How do you solve a ‘poblem’ like Zubri Khan ?

Recent ‘happenings’ had made me solemnly vow to myself that I would not do this dude a favour and write him a blog (can you believe that people actually request me to blog on them nowadays?!!!!) But then again, if you’ve read any of my older blogs, I’m sure you’d agree with me that the best revenge possible would be for me to finish my blog on him and publish it as soon as possible and make it as long as possible while I’m at it. The ‘happenings’ in question are thus –

Nishant recently hosted a swell party at this swanky restaurant in Koramangala. He’d invited most of his engineering classmates including yours truly (and the missus) and Mr. Zubri Khan. While attempting to make polite conversation with him, Mrs. Pollo was able to sense that something was afoot in his life that concerned his marriage. A little poking and prodding revealed that ‘things’ were indeed afoot and in ‘that’ general direction but ‘things’ weren’t fully confirmed as yet. Employing techniques borrowed from Freudian methods of psycho-analysis, we then proceeded to ‘extract’ some information about what was indeed ‘confirmed’, because by his own admission, some of it was yet ‘not fully confirmed’. It was then that Zubair, suffering from a mild panic attack combined with the claustrophobic effect that Mrs. Pollo and her fellow interrogators were having on him, let it slip that the only things confirmed were the girl, the venue and the date of the marriage and that he had nothing to do with any robberies which happened in March in Jayanagar, that he didn’t know Mr. Ramalingaraju personally and that he’d never in his life heard of the Dandupalya Gang :D … Well, knowing Zubair all these years, we let this unexpected torrent of completely unrelated information slide right by, as the guy sometimes says things which nobody in their right senses would, when in a tight spot … and boy was he in a real tight spot this time. If we might analyse the information that Mr. Khan was so kind to ‘give’ us, we might realize that there was indeed a lot of ‘unconfirmed things’ in his journey towards marital bliss. Some of those ‘things’ (not necessarily in the ascending or descending order of the degree of their importance or chronology) are as follows –

1) The names of all of his seven kids
2) The venue of the ‘rite of passage’ of his sons (of ‘fore’most importance if you ask me … people who find this distasteful may ‘skin’ me alive)
3) The department store from which to procure his first rubber-latex contraceptive sheath before indulging in conjugation (if you’re like me, I’m sure you couldn’t say words like ‘conjugation’ or ‘mensuration’ out loud in Maths class without blushing)
4) The room number of the honeymoon suite in a hotel in Madagascar which had to preferably contain the last two digits of the the 10th root of the 56th largest prime number

All said and done, the dude promptly went and got himself engaged to the girl a couple of days after the said interrogation happened ... and didn't call any of us ... can you believe that ?!!!! @%$#$

When Zubair took me aside once, and asked me how my blog on him was shaping up, the term ‘asking for it’ came to mind. We can’t really blame the guy for this apparent lack of judgement on his part, because, some people like Mr. Maney swear to this day that my blog was the acid test for his wife when it came to her choosing him as her life partner. But then again, it’s Zubri that we’re talking about here and he’s ‘asked for it’ pretty much for as long as we’ve known him. Now that he’s on the verge of getting hitched, he believes in all earnestness that a few words penned by yours truly would be just the icing on the cake to make the girl (now that we’ve conclusively established that there is indeed a girl and he's even engaged to her for crying out loud) fall head over heels in love with him. People like Mr. Pereira would argue otherwise however, as was obvious from his wife’s conspicuous absence at a recent party that happened shortly after my blog on him was released.

Mr. Zubri Khan, loveable ol’ fool that he is, more often than not provided that little bit of entertainment that brightened up our days back in engineering college, with his ‘unique’ pronunciation, his timeless quips (‘timeless’ as in ‘with an utter lack of timing’ and not ‘classic’:D ) and numerous other things which most people would simply attribute to his simply being at the wrong place at the wrong time (but which we all found incredibly amusing nonetheless) … Read on …

If you’ve seen the old classic musical – ‘The Sound Of Music’, you’d be familiar with the song that goes –

“How do you solve a problem like Maria?
How do you catch a cloud and pin it down?
How do you find a word that means Maria?
A flibbertijibbet! A will-o'-the wisp! A clown!” ...

Well, if Zubair attempted to sing this song, it’d come out something like –

“ ‘Ow do you ‘saalv’ eh poblem like Mawiaaaah?
‘Ow do you catch eh cwouud and pin it doun ?
‘Ow do you fiend eh word that means Mawiaaaah?
Eh fwiberpibibbep! Eh wiwowawisp ! Eh Cwoun!” ...

How is this relevant to how we all know (and love) Zubair, you may ask. You really have to ‘hear’ it to believe it. Some people might argue with me here that his pronunciation isn’t as bad as it’s being portrayed to be and the above example is an over-exaggeration (Mr. Pereira, for instance keeps insisting that the only thing is didn't exaggerate was 8 inches long) of fact. But take it from somebody who’s known him for as long as I have, it’s more fun this way! The years in engineering college were full of ‘poblems’ galore, ‘wallies’ (rallies) gone bad, ‘helicafters’ and what not!!

The first time that we saw the scrawny little guy on campus was way after we all joined the first term for the ‘tronics course. He’d joined UVCE from another institution through an exchange programme, some time in the middle of the term and arrived at the motorcycle parking lot one morning on his scooty. I still remember the very first jab (the first of hundreds that would follow) that I made at him about his scooty (since I had a way more masculine ‘Kinetic Honda’ - or so I sincerely believed - back then :D ) which was met with the same blank smile that you’d get from him if you stabbed him with a knife and stood there pushing it further in, looking elsewhere and whistling to show him that you weren’t the one doing it.

We referred to the dude by a myriad of names during Engineering ranging from – Zubri, Zubri Khan, Zoober Man and so on, but the name that really caught on was the name that he’s most famously known by within our circle … Sound the trumpets … ‘Pubair’!! (This name is to be pronounced so that the first part rhymes with ‘tube’ and the second part with ‘hair’)

Some of you must be curious now about the origins of this rather innocent sounding name and some others amongst you must also be wondering what all the fanfare and hoopla is all about as the name doesn’t even sound creative for a nickname. It merely appears to be an innocuous nickname that’s derived by simply replacing the first letter of a person's name with a ‘P’ so that a name like ‘Manju’ becomes ‘Panju’ or a ‘Harsha’ becomes ‘Parsha’. These names, being completely 'unfunny' aside, hardly even make sense. But do bear with me, for all shall be clear as crystal very shortly.

It was a few days after the ominous meeting in the parking lot where Zubair and I got off completely on the wrong foot, when we were all sitting in class, maths class to be precise. It was like any other maths class where our Prof., HP, went on and on in that monotonous drone that she considered her ‘teaching voice’. While some students were completely enthralled by her teaching (and some other sick first benchers, by her), some other of us couldn’t wait for that loose piece of plaster on the ceiling above the teachers’ stage to fall on her head and rid us of the trauma we associated with maths class and HP once and for all. She seemed to be able to read our minds (or maybe it was the placards that some of us were holding up), for she once announced in class that all those of us who were pathologically uninterested in what transpired during maths class and would be happier catching dangerous nameless diseases in the canteen (from eating … what were you thinking?), could walk out of class now and never have to worry about attendance … ever. No sooner than she had uttered the last word of that magical sentence, had the last of us dudes disappeared from Maths class, never to return. That was much later, however, than the incident that I am about to recount ...

Maths class had always been the venue of some really remarkable, serendipitous discoveries. It was here that we all discovered the joys associated with the Binomial theorem, the Fourier Series, Legendre Polynomials, Laplace transforms and much much more. Many of the distinguished denizens of the last benches however, also discovered many other things which were equally serendipitous and equally joyous and almost invariably always in Maths class much to HP’s chagrin. Some of the most important discoveries made in the order of their importance are as follows -

1) Katthe discovered that there was life on Manju’s back.
2) Mr. Maney and I discovered that Harsha could talk after rejecting Mr. Betgeri’s theory that it was his mustache which was alive and which could converse in five different languages
3) Mr. ‘Yellow coat’ a.k.a ‘The dude with caliber’ a.k.a ‘My best enemy’ discovered the joys of porn and the eleventh commandment
4) Mr. Betgeri discovered that Kulfi II could say – “Go F*** yourself” in Marathi

But, by far the most remarkable discovery was made by yours truly, one afternoon, during a particularly boring session …

The ceiling fan was grunting away and so was HP. Everybody seemed to be particularly fascinated by the day’s class. There was something about the perfume that HP was wearing that day because every single person in the first ten rows seemed to be in rapt attention of every syllable that she was uttering. Even Harsha and Nishant seemed to be taking notes and I was slowly but surely dying of boredom.

That was when I saw ‘it’. Math’s class had helped me hone my ESP to a level where I could now see reality in terms of streaming bits of information rather than what the machines wanted us to see. I had also realized one day sitting in the canteen that the truth was that ‘there was no spoon’ and we had to use our hands to eat... Now as I sat in Maths class, I saw it first through the corner of my eye ...

That head ... that head, that was attached to the body that sat on the bench in front of mine ... it reminded me of something ... something very familiar, yet something that I was unable to put my finger on ... the answer eluded me ... like it did a desperate Greek God trying to find the fountain of youth hidden deep amidst the black, forbidden forest. Something did not smell right about this. I had to let go ... I had to be one with the Matrix ...

Then ‘it’ hit me ... like a ten rupee note hits someone square between the eyes when he’s least expecting it. Of course I had seen that head before! We all had see that head before sometime or the other but we were too plugged in to be able to see it for what it truly was. I would love to reveal the entire truth behind the glorious vision that we beheld that day in maths class and share the joy we experienced in discovering what it truly was with you, but I’m afraid that the truth would just be too gross to reveal in pub(l)ic ... and trust me when I say that once you realize the truth, you’ll never, I repeat, NEVER, be able to see the guy the same way ever again. How this lead to Zubri coming to be known as ‘Pubair’, well, go figure!

One thing, I’ll grant though is that the dude had an innate understanding of how technology worked. So much so, that most of us (including yours truly as a last resort) would turn to him for help with our computers when all that we could do was, throw our hands up in frustration when the confounded contraptions would refuse to work. When I say that he had an ‘understanding’ of technology, trust me when I say that I’ve often wondered if he could talk to computers of all kinds. I once invited him over to take a look at my PC which had suddenly stopped working after I installed a new nVidia RIVA TNT II card on the motherboard’s AGP port. After the initial exchange of pleasantries when he arrived, I left him alone in my room with my PC only to sneak back and watch him through parted curtains. I swear to you that what I’m about to recount to you is what actually happened that day. He unscrewed the cabinet screws, slid the outer casing off and proceeded to extract the AGP card from its slot on the motherboard. What he did after that however, was straight out of the Twilight Zone, for it appeared to me that he was talking to the card and stroking it the way you would, a very small child. He then bent down and looked into the cabinet, and then appeared to be whispering something into it, after completing which he proceeded to install the card again and screw the cabinet's cover back on. He then called me back into the room, turned the PC’s power back on and Voila! The PC came on and booted up as though there had been absolutely nothing wrong with it. I was astonished, flabbergasted and at a complete loss for words at what had just transpired but I decided to maintain my composure and asked him about how he’d gone about fixing the problem. The dude, merely smiles angelically and says (I kid you not!) – “Sometimes, it takes time for a graphics card, especially AGP graphics accelerators to ‘get used’ to the motherboard. My uncle has a PC assembly business and even he often advises people to give the hardware a few days before it starts working glitch free”. That was when my lower jaw hit the floor and broke the flooring tiles which you can see to this day if you visit my room in our old apartment.

Always the motor sport enthusiast, Zubair once had us convinced for a while, shortly after engineering, that he would be moving to Canada to pursue a career in 'wally cars'. He’d always be the first one to suggest Go-Kart racing when we’d be making plans for an outing ... and to his credit, he was good, really good! He was the first among us to actually drive a car and Zubri, Kulfi, Mr. Betgeri and I would sometimes go out in his Maruti Omni and have a blast. Being an excellent driver, Zubair could always be trusted to drive responsibly even while being a tad aggressive in unruly traffic. The only major accident that he’s ever had that involved a motor vehicle was when he was not the one doing the driving (or riding in this case). The entire gang was one its way to a Dhaba in Marathahalli and as always this meant that there would be a motorcade of around twenty people on ten two-wheelers. Zubair, a rare misjudgement on his part, allowed Kulfi to ride his RX, opting to sit pillion himself. As we saw Kulfi hurtling down airport road at a break-neck velocity, we knew that Zubair had bought himself a date with disaster and our worst fears came horribly, horribly true, for about a kilometer down the road, we saw that an accident had occurred between a car and a motorbike. On getting closer, we realized that the badly mangled bike which lay on the curb was Zubri’s RX and that Kulfi and he had already been taken to the emergency ward at Manipal Hospital as, fortunately, (I know that there’s nothing fortunate about an accident) the accident had occurred right outside the hospital. On reaching the ward, we realized that Kulfi was unscathed but Zubair had been wounded badly on his face, arms and his legs but to our collective relief, had no broken bones or internal injuries. There was a light moment even amidst all that chaos when we learnt that the first words that Zubair uttered when he came to (he’d lost consciousness for a while) were – “How am I going to propose to her now?” He’d been waiting to propose to this girl for a while then and realizing that his face now bore wounds which would leave a scar when they healed, believed that his prospects were completely shattered (How's that for comic relief!). My parents arrived at the hospital a little later and we drove Zubair back home to his family. Being the ever tenacious one, Zubair was able to overcome even this adversity and the wounds miraculously left no scars – on his face or his heart for that matter, for Zubair would now change his outlook towards life and approach each day with renewed zeal. In his own words – “No Poblem!”

His love for technology saw him ride the road to success from one great job to the next and it’s only with stubborn grit, determination and resolve that he finds himself where he is today. So much so, that many people actually consider him to be some sort of guru in Network Technology.

There are some people whom you admire from the first second you meet them. Some, we openly admire, while some others we admire secretly but ridicule in public just because they are sporting enough to take the torrent of taunts that are hurled at them and because admitting that we admired them would tarnish our own ‘cool’ image. Every college and school has both, the cool kids (the ‘clique’ so to speak) and the uncool kids. I’ve been a bit of both in my life. The four years I spent at UVCE are closest to my heart because for the first time in my life, I met people who didn’t judge other people, who didn’t have ‘attitude’ problems, who were humble and down to earth and genuinely good at heart. Zubair has been the butt of all our ribbing and teasing in college but we didn’t hate the guy. Nay! Quite contrary to what our demeanour towards him would suggest, we really liked being in the company of the dude, for after all, can any one of us honestly say that they can think of life in UVCE without Zubair?

All things said and done, there is one undeniable fact about Zubri and that’s the fact that he’s one hell of a friend. Folks who’ve been really close to the dude such as Mr. Betgeri (and even yours truly) can testify that there’s this feeling of warmth exuded by the dude that’s completely real and uninhibited. But Zubri’s the kind of person who can botch up even something even as simple as just ‘being a good friend’. Here’s something that I really have to add … an SMS that many of us received from Zubri on friendship day. Whilst his intentions, I’m sure, were perfectly admirable, considering the fact that most of us stopped sending out ‘happy friendship day’ messages when we turned 13, this did not prevent Zubair from sending one out. The message in case read thus – “Happy friendship day my dear friends! Thank u 4 bein a part of my life!sorry n thanx 4 everythin!God bless u! tc gudmorning :) :)”. Apart from the fact that it sounded (spelled) like it had been forwarded by Katthe (a.k.a. Bharath), to me it sounded like a suicide note :D. To be frank, although I felt really happy that atleast somebody on this God-Forsaken planet had actually thought of me on Friendship day, the SMS did scare me witless.
The reasons were as follows –
1) It sounded kinda final … as in, “sorry and thax 4 everythin!God bless u!
2) It ended with a ‘gudmorning’ with two smiley faces … like it was his sick sadistic way of daring the world to have a nice time after his passing on :D
3) He was thanking you for being a part of his life … (which was soon going to be in the past ? :O )
4) He was sending this SMS to me!!! … Of all people!!! Anybody who knew me and Zubair would know for a fact that the last thing that poor Zubair would want to send me would be a ‘Happy Friendship Day’ SMS after all that I had put the poor soul through, during Engineering ! :D

Since we’re still speaking about Zubri’s botching things up, it would be worthwhile to share one event that is recounted to this day in our circle. We were all sitting in the canteen once and Zubair walks up to us, excited and out of breath, the way you get when you’re really bursting at the seams to share something really ground-breaking (for lack of something better to call it :P ). “Did you people watch the movie on Staav Movies yesterday?” he asks. Some of us who hadn’t, asked him what the name of the movie was. Still out of breath and excited, the dude continues – “It was a gvate movie. Full action. Amazing. You have to see it!”. By now some of us were actually beginning to wonder if we’d missed the movie of the century, the way Zubair was foaming at his mouth. We shouted in unison – “Ok! Tell us the name of the movie! Quick!”. To this Zubair replies – “The movie’s name was Avkon”. This strangely was a movie that we’d never heard about, and trust me, there was some seriously hardcore movie buffs amongst us who’d seen ‘em all even before the rest of us had heard of ‘em. “Avkon?” We asked. “Never heard of it before. Is it a new movie? But, then again, it can’t be that new if it was aired on Star Movies now can it? What’s it about and who’s in it?” Zubair, then says – “It’s about an avoplane getting hijacked by pvisoners who are being tvanspovted fvom one jail to anothev”. It was then that it hit us! The dude had made a monumental boo boo. He'd meant – ‘Air Con’ by which he’d further actually implied – ‘Con Air’. Collective jaw droppings all around and mass ‘faintings’ later, some of the dudes actually chased Zubri around the basketball court for a while before threatening him with dire consequences if he ever dared to set foot in the canteen again.

Studying at UVCE, I’m sure that each and every one of us has amazing memories to reflect upon when in a melancholic mood. I still remember being invited home by Zubri for a feast where I had some of the most amazing Biryanis and non-veg curries that I’ve ever eaten in my life (Note how my fondest memories always involve food. And, of course we were all wondering what he was talking about when he said that the ‘bivyaani’ and ‘kheev’ that his mom made were to die for, when he was inviting us :D. The myriad quaint theories that the guy had about the calculation of the amount of petrol which was needed for a journey from Bangalore to Chennai and back (which for some reason yielded that you’d need twice as much fuel for the return journey than on the onward journey and which was seconded by Mr.Begeri), about techniques of overtaking vehicles on a highway (if you thought that if it took 5 seconds to overtake one ‘lovvy’, it would take 10 seconds to overtake a ‘lovvy’ which was twice as long, think again :D ) and about optimally piling pakodas up, (don’t completely remember this one fully … am offering good money for any dope on this one) have becomes things of legend.

Zubri, you rock dude! You really do! We wouldn’t have liked you any other way … trust me. Thanks for the memories … thanks for everything … thanks for being my friend … Please forgive me for everything … kindly adjusht maadi :D … and do invite me to your wedding when 'everything' is ‘confirmed’.

You have been pooped upon ... Amen!

Newor Osnohpla Arierep cometh !

“The closest that I’ve been to a woman in my life is ‘– 8 inches’ …”

- Rowen Alphonso Pereira

Famous last words? The fact that this bloke has gotten himself married to a really nice girl in recent times would make one surmise that these would have made nice last words indeed considering that these words were uttered long before he got married. But, this statement too, like innumerable others which were uttered in the recklessness that can only be induced by the consumption of certain alcoholic concoctions (not excluding cough syrup) couldn’t possibly be further from the truth. That’s ‘minus 8 inches’ by the way if you were wondering … and may God have mercy on your soul if you’re still wondering. Read on …

If you’ve ever read the story of Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde, then you could possibly begin to comprehend the effect that alcohol has had (and will always have) on this otherwise well groomed, ‘soft spoken’, well behaved and devout Catholic Manglorean lad (that’s quite a mouthful of good words that I’ve heaped upon him, but bear with me won’t you?). One minute he’s Rowen, the good natured dude we’d all come to love and the next, he’s sweaty, mad-eyed and horny (and this is when there were only us guys around). Most scientific investigations into the matter have concluded quite univocally that this indeed is the way that a normal human body should react when there’s too little blood in one’s alcohol stream but our man Rowen, here, was probably the reason why the term ‘alter ego’ was invented. Even the clumsy, mild mannered Clark Kent was the alter ego for the superhero that we all know as ‘Superman’ but Rowen’s no superhero (and his alter ego aint either). Perish the thought! For one, Clark Kent never had to get drunk to turn into Superman … in fact most people believe that he was a die hard teetotaler because Clark Kent never had to drink to fly (I’ve lost myself here). Now, I’m not saying that Rowen could take off on a rendezvous with the stars every time he had a peg or two of the good stuff, but there are a couple of times I could have sworn that he’d levitated an inch or two off the ground after a couple of swigs.

One thing that they both (Superman and Rowen) do have in common however is ‘Kryptonite’. Now, let’s not get the wrong idea here, that Rowen gets all light headed and woozy when exposed to Kryptonite. He’s hardly the sole survivor of the ancient planet of Krypton, who’s adopted our world as his own. I’m merely using ‘Kryptonite’ as a metaphor here (What? You’ve never heard of ‘Kryptonite’ being used as a metaphor before? Sue me!) . For those who’re wondering what I’m talking about here (read: rotting under a rock for the last 10 years), here’s a flashback to 2003 when Rowen, as our beloved class representative was addressing us on the last day of college where he began his speech thus - ‘Big problems come in small sizes …’

When Rowen addressed the congregation on his wedding day, I kinda drifted back to ‘those days’. It’s funny how we always think of ‘those day’ when we have our hands full with ‘these days’, but ‘those’ were truly the days to be in. I’m sure that I wouldn’t be alone in wishing that I had a time machine that could just take me back in time to the days that were so that I might then be able to savour and relive all those memories gone by, but only through the eyes of an outsider this time around. I’m sure it wouldn’t be as much fun as being part of all those ‘events’ but I’ve always maintained that somebody ought to have videotaped all that crap!

Rowen’s always had a penchant for women who exceeded the height of the average Indian woman and women with below average height for an Indian woman, have always had a penchant for Rowen. He spent the first couple of semesters chasing bigger women (note how I’ve subtly concealed the fact that it was just one woman) and little women (same technique of subterfuge) spent the next six chasing him. To be or ‘Nath’ to be, that was always the question for Rowen in the beginning but the dude managed to shake her … er, ‘them’ (phew) off like a bad habit … eventually, or so he claims. Rumours, however had it that the woman in question here noticed one evening as she was walking to Cubbon Park (where she used to park her Kinetic Honda for the first two semesters) that she had two shadows instead of one and told the one that did not belong to get a life. A few confessions at Church later, our man was as good as new and was ready to take the torments that lay ahead, head-on. The abominable Kutti was not part of his life … yet …

When Rowen was in the prime of his youth, he weighed a couple of hundred pounds and was a couple of inches taller than he is today. He could have been the face of India in the WWE (The great Kali, who?), but who’d have thought that a person who could have stopped a speeding train with his bare hands … ok a speeding Hero Honda splendor (I’m kinda stuck up with Superman today), would cower in fear and hide behind CR (CR was and still is the exact opposite of Rowen’s description) at a bus stop when he saw the abominable Kutti approach. Few knew it then, but Rowen sure did, that obsession can be a dangerous thing. We always thought that if somebody raided Kytty’s house, they’d find a shrine dedicated to Rowen, with an effigy of him, strands of his hair, used tissues that he’d disposed off and all kinds of other freaky stuff.

The story goes that at the height of the imaginary affair that this woman was having with our lad (as a consequence of which she followed Rowen more efficiently than the Hutch nework), she once actually mustered the courage to go all the way to his house one day. Her alibi was that she had to see a doctor and needed to use the phone urgently. The poor lad fortunately saw her coming (arriving … just in case you’re a pervert) and managed to hide himself in the remotest corner of his house. I don’t know whether it was the knowledge that she knew where he lived or the fact that she had to see a doctor and was at his house as a consequence that scared the dude out of his pants, but the fact remains that he did not come out of the nook that he had chosen to hide himself in, till the next morning. This saga too, sadly (for us, not for Rowen) came to an end however, the means by which we’re not entirely clear about but the very fact that the abominable kutty was conspicuous by her absence at Mangalore is reassuring that ‘it’ is truly over.

Stories abound about Rowen’s escapades during Engineering College. It’s not just the fact that the guy was a regular Casanova, but also that the guy had a mischievous side as well. It’s been so many years now, so I don’t exactly remember whether it was aptech or NIIT (it’s not relevant anyway) but the representatives from one of these institutions once came to college pitching an offer for students. The offer was that we all had to take a test that they’d administer and we’d all then get discounts on the course depending on our scores in the test. The topper would even get to attend the course free of charges. Most of us thought that it would be prudent to capitalize on the offer and add another point to our CVs ahead of the placement season but Rowen had something else planned all together. Yes, he would indeed take the test but using a pseudonym which he would derive by slightly altering his name. When we’d completed the test, we met Rowen outside the center grinning from ear to ear. It all came to light when we saw the folks from the institute frantically searching for a ‘Mr. Newor Osnohpla Arierep’ who had topped the test but was nowhere to be found. It was like one of those movies about geniuses, where a shy genius would solve a cryptic mathematical problem left un-erased on a blackboard by a professory and then disappear without telling a soul or taking credit for the solution. The few of us who knew the truth didn’t dare tell them for fear that our college would be blacklisted by the institute but we were amused to no end nonetheless. Years later a Hyderabad based IT company would use the same technique to very good effect!

Rowen never had to invite anybody twice to his house. He’d just have to tell us that he was having the house to himself for half a day, and people would just miraculously apparate at his house. Rowen’s folks used to make this killer wine at home that was to just die for. So much so, that the demand would often well exceed supply. Once, we were all done with quenching our ‘thirsts’, our lad suddenly realized that his little scam ran the risk of being discovered by his folks. So, he devised the strategy of emptying multiple bottles half way and then topping them up with water so that his folks would always find full bottles. I guess, they stopped making the stuff at home when one of their guests complained that the wine that they were being served tasted like water. So, ended Rowen’s little scam and our happy hours. :D

But, that’s definitely not the end of Rowen’s affiliations with alcohol. Like I’d said a little earlier on, Rowen’s just not the same person when he’s under the influence. He turns into this (for lack of a better term) horny, sweaty bull-dozer with a perpetual grin etched upon his face. Flash back to our class trip to Ooty and Kodaikanal …

When Rowen got himself tipsy during that trip (Gardhi had his first taste of kerosene during this outing), all hell broke loose and the poor dude managed to do all kinds of unspeakable stuff that even a hundred confessions wouldn’t have helped. The first sign that things were about to take a turn for the worst was when Ravi and I, who had decided to retire from the camp fire to our lodge along with a few others heard the heavy thuds that gradually grew closer and closer until the floor boards actually began to shake. The door was then flung open with immense force and there stood the menacing silhouette of a man who was way out of control. Rowen, then trudged in with an evil grin on his face and eyes gleaming with madness. He walked over to the nearest arm chair and collapsed on it with an almighty thud! We thought that things were under control, and decided to call it a day and dimmed the lights. But things were just beginning to heat up. Our female classmates who had accompanied us on the trip were the previous occupants of the lodge that were in and we’d switched lodges with them as they were fewer in number and the lodge which they had taken up first was the largest at the resort. All that separated the two lodges was a flimsy door with a glass window. We’d just turned the lights off, when Rowen who had dozed off (or so we thought) woke up with a start and went charging towards the poor door. He first tried pushing the door, but the door surprisingly didn’t give which angered the poor soul to no end, having been rebuked and denied the forbidden fruit. He then proceeded to let the door know how he felt about its reluctance to budge by raining blow after blow upon it (Hell truly knows no fury like that of Rowen scorned!). It might be relevant now to add that these girls had retired to their lodge much earlier than the rest of us and were (until) now sound asleep. When Rowen finally realized that even an alcohol induced frenzy was not enough to bring the door down, it was time to resign to the oldest tactic – ‘sour grapes’. A physical assault was proving to be futile as the door seemed to be held together by divine force, so it was time to try ‘verbal assault’. Rowen first rained the choicest of abuses upon the door and then after he caught a glimpse of the feet of one of the girls at the edge of their bed, began shouting about completely unrelated stuff. The rant (as far as the faculty of my memory still serves me) went thus …

“You ****in’ ***res … what the **** are you doing in there … and what the **** is all that light supposed to be? A ****in’ nightlamp? Come out here …” (The rest shall not be mentioned here to safeguard the modesty of all people concerned … especially Rowen’s ;) ) … THUD ! (That was Rowen falling down on the floor with a resounding, earth shattering thud).

We all thought that we could safely go to sleep, now that the worst was over (what could be worse than that? ), but our (my) slumber was to be shortlived. I was rudely awakened (manhandled) by the bloke at around 3 in the morning and was rather taken aback even in my groggy state that the moron was in tears. Five minutes later and he was positively bawling his heart out. He had apparently woken up and found himself on the floor. The effects of the booze hadn’t worn off yet, so the act of removing himself from the floor took quite a herculean effort. Once, he was on his feet (all four of them in his own words), he felt the sudden inexplicable urge to visit the adjoining little room with lots of taps. He manages to find the room and ‘sit’ down but unfortunately falls asleep again on the ‘throne’ to wake up a little later only to find himself face to face with a cat (“pussy”) with whom he has a heart rendering conversation about life, the universe and everything … and about the presence of ‘non veg’ all around (clarified below). It was after what has gone down as Rowen’s ‘dialogues with the pussy’ that he decided that he needed to come clean about certain ‘bad things’ that he’d done in his life … and who should he bestow the honour of listening to his tirade but yours truly. Ravi swears to this day that he was asleep and he didn’t hear a word of what Rowen told me, but I swear that I could see the sly bastard from the corner of my eye, shaking with laughter everytime Rowen uttered something controversial … and boy were there controversial topics aplenty mentioned. The highlights were –

(a) He lost his virginity while Xeroxing his notes at Krishna Xerox. But it was not his fault but the girl’s as she was ‘ready’ and willing. It was a good thing he used protection though, as SARS was going around back then :D

(b) There was blood splatters on the walls of the lodge and this was attributable either to the lodge’s being haunted or to the fact that it was occupied by the girls until a little earlier …

The next morning however, Rowen was a different person (back to normal if it pleases you). No matter what we told him, we were unable to make him remember the events that had transpired the previous night. Whether he was pretending out of shame or whether he truly couldn’t remember anything we’ll never know, but the fact still remains that neither Rowen nor I remember anything that happened during the day that followed that night of horror … we slept like babies in the bus the whole day … me from lack of sleep and him from the mother of all hangovers. Ravi or Bharath had taken a snap of the two of us in the bus and then posted it on Orkut aptly title ‘Sleepy Hollow’.

All things said and done, Rowen was, is and always will be one of my best friends. He’ll always be Mr. Class rep in our hearts, who got so many internals postponed / cancelled and who influenced so many professors to go easy on their correction of our exams papers as some (all) of the questions were out of syllabus (as was invariably the case, nine out of ten times). He was always ready to lend a helping hand to those who needed assistance and he’s always had a comforting smile for us when times are really bad. Most people would describe Harsha as a gentle giant, but the truth is that it’s rather hard to come to think of Harsha as a giant … it’s Rowen who actually fits the bill. The dude always managed to put a spark into all our trips by singing funny folk songs and doing all kinds of ridiculous stuff that never failed to liven things up (who’ll ever forget the dude dancing in the bus on the way to Balmuri falls … the bus driver aint ever gonna forget for sure ;) ) Always up for adventure, he’s probably the only Pereira on the planet who can boast of having made it up to Palani and back :D. When I look back now onto the tumultuous years that followed engineering, I’ll never forget the fact that Rowen would always call me up whenever I was in Bangalore and he’s also probably the only friend who’ll always thank me when I wish him a very happy ‘Good Friday’ (which was the only time I’d ever call him :D ). I finally realized how out of touch I was with him, when I saw him after a couple of years (of no contact) and couldn’t recognize him for he was ‘half the man he used to be’ (no pun intended) :D The dude had shed a good four stones in weight!

Here’s hoping that marriage will have a sobering effect on the dude for this dude’s always been and will always be high on life …and always the dude who convinced the ‘tronics lab prof. that the KEB signal displayed on his CRO was the ‘distorted output of his transformer circuit’.

Rowen, buddy, pal o’ mine … if you disagree with any of the stuff I've said so far, I’ve only got these words for you, immortalized by Bart Simpson – “Eat my shorts!”

Rajass Rot ... the kInG of gOoD tImEs

Who said that Kingfisher was the king of good times? That distinction has always belonged and always will belong to the greater Router himself. I’ve known the dude for a few years now and he’s undoubtedly, the king … nay, the monarch of good times. Actually, I needn’t have bothered getting into this tripe in the first place ‘cause the name kinda suggests it ... well, then again maybe it doesn't ... but, just play along won't you ...

Judging by the pigsty that had replaced the bachelor pad that once stood proudly in that very spot atop H5, one couldn’t have imagined that the party beast himself once roamed those very corridors not long before ‘Blondie’ inherited the room during his second year. There was a time when H5 boasted of the raunchiest, most obnoxiously loud parties known to mankind, that even the most clinically insane, necrophilic and most importantly – stone deaf death metal fans of ‘em all couldn’t help but cower in fear and duck out of sight while Rajas played (blared) his music. These death metal fans have often tried to take evil revenge by playing their own brand of music as loud as their own speakers would permit them to , sometime even simultaneously from their rooms next to Rajas’, during the day time when the party beast had decided to hit the sack after an entire night of partying. But Vodka has the merciful effect of turning a person deaf before sending him off to never-never land and the two metal fans have never succeeded in unleashing their evil upon the party beast, for he would awaken unscathed and with his hearing intact after a good day’s slumber while we had no choice but to slink away into the shadows, defeated.

Ask him where he did his engineering and he’ll always tell you that he did in IIT Roorkee. Buddy, but didn’t they decide to give Roorkee the coveted IIT status after you joined and a good two years later too? So, what you’re trying to tell us is that although you joined Roorkee college of engineering, you passed out of an IIT. Wish I had that kind of luck. I might have joined DCE and passed outta AIIMS !

Hostel 5 has always had two kinds of people. It’s like they had some kind of sorting hat like the one that was used in Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry because, it’s uncanny how the most obnoxious losers and the biggest studs always land up in H5. Rajas unfortunately, despite first impressions, belonged to the former category of people, who always tried too hard. If you thought that Parate was bad, you aint seen this smooth operator … er … operating, or trying to operate as the case usually turned out. Nat Geo camera men would be able to attest to the fact that they haven’t seen Tigers waiting in the tall grass to ambush their prey, like Rajas waited for women at Hel(L) to break up with their boyfriends before falling hopelessly in love with them and proposing to them (without once asking them out first, mind you). It’s as though, now that they had lost the excess body weight (read: boyfriends) that they were lugging around, they had become objects of his mindless desire. He’s been visiting the gym and jogging for years now to sculpt that scrawny torso of his and rumour has it that he might have succeeded in realizing his mission statement in IIM, albeit a tad late to acquire a girl friend. The ‘DVDs’ which he had so painstakingly burnt in H5 during Manfest recently therefore must be purely for inspirational purposes and not so much for recreational purposes ;).

Router was always destined for greatness. He was the greatest pondi secy H5 ever had. From day one in H5, it was unanimous that he alone would be pondy secy and none other. Trust me, this guy was the best there was, the best there is … er well … not exactly … we downloaded more of the good stuff in a single week than he’d gotten in an entire year at Hel(L). He had deteriorated to such absolute nothingness that he actually burnt 10 DVDs of the stuff when he paid the hostel a visit during Manfest ’07. Er … didn’t someone say that he’d conned some hapless woman into becoming his girlfriend?

People have often said that the ‘M’ in the MBA degree that Rajas had ‘worked so hard’ to get for two whole years at Hel(L) stood for 'manfest', such was this guy’s dedication to the committee. He’d spend entire nights (if he wasn’t partying that is) glued to his PC working on some presentation or poster or flyer or pamphlet or the other to ensure that every single minute detail was picture perfect (literally). But his dedication unfortunately ended there. There are professors in IIM L who’ve exclaimed – “Rajas who?” when the dude was mentioned in their presence and these were professors whose subjects Rajas had taken when he was in Hel(L). He used to bunk classes as though bunking was going out of fashion and almost earned himself an I grade. Actually he did manage to get an I. How he managed to wriggle out of that tough spot is a story in itself. Being a denizen of Nocturnia, he used to stay up the entire night and go to bed only in the wee hours of the morning, which of course meant that attending classes wasn't exactly an option anymore :D. One peek into his room and it would be obvious even to the untrained eye from the sight of the naked body of the great one lying in a heap beside another heap of ‘party like’ articles (and the undeniable odour of ‘alcoholic substances’ in the air) that the night before had been one of 'those' nights. We’ve often had to literally shake the great one from slumber land, give him a swig or two of his favourite drink and subsequently dispatch him onwards to class, lest he suffer the wrath of the concerned professor owing to a dismal attendance record. Miraculously, the dude has managed to top some subjects after being woken up just in time for the exam, even when he actually realized which subject it was that he was attending an examination for, only after seeing it printed in bold letters at the top of the question paper.

Coming back to the great one’s room at Hel(L). It wasn’t a hostel room so much as it was a party shack, a luxury studio apartment or a condo. I kid you not people … at one time, he had a full fledged bar (with the works), a sofa, wall hangings, huge blowups on the wall, the loudest speakers possible for a room that tiny and his (and H5’s ) crowning glory – a refrigerator ! The only thing(s) the room lacked was a Jacuzzi and most importantly – women! Yours truly has actually feigned headaches and begged the party beast to lower the volume of the music emanating from his room during one of his famous parties. I’m a musician myself. I listen to death metal but I can also appreciate other forms of music at a rudimentary level and even pretend to enjoy some other genres but strains of ‘It’s the time to disco’ at precisely 4 in the morning, can make even the most sadistic, hardened criminals beg for mercy and promise to be good henceforth, let alone semi-deaf death metal fans such as yours truly!

In his two years in Hel(L), Lord Router has graced the mess workers with an appearance for a total of twenty times and that too while passing through from the gym to the slums. He would have died of starvation for sure if weren’t for fauji dhabha / the canteen. We had to often lie to the mess workers through our teeth that the lazy bum was really ill and down with high and that he would therefore need food to be delivered to his room, lest he died in his sleep. But, the dude wasn’t completely averse to the idea of patronizing the mess. He’s often been spotted in the premises of the mess after 11 pm (so go the rumours). Night mess was often his only source of voluntary nourishment but he rarely could motivate himself to get dressed and out of bed. Most of us on the top floor used to get out of our rooms on our tippy toes, lest Rajas should ‘command’ us to bring him an ‘allu parantha’ or two from the night mess (with the mandatory pickles of course).

Rajas Raut is confidence personified. He’s so confident that he’s actually got himself convinced that he’s a great dancer. Most people who’ve seen him dance on the other hand, would agree with me when I say that Mr. Rajas Raut can’t dance if his life depended on it. He gives 'break dancing' a bad name. Maybe he should try convincing people that he’s an expert in free form dancing. The dude actually walks around snapping his fingers like he’s listening to the latest groovy Hindi hit number to hit the charts, all the time … a little weird if it’s during the first ten minutes you’ve met him.

Rajas Raut likes Bhelpuri with Vodka, Allu Paranthas with Vodka, chocolate with Vodka, Idlis with Vodka … the dude could possible down half a maggot drowning in dog puke if you gave him a glass of vodka with it … I kid you not!

But, I do miss those days. There’s never a dull moment when the dude’s around. Always the one to greet me with a sing song – “murgi o murgi” (a tradition that was carried on by Amol in his own style), Rajas Raut was the life of hostel 5. If it rained, you’d find Rajas bathing - bar of soap in hand, shampoo, scrubber et al, on the road … while befuddled onlookers could only gape in amazement at the spectacle they were witnessing, for it’s not everyday that you see grown men bathing in public (well not in an IIM atleast). His love for frolicking in the rain was so great that he couldn’t help himself one rainy day and got himself soaked to the bone during the first rains in a long time, for which he paid the price dearly by chaffing his inner thighs (or was it a rash) causing him to walk like Charlie Chaplin for a week :D

Miss ya bro … why couldn’t you forget your charger in Bangalore again so that you’d come back to visit? I know that’s the only reason you called me when you came down to Bangalore … to get your stinkin’ charger back … cheapskate !!!!! %#^#$&#

Nut Raj ! Need I say any more ?

Nut RaJ !! How does one begin about this dude? I usually contemplate the decision to write about somebody only after I've known the person for years. I've known this nut job for a couple of months now and it already seems like I've known him for an entire life time. Well, some people really are that way I guess and then again, maybe it’s Einstein’s theory of relativity at play. So here’s a tribute to you buddy and all those little things you do that gets on my nerves :D

It's not even like me and the nut hit it off right from day one but only sometime during my second week at PwC and boy did we hit it off famously! We're not even talking about fellow consultants with nothing to do at office, bonding with one another out of sheer need for company but the fact that this dude is the dude to know if it's your first day in office (or the first day of the second week as it turned out). He's brimming with information which he'll share with you with hardly any coaxing. His heart is untouched and pristine and he'll innocently share with you even his deepest secrets if he senses but the tiniest bit of trust in you and if you're thinking that this could be the dude's undoing someday, I can only say that this makes people like and respect him better and love him more for it is rare to meet a person such as this in the big bad world. (I'm being paid good money to write this :D )

Contrary to the image he exudes, he is conservative to the core and his parents ought to be proud that he's turned out the way he has (can't think of too many other people who would think that way actually :D ). His parents have been trying to get him ‘settled’ in life (I’m sure you know what I'm talking about here) for some time now and Nattu's been really worried in recent times that he's going to be married off to the first proposal that he approves of. So, he's been rejecting proposals left and right, leaving heartbroken women in his wake, but recently we were all taken aback when he wouldn’t let us hear the end of how great his father is and why it’s always good to leave the most important decisions in our lives to our parents. Turns out that they found a babe for him that was quite a looker too. But some things in the world are unfortunately finalized through mutual consent. Wonder why we never heard about her ever again ?. :D. Well I’m really being mean here (so sue me !). I’m going to try and make it up to Nataraj in the next few lines. Few people know that he rushes back to his family business every day even after a long, hard day (giggle) at office, to help out, all the way till closing time. Wonder what he does there though for he's on gtalk till 12 midnight chatting with people :D. Like I said, his parents ought to be proud (yeah right :D) ! … er … that didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to … honest !

A recent walk-in that we conducted in office also brought out the fact that he's a crowd control expert in addition to which he also astonished us all with the amount of energy he exuded throughout the day as he helped coordinate most of the operations. It’s like he was able to part the ‘walk-in crowd’ like Moses parted the seas in that famous Biblical tale of Exodus, to lead his people to the Promised Land, by just spreading his arms and commanding the sea to obey him. But now when you think about it, it was probably just lack of deo :D. Rexona, are you reading this ? I think I just found you your next model (or test subject atleast :D )

An expert in multitasking, he breaks all rules of science and of the space-time continuum as we know it, for he disappoints neither boss nor chat buddy. But a close examination of his laptop’s display reveals how this genius is able to accomplish the aforementioned feat. He neatly stacks gtalk chat windows to fit the navigation pane on the MS Axapta screen so as to trick the untrained eye into thinking that he’s actually seriously wracking his brains on the latest bug that’s come his way. An even closer look reveals further that although the gtalk windows mysteriously change in number and content, the MS Axapta screen on the right side of the navigation pane, however hasn’t changed too much over the last few weeks :D. If you’re waiting for ‘MS-duet’ to happen, maybe MS should also consider a joint effort with Google to integrate Gtalk into Axapta. Although this move would ensure that the world would see Axapta for the crappy package it is, I can assure you that it’ll definitely improve Nattu’s productivity by leaps and bounds. And buddy, MS sucks … SAP rulez !!

The Nut’s also one of the most humble people I've come across in my professional career, for he keeps saying that he's too 'dumb' (Like I said, I'm being paid good money to write this). AS a matter of fact he's so dumb that he can't tell a male chimp from a female chimp. Now I'm not going to embarrass the reader by describing how one actually goes about the matter of distinguishing male chimps from the female of the species. Perish the thought! Well most of us can tell the male of any species from the female anyway by looking at ... er ... identifying certain ... um ... distinguishing features :D ... but apparently not our hero. He recently had to be 'persuaded' to remove a certain picture by yours truly from his orkut album which had two chimps dressed up like the 'Men in black' (you know, the movie with Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones?) and had a caption under the picture that read ... I quote - "Me and my wife". er ... I'm sure I don't have to delve into the issue anymore than I already have.

This dude’s got to be the biggest Rajnikanth fan I’ve ever seen (in PwC at least :D) and was even supposed to be in Chennai to catch the 'superstar' in action in his latest venture - 'Shivaji'. He's been raving on and on about the movie for the last one month and was supposed to miss office for a few days to be in Chennai on 'D day' to catch the 'first day first show'. Thankfully, it was decided at the last moment by the powers that be to release the movie in Bangalore as well and our hero couldn’t have been happier. I myself missed the movie owing to the fact that I had to be in Calcutta during it’s release but Nattu did more than just watch the movie. He er ... watched it thrice … on the first day … and then twice the next day. By the time I publish this blog entry, the bugger would probably have watched it twenty times!! I kid you not!

Can we really be jealous of an ordinary looking man who's almost sixty years old (and who looks every year of 'em sixty year) but who's still got the moves to woo women young enough to be his daughters? er ... We're still talking about Rajnikanth here :D ... Nataraj, like so many millions of fanatical fans smitten by the Rajni bug all over the world sincerely believes that it's not what a person is inside (and other mushy goo) but gimmicks and stunts he performs that really attract the attention of women. So much so, that he's been really at it for the last couple of months to woo the love of his life. Apart from the fact that Nataraj could in all likelihood now write a research paper on her profile on orkut, he's been trying every trick in the book to get her attention ... er, does he really have to confess to one and all that he's dumb ? :D Some of the many little things he’s done to get her attention –

• Creation of a picture mosaic with her pictures hidden amidst a thousand others
• Arbit Gtalk status messages (you haven’t seen arbit Gtalk messages till you’ve seen some of his)
• Admitting to being a chimpanzee and therefore attracted to other chimps albeit male ones
• Blasting her via email (why would you do something like that to someone you like? Kindergarten behaviour if you ask me :D)
• Getting people to write him testimonials on Orkut (muhuhahahahahahahaha … be careful what you wish for, for your wish could come true in a manner you couldn’t have imagined possible)
• Putting pictures of himself sleeping at his desk, on orkut. I ask you ! In which country is that cool ?!!! ^#$^&$*
• Transforming his orkut profile into a Kannada one with the hope that she'll fall for him now ... two words for ya buddy ... 'DREAM ON !'

He should have been the star of the latest installment in the 'Die Hard' series because the dude just doesn't know when to give up. He still harbors in some nook of his heart the hope that the love of his life would some day acknowledge his existence (to begin with). Unable to figure out whether she was offline on gtalk or if she'd blocked him, our hero almost had a panic attack one day and the situation got so out of hand that he had to be sedated :D

Rock on dude! You put the 'ly' in 'hard working’:D. Just reach for the stars and you shall have them too :) ... We all know that you've been reaching upwards within the building at least (wink wink) … You make us want to come to office everyday … er … well, me atleast, although I can’t really say the same about Ksheetij or Tiwari :D. Neither has decided to bless us with their presence today :D

Nut Raj ! Consider yourself blessed. For you have been pooped upon by El Pollo Del Infierno :D. I pray that you get whatever you desire in life including the love of the woman YOU love and the company that's been promising to take you in as CEO with an 8 figure salary for the last couple of months !!

Anshuman Mishra … 'hyper' Oriya IITian ‘HAL-brother’

A cupboard full of love … call it what you may, but my dear buddy Anshuman left his legacy behind for all to see and for me to learn from and enjoy in his cupboard when he left Hell. Some people have skeletons in their closets but one had to see it to believe what this dude once had in his closet. Well, if some of you out there are confused as to the pertinence of cupboards and closets in the life of a seemingly simple straightforward guy like anshuman mishra, well, the following words might interest you for all was not what met the eye during his two years at Hell … and about the all important contents of the closet, read on …

From the days of yore when mysterious sounds emanated from within his room that once held an entire crowd of people enthralled and spellbound in the passageway outside, for sheer volume and intensity (and duration) and more so for the audacity of the individuals responsible for the ‘production’ of the sounds in question, that they could be so reckless as to perform the acts that could result in the kind of sounds that we’re talking about, right where one would expect was the last place on earth anyone in their sesnses would want to ‘do’ such things, Anshuman has come a long way indeed but the corridors of hostel 5 still resonate with ghostly moans that serve as a reminder that everything he ever told you about his love life (or the lack of it as he’d try to have you believe) was one big lie.

If one were to ask Anshuman what the closest he’d ever got to a woman was, he’d say with innocent nonchalance – “minus 9 inches”. As you may possibly have guessed from this retort, he doesn’t believe in leaving too much to one’s imagination and he also likes to exaggerate a tad. But his demeanor (read : wandering about the corridors in a perpetual state of undress) could suggest that he was in the possession of something that at least he believed he could be proud of, proud enough might I add, to flaunt howsoever shameless the act was in itself considering that all said and done, this was a men’s hostel.

Did I mention that our dear Anshu was also once the HR of hostel 5? Although it is unanimous that the letter H stands for ‘hostel’, the word R has been the center of controversy for the myriad of things that people have thought that it stood for. Anshuman, for one has done everything in his power to reinforce their beliefs in this regard. Although his general demeanor during a hostel 5 feeding frenzy (bumping frenzy?) would suggest that he did actually enjoy the idea of getting bumped, for he’d pretend to resist but give in anyway after hurling a few choice abuses at the raging mob that held him aloft, he would try everything in his power to evade the ‘foot to ass’ ritual during his own birthday. He once crafted an elaborate ploy which involved strategically leaving campus a few hours before ‘celebrations’ began, on Arjun’s bike and then calling from outside campus about some imaginary accident that he’d met with that miraculously had affected his ability to flex his ankle and consequently his ability to withstand bumps delivered unto his ‘posterior’. But the last time that we’d read ‘Grey’s anatomy’, the ankle and the ‘posterior’ have no connection whatsoever and pain inflicted to any one of these areas is not experienced at the other part. Another story that is closely associated with that evening involved yours truly going completely overboard with a bottle of the ‘Russian spirit’ but that is a completely different story.

His first date is the stuff that comedy movies are made of. Our man and his love interest venture out from their respective hostels at different times to the bus stop and stand at two different corners of the bus stop. He engages some others waiting for the bus in conversation, while she keeps yapping into her cell phone like her life depended on it. When the bus finally arrives, he gets in first and sit in the last row and she sits in the first row after entering last. They both get off at Purania chouraha and then stand around doing absolutely nothing for a few minutes. Then all of a sudden, he hails an auto rickshaw and gets in and she jumps in right after him and then they were gone :D. Of course, the fact that a couple of us from H5 also got off the bus at Purania didn’t help their cause one bit. It was the talk of the town for days to come.

Anshuman was always going to be a good manager because he is a natural ‘delegator’ of work. You should see the guy during the rangoli competition and index. He appears out of nowhere, shouts out orders, accuses two or three people of not doing any work, abuses another couple of hapless facchas, expresses his opinion on how the decoration ought to and ought not to be and disappears just as mysteriously as he appeared. Like I said, he’s a natural and Anshu, you can’t deny any of this buddy, I have it all on tape. He’s always proclaimed that he’s a big rock fan and he’s even gone so far as to putting the fact that ‘he’s a fan of rock music, particularly metal’ in his CV but the fact remains that this couldn’t be farther from the truth. I must admit that he’s been known to play the occasional G ‘n’ R or Judas Priest song in his room but, he’s never been able to name the songs when asked to step out of his room (read: dragged out of his room) and do so. Anshuman Mishra shot to fame during the time when the press was on campus to cover the untimely demise of an alumnus, when he was the voice and the face of IIM L. Minutes after he shot to fame, people were wishing that he would shoot himself in the head ! Who’s ever going to forget the episode of Anshuman Mishra standing on a chair in front of Nescafe imploring the batch to turn up in strength for the media event, in a hurry.

The last thing we ever remember of the dude on campus is the time when he was packing before leaving for good. He left his room for a few minutes with it’s door wide open and ‘unattended’ most importantly. A few of us who were waiting for exactly such an opportunity, rushed into his room and ‘stole’ back all the books that Anshuman had ever ‘borrowed’ from us and made our escape. It’s a miracle that the fact that there were just three piles of books where four had stood just minutes earlier, escaped his attention. I would urge one and all reading this to ask him about a certain room cooler that he carried back home with him :D. Although I thought of including the story associated with the cooler here, my better judgment dictates that I ought to refrain from doing so for the sake of my own well being.

By the time Mr. Mishra was done with his course at hell, he was but a mere shadow of his former self. The pgp19s had christened him ‘hyper’ once upon a time for obvious reasons. Calling him a bundle of energy would have been grossly misrepresenting facts, so much so that pgp20s actually mistook him for a pgp19 when they joined. But a rather unfortunate episode involving a pair of broken spectacles, a few bruised fists and a bruised ego most importantly, ended that phase of Anshuman Mishra’s life and he turned into the serene and composed nut job that we know today.

HAL brother !! Forgive me if I’ve said too much here and inadvertently hurt your sentiments (assuming that you have feelings to begin with). But you know that your deepest darkest secrets are always safe with me … till I keep getting paid good money to keep it that way anyway ;) You’ve always had a kind word for me in my times of peril starting from my rather unfortunate hostel induction to when I was in dire straits with my acads. You’re a go-getter and a hard worker and deserve everything that you’ve achieved this far. During round 2, you were truly an inspiration for me when it came to putting in all nighters and working hard but partying harder. Although this ‘testimonial’ would appear to be laced with sarcasm and slander, this is in reality a testimony to how much I miss you dude and the glorious days that were. My only regret is that it took as long as it did in being composed. But as they say, better late than never and the batches to come must learn about the legend (nut job) that once roamed the corridors of H5. The corridors still resonate with those sounds …

... by the way if anybody’s still wondering what Anshu left me in his closet …he left behind a bottle of Scotch and a pack of condoms (brands are irrelevant here), both of which no longer exist today. Ask me no questions and I’ll tell you no lies ;)

Amol a.k.a Tharkee a.k.a Dhanno a.k.a Blondie

The story of Amol’s rise to fame during the very first month of his stay at Hel(L) is the kind of stuff that you send batch mails about : ) . Not too many people are going to forget the batch mail he sent publicizing an H5 party. Whether it’s the line he ended the email with – “Don’t ‘remember’, it’s Murgi’s birthday also” or the reply to this batch mail that a certain Mr. Pant sent with poor Blondie’s pic attached, to the entire batch, that actually shot him to fame has been debated time and time again in the past but it has been concluded there might have been other reasons too.

To the untrained eye (and ear), not too many things might appear to have changed at room no. 528 since the departure of ‘Router the great’. For an entire year, this room witnessed some of the loudest, most obnoxious eardrum-shattering parties on campus where booze flowed like water all night long. Under layers of clothes, mattresses, more clothes, dirty clothes, dirtier clothes and ‘used’ newspapers, archaeologists have recently discovered fossilized remnants of the glorious days that were. For today, the sty … erm … room is but a mere shadow of it’s former glory. To say that Blondie is lazy would be a gross understatement. Rather than give his clothes to the dhobi, Blondie would prefer sleeping on his dirty clothes right where he dropped them. Speaking of ‘droppings’, one look at the rotten festering contents of his refrigerator could make a believer out of even the most fervent atheist.

For those who are curious about the origins of the nickname – ‘Blondie’, one look at his mop and all would be clear in an instant. His hair has an auburn hue that most Europeans could be proud of. The reason for his choice of colour is unclear but the fact remains that the guy goes through great pains every week to dye his hair brown. It’s a good thing that he decided against the beach blonde look though, for he would have stuck out like a sore thumb in a place like Nasik or even Hel(L) for that matter.

Rituals of ‘follicular colouration’ apart, he even claims to have a number of hobbies such as playing the guitar and football. His skill with the guitar and the ball become apparent as soon as he begins to strum the football and kick his guitar … err … he has also been known to occasionally kick the football and strum the guitar. Jokes apart, he is extremely passionate about learning the guitar. He was passionate about it when he joined Hel(L) and he is still is passionate about the instrument so much so that on entering his room the first thing that meets the eye are his gorgeous black electric guitar and guitar amp in exactly the same position you saw them the week before (other things meet the nose before this but we’ll leave that bit out for now).

Amol is an extremely talented football player and as a consequence, has represented his hostel for two years in a row. However, he’s unable to show the world much of this ‘talent’ as the longest he’s ever lasted on the field without having to be substituted is 10 minutes. It’s all those chemicals that he’s subjected his body to over the years and no, we aint talking about the cigarettes here but chemicals that affect stamina due their abusive overuse on the scalp :D .

When it comes to eating food he makes his own rules. Around a quarter of Amol’s day is spent in eating food. Well this isn’t because he eats a lot. Perish the thought. It’s due to the fact that he eats like a dead sloth bear. There aren’t too many people on this planet who could beat him in a ‘slow eating’ competition. At a mind boggling pace of 2 chappatis per hour he’s sure to floor the competition. People who have had the privilege to eat dinner or lunch with Blondie dearest may be able to appreciate this fact better.

Always the one to greet you with a smile and laugh at everybody’s pjs with that silly wheezy laugh of his, Amol’s a popular dude all over campus. Amol’s a member of villagio diabolico to the core and we surely would never have been the same without the loveable old geezer. Here’s to Amol Dhanvij. We love ya dude !! You rock !

Praneet ‘Dild … erm … Dillu’ Parate

Sita, Gita, Rita, Seema, Reema, Teena, Karina, Karishma, Sushmita, Payal, Sonal, Monal, Sonali, Monali, Motwani, Peters …who’s next ? … H5’s own Lou Bega’s still going strong! He’s almost given up on the fairer sex but he’s gonna keep trying nonetheless. That probably also explains why he always has a rubber (we aren’t talking about a Camlin or Natraj product here) in his wallet !

Praneet’s life at Hel(L)’s the kind of stuff that legends are made up of. He’s tried every trick in the book. From offering to configure yahoo messenger (a service rendered only unto denizens of hostels 1 and 2) on the campus network to inviting girls over to his room for a harmless gyan session (read: movie) to abusing the girl he really liked (verbally that is) during the hoax, our man’s tried every ploy … and failed. But then … as they say … “ ‘tis better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all”.

Praneet’s claim to fame – a short-film that we made for Prom Strat for Dabur ‘Real juice’ that the dude stars in. This clip was supposed to capture the element of humour in advertisements and although the class was in splits during the film’s premiere, the prof. insisted that people had found the ad funny only because Praneet was in it. Speaking about modeling, he’s posed in every bizarre position conceivable with a guitar which brings us to a rather interesting technique in Praneet’s guitaring repertoire – ‘The Praneet Progression’. In the beginning Praneet would move the open A Major shape up and down the fret board with such mind numbing speed that it would have put the Petruccis and Satrianis of the world to shame. Then one day, he decides that he’s actually going to learn the guitar. 2006 – “hey dillu, dude, play your guitar” and he’d go 'Am A G D .. boing boing. 2007 -Praneet says “hey guys, I’ve learnt something new” and goes 'Am A G D .. sproing boing crunch !’ … Yes ladies and gentlemen, you guessed it … Praneet still aint still figured the guitar out … sigh …

Ever the fitness freak, rumours abound of sightings of Mr. Parate in the gym. During one such rare occasion, our man tries lifting a 5 kilo dumbbell to flex his long un-flexed biceps only to feel a shooting pain in his wrist. His dream that he would someday be in the possession of a body that Greek Gods could be proud of ended then and there. Buddy, we sincerely felt that you had more chances of spraining your wrist within the walls of the bathroom than in a gym. How did you ‘pull it off’ (the sprain that is ;)) ? Praneet takes 10 baths a day each one lasting for precisely two and a half minutes. Some of us have a theory that Praneet fills a bucket to it’s brim, offers obeisance to the water God and then steps out of the bathroom (sometimes unclad).

How many people can actually boast of being on the cover of Playgirl magazine ? Praneet can’t either but that doesn’t stop him from boasting about it anyway. His last birthday at H5 (or should we call it feeding frenzy) will definitely go down in the annals of H5 as one of the most brutal birthday celebrations ever where everything including the kitchen sink was thrown at the poor guy. At the end of it, Mr. Parate was one T-shirt and one jockey short.

He considers himself to be some kind of style guru and even got his hair straightened out during the summers. That hairstyle was short lived though and it was back to the baseball hat after all and sundry expressed their amusement at the woolen appearance that his hair exuded when it was long and straight. He’ll always tell you that he’s not hungry when you invite him to the mess but magically appear in the mess after precisely five minutes in some or the other girl’s company. He’s even been known to have had up to three lunches in a span of 60 minutes for reasons unbeknownst to the rest of us mere mortals. Ever the chivalrous one, Praneet’s always gone out of his way to help ‘hapless’ stex students and visiting competition participants (again mysteriously, all of them female). His ‘help’ continues even days after they’ve left campus. “Praneet’s soooo helpful” … sniff sniff sob : ).

We all thought that the guy’s search was finally over when he was overheard screaming “I love you baby … I really love you” over G talk while all the ‘female voice’ at the other end could do was cry (while all of us guys eves dropping outside his door were rolling all over the floor in splits).

School textbooks should replace the story of ‘King Bruce and the spider’ with the exploits of Praneet Parate. If nothing else, one thing this guy has is a never say die attitude. From patronizing Dr. Batra’s clinic (almost got into a paternity suit with that one) to doing his thing (ahem) no matter what the world said, we’ve all got a thing or two to learn from this guy. ‘Once bitten, twice Praneet !!’ You’re the epitome of H5 man. We all love you … and you’ll have to settle for us … :D