Thoughts-Born free

By the time I was growing from a boy to a man, I was known as devil around our house hold. Later still, I was labeled dare devil among friends and relatives, during my high school and college days. But it was not always so. When I was small, I had no courage. I was scared of every thing. I used to tag around my mother. In my early school days, my school mates bullied me. In the play ground where we usually played after school in the evening, other boys harassed me and often threw me out when they did not want me to play. I tolerated every thing silently. Ashamed, I never talked about this in my house fearing rebuke from my brother, who was really brave.
One incident changed me completely. Once I was beatenn by three boys in the park. I was playing in the play ground known as Northern Park with a few Gujarati (Guju) boys. A group of Bengali boys came there and wanted us to vacate the corner pitch where we were playing and ordered us to move elsewhere. All were regulars there from near by houses and everyone knew everyone else. An argument followed and one of the boys said something nasty. Though scared, I protested and asked the boy to mind his language. Three boys set me up. There was no question of fighting back. I didn’t have that courage and they knew it. I was beaten badly. My friends just watched from a safe distance.
When my brother came home, he saw my swollen and bruised face. When he asked what happened, I started crying and told him about the incident in the park and about the other small incidents in school. All my pent up frustration came out and I was sobbing wildly. I expected him to teach a lesson to those boys, as some times he had done in the past. Instead, he let me cry and after a while told me to come to his room.
When I went to his room, he closed the door. Suddenly, he came near me and boxed me hard in the stomach. As I began to double up, he hit me on my mouth with his elbow. In a second, I was lying on the floor, stunned and humiliated. He asked me to get up and offered his hand. As I got up, he shouldered me hard sending me reeling against the wall. I was in pain all over. I had never taken such beating.
When I was a bit normal, he asked me in his usual mild tone: ‘Tell me, which beating hurt you more. Those three boys’ or mine? Which of the two was more severe and hard to take?’ I told him that though I was beaten by those boys, I had never taken anything like what he gave me.
He became a loving brother again and started to talk in his soothing manner. I still remember his words: ‘Look here, when I beat you, you are at a disadvantage. I am your elder brother, so you can’t hit me back. Out there in the park, you had no such scruples.

You were free to hit back. When a sudden fight erupts, specially among children, the blows you get are haphazard and can’t hurt you much. You took my beating. It won’t hurt you more then this. If you fight back and even if you give them your one against their three, in future they will remember that you fight back. It is all in mind, not in the body. Remember that. So next time it happens, just fight back. Then I will take care of those boys.’
I was excited and breathing hard. I was already thinking that if this was all it hurts, I could fight back. My brother understood and told me not to go about finding those boys and to pick up a fight. Only if it happened again, I was to remember his beating and to fight back. But I could not hold myself back. It was a kind of a freedom. As soon as he was out of sight, I ran back to the park. One of those three boys was sitting alone on a bench. Before he could move, I was on him. I beat him black and blue. He didn’t fight back, not because he couldn’t but he was taken by surprise as he never expected this from me. I gave him all I had and he just took my beating. I felt elated. More then anything, I felt free.
There after, I used to pick fights in school and playgrounds and sometimes I too got beaten, but I was not scared anymore of anyone and there was a feeling of freedom.
Complaints regarding my fights kept pouring in to my father and he used to punish me. I didn’t mind because i was FREE.

m

Musings-Harsha Bhogle's clone

A few days back, I was out to buy some milk in the morning on Link Road. It was still a little dark as it was early morning yet. There was a tea vendor on one side corner of the four road crossing. Two persons were standing on one side of the tea stall. One gentleman was leafing through a newspaper. His companion was enjoying his early morning tea. Of the two, it was the man leafing through the newspaper that caught my attention. He appeared to be a familiar figure, but I could not recognize him. On the other side of the stall were some young boys and girls, just out from their night duty in call centers, having their first tea of the day. This, of course, was a familiar sight every morning.

The boys and girls were looking and pointing towards the man with newspaper. They were whispering among themselves something about that man. I was on the opposite side of the street and from his diagonal side posture I too thought that the man was familiar. It was apparent from his uneasiness and awkward behavior, that he was aware of the attention he was drawing. Still, I could not place him. He must have faced similar situations in the past. Presently, he could not contain himself any longer for suddenly he turned his face towards the youngsters’ group and told them: “Arey… mi te nai re baba, kashala time khoti kartos….” ( I am not that man, why are you wasting your time…).

I saw his full face now and instantly recognized him- Harsha Bhogle- the famous cricket commentator. Same face, same height, same specs, same broad forehead, same profile….ditto Harsha. No wonder, the young group was exited. Hello, but what was Harsha Bhogle doing here?

Common sense, of course, told me that that it cannot be Harsha. The night bag on his shoulder along with his companion’s told me that both were also call center employees, like those youngsters. That explained their presence there so early in the morning. But, the similarity with Harsha Bhogle was so striking that, but for his outburst to the young group, anybody would have taken him for Harsha, as that group and I did. The similarity was so striking. Nature, it seems, sometimes plays funny tricks to fool us.

“Harsha, be aware, your clone is here in Mumbai itself somewhere.”

In lighter vain, if ever the need arises, Harsha can be at two places at the same time. A unique feat indeed.

Humor thoughts-Disastrous romance

The year was 1960 in Calcutta. We had just shifted residence from our modest Hazra road flat to a relatively posh three bedroom apartment in Camac street. I was sixteen years old then. There was one South Indian family, Nathans , from Madras, in our adjacent building. My sister-in-law (bhabhi), though Gujarati, could fluently speak their language as she was born and brought up in Madras. Nathans had two daughters, Devi and Vatsala. They came to know about us, particularly my sister-in-law through common servants, and one day Vatsala, the younger one, came to our place to get acquainted with my sister-in-law. They started chatting in that bullet fast language, which none of us could understand and soon became close friends, though there was a gap of ten years in their age.

Vatsala was a plump, bubbly girl, quite attractive, of my age, tall, almost my height. She soon became favourite of our entire household. Even my father, who was normally a serious person and spoke little, chatted with her. She had that vibrancy. My sister-in-law and Vatsala started sending special dishes to each other, once or twice a week. Because of her, the two families mingled occasionally, but Vatsala was a daily visitor to our house, sometimes more then once. I was on hi-hello terms with her. Eventually, my sister-in-law became so fond of her that she started efforts to bring us closer. I played the mouthorgan reasonably well and at times she asked me to play a particular song of her liking. On one pretext or the other, like studies, cinema or music, my sister-in-law saw to it that we chatted more and more, and that I began to like her. Though at that time, I liked another girl in my class, I got attracted to Vatsala, may be because of our proximity and of course, efforts of my sister-in-law. Moreover, I didn’t have courage to speak to that girl in my class anyway, and never knew how she felt for me, not even now.

After a year or so, one day, my sister-in-law told me that she will speak to my brother and father about Vatsala and me when the time was right and that caste and other things will be no bar. It seemed possible because everybody in my family liked her, knew about us and silently approved. Or so I thought. I was on cloud nine, happy and content. And then the disaster struck.

Vatsala was very fond of cooking and invariably brought us South Indian dishes which we all relished. Encouraged, she once prepared Gulab Jamuns (Indian sweet), and came to our place with a bowl full. The sight of the round sweets, piping hot, beet- root red, the size of small oranges was tempting, to say the least. She declared that she had brought Gulab Jamuns for every one, but she had prepared them specially for me. Every one cheered. I felt ten feet tall. She came to me first and ordered me to open my mouth. I obeyed and she put one sweet in my mouth. What happened next was a nightmare. The next instant, the sweet came out with my spittle and a little puke all over her hand, and I started retching.

It so happened that Vatsala had cooked these sweets in coconut oil and the one thing I can’t stand is the smell of coconut oil, let alone eat something cooked in it. Every body in my house knew it but nobody had any occasion or reason to tell her about it. The deed was done. I rushed to the washroom, cleaned and brushed my mouth and teeth. I came out embarrassed and weakly apologized to her. She accepted the apology gracefully. Meanwhile, she had cleaned her hands and everyone else in the family ate those sweets and appreciated them. Even my elder sister, who was (and is) considered a wizard in cookery, liked them. But the magic of the moment was gone. Both of us felt embarrassed and after awhile she left.

Vatsala continued with her daily visits to our house but now she tried to come when I was not there. And even if I was, we were back to square one, to our earlier cordial terms.. The romance and thrill were over.

I thought: “Will I have to eat food cooked in the blasted coconut oil? And God forbid, will she wear coconut oil in her hair and come near me? Not done, most certainly not.”

She must have thought: “Doesn’t like coconut oil? God’s own oil? What kind of a creature is he? No way, I can spend my days with him.”

I don’t blame her. The romance was over even before it started properly. More then me, my sister-in-law was shattered. I was back to dreaming about that girl in my class.

Thoughts-My Life

Life has strange ways of coming back to you. I am sixty five now, retired for the past several years. I have plenty of time in my hands to do - or not to do – anything I feel like. My son, my daughter- in – law and my wife look after me very well. They give me plenty of space. I am suffering from severe arthritis for the past few years and my movements are restricted to our building’s compound. This luxury of time and the leisure has given me time to look back, introspect and think about my life of sixty five years.

It is funny, but incidents which felt like sad or awkward then, seem amusing or trivial now. Some prestige issues then now seem most unimportant and I feel like laughing at my foolishness at that time. Looking back, life has been good and bad, fun and gloom, happy and sad, high and low, humorous and serious, with good relationships and bad relationships, urgent and relaxed, at times long and at times short, all rolled into one. There are many incidents in which, I feel, I would not have reacted now like I did then. But, looking back, on the whole, life has been great, in spite of its very many limitations and setbacks.

I often remember these incidents – right from my childhood – but not exactly in the sequence they occurred. Sometimes, when on a holiday or a rainy Sunday, I talk about these incidents and happenings with my family, my son suggests : “You have had quite a colourful life, why don’t you write? “

I had never thought of writing. I have quite a few hobbies though – reading, listening to music (light classical and Ghazals), occasional drinking, to name a few. I am fond of collecting miniature liquor and wine bottles. It’s a different matter that I have not been able to collect many. I am also good at, I believe, keeping a group of friends amused by my talks. But writing? Never thought about it. On the other hand, Why not?

I am going to share a few funny and a few not so funny incidents, not in the sequence they occurred, but in the order I remember them. Let’s try.

Musings-Operation smoke

As far back as I can remember, I was addicted to having betel leaves laced with tobacco from a very early age. When I got married, my wife was aware of my habit. She did not like it, but never let me know of her dislike. She had probably decided to make me stop having betel leaves (pan), once we got married. Not aware of her plans, I happily plunged into the marital bliss. After a couple of months of our marriage, she started hinting me to try cigarettes. She never mentioned anything about my not having betel leaves. Those were the happy times when people were not yet conscious of “Tobacco-smoking is injurious to health.” as they are today.
Being a Bengali, my wife, born in the era of legendary actors like Uttam Kumar & Co., who would ligh up fags at the drop of a hat, considered it hip. Youngsters were taken to smoking in a big way. In her own circle, her brother and her friends’ husbands all smoked. Nobody consumed betel leaves. My wife also liked me to have a fag or two. She probably thought, once I was on to fags, I would automatically stop taking betel leaves, or at least, it would be easier to make me stop taking them. Not that I was averse to smoking. Occasionally, say two three times a year, when I had occasion to meet an old school friend and if he offered a stick, I would happily indulge. But my true love remained betel leaves, then and now.
So, she seriously set about the task of first make me smoke and then make me stop taking betel leaves. She insisted that smoking was manly. All of a sudden I was offered cigarettes by her brother and other relatives whenever we met. My wife cannot say I did not try. I was sporting enough to accept the offered fags. I reciprocated by offering them betel leaves. After a while I was caught on to both the things. Not only that, her brother and some other people who were trying to change my habit, caught on to betel leaves. Their spouses started to blame my wife.
Now worried, she set about the task of making me stop smoking. Luck was on her side. Suddenly, it was “smoking is injurious to health” era and the new awareness was all over the place..She said I must stop smoking. I did.
I happily continued with my good old betel leaves. “MISSION SMOKE” failed, miserably.

Healthy bribe

From my early childhood I was very fond of reading books. I had studied in Gujarati medium up to class eight and then in English medium. So naturally, I was fond of Gujarati books from early on. I was a member of the school library and I used to read short stories, novels and later progressed to Gujarati translations of Jules Vern’s ‘The Messenger’ and such other books. My entire family was fond of reading as such, but my elder brother in particular, was an avid reader- even now he is. He too was a member of an English library and was heavy into Erle Stanley Gardner and Agatha Christie. He was always after me to read one of the English books, but I didn’t show any interest. He insisted that he was not against my reading Gujarati books but if I started reading English books, a whole new world will open for me, but to no avail.

When all his attempts to convince me failed, he tried another trick. He offered that if I finish one Perry Mason book, he would give me one big Cadbury chocolate. I was very fond of Cadbury. We were a middle class family and Cadbury was almost a luxury. I was tempted. I started reading one Perry Mason book but could not go beyond three- four pages. After a while he asked me if I had read the book. I told him I could not make head or tail of the book. He was visibly disappointed. I felt guilty.

Next, after a day or so, He added a ‘Barna’ table tennis bat on top of Cadbury If I finish one book. Now this matter was suddenly serious. Cadbury was one thing and a ‘Barna’ was something else again. I was a good and keen table tennis player and had made my name in the school for my game. ‘Barna’ was the best available bat at that time and was every good player’s dream. But I also knew that my brother could not afford it. He had stretched himself too far. Hence I must make another serious and sincere attempt for his sake.

I started again with new determination. I took it slowly, reading a paragraph twice when I could not follow the gist. I closed the book often when my attention wavered, only to start again after sometime. Slowly I began to grasp the story. Even though I did not understand meanings of many words and legal terms (they were too many to refer dictionary), I began to understand the theme and story in general. When I was a little more then a half way through, I was hooked. I just could not put the book down. I finished the book and asked my brother for another. He did not have to bribe me any more. I told him I would settle for Cadbury. But my brother kept his word and in due time got me a ‘Barna’ bat.

Ever since, I am hooked to books. Of course, as time passed tastes changed. In my twenties, I was heavily into James Hadley Chase. Later still, I was into P. G. Woodhouse, Ken Follet, Sheldon to Wilbur Smith to Ludlum and others. Now at sixty five, I am a voracious reader, and reading a variety of subjects, thanks to my brother.

The smoking adventure

It was in late fifties, I was probably twelve or thirteen years old when I had my first tryst with cigarette. One boy in our class used to smoke occasionally and brag about it. So one day we four friends decided to try it out. It boomeranged miserably. We went to a cigarette shop and our expert friend, Nalin, was entrusted with the task of procuring cigarettes for all of us. We found a partly concealed corner and started our great experiment with the fag as it was fashionably called at that time. As luck would have it, one of my father’s close friends was passing by and saw us doing what we were doing. Unfortunately, we didn’t see him. Uncle wasted no time and went straight to my house and informed my father of what we were doing and where we were. Uncle knew the parents of other boys too because we all lived in the same locality. But he preferred to go to my house only, God bless him for that.

My father was a man of virtues. He never thought of alcohol, smoke, betel and such like. What is more, he never knew what betel or betel nut tasted like. He was a simple, straightforward and a very short- tempered man, but highly respected. We were all very scared of him.

So uncle told my father to catch us red handed. But my father told him to wait for my return and meanwhile share a cup of tea with him. When I returned, my father confronted me with uncle’s accusations. It was so sudden and I was so scared that I didn’t have time to think. Because of all the stories I had heard since childhood of his strictness and punishments mated to my elder brothers when at fault, that I thought he would throw me out of the house. Without thinking I denied the charges and said I was not there at all. My father told my uncle that if I say I was not there then I was not there and that uncle must have mistaken some other boy for me. However, he profusely thanked uncle for his concern. A little shaken, uncle went away. I heaved a sigh of relief.

The moment uncle was out of sight and earshot, hard came a slap on my face. Father was livid with rage: “ The moment you opened your mouth I knew you were lying. I protected you simply because however close a friend he (uncle) be, he is an outsider and I did not want to disgrace you in front of him. You have damaged years of our friendship. This slap is not because you smoked but because you lied. If I had called your lie then, you would not have ever been able to meet uncle’s eyes.”

Then came a gem of a line which neither I, nor anyone else in the family expected from my father: “Look here, I can understand and even appreciate your need to experiment at this age. But when faced, have courage to speak the truth. I don’t expect you to come and tell me of your own that you smoke, but when asked I certainly expect you to admit and face consequences. Whatever you do, do it without being scared of outsiders.”

Even at that immature age, I was impressed. As I grew, I began to understand and appreciate that one line: “ I can understand and appreciate your need to experiment
at this age.” Every time I remember that line, I wonder at the thought and understanding behind it. That one line has taught me how I should treat my own children.

However, a few days after this incident my elder brother informed me that father had doubled my monthly allowance for me to go for a good brand if I wanted to smoke. That was my father. I must have smoked hardly four-five times after that. I tried to continue, but couldn’t. Not because I had become virtuous all of a sudden. But for the fact that all adventure had gone out of it.