The Past Always Catches Up!

A close friend from my college days called up. He was very agitated. His parents had begun earnestly looking for a girl for him but nothing was working out.
He: Neeyokke blogil oro thonnivaasam ezhuthi vekkum. Athine anubhavikkunnathe njanum.
Me: Enna patti aliya.
He: Dey Thanthapadi vilichirunnu. Angere ennode chodikkuva enne kuriche naatukaarkke nalla mathippaanalle enne.
Me: Lol...I call this poetic justice! I am going to write about this!

And so I thought of all the times the past caught up with people around me, of course not excluding myself.
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My dad's best friend in college was a class act in roguery like my pal above. He is still an eccentric character and I just adore this man. He runs two Indian restaurants in Rome and has called one of them Kama Sutra!
Once his wife returned to their native place for some family function. A villager approaches her.
He: Mole ethe kudumbathiletha?
She tells him.
He: Avide oru thaanthonni ondaayirunnallo aa kattakayathinte koodeyokke nadannirunnathe. Ayaalokke rekshapetto aavo!
She: Aa thaanthonniyude bhaaryayaanu njan!
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We were doing our master's then, fresh off the boat and exploring america intently. That was when a friend's dad was visiting LA and we took him around the city. And of all places, he notices a strip club.
Uncle: Oh strip clubs! Must be very expensive.
Friend(in the spirit of tour-guiding): Oh not really. Just 20 dollars per song.
We glare at him. Friend locks his mouth with his hands.
Uncle(stunned, thwacks friend on his head): Saale, tu mera paisa aisa hi barbaad karega!
Friend(rubbing his head): Innocent fun, dad. Please don't tell mom.
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A few years back, I was in TVM on my way to Delhi for the UPSC classes. My parents were sitting around me, I couldn't say if they were happy or sad but they were both tensed. Suddenly my mom speaks up.
Mom: Did you know, that 20 years back your dad was intent on quitting his university job and wanted to go back to Idukki and join politics! I took a strong stand and thankfully good sense prevailed.
Pops: Onne mindaathirikkaavo. Aavashyamillaathathokke pillere paranje keppikkaalle!
Mom: Illa avanum ariyatte, avante appante vazhikalil koodayaane avanteyum pokkenne.
Me: Really? That takes a big load off my back. I couldn't understand why all this was happening to me.
I looked at my dad. He replied with a sheepish grin. From father to son, the struggles with idealism had found new roots in the next generation too. My mom knew at that moment, that the inherent pragmatism of the Karoors had no place in me.
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I had always thought our mom was a curious mix of conservatism and modern ideas. The hard part was always figuring out where she stood on our dealings with the opposite sex, and to be safe I always kept that part of my life masked from her.

There was this time when my sis was finding it awkward explaining to her why my bro-in-law had to visit her before the wedding. And as fate would have it sis heard a story from mom's best friend that made our ears pop!
It seems he had caught my parents hanging out together at the Indian Coffee House at Thampanoor and a few other places before their wedding.
When we questioned mom, she is shocked for a second, then blushes, a clear concession of defeat, then puts on the lawyer's robe and cunningly prods, "Ee kallangalokke aara ningalode paranjathe?"
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Pops used to be a very rash driver. He had to be at the head of the traffic and he knew no rest till he passed every vehicle on the road. Once he drove my friend and me back from Nagercoil where we went to write the TN Entrance Exam in sharp 40 minutes(the distance is like 60kms). On returning my friend remarks, "Dey entrancinte result varunnathine munpe exit aakum enne njan vichaarichu, ho jeevan thiriche kittiya aashvaasam!"
Ironically, a few wise people in Trivandrum decided to form a Road Safety Council and guess who they put in the governing body! We ribbed Pops about it and he defended himself by saying he had changed. That is when mom remarks, "Speedil odikunnathinte perspective kodukkaanaayirikkum pappaye avare member aakiyathe!"
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In our family taking the cars out and returning with minor dents or scratches is a common happening. Equally common is that none of the guilty parties, parents or children, will reveal their hand and try passing the blame on to others, if and when the laceration is detected. Last time I was home, I came back late at night and saw a ghastly dent on the rear bumper. My face fell. Just the other day, sis had taken the other car out, rammed into a roadside wall and landed the vehicle at the workshop. I knew I was in for trouble, but when did this happen - I just had one beer! So I tepidly walk in, tiptoed past my parents bedroom and then I hear whispers. What do I do? I eavesdrop, of course!
Mom: Avan Vannu
Pops: Inne vittekkam. Naale avante thalayil veche kodukkaam!

That's when I barge in.
Me: Ingane venam parents aayaal.
Mom(changes sides!): Eda pappa konde idichatha. vaikunneram enne prathi aakaan nokki, pakshe nadannilla!
Me: Deyvame, ingane aanalle enne pande pattunna ella poralinum ningal utharavaadi aakiyathu.(That day was my chance to play saint! :)
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And finally my big moment!

I always used to boast to my friends that I had an unblemished reputation in front of my parents unlike all of them, until this happened. A few years back, my dad visited me in the US and we shared a few beers. I outrightly overtook him 3 beers to his 1. He went back and told this to my mom who got very concerned.
She: Ayyo avanode entha parayaathe kudi nirthaan?
He: Rekshayilla! Nammude mookinte keezhil ninne avan kaanicha paripaadi enthaananne ariyaamo?
She: Illa?
He: Ivide pottichirunna kuppikal ellaatheennum avan ooti, ennittu level correct aakaan vellavum narachu!

My sis heard this conversation and dutifully reported it to me. I couldn't figure out how Pops found out, nor do I have the courage to ask. My best guess is that one of his cousins had the drinks "on the rocks' and found it unnaturally dilute! Pops, I know you always suspected Appachan too for this, maybe he also tried it out, but I am a guilty party too. You must be wondering how you got caught between two errant generations! That was your college-going boy showing off to his friends, please don't take it to heart. Peace between men!
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P.S - Well, there's no escaping the past. Some day in the future, even this post will come back from the past. I wrote only about the good times. About karma, my mom would tell me - if you don't suffer for your actions, it will be the next generation that has to. She would cite me numerous examples to build her case. Meanwhile, check out this blog for those interested in writing of a very high quality. Also my fave song of recent times is finally up on youtube. Happy Vishu to all!

Oru Paathiriyum Rande Kunjaadukalum...

Jagathy: "Kalyaana kuri vaangikkan pokuvaano"
Mohanlal: "Athe"
Jagathy: "Pathu kalpanakal ariyaamo"
Mohanlal: "Illa"
Jagathy: "Ennaal poyitte kaaryamilla"
That was Jagathy in a short but funny role, whose desire to get married is repeatedly foiled by his parish priest, Thilakan in the movie Koodum Thedi, for not knowing the Ten Commandments.

Recently I had to accompany my sis to our parish in Trivandrum, to get the kuri for her. And it turned out to be more hilarious than I ever expected. Going to this church and meeting priests from this church was a tense affair for me, because I was irregular for mass, had bunked sunday school and we never made it for their prayer group sessions.

The priest handed out a four page form to fill out. My sis is dismayed as it is in Malayalam, not her strength by any means. What surprised me is she ventures to fill out the form in malayalam, ignoring my entreaties to get it done with, in english. I decided to watch mutely, the fun that was to follow. Yes becomes "Uvve" in malayalam and No becomes "Illa" while filling forms. But my sis wrote "Aaa"(her colloquial for Yes), and when I broke down laughing, she changes it hastily to "Athe". The questions the form asked were funny too but i forget them. And where her answer was negative she writes "Alla", firmly in the grip of colloquial usage. Gleefully, I let her leave it that way, hoping the priest would spot it. She took the obsession with writing in malayalam to dizzying heights by attempting to write our US address in malayalam and when she came to the words "apartment", the helpless look on her face was a moment to treasure for eternity. I stopped making fun of her right there, as she seemed to be on the verge of exploding with rage and tears.

The Achan took up the form, and the first sound that escaped him was a groan, and his hands went up to his face, seeing the systematic murder of the malayalam langauge that had taken place. Like a school teacher, he diligently corrected the spelling mistakes, semantic "misjudgements" and the grammatical errors. Sis sat red-faced, while I was enjoying the comedy of errors thoroughly. It was a long time, since some situational comedy happened in my life.

Achan: "Nee kooduthal chirikkanda. Ningalode njan chila catechism questions chodikkan pokuva"
Me (laughter substituted by fear): "Njan alla acho kettunne. Ivala"
Achan: "Pathe kalpanakal ethokkeya"
I begin sweating. Luckily sis knows them all.
But the next question stumps both of us.

Achan: "Pathe kalpanakal ethrayaayitte churukkaam"
Sis: "Eh?! Angane churukkaan pattumo?"
Achan: "Sheda! Illaatha Kaaryangal njan chodikkumo"
Sis: "Ezhe"
Achan: "Ezho! Ente karthaave ninte sabha pokka"!
Achan: "Ennaal nee para"
Me: "Acho njaan alla kettunne."
Achan: "Haa parayada"
Me (tepidly): "Naale"
Achan: "Naalo! Correct answer is two"
Achan: "Ninakke extra two evidanne kitti"
Me (embarassed): "Athe njan enikke vendi ondaakiya rande kalpanakal aanacho!"

Achan: "Seven sacraments ariyumo"
Sis: "Of course."
But the seventh stumps her. The priest turns to me.
Me (triumphantly): "Holy Orders!"
Achan: "Ho nee vichaaricha poleyallallo."
Me: "Oru kaalathe enikke achanaakanam ennondaayirunnu."
Achan (sarcastic): "Ho bhaagyam, athe nadannillallo!"

After more questions and some disturbing answers from my sis...
Achan (to me): "Ithokke kettathukonde ineem ninakke eluppamaayallo"
Me (chuckling): "Achan ithey chodyangal thanne chodikkanam, please!"

The priest winds up the session, giving my sis some really awesome words of advice. We were very impressed. Mom had given us a very wrong impression of this priest, both of us thought. He had totally floored us. But like a predator, quickly moving in for the kill after cleverly ensnaring his prey, he made his next move.
Achan: "We are building a church at Pongummoodu, and we are severely short of funds."
Me (that sinking feeling): "I forgot my checkbook."
Achan: "Cash mathi"
Me: "Veetil poyi eduthonde varaam acho"
Achan: "Sheri"
Me: "Kuri?"
Achan: "Cash konde varummbam tharaam. Porey?"
Me: "Mathi acho!"
We ran for our lives. Sis, embarassed that her catechism had failed her. Me, cursing myself, for not reading the Achan's mind well enough.

Back home, we tell our parents, all what happened.
Pops: "Why did you tell him you both are working in the US. You should have said you are studying."
Mom: "Ente maathaave, enikkingane rande mandan pillereyaanallo kittiyathe"
Me (sheepishly): "It is for something good, right?"
Mom: "Achanmaarke aavashyathilere kaashonde. Athe edukkaathe nammale pirikkaan nadakkuva"
Pops (mournfully): "I sent you guys there, to escape him. Ineem njan thanne pokaam, and hopefully undo all the damage!"
Me: "Another reason, to do a register marriage!"

P.S: Phew! I never thought i would blog again. Feels nice to be back. And enjoy this wonderful xian song, that I have listened to, a hundred times already!

Anecdotes from the Loyola Days...

This was one of the initiatives that served as a precursor to my blogging days. Initially written just for my classmates, I saw its universality and propped it up on the net following which I have recieved appreciation not just from Loyolites, but also people from other schools in Trvandrum, who admired our batch's wild ways, for compiling this ode to our heroics, villainy and foolishness. Recently I recollected more anecdotes and its becoming a pain keeping my ancient tripod home page going, as it gets pulled down every few months. Ever since Blogger started labels, I have itched to place this crown jewel of my campus memoirs at the very top of my Campus Nostalgia category. Moreover a desire to rewrite the jokes, conforming to rules of better english grammar had been preying my mind. So finally after 3 years this revamped write-up comes to its final resting place.
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Thomman and ponnan go to the cyber cafe on his first vacation from nda to check his email.after some time he goes to the owner and in anger says " anna enikke mail check cheyyaan pattunnilla". the guy walks over to see wht the problem is and much to the cafeowner's total bewilderment and ponnans unmuffled laughter finds that thomman types in www.ninanthomas.com and expects all his emails to pop up on the screen.later thomman threatens ponnan with dire consequences if this is revealed and it took 2 yrs for ponnan to muster the courage to reveal. The irony is that the armymen gifted him with a B.Sc in Computer Science from the much-vaunted JNU for his physical and "mental" exertions at NDA.

Motta and Dadu are in animated conversation while Joy Sir is teaching. joy sir looking at them says "hello" intending to put a stoop to their banter. Motta immediately puts his fist to his ear as if holding a fone and asks "hello aara samsaarikkunnathu". Joy sir is stumped!

Mr.Madhusoodhanan Nair(our "beloved" 9th st malayalam teacher) is holding fort and he asks a question to vince in class..."marangalude upayogangal vivarikkuka" and vincekuttan after great thought gives the answer which would have made his pre-historic ancesators proud..."vanya mrigangal kattaalanmaare akramikkan varumbam avarke keri olikkaan marangal sahaayikkum".We broke out laughing uncontrollably hearing his answer and madhu in his trademark punch line says "entha , avan paranjathil oru paayint ille?"

DP asks Leelu to give a character sketch of Rosalind(the heroine of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night). Leelu who had then embarked on a mission to understand the female psyche better after countless failures by reading women's mags gave the shortest, most perfect answer to a question the rest of us would have spent minutes explaining...that Rosalind was a woman of substance!

Muthu on the fone to jaru: incidentally its jacob's father who is most of the time at sea picks up the fone and says hello. Muthu replies back "enthaada hellokke ithrem kaduppam"

Motta calls up thommans house and asks for ninan. thommans dad's name also being ninan responds..."yes ninan speaking". Motta immediately starts a theri abhishekam. Uncle realizes the call is meant for his virtuous son and says,"hold cheyye njan ninane kodukkaam" and motta learnt to be careful next time on.

Abba calls up jabbans house and in his trademark way asks,"hello jibbbby ondo". Jabbans grandfather picks up the fone and says, " ninakke ethe hippye aada vende"

Those were the times of great debates in our class btw mammooty-mohanlal, azhar-sachin, juhi-manisha fans and we reached a consenus by having polls. Chairman one day decided to stretch things too far when he demanded the mother-of-all-polls to find out from the guys whether anil kapoorinaano babu antonykkaano kooduthal glamour!!! Funny part is chairman still cant understand why we cruelly rejected his poll!

After joy sir's tuition we have a nice beautiful walk through a village to reach school. We started scaring puppy that the ppl here were staunch communists and one of us shouted out "oru congress manthriyude makan ivide onde" and as if on cue from one of the huts somebody said,"kathi edukkada". We looked around noone was there. On turning back we had the fun of our life seeing Puppy run for his life. Since then Puppy never walked that way with us!

China once took the goal kick for his team during games period. What happened next was unbelievable. The ball went back over his head and into the goal post which he was supposed to be guarding. The whole class laughted so much we ended up lying on the ground clutching our stomachs. Thankfully for him those where the days before we heard of match fixing.

At tuition, China once saw a gal getting onto the pillion of her dad's bike. He immediately shouted to alert us..."aa kale nokkada"...when we turned someone had come in front of us and all we could see was her dad's musular leg which was bared as he wearing a mundu! Since then whenever we chance upon a well-built guy someone would throw a poke at china, "Entha Chinae, nottamonda?"

Then there was the homo in pongummodu who chased ponnan whenever they set eyes on each other owing to Ponnan's legendary "butter-bun" and once even had the guts to walk into china's house and grab him while our jackie chan was washing his car(neigh "kuthira" in jayan style) and china bet the pulp out of him.

Ponnan always gave gays the creeps and once he accepted a lift from this guy on the bike who after a few minutes slid his arm behind and touched ponnan where it mattered most. Ponnan in his trademark style which only we guys can imitate says "ehhh, enthuvaaaado ithe" to which the man says "ithonnum ishtamille?" and ponnan shouts out "vandi nirthedo...njan erangattu".

Pothan gets into a ksrtc bus for the first time and when the conductor came over, he said " oraalke ulloor vareyolla oru roopede oru ticket" and the conductor is like "ivan aareda".

Pothen couldn't read malayalam properly in those days. He got into a bus whose board he found to read KizhakeKotta...finally the bus took him to the most inaccessible of all places in trivandrum...PulayanarKotta!!!

Pothan used to have a driver taking him to all the tuitions and once in 10th jaru who was with him criticized him for something he did. Pothan immediately says..."driver vandi nirthe...Jaru get out!!!" ...right in the middle of nowhere. funniest thing is the pothen of then and now bears no resemblence except for the fat.

Pothen's dad once came to drop pothen at tuition and comes over to us to make small talk. That is when a jet streaks through the sky and puli as we called him then exclaims in english "Look,a rocket!" and we burst out laughing leaving him chammufied. And to think he is an engineer!

During some program in school..Chakka the announcer says "I thank the chief guest on behalf of the auditorium!"

Ammavan another announcer allegedly used to do this...he would shout through the mic "Agil is needed at the announcer's desk immediately" and then slip away and walk back very importantly in front of all the junior school kids who adored him.

During a rain-hit basketball match the non-teaching staff was mopping the court and ammavan not playing that year and sorely missing the limelight wants something to do and helps with the cleaning...Fr.Mani, our princi then totally unhappy with agil's cleaning technique..and famous for his anger...walks over and gives him a merciless scolding takes the cleaning sack and shows how it is to be done...with the whole school watching with unbridled joy from the quadrangle steps, the needless labours of a dictatorial princi and his over-enthu student.

Ammavan got selected in the 8th itself for the school basketball team and motta would make fun of him saying his main duty in the team was say "vyaasa(our captain then)...vellam".

Fr.Maani, our princi is taking class and he catches Kozhi talking and tells him to stand up. Then he launches a tirade against Kozhi but Kozhi maintains his typical, cool smile throughout. Finally not being able to control his rage anymore Mani shouts out "Stop that cynical smile!"...only to make matters worse as we also start laughing now!

Once one of our guys chanced to read one of raman's essays in his english answere paper. We noiced a sentence circled out by DP. The essay was about an unforgettable day in your life. The offending line went like this..."the boys talked and made noise as though the bus belonged to their fathers"! Raman's justification for this was that "dont we say in malayalam...Ninte Achanteyannoda Ee Bus!!!"

Appu had written a superb essay for the same exam mentioned above and DP impressed by his talent thought of making use of it. She asked him to write a letter requesting permission for an industrial visit. Peri produced the letter the next day but poor DP was totally horrified to find her new promising find had made 15 spelling and gramatical mistakes in the one paragraph letter that she remarked "how will the gal u marry trust you with her life?"

Chairman, Abba and Gundu are walking through statue with a gal in holy angels from their tuition. Chairman is determined to strike a chord in the gal thru sentiments says stuff like nobody likes him or wants him. With no warning right in the heart of the city and amid hundreds of ppl the gal starts crying hearing sreehari's sob story. Abba and gundu are scared to death and run away leaving chairman to do the job of comforting her.

During the contact class, thomman, ponnan, jabban and muthu enter a really expensive restaurant at kochi...immediately 4 chicken fried rice and something new they had never see before and the most costly item in the menu,barbecue quail was ordered. With mouth watering up in anticipation, the guys started deciding where on the table everything would be kept and which part of the quail each guy would take. Finally when everything comes they see the fried rice they ordered came in 4 small cups and the quail was the smallest,thinnest chicken they ever saw. Thomman takes up the quail by its legs, looks at in dismay, points us to a protruding peice between its thighs and remarks, "ithananne thonnunnu kozhiyude sunayi...ithaarkku venam"? After 400 bucks spent and pockets and stomachs empty we swore on vengeance and for the next contact class 8 of us went in..order 2 fresh lime and 8 straws and came out tipping the same old waiter 5ps.

At the restaurant above, the four mandanmaar sat awaiting their food. The waiter was pouring water into their glasses. Some soft music is playing in the room. To show off his range in songs in front of the other guys, Jabban says, "Country Music". The waiter looks up shocked and stares at jabban who cringes. The guys pick up the cue and laugh uncontrollably while thomman within earshot of the angry waiter responds,"Eda Jabba, lavanmaar americayil ninnu hashbush paatukal konduvannathe neeyaayitte tharayaakiyallode" and all hapless jabban can respond is "Sathyamaayittu...enne vishwasikke...ithe Country Music aane!"

Chairman, dadu and motta had a crush on the same gal studying in st.thomas. Everyone resorted to different tactis to win her attention. Motta befriended her younger bro studying in our school, Dau made it a point to attend the same tuitions she went to. Chairman whose ex-classmate this gal was in another school, on his part instituted a planning board(that's how he got this name) with abba,gundu, annan,saami and raman as members to observe who she looks at when our school bus went by hers'.

Then there was bimbu who until the 10th thought that babies were born thru the mouth.

And we had kicha..our genius in all things who wasted an entire roll of film bcoz he thought by taking fotos which could capture a bird flying whose reflection on the lake to ganesh's glasses would be the next biggest thing in the world of fotography ending up with 30 blank fotos in the end.

Leelu was crazy abt this gal in holy angels and one day decided he would go talk to her, whatever happens. At pongummode he deliberately bumped into her and said in one breath..."hi i am arun studying in loyola..u must be Poo$%". Guess wht she replies. So what should I do...and our poor leelu was left licking his wounds....again.

Once we went trekking to Meenmooti and muthu as lazy as ever is finding it tough to climb a small ridge.khaja directly ahead of him is using a creeper, hugging the surface to move on. Muthu clings on to khaja hoping khaja will drag him up. Khaja immediately gave the most stunning repartee we ever heard..."uriyil thoongunnavante pariyil thoongunnoda"! Tired as we were, we threw our bags on the forest floor and broke out into several minutes of unbridled laughter.

On a trip to ponmudi...it was raining...and naga is havin a harrowing time on his bike, he had already fallen off twice...once of all things a creeper fallen on to the road trips him. and the third time a fast passenger comes along and he makes way for it to go by going too much to the left and falls. the bus driver stops beside him and says with a smile "mone oru bus koodi ithile varunnunde". All naga can respond is "Thankyou saare!"

At meenmooti we camped for the night at a cave but we suddenly remembered we didnt have any garlic to ward off the snakes. Naga saved us the trouble by starting a vomitting spree and we made him form a lakshmana rekha around us. Thanks to the odour not even an ant came anywhere nearby during the night.

During the contact class at kochi we were hanging around the marine drive. A flying squad sees us and comes closer. A foreigner steps out of the jeep looks, inspects us carefully and turns to the cops and points at jofu and says "He is the man. He is the thief. Those same big, white teeth" and a cowering jofu responds "I...I no thief...I, I student of loyola".

In 7th standard V.C teaches us that "mole is the short form of molecule". In 8th Manorama M'am says u guys must be knowing wht a mole is and we all shout out to impress her..."Mole is the short form of molecule"...leaving her flabbergasted and asking..."who taught you that"...and when we told her..she is left in total despair.

C.T, our PT sir, during basketball coaching telling us..."divide into four halves".

Rajamma madam in 6th standard sees abu talking and asks..."ey abu whaaat do u waant"...abu replies.."madam i want an icecream."

Bangu in his 6th standard composition on "My Birthday Party"...wrote..."I had porridge for my birthday party...", thinking porridge was some delicacy..not knowing it was kanji.

Thomman had a crush on this St.Thomas gal who was his neighbour. One day he was walking up the road by her house and he saw her inside combing her hair. He jumped the wall, stood by the window and just stared admiring forgetting all sense of time and place. Suddenly she turned, saw him, without any shock or surprise to see him by the window, asks, "Enthaa??"...Thomman shrugs his shoulders....blinks his eyes...turns around, jumps back out over the wall, and walks away like in a hynotic spell! Atleast this is his version of the story...his guts is unparalleled, so is his knack for tall tales...and we never had the courage to cross-check with the gal in question, what really happened.

Jaru playin football is the funniest sight..he would come running from miles away to kick the ball and everyone would move away scared to even be in the path of what would be a powerful shot and he finally ends up running over the ball totally missing it.

Raman sees a chinese model on chairman's 10th std notebook.he asks him..ithaarade... chariman tells him..."silk smitha"....and he responds..."ithaanalle silk smitha" and from then on he was called mandan raman.

Dear Fr.Pulickal's history exams were met with dread in our class. He would pick up blunders from our papers and post it on the school notice board for everyone to read with the culprits names also. Some of the blunders which the passage of time still hasnt eroded from our memories are
- Rani Laxmi Bai had no male natural hair! (Paili wuz the villain)
- The 1857 War was fought by the British to get Independence from India
- Elections are held by secret bullet.
(if any of u remember more of the blunders we made let me know)

Pulickal father launching a tirade against princi in class..."angere ayaalude andiyude shapeil oru fish tank ondaakeetonde"...as luck would have it princi walked by right then...they stare at each other and we are scared a fight would break out...fr.thayyil folds his hands and walks away with a small smile on his face and we are left wondering abt their curious chemistry.

Bazoo and Pothen had a fight in Std.8 but none of us bothered to mediate or find out the problem. A few hours later Pulickal strides into the class with a disgusted expression on his face. "Ninakkoke njan kore standard theri padippikkaam. Melaal immathiri chavarumaayitte ente aduthe varalle." And he proceeded to give us our first official class on obscenities. It was hilarious to say the least. The reason...Bazoo calls Pothen Blood Basket...Pothen responds by calling him Bloody Bus-stand...and they proceed with the case to none other than Puli!!!

Bazoo used to go for a tuition where owing to his extraordinary IQ he was the otherwise strict teacher's pet. But unfortunately for Bazoo the sir had a beautiful daughter from whom Bazoo could never take his eyes off. One day she passed by the tuition room, Bazoo's eyes followed her, the sir notices his distracted pupil and in his typical, high-pitched shrieks, "Bazoo, look here, look here"!!!

Muthu's mother is taking a young cousin of his for admission at loyola with the boy's parents. Muthu's mom is waxing eloquent about her son and the parents are impressed about muthu's prowess. That is when they run into Pulickal who sees muthu's mother and says..."Ningade makan rekshappedathilla...Avan historykke veendum thottu!!!" Muthu's mom struggles to wipe the sweat and shame off her face.

Paili and paramu in 7th are goin doubles on a cycle thru Vellayambalam and become ada to a scooterist and all 3 fall down. The man is very angry and he asks how can u big boys be so careless. To escape paramu tells him they are only in the 4th and the man softens down. That is when paili says..."eda nammal 7thil alle"...the man says..."paavam veenathinte aaghaathathil ethu classil padikkunnathu marannannu thonnunnu"....and paramu breathes a sigh of relief and paili is still confused.

In 10th standard...thomaskutty sir asks china wht is bacteria...apparently a simple question...he starts of confidently..."Bacteria is a microscopic organism..." and falters there...that is when someone prompts from behind...suspect that it is gani...that it cannot be seen with the naked eye...china not knowing wht that phrase meant and suspecting gani made a small mistake in his prompt but still having trust on the gani's judgement...finishes his answer with.."and bacteria cannot be seen by a naked man's eye!" That was one of the most hilarious biology periods ever.

The gal who cried at statue had a lot of admirers in our class like annan, chairman and raman. The guys noticed that whenever plans were made for movies, games, etc annan had started to excuse himself regularly everytime with a strange excuse..."ente oru thengum purayadathil, thenga pothikkan pokanam" and once after tuition he used this excuse and left while chairman and the other guys proceeded to the above said gal's house and surprised on seeing our new romeo, annan at his flame's place, chairman in anger and jest tells the gal, "Ivide thenga kedappondo...ivan nannayi pothiche tharum"!!!

In 1996 AniyathiPravu released and went on to run for a record 250 days in trivandrum, and we soon found out the reason for that. Every guy in our class had watched the movie 4-8 times at the theatre. That is when a friend in Sarvodaya shocked us by saying he watched the movie 28 times and that he saw Bazoo too at 18 of the shows!!! When quizzed, Bazooka, our prodiguous geek, revealed he had watched the movie a total of 30 times, from its releasing centre at Kripa, thru its first change at Pattom Kalpana, followed by our very own "hometheatre", Sreekaryam Joshi crowning his odyssey with a last lap at Kazhakootam Maharaja!!! Oh man...we were one crazy set of buggers.

Bazoo had this unbearable crush for this amazingly beautiful gal in St.Thomas. He didnt like the convential route everyone else was taking and got our daredevil, Thomman's advice on how to proceed in a revolutionary manner. Thomman tells him to walk towards the gal, stick his tongue out, then slowly pull it back and rub it over his lips in a sensuous manner. Bazooka soon finds the gal coming in his way, and does the job. Next day, the gal goes over to one of our guys, suspect it was Muthu who she was friends with and in a very concerned manner asks..."Did I hurt your friend bazoo in any way. Yesterday he stuck his tongue out and blared his lips and teeth at me in a threatening way." Muthu can't control his laughter and she adds..."to tell you the truth, he looked like a monkey at that moment." When thomman came to hear of this all he can say is, "Eda panna bazoo, nee ente paavanamaaya number ithrekke chalamaakiyallo"!

GG House was in a neck and neck race with JJ house to avoid relegation to the 4th spot in the Youth Festival. GG didnt have a participant for the Fancy Dress Competition. That is when Jaru struck upon an idea and found a hesitant prey in Pappachan. The costume was readied in no time and the event started. Pappachan comes out wearing a coat whose cuffs fell shorter than his wrist and a pant which didnt even reach his ankles and dusty, almost worn out shoes which failed the frantic black polishing it receieved prior. "Wow, we thought...jaru is a genius...Pappachan as a tramp...now who could have thought of that...he lives the role". That is when the thundering announcement fell upon the unwitting auditorium which had almost begun to cheer, "GG House presents Pappachan as Michael Jackson!!!". Thriller began to play from Joseph Uncle's sound system, Pappachan begins to wave at the crowd...loud hooting and catcalls can be heard including a shout from one of our guys..."pappacha, ineem moonwalk"...poor pappachan runs away all red-faced and we have to date never spared him the blushes and jaru the plotter joins in the laughter smugly with a njanonnum arinjille ramanarayana attitude!

For malayalam exams we have a question...shailikal(metaphors) upayogiche make sentences.One of the shailikal was baalikeramala(which i think means something difficult to do) paili's sentence for balikeramala-"randam loka maha yudhathila america japante balikeramalayil bomb ittu".
AMDG

P.S- No real names used. Only nicknames. Some of the protagonists in these stories have sworn at the altar of decency and gentlemandom and have experienced selective amnesia, especially now that they are hot market property! My apologies if despite all precautions taken, i still manage to cause pre or post-marital damages and discord.
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(AMDG - Ad Majorem De Glorium - For the Greater Glory of God!) With these 4 letters which didnt make sense to us, scribbled at the end, Fr.Pulickal encouraged us to wind up our answer paper in exams...we did it, hoping against hope that those 4 letters would compensate for an almost blank history answer paper coupled with the strictest valuation possible and save us from sure failure. This is a tribute to that man who opened the world of humour to us and taught us to laugh at ourselves. Fr.Pulickal...you are still fondly remembered. This is also a tribute to a great teacher who shepherded us admirably in the Plus Two years where a great majority of the above recounted incidents happened...DP was as much a part of our class as every one of my classmates. And Loyola...Long Live the school which gave us all the freedom for what we wanted to be and do. Finally The ISC'98 Batch...you guys were the best...you guys continue to evoke great spirit and cheer!

Oru Thattupolappan Vivaaha Vyavahaarika...

I feel odd...an inspiration for a post hit and it was on a topic i had the least idea of...marriages!!! More odd...this divine blog actually began with a recounting of an american wedding i attended...so inspite of all further oddities i will strive on to finish this post...it will be interesting for you the reader and me the blogger to find out where this goes! Apologies to my sis, her friends, my friends, our family, etc, etc whose interesting experiences is all that this post contains. A piece of trivia...my ancestor, the Mahakavi wrote a musical-play, Sara Vivaham 104 years ago, to be screened on the occasion of my great-grandfather marrying my great-grandmother...wonder how favorable the odds are for him to throw a paathaalakarandi down from heaven, to scoop me off, for writing such chavare!

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A girl reaches the marriageable age...a process akin to the software engineering life cycle begins..always begins by a requirements gathering. Lets see how a consensus was arrived at in my family.
Pops: The boy should be from a good family.
Mom: All i care for is a good boy!
Me: All i ask is he should have lived in Kerala at some point and...(secretly to my sis)i hope he drinks a bit too!
Pops: Why is that? 50% of malayali christians are expats!
Me(sheepishly): I'd like to talk to my future aliyan in pacha-malayalam!
Finally all eyes turn to the client for her concerns.
Sis: Haavoo!Thanks for asking me atleast now!

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And so begins the next phase: the groom search. At no other point in life can you ever get to see such a vivid assortment of the male mallu psyche.
Boy1: Looking for a comely girl who can sing, dance, cook, yaada yaada yaada!
Boy2: Lookin for a homely gal with us citizenship/green card but brought up in kerala.
Boy3: Looking for lovely gal from financially sound family, who is preferably a single child.
Boy4: I need a beautiful girl!!!

One night. I get a call from Pops.
Pops: Go online to ChavaraMatrimonial and look up this boy.
Me: Pops I am applying for jobs rite now!
Pops: Well somebody just applied for a bharthaav udyogam!
So I login on my sister's account to check this guy out...the same usual stuff. I am tempted to browse out the gals on the site. A message pops up - "Same Gender Search not allowed"! Dang...i didnt know the church was so hell bent on checking homosexuality!

My net-savvy dad even taught a still-surviving broker a lesson or two.
Pops: Send me a snap of the boy.
Broker: Okay sir! I will post it.
Pops: Dont you have an email? It is so much faster, you know.
Broker(now desperate):Then i will bring snap over!
Pops: Vendae Venda! Ennaal vandikooliyum tharanamello pinne!

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Then begins the emailing phase...by the end of this, you actually realize half the guys out there in the arranged-market are desperados, if not psychos...sympathies for the gals tagged to them for a lifetime!
Boy1(wud seem like a spammer in his spare time seeing his flurry of emails!): I have brought a 3 bedroom house for us.ur parents can live with us. me even ready to watch mallu movies with u!
Gal: Take it slow dude!
Boy1: Are you seeing someone (surprised that she didnt fall for all that?)
Gal: WTF!

Boy2: Take a look at some casual pictures of mine.
Each pic clicked on causing increasing panic. In one he shows his well-toned biceps. Another in front of a mirror. And finally the piece de resistance of the slide-show...he wears red-coloured goggles. Total Disaster!
Gal: Good Luck!

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And so the party moves to the backroom. Time for background check. Sometimes done by direct house visits, sometimes by asking common friends, inquiring at colleges studied, etc, etc.

A friend of mine, is asked by his dad abt a boy who was our senior in college they had found for their child.
Gal-Dad: Do u know this guy?
Friend: No...never heard of him.
Gal-Dad(relieved): Thank God! If you havent heard of him, it means the boy must be real nice, studious and didnt alambufy in college!

Marital background checks can come handy for college teachers...read on! One day The Savages, our gang in college was summoned to the ladies staff-room and the teachers ganged around, scolding us for all the alambs in class. Seeing us not bothered...
Teacher1: Ha Varatte! Ningalkke kalyaana samayam aakumbol pembillerude achanmaar chodhiche varum
Teacher2: Annu njangal kaanichu tharaam
Savage1: Njan love-marriageil vishwasikkunna aalaanu.
Teacher3: Ho thanne love cheyyaanum pembiller dhairyapedumo!

This happened at one such direct visit i had to attend to make up a quorum for marriage functions...i forget if it needs to be odd or an even number of people that needs to proceed.
Gal-Dad(a relative): How come the boy did his MD in such a useless field?
Boy-Dad(our family friend too, this man, now irritated): How come the gal got 80% for degree and only 54% for PG? Was she distracted by something?
Mom unable to stop laughing, me wondering if a fight would break out!

Another such visit of a Gal-Dad to a friend's workplace to interview him.
Gal-Dad: Do you smoke or drink?
Friend: Yeah!
Gal-Dad: Eh! But your parents said you dont.
Friend(to himself):Iyaal aaruva! Ithokke veetukaarode paranjitta ellaavarum cheyyaa?!

Nowadays a new tool rampantly used. Orkut! Every boy/gal's profile, scrapbook and friends-list is checked...many are rejected for being around in the site long but not having enough friends! So those on Orkut...be warned...either leave or get active, if inside!

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And now comes the Pennukaanal Chadangu. So long as you are neither the boy/gal involved it is fun. Some of my blog-pals like Anish and Silverine have written awesome posts on this endeavour.

Here is one incident that went almost wrong. To satisfy the quorum said somewhere above i had to go for this ceremony once. My cousin-chetan, the boy, all clean-shaven, me with a beard, arrive at the gal's house...
Gal-Dad(outstretched hand, towards me): Welcome, nice to meet you, i am george
Cousin(lunging forward, taking the hand): Njaanaanu cherukkan
Gal-Dad(to cousin): You look younger to him!
Gal-Dad apologizes profusely...my cousin made sure i never went with him to see gals after that!

Another one that went real wrong.
Boy: You said you were 5ft,4 and 52kgs in ur profile...look at u!
Gal: You said you were fair-complexioned, handsome and well-built...look at u!

This one had almost tragic repercussions. 30 years back. My uncle was to go for Pennu-Kaanal and his friend agreed to tag along for company. On the appointed day the friend arrives, decked in a new, finely stitched coat and suit while my uncle wore an old, almost worn out one. Uncle surveys the friend head-to-toe, realizes the danger of his bride-to-be casting her eyes on this upstart.
Uncle: Nee varaenda. Nee vannaal sheriyaavilla
Friend: But...But...this new suit...50 dollars...quorum...
Uncle: Quorums be damned. This is America!
The joke in later years was, this friend realizing how a man can change with the coming of a woman, swore at the altar of chronic bachelordom for 15 long years, until he finally yielded to nature's call!

Sometimes the Pennukaanal Chandange never happens...a friend's wife said she saw 28 guys before just talking over the fone with him just once...and she realized he was the right guy and decided to forego the Pennukaanal!

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And so my good people, an odyssey of unparallelled psychological profiling besides other physical, mental, material, logical, familial analyses leads to an engagement and then the marriage which despite all the above said human exertions is supposedly ordained in heaven! A post i thoroughly enjoyed penning...well i think the incidents above can be generalized across the kerala spectrum. But the troubles malayalis have to go through even after a marriage is over...i leave you with one final anecdote.

Man: We were the best of friends 30 years back. Yet he didnt invite me for his daughter's wedding.
Pops: Maybe he forgot.
Man: I am not inviting him for my daughter's wedding.
After the man leaves...
Mom: What's wrong with him? I'd be glad if there was one less wedding I'd be invited to.
We could only laugh in agreement at her pungent observation.

A Comic Strip

Of all the places were the muse can strike! This one happened in a classroom in Delhi during my Civil Service coaching. The hero of this cartoon was one of the sweetest boys i had met, totally uncorrupted by the ways of the world, preparing for the UPSC because it was his dad's big dream to see him as an IPS officer. I had this habit of drawing cartoon and mythical characters in school on the last pages of my notebook and was pleasantly surprised to find this talent revisiting 10 years later! Had totally forgotten about this...if not for my sister who miraculously discovered this one scribbled inside one of my notebooks.



P.S - Please open the image in another window. For some reason its all blurred.

In God, We Trust...

Anyways this one is about our family praying at night. Not all of the following account is a routine, though a lot of it is. I have just tossed in a lot of the funny moments that came to mind. Anyways life has taken us kids out of our home...but memories linger. This one is dedicated to my parents and grandparents who tried their best to give us a Christian upbringing and a horrible reminder of what the future that lies in store for us with our kids.

Night- 7:30-8:00pm
Mom: We should pray first.
Us: No! We should eat first.
Ammachi: But that is not how others do it. Will you people even pray after i am gone???

Night 8:30pm
Mom: "Pillere, praarthikkaan vaa"(Kids come to pray)
Sis: "Chach, come"!
Me: "Wait a minute!"(believe me, my version of a minute is a long long time!)
Pops: "I have one more short fone call to make."(his version of a short call is a still longer one.)
Ammachi(already seated, waiting impatiently, on the verge of sleeping, and looking at my mom accusingly): "Gracykutty...ithonnum nallathinalla"(All this is not for good).

Night 9:00pm. Finally the actors arrive. Everyone has a pre-reserved position. Ammachi on a chair by the dining table. Pops on the steps leading upstairs. Mom by the sofa-side. Sis seated against the TV stand and me resting against the wall. We are all set to begin.

The Holy Bible is taken up by mom. She passes it to me. I push it back to her. She passes it to sis. She pushes it away too initially before relenting and more often than not thrusts it into my lap and then another reverse tug-o-war begins.
Sis: "I read yesterday. Today its your turn."
Me: "I read three days at a stretch last week."
Finally a commanding voice from behind arises,
Pops: "Mathi! Da nee vaayikke" (That's enough!)
I close my eyes and randomly open a page...still scowling. Dang...that went to the Old Testement. So I try again. This time it is one of the Psalms. Again not my favorite. Moreover sis has beaten that to death through the years...cant really understand the female fascination with the Psalms. Then Finally.
Me: "Lukosinte Suvishesham. Adhyayam Pathinanju, Pathu Muthal Pathinanju Vareyulla Vaakyangal."(A reading from the Gospel of St.Luke. Chapter 15. Verses 10-15.)
Oh-ho! This is trouble. It is about the prodigal son. I gloss over that, and start with another section.
The reading is done. I turn a triumphant glance at my sis. Didnt mess my pronounciation of the malayalam unlike her. This is what she once read out..."Yeshu peedippicha prarthana"(The prayer Jesus tortured). The actual line was "Yeshu Padippicha Prarthana"(The prayer Jesus taught, Mathew 5:9). A look of "Ninne njan adutha vattom edutholam" is all i get back.

Everyone breaks out into a song. Its a lovely one. "Nithyasahaaya Naathe..." But the beginning is a problem. All of us suck at singing. So mom starts out. It is funny to hear her start diffidently, with ears sharpened waiting for us to join in the crooning. Usually ammachi piches in and gives her support and then the rest three of us open up. One night sis and i decided on a small prank, to not parttake in the singing and watch how far she can go on. Mom lost her confidence and turned back and gives the kind of look of having been utterly back-stabbed!

The next items in the itenerary. Our Father in Heaven, followed by Hail Mary, then the I Believe prayer, then the I Confess prayer, then the Hail Holy Queen prayer, then The Act of Contrition, and then another song...Walking with the Lord. All these are said in English and were a byproduct of the convent education and the jesuit schooling sis and i got. All the prayers are said at break-neck speed and mom tries to join us and then gives up midway panting. These days we have given up on the english prayers. It is all in malayalam. I think i must have forgotten all the above ones by now.

Now mom, ammachi and sis takes over. The rites begin in malayalam.
Chorus: "Swargasthanaaya Njangalude Pithaave, Ninte Naamam Poojitham Aakaname". (Our Father in Heaven, Holy be thy name)
Me: "Ninte Udarathin Phalamaaya Easo" (Blessed be the fruit of thy womb)
Everyone turns around. Cold Stares. I know what that look means. I messed up again. After the first line of Our Father I had jumped straight to the second line of Hail Mary. I raise my hands to conciliate everyone and decides to sit quietly. My sis opens her mouth and flashes her tongue at me. If it wasnt prayer time...i would have pulled it out.

All the while there is one man sitting behind who softly hums quite-inaudible somethings which none of us could really make out. That was Pops' way of praying. For me the interest in catching him in the act was heightened by my doubts that he was a communist at heart. After all Marx was the founding father of his bread-earner, Sociology and every sociologist i knew seemed to be a commie at heart. All his friends in the University were die-hard leftists, he rarely went to church in the 80's, and i suspect only once in the 70's...to marry my mom!!! Our library had scores of books on Marx, Engels, Lenin, et al. Even today without me asking, he will walk up and recount all the times of the week he visits a church or atleast a kurishadi...he must be hoping it makes an impact on me...but first impressions linger.

My mom follows the Syro-Malankara rite which is full of arcane prayers, syriani chants, and a tendency to neetufy the last syllable. You find it in the Orthodox Church too. Now comes my favorite...That is one part i understand...because its slow...and its a chance to playfully test my lung power. Everyone is taken aback with my new-found zest which dies with the passing of those lines.
Chorus:"Deyvameyyyy, nee Balavaaaaaaaaaanaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaakunnnnnnnnuuuuuuuuuuu."(God, you are so strong!!!)
Chorus:"Deyvameyyyy, nee Parishudhanaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaakunnnnnnnnuuuuuuuuuuu."(God, you are so sacred!!!) Wonder if god will do the same literal translation and laugh at the result!
"Pirrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!"
I looked back all deflated. The fart had spolt my best lines. But sis couldnt stop laughing, mom joined in, and even ammachi who keeps a sombre face during prayers joined. It had to be pops, or so we always decided and ganged up against him. Usually he took it sportingly but sometimes a whiff of anger would fleet through his face and we would all hurriedly resume.

Then begins two prayers that mom adores, i suspect to be novennas, but she doesnt bother. I have a short easy one of 3 small paras which i have been saying for years yet cant memorize. Can never finish without help from mum and sis. And then sis begins hers, which is pretty long, citing proudly from memory. Suddenly the phone rings. Mom turns back and looks at dad. He rushes to replace the reciever and comes back. The prayer resumes. Suddenly the other phone rings and Pop is out of the block like a 100mt sprinter.
Mom(loosing her cool): "Ee veetile phonukal ellaam njan thalli pottikkum"(I will break all the darned phones in this house.)

And finally, its all over. A few moments of meditation to wind up is an unspoken rule in the household. I look around wondering why noone leaves...and suspecting it to be a case of inertia, I am up in a moment rushing upstairs, taking the cue Pops dashes for the fone and sis lunges for the TV remote. Our cousins had to give sthuthi(praise...done with palms pressed like in namaste) to the elders before leaving but we both are so informal with our parents that it seemed awkward.
Mom:"Ingane Praarthichitte oru kaaryavum illa."(There is no point praying like this!)
A solemn, gloomy looking ammachi sits staring at a puzzled, thoughtful looking mom wondering how in a span of 20 years her family which contributed 3 priests to the church, one her son, and the other two her nephews...had changed...or was it the times?

It was just a half-hour in the 24 hour days of our lives...nowadays looking back one of the constant memories of home that i treasure are the images of our awkward family-prayers. I wont be a boy again, I maynot be a practising christian ever again, but i will say two things for sure...prayers bring families closer and they sure can be fun too!

Of Bungling Lovers, And Their Tales...

Whats funny these days is the amazing candour with which we discuss a subject that was among the most taboo and worst kept secrets in school and college life...love! Back then, it was an affair of private despair clumsily stashed away very from public glare in the deepest recesses of the mind, only to be reopened, mulled at, strategised, procrastinated and once in a while mustering the guts to make a public airing of feelings. Today with the girls who then captivated our hearts married and gone, we look back and laugh at all the embarassingly funny situations that infatuation, love and trying hard to keep the affairs of the heart secret produced. I had the good fortune to study with a huge set of dimwits from school through college who conceived ideas of megalomanical proportions to win over the ladies, and though we knew how bound for failure they were, yet we would prod them on in their heroics for a good laugh later on at the unfortunate victims expense. Today those duffers regret their heroics as even years later because of unforgiving, unforgetting friends using those mistakes to have a jolly, good laugh at reunions and idiots like me blogging those down for eternity.

School was the heyday of infatuations. What made our situation more precarious was that we kept Vishwamitranian ideals and a belief that girls entering the fold would damage our batch's unity. But boys will be boys, and from motta who could find his way to a gals heart so easily that we would stand respectfully at his side trying to get the "mullapoonkodiyettu kedakkum" effect to the forever love-lorn chunni to the tough and hardy hooper, everyday in schoollife had a most hilarious outpouring of somebody's woes, another's gaffes and someone's successes to narrate. As for me, I remember waiting for my crush, all over the place from Nanthencode Junction to Pattom
LIC wondering what mode of transport she used and finally giving up that tactic when she arrived with a policeman for escort...her dad wuz an IPS officer!!! But what took the cake was a love rectangle shaping up in class and Hooper forming a planning board with a few guys to deduce who the gal was interested in, and finally for all his efforts landing up with a nickname chairman which still stands! Well that was not the end of chairman's travails as he used sentiments to appeal to an HAC gal and she broke into tears in the middle of Statue Junction with hundreds of people watching and abba and gundu who accompanied chairman, running away with chair trying his best to console her... that was the last i ever heard of chairmans tryst with the fairer sex. Infact something happened so reminescent of Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar that we would tell muthu, "ninakkum oru waste penninum vendi loyolites peruvazhiyil chenne adiyondaakenda gathikedayi"!!! There are so many more tales that merited mention here but due to lack of space you readers could look up this link

College brought on dilemmas of the same nature as school. I again fell into the hands of a dedicated gang of rogues whose first priorities were mischief and adventure and who considered love and gals as waste of time and money. But then human nature has a way of asserting itself...viswan soon began writing love poems, shan began to study hard to catch up, kiran went from gyms to diets to naturopathy to loose weight, anoop trying to be quiet and obedient in class, i would try my hand at sitting studiously in the frontbenches...oh, unforgettable all our experiements at taming our wild ways and finding a path to reform! None of it really worked...we would think to ourselves, "ithinokke oru knack venam enne thonnunnu" and return to what we were best at...movies, cricket, booze and alambufying in class. Still remember the day Kevin hit on a novel way to propose to his lady love...got a t-shirt specially painted with a "Right Here Waiting for You" caption and borrowed a bike and a sunglass, waited for her at the college entrance and the gal walked right by giving just a smile and not making much of the hardly crafted tshirt. We then decided a more direct, "I love you" painted tshirt could do the trick but by then poor kevin had enough!!! Or the day Viswan got his first love letter, thanks to Yours Truely's nascent writing ability, arriving late in class that day with a most bewildered look on him...taking a seat somewhere in the front, and every few mins looking back sharply at us as we struggled to maintain a straight face and then at the unsuspecting girl, trying to glean where
exactly the change in his life's fortunes emanated from! The mutual distrust among our guys was so great...there were surprise visits to each others house, complete ransacking of computers, bnedrooms, almirahs for personal diary's and other incriminating evidences there were times the savages actually dreaded each other...actually we couldnt blame each other...shan's fone bill, viswan going to ponmudi or kovalam without us, i once went to a coffee shop and the next day as I gingerly stepped into class a shout from viswan, "Eda Kalla Kattankappi, nee aalu kollamallo" and the sinking feeling of embarassment with me wondering despite all precautions how they found out, chakkas secret visits to the gyms and so many more incidents always raised our suspicions...and at the other end of the spectrum there was arun hari who in between playing super spy and enfant terrible to us would "silently" scream at us with a "look at me, learn from me" attitude on how to lead life.

Its time to wind up this post...but i need to mention this incident from cet of a guy who was hellbent on eloping with his girlfriend, despite both sets of parents agreeing to a marriage that he took along with him goondas to whom he lied that the gal was in house arrest, tied up the gals parents, and strutted out with the gal and when the gals father told the truth of the story to the goondas, it wass the guy's turn to get thrashed by the goondas and spent a few days in hospital. Unbelievable...none of us ever understood his logic...whoever said love is blind could never have forseen such a situation...beats even the most twisted bollywood romance!! And to call it quits this last anecdote, may be the best of our schoolife...the gal who cried above drove into her akarshana valayam another of our classmates who started to excuse himself everytime with a strange excuse..."ente oru thengum purayadathil, thenga pothikkan pokanam" and once after tuition he used this excuse and left while chairman and the other guys proceeded to the above said gal's house and surprised on seeing our new romeo at his flame's place, chairman in anger
and jest tells the gal, "Ivide thenga kedappondo...ivan nannayi pothiche tharum"!!!...Oh My God, incidents like this as i have never been tired of saying made our school one of the most extraordinary experiences of our lifteime. Like its funny side, many of us experienced its sadder side too but with time, the scars heel and what remains is a wealth of humor that love and infatuations contributed. Well, unfortunately there's no way to rewind time, but there's always going to be days when I can unwind and laugh and wonder what an amazing maze of feelings, experiences and embarassments litters a man's path to maturity and adulthood. Back to my books now...hope I dont get lynched for this post!!!

From Vazhimutti to Meenmooti!!!

And so it came to pass that eight lazy souls who were the only surviving relics of an unbelievably eventful schoolife had an xmas vacation to spend in trivandrum. The year was 2001 and our final semester of engineering college life was winding its way to the finish line. Thomman, the most dreaded and loved loyolite ever in the annals of the school's history arrived in trivandrum from the NDA. The scars of a disastrous trip to Ponmudi, six months back had barely begun to heal. Under pouring rain seven of us had set out on 4 bikes, but Naga, G-Sec of the CET College Union, the redoubtable SFI leader of a dozen strikes in college and enfant terrible to the College Principal had his reputation in tatters as he fell of his bike thrice with the aid of the rain and a little extra beer to go with it...and the bike he loaned from ponnan looked just a shadow of its old pristine self. To add to it the bike thomman and i were on ran out of petrol and we pushed it in the rain all the way to Vithura which luckily happened to be "only" a few kilometers away. And motta escaped by the skin of his teeth when a flying squad jeep caught him and asked him to blow into the balloon...it wudnt inflate and since then our confidence in KP methods hit sky high. And so Thomman, Muthu, Paili, Raman, Khaja, Motta, Naga and I set off stopping on the way to buy supplies of barotta, beef, kuppis and water.

And thus we set off to the proverbial Meenmooti aided by descriptions of the place from Muthu and me which seemed to coincide. I started having my doubts when we got off at Kallar and began the trek as my earlier visit to Meenmooti had been from the Neyyar dam. Anyways we set off and in 45 mins reached an imposing single peice of rock towering almost 200 feet into the sky at an angle of 60degs. It almost looked like a cave inside and the Kallar river flowed by its side. We wondered for a sec if this was Meenmooti...but the place I had been to with the same name needed 2 hours of trekking thru the forest and there was a waterfall and a TB nearby. Muthu was doubtful as his cousins description of the place they had been to didnt seem to match exactly. And so we walked until we reached a clearing and on two sides there was a deep gorge and a vague path leading into the deep forest. Against our wiser counsel we set off and entered the jungle cracking dialogues like jagathy's in yodha..."ee forest muzhuvanum kaadaanallo" and like. By now it was well past noon and the jungle grew thicker and thicker, the sun's rays barely made it to the ground, and after a while we srarted seeing stones assembled like milekuttis... somebody remarked that this was the tamil nadu-kerala border and we dimwits shook our head in agreement.

Soon the path disappeared and again we kept troding...thoughts of the mythical meenmooti tempting us further and further into the thick rainforest. The tree barks had become so thick even clasping two of our hands around it wasnt enough to cover the diameter, we started seeing giant spider webs with a span of a meter. And then it happened...a load of fresh anappindam!!! A shout of unison was heard among the boys...ente amme...and the next second we ran ahead at breakneck speed(i wonder now we didnt run back!!!)...but it was increasingly becoming clear to me that my meenmooti was elsewhere and we were heading for the wrong track...i made a tepid suggestion but was dismissed rudely...i looked around to build my case and found support in motta and muthu. Khaja and Naga became fencesitters while Thomman, Paili and Raman wanted to push ahead. In normal circumstances with Thomman around I would have kept my cool but I got pissed that his Armyman's bravado was coming in the way of his seeing reason. In a fit of rage I threw my bag to the ground and said I wont move an inch and we had to head back the way we came. Soon sides were taken and a war of words began(I always thought it cliched seeing fights breaking out in movies when ppl got lost but now i realised the psychology behind that!). Soon I had my way and we headed back. But we had hardly taken 50 steps when we couldnt even know which way we came. The forest lay thick and spread in all directions...whatever path was there we had left behind almost an hour ago...

Bickering broke out again on pushing forward but I stood my ground...we were all tensed and the realization of being lost in this jungle dawned...we were still game for jokes though...motta got hold of a branch and started practising tarzan tricks in anticipation of a long spell of forest life...thomman and paili decided to scout the area and there they saw a spring emerging from under a rock and a stream flowing down...paili listened carefully and he heard the sound of a river in the distance...we had followed the kallar upstream for an hour and if we could get to it all we needed was to follow it downstream to reach the rock cave we had seen earlier...for a second we marvelled at paili's genius...he was always belittled with the nickname shishu from school but today he had risen to the occasion while all we self-proclaimed streetsmarts couldnt think straight...by now we had all come to agreement that the cave was meenmooti...and immediately we ran for our lives...on the way we saw a giant giant spider the like of which i'll never see again in my lifetime...we ran at double speed now and a kilometer on we saw the anapindam again...the relief it brought to our face cannot be described but we wondered if the kattana was close by and fled for our lives again!!!

Wearily climbing up a small hillock we had the golden moment of the trip...struggling to climb using a creeper, khaja was miffed to find a lazy and tired muthu hanging on to him in the hope that khaja would lift him up and khaja came up with a repartee i have not heard in the best of malayalam films...."uriyil thoongunnavante pariyil (tvm lingo for ass) thoongunnoda"...hearing this muthu gave a cry of "ente amme" and fell back in resignation while we threw our bags to the ground and broke out in a long long laugh. Although the sun had not set and it was just 4 or 5 in the evening the forest had begun to get dark but we reached the rocky banks of the kallar and followed the river to the cave. On getting to our campspot we just jumped into the river for the refreshing bath of our life...worries about the notorious under-currents which had taken many a young engg and medical student life at kallar was the last on our minds...we just had a memorable adventure to relish for a lifetime. After the bath we returned, suddenly felt religious and muthu recited the "gayatri mantra"(in the evening!) and paili said an "Our Father in Heaven" before we got down to business. Well by business, I really dont need to explain further but the end result of all this was the comic sight of muthu camping in a lungi and all set to fly to america taking exception to our constant barbs about the standard of his english and saying stuff like "I am standing on the 30degree inclination of a small rock" to prove he wasnot fit and we were concerned at not having bought ginger and garlic to ward off snakes but naga "gamefully" beginning a vomitting spree that drew a virtual lakhsmana rekha around us and oh the smell...let me not talk about that! There was a bonfire, old memories, new ones the day had given us, talks of where the future would take us...oh what a night of fun we had. The dialogue "Anapindam Oramyondo Jabba" just like the "Thomaskutty Vittoda" dialogue in In Hariharnagar became part of our class folklore and 4 years on, this december I see the faint outlines of another disastrous vacation taking concrete shape...

Heady Days...

The last few days I went thru old photos from college and school that had been lying on my computer for years and years. Thought of selecting a few and uploading here.
Snap 1 - The Kaadan Demo
Snap 2 - Viswan, the Mooppan!!!
Snap 3 - Bermuda Demo!!! Standing - Shinoj, Jofu, Jijo, Kozhi, Arun , me and Chaks...Sitting - Kevin, Shan, Sandy & Viswan
Snap 4 - Gundu, Ponnan, Muthu, Motta, Thomman and Jofu @ School - Undoubtedly our batch will become Loyola's best!
Snap 5 - With Motta at Kovalam - One of my favorite snaps for all time.

Ullaasapoothirikal Kannilaninjavale...

L to R: kannan(outside the stage...looks like he is watchin out for rotten eggs to drop the curtain!), me(don't i look like a dork!), shan(pink shirt, green pants...haha!), kiran(background...enjoyin!), kevin(background...barman all the way!), arun(he looks rite out of a jayan movie), viswan(is that a tanktop shirt???...lol), shinoj(oddly missing in the frame!). Courtesy and Gratitude: Shan for spending his valuable time digging this lousy(but this is the best we have!) snap out!

College wuz all about proving to others that the savages cud do anything under the sun. And Viswan, made it even more tougher for us. Hardly a day wud pass before he came up with a new scheme or adventure...that typical mischievious smile on his face and we were all shouting..."Oh No!...run for cover"...we dreaded his many whims and fancies...as a nice afternoon that wud have been spent lazing away in the backbenches irritating teachers and distracting classmates, shooting bullets, playing cat-and-bull, etc had to be sacrificed for a day-out-in-the sun, raising funds(college panavu pirivus were so fun) and begging for support from teachers and classmates, etc. And that wuz when the Arts Festival came up and we were just happy taking part in essay writing, dumb charades, poetry writing, drawing, music, etc when Viswan dropped the bombshell...we had to dance too! Now, we knew he wuz crazy...except for Arun Hari and Anoop the rest of us including Viswan wud have made mammooty strut with pride!

The infuriating thing about Viswan wuz his vulnerablity and compulsiveness when he cant have things his way...and as usual we fell in line. Finally practise was scheduled for next day...
SCENE-I Viswan's house. The song..."Who Let The Dogs Out"...the choreographer, Viswan himself, the dancers...Arun, Shan, Anoop, Kevin, me and Viswan. Kiran and Shinoj didnt even bother to turn up...they must have been laughing at our plight huddled in some a/c bar while we sweated. Viswan showed us a few steps, told us to practise till perfection and when we tried to sync up it wuz a total failure. Kevin and I were miserable...we had two-left foots, Shan and Arun lazy as ever, only Anoop like a diligent pupil lend his ears to Viswan...who finally ended up in tears as we excavated his cricket bat and headed for the medicos ground. SCENE-II My Basement. To distance us from the medicos ground viswan prudently shifts practise here. After a few mins of practise, the villainous cricket bat comes out again and finally we bargain with Viswan that if he let us play a game we wud obey him henceforth. After frantic calls to get Anoop, viswan despondently breaks the news that Anoop fled to mangalore seeing our performace yesterday and for fear of rotten eggs. After the game when we start practise in earnest, Kiran and Shinoj barge in and they ruin everything poking fun at our clumsy steps and mocking our "master". After half an hour of this parody, Shan announces he is tired and need refreshment...again beerings!

SCENE-III The Footloozers - By now Viswan had Arun on his side, and realizing his inability to coach us,he hires The Footloosers, Trivandrum's champion professional dance troupe to coach us. We stared open-mouthed at the steps they asked us to do... we hardly cud manage Viswans stupid moves...within a few minutes they realized our caliber...we wondered if they wud bolt as they huddled in serious thought at a corner...suddenly asked us if we would be interested in doing the 70's Ullasapoothiri song...we jumped at that idea as it wud be a demo-song and we wouldnt have to dance much. I sulked as Kevin and I were told our services werent required anymore...we were left with just 3 dancers now, Arun, Viswan and Shan and except for Arun, Viswan wuz so comic and Shan wuz so slow on the uptake we were sure to flop. But then we started thinking big...as always...we had to make sure of pooling all our talents to make this work...we had come too far to give up...we created a setting of a bar, arun, shan and viswan wud be dancers with arun as the evergreen action-hero of malayalam filmdom, the late Jayan, Kiran and Shinoj were made two smugglers, Kevin wud play a barman serving drinks and I wud do a singer and lip-sync over the mic.

It wuz meant to be comic all the way and we had to win the crowd...we rented 70's garishly colored, multi-pocketed tight shirts, bell bottoms and huge belts, we collected huge-rimmed sun-glasses from the 80's, we redid our hairstyles and got wigs for huge moustaches and sideburns. When the curtain opens, kevin stand behind the bar, as the singer...I would enter the stage when the music started with a guitar, dancing in a wild-70's disco way. I couldnt do it the way they wanted me to but everyone agreed the comic-effect of wht i tried to do wuz great. Then the dancers wud come in, followed by the smugglers, who were told to improvise on the stage, fake having a few drinks, converse briefly, exchange briefcases and at the end our Jayan(Arun) wud shoot them down with two pistols he stuck into his already tight pants!!

And so the big day arrived. The moment the music started, the cheering began thankfully, our adrenalin raced, I made my wild entry into the stage, our dancers were charged...Arun, a superb dancer and great mimic had perfected Jayan's mannerisms to impossibly sublime heights, Viswan and Shan finally got their steps and synced up well on stage though Shan wuz found jumping up and down in agony after the dance as Viswan accidentally kicked him while dancing, our smugglers and barman were perfect, we had won the crowd and they danced and sung with us all the way. Not a single rotten egg or tomato came our way, and at the end of the dance, our classmates, seniors, juniors and the abvp guys who hated our very sight came over to congratulate us. We did have a shock though...a bottle placed on the bar that we planned to celebrate with after the dance and which the barman wuz supposed to only fake in pouring to our smugglers, wuz served out by our "kannilunni" kevin to an overjoyed kiran and shinoj...but it didnt matter anymore as we were still taking in the euphoria of the moment. For one person, however it didnt last long...the Footloozers where hot on Viswans heels to settle their choreography dues for almost a month giving him a hard time...Viswan vowed never to crusade for a cause henceforth...and we heaved a sigh of relief. Well almost, because a month later he had started planning for Dishaa, our inter-collegiate technical fest, which countless batches of seniors broke their backs trying to organize!!!

P.S - I have suddenly started to feel like an old man...all the ribs abt silver jubilees and quarter centuries seems to have gotten to me...i think this post shud serve to remind me of a carefree jabban-of-a-long-time-back and his fun-loving comrade-in-arms who lived life to the fullest...whenever the boring, predictable side of Mr.Kattakayam threatens to engulf me.

War of the Worlds!!!

Yesterday at 12:40 PM I experienced my first power-cut in the US. Except for computers powering off it didnt sound like a big deal at first....but then a colleague came running saying the majority of Los Angeles was hit. Everyones mind wuz on the same topic...the day before's message from Al Qaeda that they wud hit LA and Melbourne. I wuz starving from having skipped breakfast and dinner the night before. To my dismay I found the elevators wouldnt work...came back to the office and decided to drink water to stave off the chickens in my tummy. That didnt work either. So began the climb down 24 storeys...at the half-way mark my limbs had joined my stomach in crying...but i wuz amazed by 40 and 50 year olds actually taking the steps up to get on with their work! At the lobby I had a real surprise..almost 500 odd people sprawled all around! Most were just back from lunch I presume and waiting for the power to be back and the elevators to start working!

I passed by them and walked over to the street...the traffic lights wouldnt work... it wasnt chaos yet...i really admired the people for that...its an unwritten rule here that the first cars at the crossroads get to go in whichever directions they want when the traffic lights are out...but I knew some people had violated that as sirens were wailing all around and LAPD cops hurrying to clear up traffic delays. I struggled on further ahead...I had almost 10 eateries to choose from in the vicinity...as I passed by each wuz met with a "Closed" sign...the reason wuz their cash drawers were automatic. Thought of calling a friend in the downtown area to find out how he wuz doing...the phone networks were jammed!!!

I seated myself at one of the outdoor tables of a restaurant...dang, i couldnt even get a chocolate to eat...well as you all must have guessed by now...I badly needed a reason to smile...and, and I thought abt what a power-cut means to Indians...its so much a part of our lives...we are so ready for it...ups's for our computers, inverters for our homes, generators for movie theaters...nothing ever comes to a standstill, power-cuts are so much a part of our life...here it felt like a miniaturized version of The War of the Worlds...I even imagined a meeting of head-honchos at Pentagon taking stock of the situation. I walked back to my office, dejected and tired...and on the way saw something that made me smile...who else but desis wud improvise in these situations...the sardarji who owned the gas station wudnt let something as silly as a power-cut affect his business...so wht if his gas pumps wudnt work...he still had a food mart...and in the good old-fashioned way he wuz noting his sales down on a ledger. I grabbed a muffin, an icecream sandwich and a cold coffee from there and headed back...on the way wuz stopped by countless number of people asking where I had procured my "lunch" and I wuz more than happy to send them in the way of the good sardar.

The lounge and lawns were all crowded and I headed to my car...had my lunch inside...there wuz a woman sleeping in the car next to mine and I wuz immediately tempted by this chance to grab an afernoon nap. I had been lazy all day and wuz just hoping for this kind of reprieve and i dozed off immediately. Walk up with a start around 2:40 and the woman in the neighboring car wuz gone...ran all the way back... there wuz none in sight...all the people had disappeared, no more wailing sirens...my War of the Worlds fancy wuz over...it wuz time to get back to my newly begun war with .Net Windows Forms...

Chiriyo Chiri....

CAUTION...this is painfully long. My bud Arun, has paid a glowing tribute to our college life through his blog. He has written so well I have wondered what way I could contribute...so here it comes. A compilation of all the anecdotes I remember that happened in those four funny years on a semester-by-semester break-up. Like old wine, many of these jokes get better and better and so worth remembering for a lifetime! I wish I could do justice to each of these incidents...each of our savages had their own style of talking, their own way of exclaiming and emoting and the comic timing that resulted from our amazing cameraderie which grew with each semester wuz just a treat and a pain in the ass for the classmates and teachers who spent 4 years of their life with us.Thank You guys for all the times you made me laugh day-in and day-out from Nov'98 to May'02 and for every moment I think abt you all that never fails to bring a wry smile to my face and evokes such sweet remembrances of life in Trivandrum that I will forever miss.

S1-S2:
Sabu Sir is teaching abt cell phones during his Basic Electronics class. Shan takes out his fathers old first generation gamandan cellphone flashes it at Sabu Sir and said to the poor, dumbstruck man, "Sir, saarinte notes vechundaakkiya cell phone aanu….pakshe work cheyyunnilla".

Viswan at the first day, first show screening of Usthad says ‘Enthaade aarkum ore ulsaham illaaathe, lalettante padam alle”…and shouts “Bolo, Bhaaaratha Mohanlal Ki Jai”….the locals and fans association members who made the bulk of the crowd started laughing at us!!!

Sheenu on loosing her black hero pen writes on the blackboard:
"LOST: Sheenu's Black Hero" to which an overjoyed Sooraj Thankappan who calls himself “Born in Africa…Lost in India” shouts out : "Yehhhhhhh"!!!Can never forget Sheenu scrambling desperately for the blackboard to rub off all she wrote.

We planned to spend the day at Neyyar Dam and everyone except for me wuz able to bunk class saying some reason or the other…fretting at my misfortune I jump out of the class throught the back windows onto the sunshade while the sir had turned towards the blackboard…finally find an empty classroom…to get off the sunshade and search all over campus for my mates…somebody tells me that having not seen me the trip wuz cancelled and the guys had headed back to the class…having nothing to do I walk into class and at the door the sir stares at me as though he wuz seeing a ghost…only a few minutes back he had looked at me…thankfully he didn’t check the attendance register!

During workshop class, Jessen asked by Foundry instructor to hand him a cleaner very intelligently gives him a rag of cotton wool. The cleaner actually happened to be a steel rod much unlike its name to jessen’s dismay, the sir's disgust and our unbridled laughter.

S-3:
During S-3 excursion we were passing through a junction just outside Ooty. Shinoj put his head outside the bus and was greeted by faces of some thamizhan locals.As it comes naturally to him, he wagged his middle finger at the unsuspecting guys. Just 10 metres on, the bus screeched to a halt due to traffic. We all waited breathlessly for the locals to come at us. Luckily the bus took off and we all put our heads out again. Guess what the name of the place was: Moonchikkal Junction!!!

During Logic Systems Design class Manoj Sir hauls up a noisy Shan and asks him: If you want a GATE(IC chip) at a shop how should u ask for it: Shan without any qualms answers: "I want a GATE".

Our last DMS class with Sreenivasan Sir,we all shouted,"Sir,Wish you a Happy Onam and a Happy Married Life" to which he replied ”Same to you all also" only to walk out of the class chammufied by our laughter at his gaffe.

There was a convent adjacent to Viswan’s house and Arun Hari wuz waiting for him to come and leaning against the wall having nothing better to do starts enticing a cat on the convent property with meows and other sounds. Suddenly a nun who wuz taking a shower in an outside bathroom on the property comes out and stares at Arun…fearing she had misunderstood him….he runs for his life leaving his bike behind!

S-4:
We planned a trip to Veli beach and as we went to buy the booze viswan obstinately declares there is a bar at Veli and we neednt take the trouble of buying in advance. Believing his words we reach Veli….guess wht the bar he referred to said…COOL BAR…selling soft drinks!!! Eduthitte thalli avane…

That same trip while walking on the beach Shan has a sudden desire to ride one of the horses there. He pays the guy, gets on the horse and tugs at the reins…the horse ambles ahead at a slow pace…shan turns to the guy and asks….”enthe anna, oru speed illaathe ee kuthirakke”….and the owner cracks his whip sending the horse racing ahead….shan is taken aback and is fearful….struggling to keep his balance grabs the kuthira’s mane which made it even more mad and it starts galloping faster…we fell over each other laughing with shan shouting out….”anna enne rekshikke”!!!

The savages were hanging outside one of our earliest joints, the LMS hostel compund wall by the junction. Suddenly anoop alerts the group that the warden is around and lower our voices….kiran as always busy on two things at the same time remarks…”aaraada ee warden”. He intended to ask it in the proper way but in the bonhomie that our group imparts it took a menacing “aaraada ee warden” tone. The warden overheard that, walked upto kiran and said in an equally menacing tone, “njaanaada ee warden”. Kiran wuz almost on his knees trying to apologize to the unheeding man while we didn’t know whether to laugh or to help Anoop and Kevin carry out their stuff if they got thrown out.

S-5:
Chakka walks into Café Magnet and tells the waiter…”10 barotta, 2 chilli gobis”…immediately the waiter asks “parcel aano sir” to which an embarrassed kiran replies in the negative.

This is my favorite Kevin goal. We took a hotel room at Kovalam once, and viswan while signing the register pens his name in there as Shaju Cherian. Kevin watching him intently immediately asks aloud ‘eda nee Viswanath Prasad alle?”. The receptionist having seen bigger thappaana’s than us thankfully ignored it…. Its strange really how a brilliant guy like him can be absolutely absent-minded at times.

Viswan is caught by his dad for drinking and he gets into trouble big time! Next day we spent an anxious time at college waiting for our heads to burst as his parents decide to conduct a Shatrusamhara Pooja to destroy all the evils afflicting their aruma santhanam!

S-6:
The guys are cutting class and playing cards at kevins lodge room. Kevin goes out, reappers and folding his fingers into a concave shape indicating a snake says “porathe oru aana”…and then makes a noise “meow”. the guys run out to see wht it is and all they see is the elephant and no sign of any cat or snake!

This is an unbelievable Kevin goal. We have to submit lab records at the end of the semester and all the guys are busy copying from the gals. After all the donkey’s work is done we start working on the Index page with the date and the name of the experiment done. Kevin writes all the names first and in one stretch starts filling in the dates.He goes 3/16/2001, 3/23/2001,3/30/2001,3/37/2001, 3/44/2001 and 3/51/2001!!! One of the gals helping us out peeks over his shoulder and catches the blunder! Kevin’s response...an unforgettably typical squeak…"Oh Njyo"!!!!!!

One day in class we get an emergency request for blood donation. Only Viswan’s and Anoop’s blood type matched and they headed out. On returning they said it was for a close relative of Seeja Teacher, enfant terrible to us. Sometime soon after, all the savages got hauled up in class by her for alambs…Immediately Anoop and Viswan start rubbing their hands in agony where the blood wuz taken….an embarrassed Seeja Teacher tells the two of them to sit while the rest of us remained standing for the rest of the class fuming at the two of them and baying for their blood.

Viswan and Arun decide to start working out at Power Gym at Palayam. Chakka frantically tells them Power is not good, and it’s a fucked up place and Viswan and Arun decide not to go. Next morning however they change their mind and the first sight they see at the gym…Kiran struggling with dumbbells!!!...and on seeing them gives the most chammufied look ever. We later found out he had been at it for more than a month while all the time claiming he wuz headed for some naturopathy treatment for weight loss.

Jayasudha Teacher realized one day that guys were bunking class while she wuz teaching. She says, "Aarokkeya chaadi poyothe enne njan kandupidikkum"...and she looks to the nice, studious folks in the class for assistance. Krishnakumar, our rank-holder's response leaves her stunned..."teacher, namukke dummy itte nokaam"!!!

S-7:
Viswan asked by Rajeev,SFI leader to join in a fight against some
ABVP guys tells him,Eda njan innale gym il randu dumbbell
pokkiyappazhathekku biceps sprain cheythu.che,sorry
eda, allengil.........

The convent adjacent to Viswan’s house had begun to double up as a Ladies Hostel too and suddenly every evening all the guys wud arrive after class to play cricket with a punctuality that seemed odd. Everybody was playing their best shots, bowling bouncers, taking sharp catches amidst taking a peak back at the gals spying on us from their rooms which seemed all too suspicious to Viswan’s watchman who ensured another interesting pastime got nipped in the bud.

In S-4 Viswan(Viswanath Prasad) had bought a thin, frail dog and called him Dexter. It wuz fun watching him trying to train the dog who all he did was bark and eat. In two years time Dexter had become a fat, huge dog while Viswan had lost a lot of weight. We started joking all the food cooked in his home wuz meant for Dexter and that he wuz almost like a brother to Viswan now and we started calling Dexter, Dexter Prasad.

(Courtesy:Arun Hari) Place: sandy/kevins house in pappanamcode. lunch time.and the servant there prepares some real good food...and there are 4-5 ppl apart from sandy/kevin who stay there...so the food is meant for all...so its lunch time and our dear chakka decides to dig in on a light snack...apparently he likes the food so much that he takes helping after helping....all the while, sandy is looking with horror at the carnage...and cant say anything as chakka is understandably enjoying himself without realising other hungry ppl will come in a short whileand beat up poor sandy n kevin for missing food....here goes the killer punch...chakka goes upto sandy (very seriously) and says...."ninte ee jolikkari kollamallodey....adipoli food...njanoru karyam cheyyam...i will give a fixed amount of money additional and she can cook for me also"...that was the last straw on poor sandy's back...he shoots back with desperation and suppressed anger...."EE veettil oru kalame ollu"!!!!.....and we all burst at our seams laughing.

S-8:
Exam time. I walk past kevin shoving away a branch of a small tree under which we were all huddled. The branch recoils and hits Kevin who is deep in last-minute study and thinking somebody hits him turns around and shouts “eda patti” and grabs hold of the person who hit him…and is shocked to see the branch in his hands wondering how it cud ever do that to him!!!

We were out all night plastering the walls of trivandrum with our dishaa’ 02 posters. By 4 am we were famished and drove all around the city trying to find a thattukada. We rejoiced upon stumbling upon one at pattom and what followed was a plunder. Dosa upon dosa, countless omlettes and beef were dispatched away in minutes. The owner told us ningal ellaam theerthu but kiran so engrossed in eating never heard that and asks..”ineem enthe onde anna”…and the guy shot back “ineem ee kadayum koode olle”! Man I never laughed that loud at 4:30 in the morning.

Kevin was told to book tickets for our train journey to Bangalore to appear for an MBA entrance exam. On the appointed day our guys board the train at thampanoor…everyone is as usual in high spirits…on boarding the train chakka is more gregarious than normal and says…”ningal enne thettidharikkalle…apparthe compartmentil neena cherian(ex-vj-suryatv) onde…we are acquaintances…ningalude koode ethra neram irikkaan pattum enne ariyilla”…and on making the way to their seats finds a man perched there…chakka immediately…”plaze daant misunderstand…this is our seat” and the man a bit shaken at this 100+ kg guy talking like this to him says meekly…”ithente seat aanu…enikke ticket onde”. Chakka not in a mood to let it go throws his ticket towards the man who carefully looks at it and then fighting hard to suppress a smile of victory tells chakka to look at the date more carefully. Instead of jan 14 kevin had taken the tickets for feb 14 and there wuz an exam to be written!!! Somehow the guys frantically manage to find space on a bus headed to blore and the guys were angrily waiting to give an earful to Kevin who wuz to board at the kollam railway station and calls him up…explaining to him his abadham amidst therivilis and their plan to travel by bus…they totally loose their composure when an unrepentant Kevin says…”enikke businte middle seat thanne venam”!!!

P.S - Long back when we were bidding farewell to college I wrote an autograph for every person who studied with me during those four glorious years. A character sketch of the many protagonists who lighted up this post can be found here in alphabetic order.

The Lighter Side of American Life...

Its not often we get to laugh a lot in America but when things happens it becomes the stuff of folklore for us. Dunno how funny these will turn out in writing but when these incidents came to light we laughed days on end abt them.

Mithun calls up Jacob, our Loyola classmate who is an executive at Asian Paints one day and says, "Is this Jacob? I want to place a large order". Jaru licks his lips in anticipation and tells him to go on. "Well, I want some kummayam to whitewash the White House"...leaving the first of our IIMians flummoxed!

Muthu is an expert at telling tall tales...he punctuates it with wild gesticulaions, eyes that light up like a thousand suns, a flair for talking that wud make a sreekantan nair of asianet's nammal thammil fame proud...for years he has given our batch wholesome entertainment of the highest order...and once he visted viswan at new york and there he held his audience of other mallus speechless in rapt attention with his stories. That was when he told them of his friend who had come onsite and was arrested by the FBI for taking fotos of the american embassy in Washington D.C. Unfortunately for him one of the guys was sharp enuf and asked,"americayil evidayaada american embassy"! and they were all like "eeshwara ivan ithreyum neram nammalode paranjathellaam odukkathe vedikalaayirunnallo"!

Muthu did an internship last summer for a chain of Burger King stores in Chicago to suggest cost-cutting measures and on the first day his manager suggested he sit in the store to observe their operations. Having nothing better to do he starts munching on french fries cooked for the customers...after watching this for an hour a malayali working there comes to him and says..."ithaanalle cost cutting"!

One day in between my job search I tell muthu I am goin to apply for a teaching job at the LA County School. "Dey, nee veruthe nadakkunna paavam karamban payyanmaarude thokkine paniyondaakale"...i had turned to him in search of support but his cruel reply made sure a glorious career in teaching got cut short even b4 it started.

Viswan was visiting california for our xmas vacations in 2002. it wuz nitetime and we were walking like in india...our bodies grazing, an occasional arm thrown over the shoulder and like. A homeless kallu passes by us...then turns around and remarks.....'hey u guys gay???"....we were embarassed and moved apart....we thought that wuz the end of it but his next line totally floored us... "brothers u dont know what ur missing"!

Viswan is on a flight and an airhostess accidentally trips and falls on him. She apologizes profusely to which the demo mannan's reply was..."No worries...It was my pleasure".

Back home for our summer vacation in 2003...first thing viswan who reached a few days earlier did when i arrived was give a call to my home. As soon as he hears the hello on the other end he lets out a blood-curling "Aliyaaaaa".My dad had answered the fone...all he said was "hold cheyye, aliyane njan ippam fone kodukkkaam" leaving viswan chammufied.

Abhijith did his schooling in england before moving to kerala. His malayalam is weaker than the rest and one day one of our guys at usc kept making fun of him continuously. Not being able to take it any further Abhi says, "Dude,either on the ashaan's chest, or outside the kalari"!

We always take the liberty of talking malayalam in public since noone around understands.But once at the indian theater we were at the restroom during the interval of a malayalam film. My leak done and abt to leave mathew asks me "theateril keruvano" to which i inopportunely said "illa illa cinema thodangeete kerunnolle...chicks okke veleela" only to see almost a dozen heads pop up to take a look at the culprits. everyone around were mallus! i ran out leaving mathew still peeing away, helplessly and embarassed, amidst uncles who chuckled at his discomfiture.

A usc senior got caught for jaywalking at midnight...and rather than keeping quiet tells the LAPD officer..."Is this the only crime happening here"...and the officer promptly pulls out his ledger and writes him a ticket for $100 and tells him..."I wuz just abt to let u off when u opened ur mouth!"

Abhi also racked up a ticket for jaywalking and he calls his mom and mournfully tells her,"amma, enikke jaywalkingine ticket kitti". Immediately she asks..."athenthada, avide aanungalude koode nadakkunnathu illegal aano?".Either the poor aunty had heard it as gaywalking or as we frequently tell him even she has her doubts abt Abhi!

Once I called my mom, and excitedly tells her I got an interview coming up with Boeing. She immediately asks, "Etha mone, Boeing Boeing aano?"

Mathew and I were doing an assignment at the library. I get a drawing wrong and turns to the gori next to me, "Excuse me, do you have a rubber"...She shouts out "WHAT??!!" leaving me frozen for a few seconds and mathew jumps right in and says, "he meant do you have an eraser" and apologizes.Dang...I wish I had watched American Desi earlier.

Pappanabhan's full name is ananthapadmanabhan karthikeyan sulekha. All the situations a name like that cud do in a country like this is just outright hilarious.
-Once he applied for a credit card and it had only enuf space for his middle and last name and coz of that the credit card got rejected.
-On doing an immigration verification the INS had no record of his entry into the US bcoz the computer wouldnt allow more than 30 characters.
-Making calls to call-centers is the worst part.Pronouncing his name doesnt work and so he has to spell each letter out. Once I went to take a shower and he took my cellfone promising to make a quick support call. Half an hour later I got out, and there he was still spelling out his name and all parties concerned in the call are at their wits end as they got alphabets wrong somewhere in the middle and were still trying to sort out the mess that I didnt know whether to be angry at his wasting my daytime minutes or to laugh out at the comic interaction btw the hapless puppy and the frustrated gal on the other end. Every customer support call he makes is preceded by a short prayer to have it routed to india!
Finally he arrived at a solution for his name bug...started calling himself Andy Padman!

Mathew and me took a break from studies and headed out for our first baseball match. usc wuz playing stanford. we didnt know much abt the game and were totally lost. suddenly a usc batter struck a powerful shot and started running. mathew wuz up in a second and lustily cheering. i decided to do my bit and whistled. Suddenly we realized the crowd had turned towards us and wuz giving hostile glares....we hadnt noticed that a catch was taken...filled with shame and fear of an adi, we ran for our life.

A professor is holding forte in class.Suddenly we hear one of our classmates,a desi call him sir. The professors response wuz unforgettable..."I have not yet been knighted by the English Queen, so until that day comes you can address me as Professor or by my first name"!

Coming to the US...at the Tokyo International Airport I realized I had a Japanese version of my name....everywhere kept being called Mr.Kattakama.

Once, mathew was working early mornings at his campus job office when he heard a gal scream. he ran to her side and starts comforting the hot babe but she shakes him off and points in the direction of the corridor and tells him to catch the thief who took her money.Our chivalrous hero confidently moved to the corridor and he sees the assailant,a 6'5" hefty kallu walking away coolly.The guy turns back and stares menacingly at mathaichan.The gal yells at mathew "catch him, catch him"...mathew takes a few hesitant steps towards the man...and slowly tells him without the gori hearing..."run away, please run away".Luckily for him the guy starts running and the gal thanks him for being a "big help"!

vikas my usc roomie had this habit of talking on the fone to his bhayya at nite on the road in front of our apt. our area wuz notorious for crimes as we were close to the LA ghettos. one day a kallu crept up beside him on a cycle tapped him on his shoulder and rasped..."gimme all ur money or i will shoot u"...having only his dear fone and nothing else...all he cud plead wuz...'u want my money...u want my money??" and gave the kallu the last thing he wud ever expect from a desi....a resounding kick on his balls! the kallu left his cycle behind and ran for his life. that day on vikas became a symbol of pride and courage among our desi community while vikas shivers to think wht wud have happened if the guy really had a gun on him as he had boasted!!!

Anyways most of us are past the fresh of the boat stage and there are fewer anecdotes to recite each time we all meet up...all our guys are slowly getting smug and comfortable with life in america...its true whether in movies or in life...the best comedy happens when we are in the struggling phase. Tomorrow viswan is coming to LA for the weekend, we meet after 6 months...deyvame enthokke prashnangalilaanontho chenne chadaan pokunna ineem!