Sunday 10 February 2013

Juvenilia...School Times...



2004,Standard XII
INGRAHAM INSTITUTE  ENGLISH SCHOOL
SOME GAGS OF MY LIFE




# MY  MOST EMBARRASING MOMENT ON STAGE
We were in green house, all the questions were childish , even a junior student could have answered them ,the auditorium was full and occupied by every criticizing person possible .And they had ‘Great expectations from me’  every thing was going fine ,until- 
 I was sitting nervously, then the next terrible question was shot at us...the girl (anchor)  started –‘which is the fastest running animal on earth?’ I didn’t knew what happened to me in that very moment. Had I gone blank? not exactly, for without even the slightest hesitation I replied-  “OSTRICH”
and ..for three whole seconds ,the whole auditorium submerged into silence , I raised my head a little ,looked here and there ,’what is happening?’  and the  next thing which I heard was a loud ,roaring ,thundering ,combined laughter in the auditorium… and Neha, was venting out all her anger on me. “Its not ostrich ,you idiot it’s a leopard she asked about the fastest running animal ,not bird .”  They would have excused me, If I had even uttered the name of a animal , ostrich is not even an animal . I felt so, so, so      embarrassed that I didn’t dared to even look at any thing else except the surface of the table, my head bowed down, till the quiz contest came to an end and the worst part ,we lost …when it all ended ,I rushed to the cycle stand and I cursed myself I didn’t even turned back and looked anyone ,if I were a little late my classmates and those devils of the ‘B’ section would come and make fun of me ,and I feared what I will face if that Rahul came….HUMILIATION.  I fled from the spot .When I reached the main gate of the school a boy from my house was mocking at me he was in  a much junior class . He said  ‘There goes the loser ,our house lost just because of you ‘   .
I cycled as fast as I could and breathed a sigh of relief only when I reached home .
To avoid all possible embarrassments and accusations, I didn’t go to school one whole week and spent my time in home, sulking over what I had done it may seem a little but it was too much to be taken for granted…although there have been many embarrassing moments in my life nothing can be as embarrassing as answering a question wrong in a stupid quiz competition ....and that too the question being most trivial….
 ...there was no excuse left for me to say anything or to persuade my mind against my predicament. I was even nicknamed –‘Mr. Ostrich’ by one of my friends.



#MY LOVE FOR SINGING
 It was our English Literature period .As usual, my love for singing continued even in the lecture of the subject which I loved the most .And that too ,every kind of song ,whether the singer is Madonna or Shamshad Begum ,it didn’t matter to me. I loved singing ,no matter what a torture it is to the listeners .My friends fondly called me –‘FM Radio’ , as I used to sing songs on every situation. So, just as usual, my singing was in full swing that day. Mrs. Shukrey happened to be our English teacher .She is an old lady and moreover, I happened to be her favorite student, after all, who got the highest marks every time, okay, I am not boasting, let me return to our subject –my singing.
I was sitting with Vvidushi. The teacher had not yet arrived. She is an old, aged lady and took a lot of time to reach our class. We usually had a lecture of 35 minutes, 10 minutes she took to come to our classroom, 15 minutes we took to settle down, so Mrs. Shukrey had to remain contented teaching us hardly for 10 minutes.
This time my song happened to be –‘Tan dole mera man dole’  ,from an old movie . A gem of Lata Mangeshkar was today finding place in our English Literature class.
My song was in full swing, Vvidushi was listening and enjoying thoroughly, laughing at me, suddenly the expression on her face grew grim, serious ,pale, terrified and stupefied .
But I continued my singing, I asked Vvidushi-“what is the matter? Why are you so quiet?” I suddenly realized that the whole class was silent. What was happening ?From a wink of her eyes, she tried to tell me something , and I turned back ,there she was our teacher –Mrs .Shukrey , “What happened Abhishek? you may continue singing ,go on”
I was so shocked by embarrassment that I could hardly say any thing I stammered – “ I …I … Am
sorry ma’m “    She would not listen a thing she continued – “come on, I heard you singing “ I didn’t reply .
“How come you remember such an old song ?”
At once a reply came from me-“ Because it was remixed !!”   How absurd was to give such a reply to her In front of the whole class.
She only said “I expect you to be more disciplined “
 The matter was left out but I became a laughing stock for my classmates. This was even worse than that stupid quiz competition.

#I CAN’T CONTROL MY SLEEP !!!
Our biology teacher respected Mr.Ajay Singh happened to be the most boring teacher in the whole world ,whom I used to hate (pardon me ) ,he was just so boring and he boasted of everything and every experience(whether he had it or not, I don’t know) .He was small ,not much in height just five feet ,three or four inches ,with a tummy bulging slightly outside, and with a leather belt with a cellphone tucked onto it. Anyone who saw him understood why he was famous as “CHAVANNI”,because of his height .It is a hindi name given to the 25 paisa coin .
 When he smiled ,three of his front teeth , molars ,or whatever, gave a sight which I  will never forget  , and moreover ,those three teeth were blackened . Somebody told me that it was a result of a feud with some vagabonds, rowdy boys of some other school, who burnt his TEETH!!, after giving him a severe beating. I laughed at this idea, it may be true, who knows? His character had many layers to it.
While teaching biology ,he gave us a rough knowledge of all the subjects which existed in this world .He wore spectacles that were a bit huge for his face, frowning through them ,he would teach us the theory of evolution ,often interrupted by his own enriching experiences , One day ,when he was giving a lecture on the theory of evolution , he asked us “Okay ,can you tell me ,class, which living being bears a close resemblance to us, from which evolution of the Homo Sapien has taken place?”
 To this question I answered, keeping him in mind – “Sir, we have evolved from monkeys!” This I had answered just for fun, however that part is true that I meant him, by that answer. The whole class roared in  fits of laughter . And he said with an angry tone - “you better keep quiet if you don’t know the correct answer”. My answer was enough to disgust him for the next few days .But I had no doubts that he has evolved from monkeys.
Now, his experiences, I must tell, included a lot of trekking, fishing, hunting, adventures and his tales of his family. Often, genetic mutation was interrupted with his mention of his Grand father and how he encountered a ghost which wore expensive jewelry!
Often I thought ,’if you have so much experience, then what the hell are you doing in this school?’

Another dilemma with him was that his syllabus was never complete. No matter how fast we were in catching or how fast he could be, which he never was. As a result, a lot of course was left to be covered and to compensate, he started taking extra classes, which I never attended, he sometimes took other teacher’s periods too, to teach biology.
Once, we had practical classes in whole of our second half, so this was his chance, and it was the greatest torture of my life, he took all the four periods after the lunch break to teach us biology, I was attentive throughout the first two periods ,and each time the bell sounded, I was excited ,as it marked the end of one period ,end of 35 minutes of suffering. When the third bell sounded, I was growing sleepy, effected by the dullness of the November month , and the gloomy ,dingy classroom ,and most of all his lecture , I was on the last bench , and I was far away from his sight, unnoticed, I took my heavy bag ,placed it in front of me on the desk ,so that it will reduce my chances of getting caught, and threw myself on the desk ,my eyes closed, and I gave up to the honey-heavy dew of the slumber ,though partially, not completely. I could hear his speech but I didn’t dare to look up, it was so enjoyable. All, of a sudden , everything came to a came to a standstill, and a silence occupied the room, I suspected something is wrong , I looked up with dizzy eyes ,yawning, with my jaws wide open. I found everyone staring at me, I started feeling nervous, and the situation worsened, interrupted by a familiar voice-
“Abhishek, I never expected you to sleep in the class. “
No answer.
“Actually”, he continued ,” You are not sleeping , I am sleeping “ Then addressing other students ,he said –“ He has made me realize that It is me who actually sleeps in the class , this means that I am not a good teacher , had I been a good one , you won’t have a reason to sleep during my lecture.”
I agreed completely with him, after all, one should admit his mistakes, be it a teacher.
He then came to me and asked –“Are you not feeling well?”
I said –“Sir, may I go and wash my face?”
“You surely can, you can even take a bath if you want.” He said cynically.
To this I replied, “Sir, that is not possible here, I have to manage by washing my face only.”
This ridiculed him and he arranged the fingers of his right hand in a curved form, caressing the thumb, he then again asked me- “Do you know what this is?”
“Surely sir, it’s a punch!!”
“Get out before it destroys your face and you are never able to wash it again.”
I fled.


#FUNNY YET SERIOUS
Once, it was proved practically that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, it can only be transferred from one body to the another .
It happened so that Anu was sitting peacefully at her seat the period being a free period , we were taking full advantage of it , Asheerwaad , the prankster , came and was in a mood for fun , helpless Anu being unaware of it , Asheerwaad is a person whom I used to hate but today ,he is my good friend , but that is another story , well he came and in an impulse of a moment, swung his bag over her head , his intention was not to hurt her , but it did , a great blow over her head and her temper knew no bounds , and he went away to avoid all embarrassment .She was still sulking and fretting over him and was standing just near the door , when I entered the classroom , unintentionally, I hit her , and as we all know , every action has an equal and opposite reaction , she hit me back .A tight slap right over my face ,   on my left cheek. And, for a moment , I remembered my mother , only she had slapped me in my whole life.But to get a slap from a girl, and that too with no fault of yours ,was really disgusting. My spectacles flew away five feet apart ,to the biology lab. And I being almost on the floor .I was about to fall. I recollected myself, and just went away, without even saying a word.
By lunch break everyone came to know that ‘K.V.’ was slapped by Anu.
In the lunch –break , I was walking in the corridor downstairs, Pulkit, that irritating guy, was behind me. According to my personal observation , some people do no harm to you ,but on seeing their face , you feel disgusting and get irritated, and you just wish to give them a tight punch ,without any reason.
He was just like that . I was in a bad temper . So, he was at risk, he held my blazer and wouldn’t let me go ,he was irritating me.
I persuaded him to leave me, but he wouldn’t, and I found myself more and more ridiculed. Then I didn’t see anything and just flung my right hand in the air, and gave him a tight slap which he is going to remember his whole life. He fell onto the floor. And I left the spot, later on I saw him, with his face swollen as if fat had accumulated over it .
In the end the energy of the slaps was transferred from Asheerwaad to Anu to me and finally to Pullkit . Perhaps he may have given that to someone else .
For the first time I saw that Physics is very much there in our daily lives .Energy can neither be created ,nor destroyed, it can only be transferred from one body to the another.




Saturday 9 February 2013

Being Iyer…Part 2



As I write this, I am simultaneously flipping through some pics on a Facebook page dedicated to Iyers…called Iyer Tips, personally I love this page, haha… for each and every goddamn thing written here is true to the core, ranging from Poonal to Thayir-Chaadam and what not…!! Well.. talking about Iyer bhashai, whenever I saw those lame TV serials on Sun TV, which my mom used to follow so religiously, I became confused as I was a kid then and wondered, why the hell do these people speak that kind of Tamil, with an accentuated nasalized tone?? 
Haha… boy oh boy… who knows pure tamil anyway… everything has become so adulterated nowadays,well.. growing up in Ghaziabad was quite easy, as I passed myself for a north Indian. Having been born in Ghaziabad, My elder sister, though had to undergo the numerous regimes of a typical Iyer family, like..learning Bharatnatyam by one Shantha aunty, who lived quite far from our home, another Palakkad iyer like us, living in Ghaziabad, the day Shantha aunty’s family got shifted to New Delhi, that was the happiest day for my elder sister K.V.Meenakshi, as she is called, for she no longer had to tolerate those torturing and long bharatnatyam classes.

I was named Subramaniam at birth. Subramaniam being my Paternal Grandfather’s name, and as per Iyer custom, a grandson is named after the Grandfather, so my name became K.V.Subramaniam, that is Koduvayur Venkitaraman Subramaniam, Koduvayur being the place of the family lineage, and Venkitaraman being my father’s name, but mom decided to go against the family norms for once and rechristened me as “Abhishek” . although common, but I guess it sounded easier and less scary than Subramaniam, gaawd… at that time I hated subramaniam so much , and everyone in the family used to call me as Chuppamani…!! (ughhhh)… but the irony of the situation today is –after a lot of trials and tribulations , I decided that my facebook name would be Abhishek Subramaniam Iyer, after all, I am proud of being an iyer 

My sister used to be taunted by my mother, and as our Facebook page says: She used to taunt her when she didn’t get up early –“Naalaku nee thaan innooru aathuku poyi kashta pada porai”  !! Now I realize that one can never ever forget the essence of the place from where we came from, sometimes at the local south Indian Temple during avaniattam, I used to get embarrassed, as I don’t know how to wear a veshti properly to this day, so I really avoid avaniattam at the first place, that rebellion seed had been planted inside me since childhood, I got so suffocated by all those customs, and dos and don’ts.. everytime…!! 

Well.. this is just the beginning of the story.. a lot to share.. a lot to come….!! But bye for now… as More assignments are waiting for this Iyer…!! :D