre started moving out in disgust…some of them made it to the door by foot while most of them fell half way to the door. Some loved ones were carried out while the others in coma, were stretchered out later )
Epilogue of KMG: Hritiks father who was equally powerful as him (read EQUALLY MIND NUMBINGLY STUPID) was stupid enough to be kidnapped by the movies saving grace (Nasir u din shah) , an evil scientist who wants to rule the world. He captures Hritiks Sr. just after KMG ends and asks him to make a machine that can help one see into the future…defying all laws of physics and making flicks like Star Wars look like bad mistakes, he actually creates the machine. Its only then when he sees into the future and sees how cruel the big bad world is…infact, one of the dialogues are so funny, even I laughed…He calls his mummy(Rekha Daadi) up weeping saying “maa yey duniya bahut burraah hai maa”. The tears in my eyes were genuine though!
In his quest to procure a machine that can see into the future, Shah(whos screen name I cant recollect now) has kept Sr. HR in captivity to preserve his retina and heart rate which is used as a password to access this machine(One wonders that if technology has reached such a stage, where one can see into the future, why worry about a bloody retina scan!!!). The machine is as large as the room and has cool digital displays and Total Recall type hand dials. A very famous quote comes to mind here…someone once said If you steal from one author, it's plagiarism - if you steal from many, it's RESEARCH...if you take the analogy to movies, our director has done TONS AND TONS OF RESEARCH!!!
Anyway…back to the movie…Being the model bad guy whose butt has to be kicked in the end, Shahs wait for 20 years comes to an end, and he finally logs into the machine. Much to his dismay, he sees his butt getting kicked in the future and doesn’t like it one bit. So to counter that, he goes around killing people who he suspects to be Krrish (remember that mask I was talking about?...THATS what saves the real Krrish)
From here on, it becomes a normal Hindi movie again. Jealousy, betrayal, hatred, love, melodrama, glycerin, evil, revenge and stupidity are the key words that come rushing to mind… The climax of the movie is dramatic. The good dude kicks the bad dudes butt, rescues his father, saves the world and everybody lives happily ever after…
The movie ends in a desperate attempt by the director to prolong the agony into a part 3. Apparently he was not happy with the number of people that died watching his earlier film in theatres. This(he admits) is a good attempt but this never say live director will never give up! I would just like to say that I am thankful to my friends and relatives for being so supportive and by my side throughout the film…had they not have bought the ticket for me, I would have definitely jumped off the balcony myself!
* Why Singapore? Because in a closely contested bid for "we want Bollywood in our city", Singapore edged out most European Capitals, American cities, Sydney, Melbourne and Shanghai…(the list is endless really)…for this prestigious event. Apparently, the free entertainment for the people around the sets of Indian films in these cities is being promised in election campaigns these days!
** 10 Advantages of wearing a mask
1) He doesn't look as stupid any more
2) He doesn't look as stupid any more
3) He doesn't look as stupid any more
4) He doesn't look as stupid any more
5)His promise to daadi to remain as anonymous as possible(perhaps because she is ashamed of him) is taken care off….)
6) He doesn't look as stupid any more
7) He doesn't look as stupid any more
8) He doesn't look as stupid any more
9) He doesn't look as stupid any more
And ofcourse
10) He doesn't look as stupid any more…
Monday, March 06, 2006
Chennai – My first experience….
"Remember...People of Chennai believe in SWORDS, not WORDS" ...the words of he who shall not be named (no not Voldemort*..Voldemort is fictitious). These words echoed in my head as I got off the train onto platform number 5 at Chennai Central, some 8 months ago. These angry words had come from a person who had lost very badly in a verbal battle (a battle of words), a cornered animal who generally resorted to physical violence but was restrained from doing so because at that time he was in someone elses territory (i.e. mine...we were in Mysore-Karnataka) then.
The events that led to the altercation with that above mentioned individual, are not of any consequence to this passage, but the fear that it instilled within me is indescribable and that is the reason I have included it in the beginning.
The events chronicled below took place (as I mentioned) some 8 months ago. I had just come into Chennai from Mysore where I had done my training for 4 months. I was nervous as hell because to start of with, I was leaving the warmth of the place where I had been brought up in...by warmth here, I’m being VERY metaphorical because when it comes to physical warmth, I had heard gruesome stories about Madras summers. Also, for the first time in 22 years, I was going to stay in a place where most of the languages that I know were not recognized. (For the purpose of academic interest, I know just 2 and a half languages...I wont delve into it as that will be reserved for another story). To add icing to the cake, those words in the first line of this passage(let us call it the "catch phrase"), had been said by a person (Note: MUCH bigger and MUCH stronger than me) and every one of those words had come out through gritted teeth, with smoking nostrils and evil red eyes( a little drama here but come on, I’m Indian you know)...
And since I have introduced the word "territory" sometime back, let me just say that I was now in Lord Voldemort’s(the real one) BACK YARD.
Back to the scene, when I got onto the noisy platform, I was immediately accosted by a BIG BURLY man who was wearing a red turban and a coolie’s** overalls. I really didn’t need a coolie as I was (I’m boasting here) quite capable of carrying my own luggage. But Mr. strong man didn’t think so and after a flurry of guttural verses, he grabbed my bag from me while I very weakly kept saying "no no" like a sissy girl in a room full of chimpanzees.
As I wrestled with the coolie (who insisted on carrying my luggage even after my telling him that his services were not required), the catch phrase floated into my head again and I immediately changed my mind and gave in. Who knows, he might have removed a sickle from under his lungi*** and slashed my neck right??? Well, that just describes the frame of mind that I was in...in one word, JUMPY.
Then at the entrance, I was again bullied by a short, Tamil speaking person (might have been Greek for all I know), evidently a taxi driver who insisted that he would drop me off to my destination (somewhere in Kottarpuram) for 350 rupees only...for academic interest again, I did realize the language to be Greek because his taxi driver counterparts and auto-rickshaw drivers in Bangalore, the city from where I hail from, speak German when it comes to fares. So like a well informed foreigner, I shook my head sternly and said a firm "NO"..."200...take it or leave it". For those who wish to know how the conversation went, here goes...
Taxi Driver: " Yenga pogunum saaar???" ****
(I took it as "How are you sir?")
Me : Im fine Thank you...
Taxi Driver(the creep obviously knew English): "ille saaar...where...go..you?" #
Me(like one true Angrez ka aulad #*): "Kottarpuram…Infosys Guest House" NOTE: FIRST BLUNDER
Taxi Driver(with gleaming eyes) : "waa saar, naa kootitu poren" #**
(by the way he gestured, I assumed that he was a Taxi driver...so I stopped the coolie(the same above mentioned gentleman who was ALL muscle from the neck upward)
Me : " Ye-wo-lo"..(these were one of the very few words I had been taught...my first 3 syllables in Tamil)
Taxi Driver(obviously very confused...slightly alarmed) : "........"
Me(again...raising my voice a bit): "YE-WO-LO…HOW MUCH???"
Taxi Driver(very understanding person): "munnithi imbadhu saar"#*** He said, raising 3 very grimy fingers with the filthiest nails I had seen in my life. That had just sounded like "alpha beta gaama saar" to me...as I said, GREEK
Taxi Driver (again): "Thrii hendreda feefty" (yingleesa to English translation: Three Hundred and fifty)
Me(after taking a start and then regaining composure and balance): "NO"...."200..take it or leave it"...(raising 2 fingers) NOTE: SECOND BLUNDER... in programming languageà FATAL ERROR
The speed at which he accepted the offer was alarming and the gleam on his face was a sight worth paying for. I at once realized that I had created the cardinal blunder of bargaining with a thief. In that brief period of his momentary happiness, I spotted that he had only 4 of his front teeth, all yellow and paan#**** stained. So I straight away inferred that the rest were lost in battle and quickly got into his taxi as he had agreed to my bargain. The catch phrase was still playing along in my head like a broken tape recorder. "Swords not words... Swords not words... Swords not words". It is then when I realized that the coolie was still standing out with my luggage. So I got off and fired another series of "Ye-wo-lo"’s. The coolie seemed to have caught on pretty soon as he very audaciously asked for an exorbitant sum of Rs 150/-
Me : "WHAAAAAAT????" (Forgetting that he "didn’t understand" English)
Coolie: "yenna pannarthu saar? yen kudumbathiley anju peru yenna nambi irukkanga...vazhkai rombo kashtam aidthu...market la arisi oda velai oru kg ku yezhu ruba jasthi aidthu!" ##
As he said this, he had a pathetic look on his face. I have no idea what he blabbered but I was definitely moved. So I became very stern again(yeah right!!!) and told him...
Me: " NO...100...take it or leave it"...(raising one finger)
A similar happy gleam was quickly masked by a hangdog expression and he went on to tell me(as was later translated to me by our wily driver friend) that such big people like us who could afford to go on cars, couldn’t even pay properly for manual labour and what a big shame that was.
So after paying extortion money to the coolie, who as I distinctly remember, did a little gig around the corner, I entered the taxi again. Our driver friend unfortunately, had just got into the mood for a "dumm"##* as he irritably asked me to give him 5 more minutes. Having no idea what I dumm was, I looked on. He lifted the bottom of his lungi from behind him(much to my alarm) , did some tricky looking manouver between his legs and finally tucked it between his big belly and the rest of the lungi at his waist. Then he squatted on the side walk, removed his beedi##** and lit it. Holding it between the tips of his thumb and forefinger, he rested his other hand on his bent knee and took a long drag(with his eyes closed and looking up) The whole series of motions had a striking resemblance to what I had seen somewhere earlier .I wasn’t able to place it. Later on in my short stay at Chennai, I realized that all self respecting auto-drivers/taxi drivers/bus drivers/bus conductors(on the whole, the common man) smoked their tobacco in exactly the same way. It was only a few months later when I saw Rajni Kaanth( a popular Tamil Super Star) doing the exact same thing in some Tamil flick on TV did I realized that they were aping him.
After 5 minutes, he flicked the beedi butt off like a marble(again, JUST like Soofar Staar Rajni) and took the wheel. While he was smoking, I’m sure that he must have been wondering what he would get himself for Christmas with the stash he had just made. He started the car and then opened his mouth which closed as the engine died out some 20 minutes later at the doorstep of my destination. In that short ride to the Guest House, I got a crash course on Tamil culture and about the people and about how bad some of them were(pretty ironic coming from him, that too in English, but I took it all with very casual "Hmmm"'s )
Madras, my dear friends...oops, Chennai(pardon me) was alien to me. More aptly, I was an alien in Chennai. In fact, in one of those friendly bantering sessions, my friends had pulled my leg saying that I was going to the dark side of the Moon.(My apologies Gilmour and group) But as I stayed there, I realized that it was no different from a Bangalore or a Bombay. It was just a big city with many people who go about doing their own chores and worry about their own lives. They were people (just like you and me) who enjoyed their movies(as in the example I portrayed) and liked to eat and drink good things, who laughed at jokes, cried when they were hurt, and finally, who played cricket like all other Indians. It had the most amazing beach I had seen in my life(I’ve seen a whole lot of beaches, trust me) and the best roads in the country. Neither am I paying tribute to the place nor have I been paid to write this. I would just like to say that I learnt a lot more than I thought I had and very grudgingly liked the place more than I thought that I ought to have.
And as the time flew by, the catch phrase became dimmer and dimmer in my mind and I started making a whole lot of friends. As I left Chennai Central 8 months later(around 2 weeks ago), I wiped back a tear but at the same time laughed at my first experience here(mind you, this time I paid only 50 bucks to the coolie and 50 bucks as auto fare…my mother still insists that I got conned :))
Getting back to the catch phrase, I also realized that it was not wholly true. As I mentioned earlier, I made a lot of friends most ironically ones who firmly believed that the PEN was mightier than the sword(infact, one of the chaps I met had written a novel which had cleared the first round in contention for the prestigious booker prize....another was a reporter at a local paper).....
Key
* He who shall not be named….refer to books written on JK Rawlings’ brainchild
** Coolie = Porter
*** Long piece of cloth wrapped around the waist running till the ankles and is the standard garb for many in South India
**** "Where do you want to go sir?"
# "No Sir…where do you want to go"(yingleesa to english translation ofcourse)
#* Son of a Britisher(literal)...in other words, a foreigner
#** "Come Sir, I will take you"
#*** "Three Hundred and fifty Rupees"
#**** Betel leaf
## " What to do sir, I have a family of 5 who depend on me…life is tough.. The price of rice has risen 7 rupees per KG in the market"
##* Cigarette(colloquially)
##** A roll of tobacco in a special type of dried leaf. Very popular among the lower classes in South India
The events that led to the altercation with that above mentioned individual, are not of any consequence to this passage, but the fear that it instilled within me is indescribable and that is the reason I have included it in the beginning.
The events chronicled below took place (as I mentioned) some 8 months ago. I had just come into Chennai from Mysore where I had done my training for 4 months. I was nervous as hell because to start of with, I was leaving the warmth of the place where I had been brought up in...by warmth here, I’m being VERY metaphorical because when it comes to physical warmth, I had heard gruesome stories about Madras summers. Also, for the first time in 22 years, I was going to stay in a place where most of the languages that I know were not recognized. (For the purpose of academic interest, I know just 2 and a half languages...I wont delve into it as that will be reserved for another story). To add icing to the cake, those words in the first line of this passage(let us call it the "catch phrase"), had been said by a person (Note: MUCH bigger and MUCH stronger than me) and every one of those words had come out through gritted teeth, with smoking nostrils and evil red eyes( a little drama here but come on, I’m Indian you know)...
And since I have introduced the word "territory" sometime back, let me just say that I was now in Lord Voldemort’s(the real one) BACK YARD.
Back to the scene, when I got onto the noisy platform, I was immediately accosted by a BIG BURLY man who was wearing a red turban and a coolie’s** overalls. I really didn’t need a coolie as I was (I’m boasting here) quite capable of carrying my own luggage. But Mr. strong man didn’t think so and after a flurry of guttural verses, he grabbed my bag from me while I very weakly kept saying "no no" like a sissy girl in a room full of chimpanzees.
As I wrestled with the coolie (who insisted on carrying my luggage even after my telling him that his services were not required), the catch phrase floated into my head again and I immediately changed my mind and gave in. Who knows, he might have removed a sickle from under his lungi*** and slashed my neck right??? Well, that just describes the frame of mind that I was in...in one word, JUMPY.
Then at the entrance, I was again bullied by a short, Tamil speaking person (might have been Greek for all I know), evidently a taxi driver who insisted that he would drop me off to my destination (somewhere in Kottarpuram) for 350 rupees only...for academic interest again, I did realize the language to be Greek because his taxi driver counterparts and auto-rickshaw drivers in Bangalore, the city from where I hail from, speak German when it comes to fares. So like a well informed foreigner, I shook my head sternly and said a firm "NO"..."200...take it or leave it". For those who wish to know how the conversation went, here goes...
Taxi Driver: " Yenga pogunum saaar???" ****
(I took it as "How are you sir?")
Me : Im fine Thank you...
Taxi Driver(the creep obviously knew English): "ille saaar...where...go..you?" #
Me(like one true Angrez ka aulad #*): "Kottarpuram…Infosys Guest House" NOTE: FIRST BLUNDER
Taxi Driver(with gleaming eyes) : "waa saar, naa kootitu poren" #**
(by the way he gestured, I assumed that he was a Taxi driver...so I stopped the coolie(the same above mentioned gentleman who was ALL muscle from the neck upward)
Me : " Ye-wo-lo"..(these were one of the very few words I had been taught...my first 3 syllables in Tamil)
Taxi Driver(obviously very confused...slightly alarmed) : "....
Me(again...raising my voice a bit): "YE-WO-LO…HOW MUCH???"
Taxi Driver(very understanding person): "munnithi imbadhu saar"#*** He said, raising 3 very grimy fingers with the filthiest nails I had seen in my life. That had just sounded like "alpha beta gaama saar" to me...as I said, GREEK
Taxi Driver (again): "Thrii hendreda feefty" (yingleesa to English translation: Three Hundred and fifty)
Me(after taking a start and then regaining composure and balance): "NO"...."200..take it or leave it"...(raising 2 fingers) NOTE: SECOND BLUNDER... in programming languageà FATAL ERROR
The speed at which he accepted the offer was alarming and the gleam on his face was a sight worth paying for. I at once realized that I had created the cardinal blunder of bargaining with a thief. In that brief period of his momentary happiness, I spotted that he had only 4 of his front teeth, all yellow and paan#**** stained. So I straight away inferred that the rest were lost in battle and quickly got into his taxi as he had agreed to my bargain. The catch phrase was still playing along in my head like a broken tape recorder. "Swords not words... Swords not words... Swords not words". It is then when I realized that the coolie was still standing out with my luggage. So I got off and fired another series of "Ye-wo-lo"’s. The coolie seemed to have caught on pretty soon as he very audaciously asked for an exorbitant sum of Rs 150/-
Me : "WHAAAAAAT????" (Forgetting that he "didn’t understand" English)
Coolie: "yenna pannarthu saar? yen kudumbathiley anju peru yenna nambi irukkanga...vazhkai rombo kashtam aidthu...market la arisi oda velai oru kg ku yezhu ruba jasthi aidthu!" ##
As he said this, he had a pathetic look on his face. I have no idea what he blabbered but I was definitely moved. So I became very stern again(yeah right!!!) and told him...
Me: " NO...100...take it or leave it"...(raising one finger)
A similar happy gleam was quickly masked by a hangdog expression and he went on to tell me(as was later translated to me by our wily driver friend) that such big people like us who could afford to go on cars, couldn’t even pay properly for manual labour and what a big shame that was.
So after paying extortion money to the coolie, who as I distinctly remember, did a little gig around the corner, I entered the taxi again. Our driver friend unfortunately, had just got into the mood for a "dumm"##* as he irritably asked me to give him 5 more minutes. Having no idea what I dumm was, I looked on. He lifted the bottom of his lungi from behind him(much to my alarm) , did some tricky looking manouver between his legs and finally tucked it between his big belly and the rest of the lungi at his waist. Then he squatted on the side walk, removed his beedi##** and lit it. Holding it between the tips of his thumb and forefinger, he rested his other hand on his bent knee and took a long drag(with his eyes closed and looking up) The whole series of motions had a striking resemblance to what I had seen somewhere earlier .I wasn’t able to place it. Later on in my short stay at Chennai, I realized that all self respecting auto-drivers/taxi drivers/bus drivers/bus conductors(on the whole, the common man) smoked their tobacco in exactly the same way. It was only a few months later when I saw Rajni Kaanth( a popular Tamil Super Star) doing the exact same thing in some Tamil flick on TV did I realized that they were aping him.
After 5 minutes, he flicked the beedi butt off like a marble(again, JUST like Soofar Staar Rajni) and took the wheel. While he was smoking, I’m sure that he must have been wondering what he would get himself for Christmas with the stash he had just made. He started the car and then opened his mouth which closed as the engine died out some 20 minutes later at the doorstep of my destination. In that short ride to the Guest House, I got a crash course on Tamil culture and about the people and about how bad some of them were(pretty ironic coming from him, that too in English, but I took it all with very casual "Hmmm"'s )
Madras, my dear friends...oops, Chennai(pardon me) was alien to me. More aptly, I was an alien in Chennai. In fact, in one of those friendly bantering sessions, my friends had pulled my leg saying that I was going to the dark side of the Moon.(My apologies Gilmour and group) But as I stayed there, I realized that it was no different from a Bangalore or a Bombay. It was just a big city with many people who go about doing their own chores and worry about their own lives. They were people (just like you and me) who enjoyed their movies(as in the example I portrayed) and liked to eat and drink good things, who laughed at jokes, cried when they were hurt, and finally, who played cricket like all other Indians. It had the most amazing beach I had seen in my life(I’ve seen a whole lot of beaches, trust me) and the best roads in the country. Neither am I paying tribute to the place nor have I been paid to write this. I would just like to say that I learnt a lot more than I thought I had and very grudgingly liked the place more than I thought that I ought to have.
And as the time flew by, the catch phrase became dimmer and dimmer in my mind and I started making a whole lot of friends. As I left Chennai Central 8 months later(around 2 weeks ago), I wiped back a tear but at the same time laughed at my first experience here(mind you, this time I paid only 50 bucks to the coolie and 50 bucks as auto fare…my mother still insists that I got conned :))
Getting back to the catch phrase, I also realized that it was not wholly true. As I mentioned earlier, I made a lot of friends most ironically ones who firmly believed that the PEN was mightier than the sword(infact, one of the chaps I met had written a novel which had cleared the first round in contention for the prestigious booker prize....another was a reporter at a local paper).....
Key
* He who shall not be named….refer to books written on JK Rawlings’ brainchild
** Coolie = Porter
*** Long piece of cloth wrapped around the waist running till the ankles and is the standard garb for many in South India
**** "Where do you want to go sir?"
# "No Sir…where do you want to go"(yingleesa to english translation ofcourse)
#* Son of a Britisher(literal)...in other words, a foreigner
#** "Come Sir, I will take you"
#*** "Three Hundred and fifty Rupees"
#**** Betel leaf
## " What to do sir, I have a family of 5 who depend on me…life is tough.. The price of rice has risen 7 rupees per KG in the market"
##* Cigarette(colloquially)
##** A roll of tobacco in a special type of dried leaf. Very popular among the lower classes in South India
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
Hindi and me......
First Voice (shrill, Young, Loud) : “Uh-AAh-E-EEEEE-OO-OOOOO-HARI....”
Second Voice (Shriller, Older, MUCH louder) : …..”NO AJAY, NOT HARI, its HRRI”....
The first voice wasn’t the sound made by a monkey excited at the prospect of getting a banana…it was a 4 year old me, desperately trying to master the intricacies of the Hindi alphabet. The second voice was that of my mother, who lost the best years of her life trying to make me learn the language. I, my dear friends, am a south Indian. To put it very crudely, I SUCKED at Hindi(still do by the way…I’m ashamed of it, but blame the Education Board for crying out loud!!!)
Affectionately christened as the ‘Dahi wadas’, we South Indians were always the butt of the Hindi jokes made by the ‘Butter Chickens’ and the ‘Konde Maamas’(These were the names which we so affectionately gave back to our brothers and sisters from the North, the second being specially for Sardarjis.) When I so confidently say ‘we’, I am referring to most of us who were brought up in Christian and Anglo Indian Institutions (KVs being excluded almost immediately from the elite bracket)
One might ask why my mother (very much a South Indian) NEVER had a problem learning the national language. She speaks the language beautifully and without a trace of that distinct South Indian accent. The answer is simple...She was brought up in the North.
I on the other hand, was brought up in the South, in an Anglo Indian School and never spoke a word of Hindi outside Hindi Class. Coming to think of it now, I never spoke a word of it INSIDE the Hindi class either. THAT WAS THE PROBLEM.
For all the North Indian readers and those who are fortunate enough to speak the language fluently (OH I ENVY YOU’LL!), let me tell you how our Hindi classes were in school. I'm sure most of my type will agree with me. A teacher would stand in the front of the class (99 times out of 100, a fat, old happy lady), and read something out to us in Hindi. We (I speak for my beloved last bench mates here) would see stars when that happened and soon return to what we were doing before she came into the class (most of time that would be gossiping, sleeping or brewing treacherous plans to ambush Karl Mehta’s lunch box…his mother knew how to cook…Oh yes she did!)…for those who cared to listen, the teacher would then translate whatever she had said in Hindi, to English and the basic medium would be English. Occasionally, a piece of chalk, flying at alarming velocities towards the back benches, would stop us from continuing our evil endeavors and we would sit upright again and 'listen'.
One particular Hindi teacher(no names here because that would be very rude) used to find sadistic pleasure in laughing as she corrected our Hindi papers…this as we sat praying to the lord above that we fall over the red line by his grace(or hers…i.e. the teachers!). She would smile and giggle, sometimes guffaw as she moved her red pen on our artwork like a wand. When things got very funny (for her of course), she would make the respective joker read his/her essay out to the class (which was a very mean thing to do I must say). I had that pleasure of reading to the class twice. Again, I’m not proud of it.
This would invariably make her laugh and that would trigger sniggers from her “pets group” which comprised of a group of children whose surnames ranged from Gupta to Mehra. It would be appropriate to mention that we gave back the same to her henchmen when it came to Maths and Physics(where they didn’t know the difference between factorials and powers…snigger snigger)
This of course, was just one teacher. Some of them were really very helpful and kind, almost pitying us for our deficiency. Why one teacher was so sweet that she actually told my mother to take me to Hindi movies because that would improve my pronunciation and gender realizations.(the KAA’s, KAY’s KEE’s and KOO’s baffle me…note the tense of that statement…baffle)
As a result of this trouble which I had, anybody who asked me in Hindi, to do something or expected a reply in Hindi would get a bovine look from me…Its not that I didn’t understand the language…NO…definitely not. I understood it…it was speaking in it that was the problem…speaking it correctly to be more precise.
By the time we had reached higher classes, so much Hindi had been rammed into our cranial cavities that the only Hindi we knew was TEXT BOOK stuff.
In this context, I will end this article with a rather funny incident that springs to mind, which I’m sure, will make you experienced folks laugh (it has never failed to bring a smile on anybody’s face)
It was a Sunday afternoon sometime during our 10th standard holidays where we had finished the last contact in our academic lives with the subject (most of the people in my friend circle didn’t opt for a second language course for pre-university…in fact some preferred to take zoology as the extra subject) A big group of us, right from us young boys to older working men and servants were playing cricket in the building where we stay. During the game, our ball went out of the compound into a nearby field where the batting team was sitting(they didn’t need to field that day as there were too many people who wanted to play)….so me being closest to the boundary, sauntered to the fence. Raju was standing there. Raju was the old man who delivered tea to the employees of offices in our building from the local tea stall, the vendor of which was also there that day. We got along really well till the part where we had to communicate (which was mostly done by gesturing). Raju knew only Hindi. So not wanting to show that I was lesser to anyone when it came to speaking our national language, I pointed at the ball which was next to this big tree and said “ Bhai sahib, Gaend Vriksh kay sameep hai” …(“Dear Sir, the Ball is next to that tree” in the purest Hindi imaginable …)We didn’t play anymore that day because play was stopped due to aching stomachs. All those who listened to that innocent statement, dropped down to the floor and laughed till they cried…Those who didn’t, laughed anyway and laughed again when they heard about why they were laughing the first time. It is a very contagious thing laughter; In 5 minutes, groggy, half awake residents had started poking their heads out of the windows to see what the din was all about, which had woken them from their siestas. They just saw 25 people laughing their heads off. Some of them who witnessed the laughter filled scene started laughing too.
I didn’t laugh because deep down in the depths of my gut, I knew that the results of the board exams were due and laughing at a subject I took would make Saraswati, the Goddess of Knowledge, angry. After all, I must point out that Sita(her fellow goddess…if ever there is a term like that in English) was sitting very "sameep" to the "vriksh" when Hanuman arrived in one of our lessons (how else do you think I made up that statement. Huh?).
The results came 8 days later and I had passed in Hindi (got a whooping 64, the best performance in my LIFE). But the fact remains that Im 23 years now, nearly done with my education and all…What would happen if I were transferred to a location in the North???
Second Voice (Shriller, Older, MUCH louder) : …..”NO AJAY, NOT HARI, its HRRI”....
The first voice wasn’t the sound made by a monkey excited at the prospect of getting a banana…it was a 4 year old me, desperately trying to master the intricacies of the Hindi alphabet. The second voice was that of my mother, who lost the best years of her life trying to make me learn the language. I, my dear friends, am a south Indian. To put it very crudely, I SUCKED at Hindi(still do by the way…I’m ashamed of it, but blame the Education Board for crying out loud!!!)
Affectionately christened as the ‘Dahi wadas’, we South Indians were always the butt of the Hindi jokes made by the ‘Butter Chickens’ and the ‘Konde Maamas’(These were the names which we so affectionately gave back to our brothers and sisters from the North, the second being specially for Sardarjis.) When I so confidently say ‘we’, I am referring to most of us who were brought up in Christian and Anglo Indian Institutions (KVs being excluded almost immediately from the elite bracket)
One might ask why my mother (very much a South Indian) NEVER had a problem learning the national language. She speaks the language beautifully and without a trace of that distinct South Indian accent. The answer is simple...She was brought up in the North.
I on the other hand, was brought up in the South, in an Anglo Indian School and never spoke a word of Hindi outside Hindi Class. Coming to think of it now, I never spoke a word of it INSIDE the Hindi class either. THAT WAS THE PROBLEM.
For all the North Indian readers and those who are fortunate enough to speak the language fluently (OH I ENVY YOU’LL!), let me tell you how our Hindi classes were in school. I'm sure most of my type will agree with me. A teacher would stand in the front of the class (99 times out of 100, a fat, old happy lady), and read something out to us in Hindi. We (I speak for my beloved last bench mates here) would see stars when that happened and soon return to what we were doing before she came into the class (most of time that would be gossiping, sleeping or brewing treacherous plans to ambush Karl Mehta’s lunch box…his mother knew how to cook…Oh yes she did!)…for those who cared to listen, the teacher would then translate whatever she had said in Hindi, to English and the basic medium would be English. Occasionally, a piece of chalk, flying at alarming velocities towards the back benches, would stop us from continuing our evil endeavors and we would sit upright again and 'listen'.
One particular Hindi teacher(no names here because that would be very rude) used to find sadistic pleasure in laughing as she corrected our Hindi papers…this as we sat praying to the lord above that we fall over the red line by his grace(or hers…i.e. the teachers!). She would smile and giggle, sometimes guffaw as she moved her red pen on our artwork like a wand. When things got very funny (for her of course), she would make the respective joker read his/her essay out to the class (which was a very mean thing to do I must say). I had that pleasure of reading to the class twice. Again, I’m not proud of it.
This would invariably make her laugh and that would trigger sniggers from her “pets group” which comprised of a group of children whose surnames ranged from Gupta to Mehra. It would be appropriate to mention that we gave back the same to her henchmen when it came to Maths and Physics(where they didn’t know the difference between factorials and powers…snigger snigger)
This of course, was just one teacher. Some of them were really very helpful and kind, almost pitying us for our deficiency. Why one teacher was so sweet that she actually told my mother to take me to Hindi movies because that would improve my pronunciation and gender realizations.(the KAA’s, KAY’s KEE’s and KOO’s baffle me…note the tense of that statement…baffle)
As a result of this trouble which I had, anybody who asked me in Hindi, to do something or expected a reply in Hindi would get a bovine look from me…Its not that I didn’t understand the language…NO…definitely not. I understood it…it was speaking in it that was the problem…speaking it correctly to be more precise.
By the time we had reached higher classes, so much Hindi had been rammed into our cranial cavities that the only Hindi we knew was TEXT BOOK stuff.
In this context, I will end this article with a rather funny incident that springs to mind, which I’m sure, will make you experienced folks laugh (it has never failed to bring a smile on anybody’s face)
It was a Sunday afternoon sometime during our 10th standard holidays where we had finished the last contact in our academic lives with the subject (most of the people in my friend circle didn’t opt for a second language course for pre-university…in fact some preferred to take zoology as the extra subject) A big group of us, right from us young boys to older working men and servants were playing cricket in the building where we stay. During the game, our ball went out of the compound into a nearby field where the batting team was sitting(they didn’t need to field that day as there were too many people who wanted to play)….so me being closest to the boundary, sauntered to the fence. Raju was standing there. Raju was the old man who delivered tea to the employees of offices in our building from the local tea stall, the vendor of which was also there that day. We got along really well till the part where we had to communicate (which was mostly done by gesturing). Raju knew only Hindi. So not wanting to show that I was lesser to anyone when it came to speaking our national language, I pointed at the ball which was next to this big tree and said “ Bhai sahib, Gaend Vriksh kay sameep hai” …(“Dear Sir, the Ball is next to that tree” in the purest Hindi imaginable …)We didn’t play anymore that day because play was stopped due to aching stomachs. All those who listened to that innocent statement, dropped down to the floor and laughed till they cried…Those who didn’t, laughed anyway and laughed again when they heard about why they were laughing the first time. It is a very contagious thing laughter; In 5 minutes, groggy, half awake residents had started poking their heads out of the windows to see what the din was all about, which had woken them from their siestas. They just saw 25 people laughing their heads off. Some of them who witnessed the laughter filled scene started laughing too.
I didn’t laugh because deep down in the depths of my gut, I knew that the results of the board exams were due and laughing at a subject I took would make Saraswati, the Goddess of Knowledge, angry. After all, I must point out that Sita(her fellow goddess…if ever there is a term like that in English) was sitting very "sameep" to the "vriksh" when Hanuman arrived in one of our lessons (how else do you think I made up that statement. Huh?).
The results came 8 days later and I had passed in Hindi (got a whooping 64, the best performance in my LIFE). But the fact remains that Im 23 years now, nearly done with my education and all…What would happen if I were transferred to a location in the North???
Monday, February 06, 2006
School...a short anecdote on how i got in!!!
The making of this short article was triggered off by a questionnaire wherein there was a question regarding which school I studied in and what I had to do to get in. This probably takes me back to my first few hours(pretty hilarious on looking back) which I spent in the institution…the same institution where I spent more that half my life in.(14 years to be precise)
My earliest recollection of me at school go way back to a bright, well furnished foyer where we were waiting to be summoned by the School’s Head Mistress. My father was all suited and booted, mother - decked up in her most gorgeous blue sari, jewelry and all; both looking nervous as hell. And there I was, sitting on the bench in between the two, wondering where the tips of my nails and the dirt behind them had disappeared. My mother had forcefully scrubbed and cleaned me up (much to my disgust) for the occasion.
I was 3 and a half summers old in bright red short pants, and an equally bright yellow T shirt which had 'ANGEL' printed on it in bold red capitals(which would have made Govinda, Armani, Donna Karen and God, all cringe in shame at the same time)…the thing is, my mother had sole rights to my wardrobe. She felt that the brighter the clothes got, the cuter a kid looked. Apparently I looked just like Dennis the Menace dressed up for church but then again, Bill Watterson hadn’t published his brainchild yet ! My hair was neatly slicked back with the help of coconut oil (a sight which was very rare to get a glimpse of in those days) and the base of my scalp could be spotted after the "summer cut" I had got on the previous day. I vividly remember nearly kicking the barber’s teeth out because he "poked me with the scissors" but I very clearly remember the spanking I got after coming home. I stood barely 2 feet off the ground in my brand new red "BATA" sneakers(another of my mothers investments for the occasion…Mrs. Karen, I wont be spotted dead in any of those anymore I assure you). All in all, I was one ball of energy and spunk, waiting to be unleashed into the Indian education system. I personally didn't think I needed the schooling because as I had pointed out to my mother the earlier day,(just before dislocating the barbers jaw) I knew my alphabets till S and numbers till 100(i.e. 1-2-3-5-7-6-8-9-10-100…where 100 was yelled out in the midst of peals of laughter and appreciation from admirers)…And like every self respecting mother, I was the apple and all the other fruits of her eye and was undoubtedly going to dethrone Einstein’s theories some day. But somehow she insisted that it was a good place and that I would have fun in it though I had pictures of jail floating in my head when the word was mentioned. I told her so.
Anyway, when it was finally my turn to be interviewed we were shown into a small room by a smartly dressed peon in khakis. I remember that the walls were painted pink and there was an old lady sitting at the only table in the corner. She had grey hair and very soft eyes. The rest of the furniture included 3 chairs, (of which, the small green one was obviously for me) and a filing cabinet by water cooler in the adjacent corner There were Stuffed toys and other play things all in a big brown carton on the other side of the room. Her name was Mrs. Warden (ironic considering the fact that at that point, I thought school was a place where children who misbehaved were sent…to do time) and after the initial pleasantries, she started asking me a lot of questions….too many for my little brain to process. She had been badgering me with questions like "what’s this shape called", "what’s that colour" and "what’s this animal called"...I answered all those question alright, but my 3 and a half year old brain couldn’t comprehend that fact that such an aged lady didn’t know all these things...
“SHES SO OLD…SHOULDN’T SHE BE KNOWING ALL THIS?” I asked my father quiet confused and rather loudly…all in English.(we speak English at home) Of course my father turned purple and cringed, my mother sank through the floor(after changing into a pretty shade of crimson) and Mrs. Warden burst out laughing. Little did I realize that it was probably that "innocent" wise crack which was the reason why I’m working for such a big company today. My School taught me everything I know today and I will dedicate any accolades that I encounter (hopeful here) to that institution.
That was the beginning, a very rare beginning indeed to my learning cycle and though things havn’t changed much(...my brain is still 3 and a half years old as Im as kiddish as they come), I will never forget those GOLDEN years at school. The Frank Anthony Public School….MY SOUL RESIDES THERE.
My earliest recollection of me at school go way back to a bright, well furnished foyer where we were waiting to be summoned by the School’s Head Mistress. My father was all suited and booted, mother - decked up in her most gorgeous blue sari, jewelry and all; both looking nervous as hell. And there I was, sitting on the bench in between the two, wondering where the tips of my nails and the dirt behind them had disappeared. My mother had forcefully scrubbed and cleaned me up (much to my disgust) for the occasion.
I was 3 and a half summers old in bright red short pants, and an equally bright yellow T shirt which had 'ANGEL' printed on it in bold red capitals(which would have made Govinda, Armani, Donna Karen and God, all cringe in shame at the same time)…the thing is, my mother had sole rights to my wardrobe. She felt that the brighter the clothes got, the cuter a kid looked. Apparently I looked just like Dennis the Menace dressed up for church but then again, Bill Watterson hadn’t published his brainchild yet ! My hair was neatly slicked back with the help of coconut oil (a sight which was very rare to get a glimpse of in those days) and the base of my scalp could be spotted after the "summer cut" I had got on the previous day. I vividly remember nearly kicking the barber’s teeth out because he "poked me with the scissors" but I very clearly remember the spanking I got after coming home. I stood barely 2 feet off the ground in my brand new red "BATA" sneakers(another of my mothers investments for the occasion…Mrs. Karen, I wont be spotted dead in any of those anymore I assure you). All in all, I was one ball of energy and spunk, waiting to be unleashed into the Indian education system. I personally didn't think I needed the schooling because as I had pointed out to my mother the earlier day,(just before dislocating the barbers jaw) I knew my alphabets till S and numbers till 100(i.e. 1-2-3-5-7-6-8-9-10-100…where 100 was yelled out in the midst of peals of laughter and appreciation from admirers)…And like every self respecting mother, I was the apple and all the other fruits of her eye and was undoubtedly going to dethrone Einstein’s theories some day. But somehow she insisted that it was a good place and that I would have fun in it though I had pictures of jail floating in my head when the word was mentioned. I told her so.
Anyway, when it was finally my turn to be interviewed we were shown into a small room by a smartly dressed peon in khakis. I remember that the walls were painted pink and there was an old lady sitting at the only table in the corner. She had grey hair and very soft eyes. The rest of the furniture included 3 chairs, (of which, the small green one was obviously for me) and a filing cabinet by water cooler in the adjacent corner There were Stuffed toys and other play things all in a big brown carton on the other side of the room. Her name was Mrs. Warden (ironic considering the fact that at that point, I thought school was a place where children who misbehaved were sent…to do time) and after the initial pleasantries, she started asking me a lot of questions….too many for my little brain to process. She had been badgering me with questions like "what’s this shape called", "what’s that colour" and "what’s this animal called"...I answered all those question alright, but my 3 and a half year old brain couldn’t comprehend that fact that such an aged lady didn’t know all these things...
“SHES SO OLD…SHOULDN’T SHE BE KNOWING ALL THIS?” I asked my father quiet confused and rather loudly…all in English.(we speak English at home) Of course my father turned purple and cringed, my mother sank through the floor(after changing into a pretty shade of crimson) and Mrs. Warden burst out laughing. Little did I realize that it was probably that "innocent" wise crack which was the reason why I’m working for such a big company today. My School taught me everything I know today and I will dedicate any accolades that I encounter (hopeful here) to that institution.
That was the beginning, a very rare beginning indeed to my learning cycle and though things havn’t changed much(...my brain is still 3 and a half years old as Im as kiddish as they come), I will never forget those GOLDEN years at school. The Frank Anthony Public School….MY SOUL RESIDES THERE.
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