The last two months have been shit. Absolute fucking shit. I have knocked on every door, hoping that at least one, at least one, would open to something interesting. But it wasn’t to be, my luck had run out. And we are not talking about ladies here, let’s not even go down that road. I have climbed every hill I could, even climbed one of them thrice, the last of them under the cover of darkness…..been to every watering hole and restaurant. I was so bored that I even went to the blooming air show after having sworn that I would never go for it ever again a couple of years ago. I managed to, however, succeed in staying away from the Maiden concert, thank god for small mercies. My fish kept me busy for some time, but my present lot are the peaceful kind, the live and let live types, even the infamous Red Devil that has a reputation to devour any object in his field of vision, even rooted plants leave alone the stupid gold fish I feed him, has turned himself into a vegan. Only fruits and berries for him. He happily gorges on little green and red pellets and plays hopscotch with the other girlies in the tank. God save him.
If there was ever a scale of human irritation, I would have set a new record high with absolute ease.
People thought I was going through a mid life crisis.
Just when I thought all was lost, my good friend, the fiend, wakes up from his winter slumber. He yawns. He stretches. Groggily he searches for his wristwatch that’s lost under the bedding; a heap of soft straw and fragrant leaves. He finally finds it, stares at the dials for a whole minute. Still drunk on sleep, he sees the time through slit eyes. He smiles and is about to hit the sack thinking he awoke a little earlier than schedule, when suddenly he leaps out of the bed. Shit! He should have been up a whole month ago.
Madness, Eccentricity, Insanity, three of my best friends, live just around the corner. They spent the whole winter anxiously waiting for his arrival. Then, they see it coming. A shining black steam train, breathing fire as it cuts through the heartland, the gleam from the chrome cowcatcher is juxtaposed with the mile high trail of smoke that’s ascends into the heavens. The-Man-Upstairs, shuts the windows of his pearly white mansion and shouts at his assistant to turn on the aircon. With bated breath he murmurs to himself, “That son of a bitch is back”.
In the distance, he watches Madness, Eccentricity and Insanity. As the train screeches to a halt, sparks fly off the rails. The blaze sets fire to the grass growing alongside the track. That sets off a forest fire. It’s not long before it’s turned itself into a flaming inferno. The towering flames set fire to the canopies hundreds of metres high in the sky. Birds and baboons flee the flames, but it’s futile. They are soon engulfed and consumed by the flames. The air is rich with the aroma of bush meat, “well-done”.
Madness, pulls up the handbrake, quickly runs into the forest, grabs a nicely grilled a baboon and hops onto the train. He was ravenous. He starts gorging on it, without sparing a thought as to which end he’s starting his meal from, not like it really matters.
The fiend smiles. He’s happy. That was some entry. He’ll win five Oscars for that.
Meanwhile in the background, I can hear “Puli…Puli…Puli”.
Oh, don’t worry, that just some thousand fans chanting my name. They do this all the time. They are just happy the master’s back. Let’s put on our cool sunglasses and smile at the crowds. These fans…. What would you do…..
“What’s the plan, Master?”. “What’s the plan?”. Shall we use the telephone lines to dry our underwear? Shall we tether a buffalo in the office parking lot? How about we wax that hairy sardar? Shall we ask the archbishop the way to the closest sleaze bar? Shall we pour ourselves one shot of whisky each and ask the traffic constable to judge who poured the perfect sixty? Shall we enter a night club through the fire escape?”
Suddenly everything goes quiet. The silence is deafening. Even the clouds have stopped sailing across the sky.
The fiend loses it. Slaps the guy who uttered the last idea,, I think it’s Madness, all that monkey meat must have done that to him. “Shall we enter a night club through the fire escape?” I have already done that! In true * Rajni style Insanity mutters, “Kannaa, you lack ‘origgi naality’. That’s not very original either, but the fiend hadn’t heard that joke before. He was enjoying his winter slumber remember.
(* Joke on the local radio. A comic depiction of Rajni Kanth, defines originality as Oru G = one joint of grass(G)/weed, and naal T = 4 teas.)
It takes a gifted person to see what I see. Just as spring bucks, after a long, cruel dry season, look yearningly towards to the sky and on watching storm clouds gather on the horizon, spring into the air in sheer delight, for the days of hardship are nearing to an end and the season of abundance is just around the corner, my fan club waits, nervous and impatient.
Are they ready? Can they handle it? One of them is so excited that he runs fast and sinks his head into the rear of a hippo. Another is tickling a crocodile. A third just pinched the one sitting next to him in the backside. A minute later his countenance took an international flavour as he had what looked like a maple leaf imprinted on his face. But he doesn’t mind, it’s all worth it, its nothing when compared to what the master has in store for them.
The steam engine races along the track, setting the old teak sleepers on fire, it’s rails white hot. The burning embers cast against the dark night gives it a very surreal look. And then, the engine leads into a tunnel and disappears without a trace.
Scientists at the space station frantically send panic messages to NASA. No sooner did they do that than there’s an explosion at space station. It goes up in ball of fire. A star gazer in some obscure land thinks points it out to his girlfriend as a shooting star, and asks her to make a wish. Too bad, he doesn’t see any action that night.
Back home in NASA, a message prints on the telegraph machine. A man rushes to read the message. The next moment his head explodes scattering grey matter all over the carpet. The telegram flutters as it lies glued to a chunk of grey matter covered in coagulating blood. It reads, “Puli is going to build a bicyle”.
The madness has begun.
The End.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
The Mummy - Part 1
“You know Amitabh Bachchaaan? You look like Amitabh Bachchaaan. Very Strong Amitabh Bachchaaan. Very handsome. I like Amitabh Bachchaaan .”
I wonder when was the last time someone said that to you. I wonder if anyone has ever said that to you. Chances are that they haven’t and that’s because, you’ve probably never been to Egypt.
This is one crazy country and I’ll tell you more as you keep reading. If you want to hear more about the great pyramids and the river Nile, go look it up on google. I have been there done that all right, but let’s just leave it at that. This is my story, not a class in Geography.
The first thing that strikes you as you get off the airplane at Cairo airport is not how far are the pyramids, or how high is it, or how many people did it take to make it, booby trapped doors, Imhotep, Ramsees, or Tutankhamen. The first thing that strikes you as you get off that airplane is, “Shit, it’s bloody cold out here”. I thought this was the bloody desert. Who turned on the air conditioning? It was only around half past five in the evening, the sun was still shining in all its glory, and yet it was seriously quite cold, more cold than cool, an unpleasant 10-11C. So, there you are, just about to disembark from the plane and you just can’t help but think of how so many people and great institutions, starting with your high school Geography teacher, great writers, historians, Discovery Channel, National Geographic were misleading you from the time you can remember. May be I too ought to buy one of those “Education ruined me” t-shirts.
The desert, I got to know over the next couple of days is not always as hot as they make it appear. I am sure it’s miserable in summer, but as I was about to find out, it can be very pleasant during other times of the year. Its just like Delhi, a melting pot in summer, quite pleasant at other times of the year, chilling to the bone in winter.
How I was mislead from the time I was born however, is the least of my concerns. I have a suitcase full of summer wear. I was gunning for the “O’Connel” look - Brendan Frazer in the Mummy. Nice whites and khakhis. I was ridiculing my colleague when he said they are very formal in Egypt and I’ll have to carry my suit. “Who carries a suit to a desert? I am going to be sweating bullets wearing a suit in the desert.” I am glad that for once I paid heed to someone’s advice and didn’t let my common sense go into overdrive.
The second thing that strikes you as you get off the airplane and enter the airport is that the old HAL Bangalore airport was not the crappiest airport in the world, wait till you’ve seen Cairo airport. But then, no sooner have you noticed that may be you come from a rich country after all, than it suddenly starts getting interesting.
There you are standing in line at the immigrations, it’s the same everywhere in the world, I don’t want to murder Egypt on that count, but as I was saying, as you stand in line waiting for the bureaucracy to work its bit, you just can’t help but notice how pretty the women folk here are. They are simply stunning - beautiful eyes, clear and lovely skin, sharp features, some of them sport their hair in curls and red nail polish. How I wish I could marry one of them.
Red nail polish? Let’s not get kinky at this point, I am merely documenting my finds.
I slowly begin to understand why the Arab world invented the parda, not that I approve of it, but as my uncle rightly once said, when you see such beauty, I wouldn’t be surprised if you want to shield it from the world.
Then, it gets better.
Did you know that you can light your cigarette while you standing in line waiting for the Immigration officer to stamp your passport? For all you know, the man behind the counter is smoking his cigarette while he’s stamping it. I come from a country that just banned smoking in public spaces and I am, for once quite pleased with the health ministry for passing a useful legislation for a change. But there’s something very cool about watching someone light his cigarette right in front of the Immigrations officer. If you can smoke at Immigrations, you can smoke just about anywhere you please. There’s a picture forming in my head, where I am dressed as a surgeon, doing an open heart on some hapless patient, a cigarette held between my lips, “Nurse, forceps. Nurse, check the blood pressure? Keep the knife ready. Nurse, Ash tray.”. I am going to have a whale of a time all right.
I went for a tour of the pyramids the next morning.
Yeah yeah, I know what you saying, I swore I wouldn’t talk about the pyramids, but this is different, and more importantly, who are you to question what I write? This is not a free country, the moment you started reading this article, you have stepped into the Country for Pulickal, of Pulickal and by Pulickal. You have no rights.
But if you really want to know something about the pyramids, here you go - you can’t scale the pyramids like you see in the movies, it’s prohibited, the place is swarming with soldiers armed with machine guns, and you are not allowed to take photos inside the pyramids, and like I already mentioned, the moment they get to know you are from India, you get the standard response “You know Amitabh Bachchan? You look like Amitabh Bachchan. Very Strong, very handsome.” Well, to be honest I know the latter half of that statement is true, but Amitabh Bachchan?
As I was saying, you enter the “sacred” pyramids, you meet flocks of tourist escorted by guides who go and on rumbling about the hieroglyphs, and this is the cartouche – the name of the individual in hieroglyphs, this is a fish, this is a lotus flower that the pharaoh presents to his queen, they had three children, judgement day, Horus, Anoobis, the burial shaft is 25 mts below the ground, worldly wisdom, their vision, blah blah blah….my guide, aka the sentry at the gate, lights up his cigarette! Once the tour party leaves the room, his lights another and as a faithful servant guards his master’s house, he dutifully keeps an eye on the door and mutters, “You can take photo. Take photo of Titi, his wife, this hieroglyph, this fish”. He points to a scene where Titi or whoever, is making out with a dozen chicks. Serious! So much for caretakers of sacred monuments. And as the piece-de-resistance, I know Monkey will love this word and finally can savor its spelling, he stubs it out inside the pyramid!
Egyptians, don’t you just love them.
I wonder when was the last time someone said that to you. I wonder if anyone has ever said that to you. Chances are that they haven’t and that’s because, you’ve probably never been to Egypt.
This is one crazy country and I’ll tell you more as you keep reading. If you want to hear more about the great pyramids and the river Nile, go look it up on google. I have been there done that all right, but let’s just leave it at that. This is my story, not a class in Geography.
The first thing that strikes you as you get off the airplane at Cairo airport is not how far are the pyramids, or how high is it, or how many people did it take to make it, booby trapped doors, Imhotep, Ramsees, or Tutankhamen. The first thing that strikes you as you get off that airplane is, “Shit, it’s bloody cold out here”. I thought this was the bloody desert. Who turned on the air conditioning? It was only around half past five in the evening, the sun was still shining in all its glory, and yet it was seriously quite cold, more cold than cool, an unpleasant 10-11C. So, there you are, just about to disembark from the plane and you just can’t help but think of how so many people and great institutions, starting with your high school Geography teacher, great writers, historians, Discovery Channel, National Geographic were misleading you from the time you can remember. May be I too ought to buy one of those “Education ruined me” t-shirts.
The desert, I got to know over the next couple of days is not always as hot as they make it appear. I am sure it’s miserable in summer, but as I was about to find out, it can be very pleasant during other times of the year. Its just like Delhi, a melting pot in summer, quite pleasant at other times of the year, chilling to the bone in winter.
How I was mislead from the time I was born however, is the least of my concerns. I have a suitcase full of summer wear. I was gunning for the “O’Connel” look - Brendan Frazer in the Mummy. Nice whites and khakhis. I was ridiculing my colleague when he said they are very formal in Egypt and I’ll have to carry my suit. “Who carries a suit to a desert? I am going to be sweating bullets wearing a suit in the desert.” I am glad that for once I paid heed to someone’s advice and didn’t let my common sense go into overdrive.
The second thing that strikes you as you get off the airplane and enter the airport is that the old HAL Bangalore airport was not the crappiest airport in the world, wait till you’ve seen Cairo airport. But then, no sooner have you noticed that may be you come from a rich country after all, than it suddenly starts getting interesting.
There you are standing in line at the immigrations, it’s the same everywhere in the world, I don’t want to murder Egypt on that count, but as I was saying, as you stand in line waiting for the bureaucracy to work its bit, you just can’t help but notice how pretty the women folk here are. They are simply stunning - beautiful eyes, clear and lovely skin, sharp features, some of them sport their hair in curls and red nail polish. How I wish I could marry one of them.
Red nail polish? Let’s not get kinky at this point, I am merely documenting my finds.
I slowly begin to understand why the Arab world invented the parda, not that I approve of it, but as my uncle rightly once said, when you see such beauty, I wouldn’t be surprised if you want to shield it from the world.
Then, it gets better.
Did you know that you can light your cigarette while you standing in line waiting for the Immigration officer to stamp your passport? For all you know, the man behind the counter is smoking his cigarette while he’s stamping it. I come from a country that just banned smoking in public spaces and I am, for once quite pleased with the health ministry for passing a useful legislation for a change. But there’s something very cool about watching someone light his cigarette right in front of the Immigrations officer. If you can smoke at Immigrations, you can smoke just about anywhere you please. There’s a picture forming in my head, where I am dressed as a surgeon, doing an open heart on some hapless patient, a cigarette held between my lips, “Nurse, forceps. Nurse, check the blood pressure? Keep the knife ready. Nurse, Ash tray.”. I am going to have a whale of a time all right.
I went for a tour of the pyramids the next morning.
Yeah yeah, I know what you saying, I swore I wouldn’t talk about the pyramids, but this is different, and more importantly, who are you to question what I write? This is not a free country, the moment you started reading this article, you have stepped into the Country for Pulickal, of Pulickal and by Pulickal. You have no rights.
But if you really want to know something about the pyramids, here you go - you can’t scale the pyramids like you see in the movies, it’s prohibited, the place is swarming with soldiers armed with machine guns, and you are not allowed to take photos inside the pyramids, and like I already mentioned, the moment they get to know you are from India, you get the standard response “You know Amitabh Bachchan? You look like Amitabh Bachchan. Very Strong, very handsome.” Well, to be honest I know the latter half of that statement is true, but Amitabh Bachchan?
As I was saying, you enter the “sacred” pyramids, you meet flocks of tourist escorted by guides who go and on rumbling about the hieroglyphs, and this is the cartouche – the name of the individual in hieroglyphs, this is a fish, this is a lotus flower that the pharaoh presents to his queen, they had three children, judgement day, Horus, Anoobis, the burial shaft is 25 mts below the ground, worldly wisdom, their vision, blah blah blah….my guide, aka the sentry at the gate, lights up his cigarette! Once the tour party leaves the room, his lights another and as a faithful servant guards his master’s house, he dutifully keeps an eye on the door and mutters, “You can take photo. Take photo of Titi, his wife, this hieroglyph, this fish”. He points to a scene where Titi or whoever, is making out with a dozen chicks. Serious! So much for caretakers of sacred monuments. And as the piece-de-resistance, I know Monkey will love this word and finally can savor its spelling, he stubs it out inside the pyramid!
Egyptians, don’t you just love them.
How the BBC Ruined My Monday Morning
My weekend revolved around BBC. I am not referring to the British Broadcasting Corporation, but Badminton, Beer and the Cold.
The beauty of this story, it's a true one and happened under the influence of zero alcohol. Readers must realise that even a simple thing like a common cold can have a huge impact on a high performance machine like Pulickal. And the beauty of extreme fatigue on one's thinking.
Now, one must know the background and the build up to this event. It goes thus.
Last Friday and Saturday were two very busy and fun filled days. Recuperating from a cold, I was challenged to a game of badminton by a friend of mine. Eager as we both were to play, I passed on it, as I was down with the flu, running nose and all. But my friend Royston, wouldn't take no for an answer. Having beaten him on the previous four consecutive weekends, he must have been eager to extract his revenge. But with due respect to the lad, I am a lazy bum who needs a kick in the backside to get things rolling. Just because I said "kick in the backside" and "things rolling", don't let your imagination run wild and take things literally, my manhood is not detachable. Such dirty movies you people watch that your minds are filthy, shame on you.
I'll try to keep this simple, because I am still flirting with Delirium. She's damn cute, this Delirium, but like all cute things, she's very unpredictable, and never stays long enough.
Three days of hardly any sleep, plenty of beer and for the 16th time, a bloody cold, and tablets for cold, I receive a phone call y'day afternoon at 3.30pm. I had just got back from another exhausting round of badminton, and was half asleep when the mobile begins to ring. If I ever get to meet that beast who invented it, I would shove his invention up his bum, for that's it's rightful place.
Coming back to my story… the phone rings. Groggy as groggy can be, I answer the call. It's a girl at the other end. Says, "Hi, this is Aparna. Sachin, how do you go from Koramangala to Kalasipalayam.". I just met a girl by the same first name the previous night, a very close friend's fiance. She happens to stay in Koramangala too. I hadn't heard her voice on the phone before, so I thought it was her. I know what you arseholes are thinking, but my thoughts were absolutely noble. It sounded weird that she would call me and ask me for directions, but then, it's only directions. May be Sunil, my friend, had asked her to call me and me for directions. Even that didn't make much sense, but I didn't bother to break my head over it, and I just complied gave her directions. When you are woken up from your sleep, one's only motivation is to somehow put a swift end to the call and go back to sleep. I give her directions. I asked her if that was her number and saved it against her name. I promptly got a messgae"Contact saved to Memory" from my stupid phone, bloody brainless device. I go back to sleep and forgot the whole episode.
This afternoon, I got a call on my phone while I was out for lunch. I had left my cellphone in my desk drawer, so I saw the missed call. It was an unfamiliar number. Being the courteous soul that I am, decided to return the call with my new found corporate manners, "Hi, This is Sachin Pulickal, I got a call from this number…. How may I help you". The voice at the other end, another lady says I had reached the reception at the WIPRO office in Bangalore. She said, may be one of your friends from Wipro might have called you. I said "Ok", and ended the call.
But whom do I know who works at Wipro? No one (at least no one that readily comes to mind). So I take a wild guess, and it must be that Aparna who I met recently , may be she called to thank me for giving directions to Kalasipalayam. So I called the number I had saved yesterday. So, I call from my desk phone. "Aparna" picks up and the conversation goes thus:
Sachin: "Hi, is this Aparna?"
Aparna: "Yes……. Who is this?"
Sachin: - "This is Sachin Pulickal."
Aparna "Hi Sachin"
Things are going fairly normal at this stage. The conversation continues…
Sachin: "Which company did u say you worked for?"
Aparna: "Huh? Who is this?"
Sachin; "Sachin Pulickal. This is Aparna, right?"
It gets weird from here…
A: Yes, it's Aparna you monkey.
S: "Did you just call me some time ago? Do you work for Wipro?"
A: Speechless.
Now I am really bloody confused. I check the number on the phone display and check the number saved against Aparna in my cellphone. They both match. It doesn't make sense. Why is she sounding so confused?
My Eureka Moment
A: "Sachin Pulickal, who have you called?"
S: "Aparna Nandakumar…."
A: This is Aparna Sharma. We met during lunch 15 mins ago, I work in your same office, you stupid dog…"
S: "Oh shit!".
After a long string of abuses on how she wants to murder me, I apologise for my mistake, and decide to call the REAL Aparna I intended to call. But I am still surprised how, my cellphone stored this number against her name. Then I think, in my sorry state, may be I "edited/wrote over the other Aparna's contact details".
Now, I still don't know who is that called me from Wipro. I recall Aparna telling me that she workd in HR in some company, but I couldn't readily recall the name. It didn't sound like Wipro, but what if they are some subsidiary of Wipro, recruiters who hire on behalf of Wipro, contractors, etc. I don't know anybody who works for Wipro, so I still under the assumption that Aparna must be the one who called me, because, "I don't know anybody who works for Wipro".
Perfectly logical Pulickal. Bravo. Although I am still clueless why she would call me. Read the second paragraph for my assumptions.
New problem.
I don't have Aparna's number. Looking into my gmail inbox and problem solved! She mailed all those who met her on the weekend with sweet little one-liners for each and every one of them and she's shared her phone number too. So, things start falling into place. May be because I asked her if it was her number before I saved it on my cellphone, she might be sharing it across the group, so that they might not ask retarded questions next time she calls. What are the odds of that happening? Don't ask me man, my brains are not functioning particluarly well at this point.
The story goes on…
Blunder of blunders, I call Miss Aparna Nandakumar……
SP: Hi Aparna, This is Sachin Pulickal
AN: Hi!
SP: Which company do u work for?
AN: Cambridge something something….
SP: Speechless.
SP: Not Wipro?
AN: I told you I work for Cambridge something something….
SP: Speechless.
SP. So, did your friend manage to get to Kalasipalayam y'day?
AN: What?
SP: Kalasipalayam……. y'day, you called, I gave u directions….
AN: Why would I call u for directions?
Bingo. Finally, she's talking sense! I was still wondering why she called me of all people, but then again, may be because I was mallu and seemed like a decent guy and she must be scared of Amith. But it doesn't make sense. AN's asking me about some friend's resume I was supposed to forward, blah blah blah, and I am still wondering what the hell's going on.
After exchanging pleasantries, the call ends.
Now, the Real Eureka moment!
I finally figure it all out.
It was Aparna from my office, she's from out of town, and I happen to be th eonly localite she knows. She called and in my slumber I thought it was A.N. and gave her directions, saved the first Aparna's number as AN's number. Stupid cellphone, brainless piece of technology. This I am sure wouldn't have happened if it was on the landline, mum would have answered the call, "Sachin is sleeping. Please call later". I love my landline.
Now, I call up the original Aparna who called me and is the cause for all this mess. I explain what happens, and she's livid. I got another mouthful.
I am not calling Aparna Nandakumar. There are more expletives in her vocabulary. And being mallu, she can curse in the vernacular, which is twice as bad.
So, I throw my cellphone into my draw, where it's under lock and key. I am not answering any more calls on it for a while. God only knows what happens on the next phone call.
And yes, no more courtesy calls to "Missed Calls" from unknown numbers. If they really want to get in touch with me, they'll call me again.
Stupid cellphones….. the day I find the guy who invented it, "Somebody's gonna get hurt".
And that's how the BBC Ruined My Monday Morning.
Fin
Readers please note:
All the people who need to be copied onto this email have been copied. That includes Sunil and both the Aparnas, all the guys I went drinking with, and some of you who don't know of the above.
The author is sufficiently embarassed with himself, so you need not make things any worse for him.
Cellphones are nasty.
In future, if I you call me from a new number, I don't answer and don't return your call, now you know why!
The beauty of this story, it's a true one and happened under the influence of zero alcohol. Readers must realise that even a simple thing like a common cold can have a huge impact on a high performance machine like Pulickal. And the beauty of extreme fatigue on one's thinking.
Now, one must know the background and the build up to this event. It goes thus.
Last Friday and Saturday were two very busy and fun filled days. Recuperating from a cold, I was challenged to a game of badminton by a friend of mine. Eager as we both were to play, I passed on it, as I was down with the flu, running nose and all. But my friend Royston, wouldn't take no for an answer. Having beaten him on the previous four consecutive weekends, he must have been eager to extract his revenge. But with due respect to the lad, I am a lazy bum who needs a kick in the backside to get things rolling. Just because I said "kick in the backside" and "things rolling", don't let your imagination run wild and take things literally, my manhood is not detachable. Such dirty movies you people watch that your minds are filthy, shame on you.
I'll try to keep this simple, because I am still flirting with Delirium. She's damn cute, this Delirium, but like all cute things, she's very unpredictable, and never stays long enough.
Three days of hardly any sleep, plenty of beer and for the 16th time, a bloody cold, and tablets for cold, I receive a phone call y'day afternoon at 3.30pm. I had just got back from another exhausting round of badminton, and was half asleep when the mobile begins to ring. If I ever get to meet that beast who invented it, I would shove his invention up his bum, for that's it's rightful place.
Coming back to my story… the phone rings. Groggy as groggy can be, I answer the call. It's a girl at the other end. Says, "Hi, this is Aparna. Sachin, how do you go from Koramangala to Kalasipalayam.". I just met a girl by the same first name the previous night, a very close friend's fiance. She happens to stay in Koramangala too. I hadn't heard her voice on the phone before, so I thought it was her. I know what you arseholes are thinking, but my thoughts were absolutely noble. It sounded weird that she would call me and ask me for directions, but then, it's only directions. May be Sunil, my friend, had asked her to call me and me for directions. Even that didn't make much sense, but I didn't bother to break my head over it, and I just complied gave her directions. When you are woken up from your sleep, one's only motivation is to somehow put a swift end to the call and go back to sleep. I give her directions. I asked her if that was her number and saved it against her name. I promptly got a messgae"Contact saved to Memory" from my stupid phone, bloody brainless device. I go back to sleep and forgot the whole episode.
This afternoon, I got a call on my phone while I was out for lunch. I had left my cellphone in my desk drawer, so I saw the missed call. It was an unfamiliar number. Being the courteous soul that I am, decided to return the call with my new found corporate manners, "Hi, This is Sachin Pulickal, I got a call from this number…. How may I help you". The voice at the other end, another lady says I had reached the reception at the WIPRO office in Bangalore. She said, may be one of your friends from Wipro might have called you. I said "Ok", and ended the call.
But whom do I know who works at Wipro? No one (at least no one that readily comes to mind). So I take a wild guess, and it must be that Aparna who I met recently , may be she called to thank me for giving directions to Kalasipalayam. So I called the number I had saved yesterday. So, I call from my desk phone. "Aparna" picks up and the conversation goes thus:
Sachin: "Hi, is this Aparna?"
Aparna: "Yes……. Who is this?"
Sachin: - "This is Sachin Pulickal."
Aparna "Hi Sachin"
Things are going fairly normal at this stage. The conversation continues…
Sachin: "Which company did u say you worked for?"
Aparna: "Huh? Who is this?"
Sachin; "Sachin Pulickal. This is Aparna, right?"
It gets weird from here…
A: Yes, it's Aparna you monkey.
S: "Did you just call me some time ago? Do you work for Wipro?"
A: Speechless.
Now I am really bloody confused. I check the number on the phone display and check the number saved against Aparna in my cellphone. They both match. It doesn't make sense. Why is she sounding so confused?
My Eureka Moment
A: "Sachin Pulickal, who have you called?"
S: "Aparna Nandakumar…."
A: This is Aparna Sharma. We met during lunch 15 mins ago, I work in your same office, you stupid dog…"
S: "Oh shit!".
After a long string of abuses on how she wants to murder me, I apologise for my mistake, and decide to call the REAL Aparna I intended to call. But I am still surprised how, my cellphone stored this number against her name. Then I think, in my sorry state, may be I "edited/wrote over the other Aparna's contact details".
Now, I still don't know who is that called me from Wipro. I recall Aparna telling me that she workd in HR in some company, but I couldn't readily recall the name. It didn't sound like Wipro, but what if they are some subsidiary of Wipro, recruiters who hire on behalf of Wipro, contractors, etc. I don't know anybody who works for Wipro, so I still under the assumption that Aparna must be the one who called me, because, "I don't know anybody who works for Wipro".
Perfectly logical Pulickal. Bravo. Although I am still clueless why she would call me. Read the second paragraph for my assumptions.
New problem.
I don't have Aparna's number. Looking into my gmail inbox and problem solved! She mailed all those who met her on the weekend with sweet little one-liners for each and every one of them and she's shared her phone number too. So, things start falling into place. May be because I asked her if it was her number before I saved it on my cellphone, she might be sharing it across the group, so that they might not ask retarded questions next time she calls. What are the odds of that happening? Don't ask me man, my brains are not functioning particluarly well at this point.
The story goes on…
Blunder of blunders, I call Miss Aparna Nandakumar……
SP: Hi Aparna, This is Sachin Pulickal
AN: Hi!
SP: Which company do u work for?
AN: Cambridge something something….
SP: Speechless.
SP: Not Wipro?
AN: I told you I work for Cambridge something something….
SP: Speechless.
SP. So, did your friend manage to get to Kalasipalayam y'day?
AN: What?
SP: Kalasipalayam……. y'day, you called, I gave u directions….
AN: Why would I call u for directions?
Bingo. Finally, she's talking sense! I was still wondering why she called me of all people, but then again, may be because I was mallu and seemed like a decent guy and she must be scared of Amith. But it doesn't make sense. AN's asking me about some friend's resume I was supposed to forward, blah blah blah, and I am still wondering what the hell's going on.
After exchanging pleasantries, the call ends.
Now, the Real Eureka moment!
I finally figure it all out.
It was Aparna from my office, she's from out of town, and I happen to be th eonly localite she knows. She called and in my slumber I thought it was A.N. and gave her directions, saved the first Aparna's number as AN's number. Stupid cellphone, brainless piece of technology. This I am sure wouldn't have happened if it was on the landline, mum would have answered the call, "Sachin is sleeping. Please call later". I love my landline.
Now, I call up the original Aparna who called me and is the cause for all this mess. I explain what happens, and she's livid. I got another mouthful.
I am not calling Aparna Nandakumar. There are more expletives in her vocabulary. And being mallu, she can curse in the vernacular, which is twice as bad.
So, I throw my cellphone into my draw, where it's under lock and key. I am not answering any more calls on it for a while. God only knows what happens on the next phone call.
And yes, no more courtesy calls to "Missed Calls" from unknown numbers. If they really want to get in touch with me, they'll call me again.
Stupid cellphones….. the day I find the guy who invented it, "Somebody's gonna get hurt".
And that's how the BBC Ruined My Monday Morning.
Fin
Readers please note:
All the people who need to be copied onto this email have been copied. That includes Sunil and both the Aparnas, all the guys I went drinking with, and some of you who don't know of the above.
The author is sufficiently embarassed with himself, so you need not make things any worse for him.
Cellphones are nasty.
In future, if I you call me from a new number, I don't answer and don't return your call, now you know why!
Drunk and Bad Boy vs Show Off
I have always believed that the man upstairs was in a very interesting mood when he decided to work on The Puli, and every day has been a living testiment to that belief. The world has thrown numerous challenges at the Puli, but the Puli to his credit, simply waltzed around them with fluid movements, poetry in motion am I. Little surprise, afterall I am the Puli.
And being a Master of Complications, incidentally I even have a watch by that name, strange..., where was I.... oh yes, being the Master of Complications, no day is an ordinary day in the books of the Puli. If it's complicated, The Puli will simplify it, turn it into a walk in the park. But if it's simple, Puli with his natural charisma, will complicate it, effortlessly.
Like what happened today. For the past two weeks I have been under some pain. I have had a niggling pain in my right cheek as I kept biting into it everytime I chewed on anything. To cut a long story short, my wisdom tooth, my right upper wisdom tooth, curse the devil, decided he didn't want to come out straight instead he came out sideways. Thank god he decided he didn't come out "bottoms-up". Someday when I donate my body to medical science, in all probabilty they will stumble upon a very interesting research topic, - the effects of beer drinking on the growth patterns of wisdom teeth. It has already been proven that people who consume alcohol, have a tendency to walk sideways, when under-the-influence, of course. But is there any connection between you walking sideways and your wisdom tooth growing sideways, can individual parts of your body too be under-the-influence? We'll just have to wait and see, I am yet to donate my body to science.
So, the story goes that I went to a dentist to have my wisdom tooth removed. Now as is always the case with the Puli, it didn't long to figure out that an ordinary dentist wouldn't do, we needed a Dental surgeon.
Now, why is is that everytime I go to a doctor, they are suddenly compelled to act all cool and they want portray themselves as "hep and happening" people? This man, the surgeon, said he had just returned from a holiday at Bandipur, where he saw plenty of panthers (they also go by the name Puli in Malayalam), and he ran into a Tusker that nearly gored him to death, and he escaped withing inches of his life. "My friend is a conservantionist and we have access to areas that other people only dream of". Two minutes later he gave me the number of his friend who runs that resort and told me that thay guy would take me to all these exclusive places, but promptly added that he would charge a fortune for it. Sucker. What a loser, stupid Show -Off. Doctors these days push the whole concept of references to a whole new level. I am sure he would also make a little off the side. Cheapo. So, automatically I discounted all that jack he told me about working with the tribals in the area and how Mr Goody-two-shoes does his bit to save the world. Now after he had established himself as a raring adventure junkie who knocks people's teeth out for a living, he decided to get working. I put up with all this because we had to wait till the anaesthetic took effect. The Jackass stuck me in some seven times, may be more, I lost count, he just kept poking that stupid needle in my mouth at regular intervals, and as it didn't pain as most of my mouth was alread numb, I didn't complain. But as usual, in typical Puli fashion, my tongue decided he wasn't going to go down without a fight, so we had to stick him in twice. This is why I hate doctors and people in the medical profession, actually I dislike a lot of people, but doctors would figure really high up on that list of people I hate or would go to great lengths to avoid.
He knocked out one of my wisdom tooth, Drunk Boy, in one clean move. He didn't put up much of a fight, he is street smart you see. You don't get into fights when you are high. He was a fast learner. Now, it was the turn of the second one, Bad Boy. Bad Boy had to be pulled out because he was being a bad influence. It was he who made the Drunk go "astray" in the first place.Else Drunk Boy would have, in all probability come out straight and gone on to discover pure and clean alternative forms of energy.
Coming back to the Bad Boy. Now you must realise that Bad Boy wasn't drunk at this point of time, so he wasn't going to go down without a fight. The surgeon ran his drill through him, hammered him about a dozen times, but in true Puli spirit, he didn't budge. Finally, the doctor, Captain Show-off, opened his bag of gizmos, typed in the secret code, and locked the co-ordinates of his most powerful weapon onto Bad Boy. Now Bad Boy becuase he had signed the infamous NTPT and was an active signatory of IAEA, no longer possed nuclear weapons, but Show-Off hadn't done any such thing. By the way, considering all the UN sanctions with all due credit, he was reluctant to resort to this as he feared " contamination". Finally, after several rounds of contemplation, the Loser aka Show-off, aka the surgeon, decided he was left with no choice but to go use his nukes, and he pulled out his drill bits. First, he beheaded poor old Bad Boy. That's when he realised that he wasn't named Bad Boy without a reason. You couldn't simply uproot Bad Boy, he wasn't going to throw in the towel that easily. In his infinite "wisdom", he had locked himself firmly into my jaw, making him unshakable, literally.
But the doctor, went about his business with his fancy drill bit. He cut up the now beheaded Bad Boy into three pieces, some postmortem this. Then, again he got working with his funny tools - a shiny screwdriver like device that he used like a crowbar to dislodge the remains of the Late Bad Boy, a shiny hammer like device and tweezers. I know if I asked him for more details, Captain Show-off would have told me that it's not called a screwdriver and a hammer, but it's called something else, it's made from the finest metals and it was forged in some special mould by a one eyed monster, who dwells in some remote cave that occasionaly receives a few blasts from hell that he uses to melt the metals and make this "magic" tool. Like his tweezer was called Forceps, as if I didn't know that, as if knowing it was called a Forcep made all the difference and we now can now solve the global food crisis. We can release a new version of the Puli, one that knows what a forcep is, only to realise that that word already existed in his vocabulary before the mighty Show off decided to give him an educaton into the fine art of naming surgical instruments. I was in no mood to listen to that shit, so I decided to keep mum. He had already given me a lecture on how Bad Boy before he decided to come up North and emerge through the gums, had secured his house firmly with a good Godrej 11 lever lock and locked himself against my jaw.
Show-Off toiled labouriously for some fifteen minutes. Throughout which, of course, he kept telling me that it shouldn't have taken so long, usually it's a two minute affair, a wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am sort of thing, but Bad Boy had sent him in search of the fabled g-spot. I lost track of what else he did, I just lay back, closed my eyes and waited till he had knocked himself out and thus Bad Boy was finally knocked out. I counted till ten, but he didn't not rise. A new champion was born, Captain Show-off.
Being a good sport, he acknowledged that Bad Boy had given him a fought fight. Respect, afterall he was born of the Puli. He formed a fist and held it out, hoping Bad Boy would do the same and the two could gently tap, a boxer's shakehand as one would call it, but it wasn't to be, Bad Boy was wasted. But in the spirit of the Geneva protocol, he offered to give Bad Boy a decent burial. Bad Boy now lay, or more aptly, where Bad Boy once lay, he built a tribute, covered the hallowed ground under six millimeters of flesh, held together by sutures. A lot of his "blood" relatives arrived by the truckload (don't ask me how by the truckload - the truckers strike has been called off you moron) to watch this great duel and their numbers "swelled" by the time he was finally laid to rest.
The sudden demise of Bad Boy and the Drunk has left an emptiness in my mouth. They will be missed. As for me, I am trying to come to terms with it. All the "blood" relatives have left, but the "swellings" remain and remain they shall for a whole week. Vultures, hoping he left them something in his will.... what has this world come to.
I have been given six days and a basket full of drugs to come to terms with this sudden loss. And, since Drunk Boy is no more, as a tribute to him, I have sworn to/had to/forced to, stay off all forms of his favoured drink for a full week, no easy feat considering this is the weekend. No beer, no liqeuer chocolates, no rum cakes, nothing. As for Bad Boy, he truly was a bad boy, he's left me without any hard food, without spice and not even warm food. True sadist he was, and even in death, he torments me. Now I have to spend the next seven days of my life eating bananas, cold rice porridge, drinking cold tea with the occasional ice cream offering some relief. Oh wait, I forgot to mention the delicious steriods, multicoloured capsules which tend to give you a tummy upset, some more coloured tablets to prevent a tummy upset, painkillers, who knows what else. The Show-Off wrote me two pages of shit that he would like me to do when he goes about doing his victory dance...... stupid Show-Off.
I just can't wait for the next weekend when I get to meet him. This time he'll be the one going home with a feeling of emptiness in his mouth, but the son of a bitch has put a hole in my wallet. Too many battles to fight, too little time. If those drugs do what they are supposed to, may be after some mind altering experiences, I shall forgive him. Isn't that what mind altering drugs are about anyway. I just hope there's some LCD or heroin in some of those drugs that he prescribed.
The End
*********************************************************************************************************************************************************
Characters:
Show-Off = the Dental Surgeon
The Drunk = My right Upper Wisdom tooth
Bad Boy = My Right Lower Wisdom tooth.
**********************************************************************************************************************************************************
And being a Master of Complications, incidentally I even have a watch by that name, strange..., where was I.... oh yes, being the Master of Complications, no day is an ordinary day in the books of the Puli. If it's complicated, The Puli will simplify it, turn it into a walk in the park. But if it's simple, Puli with his natural charisma, will complicate it, effortlessly.
Like what happened today. For the past two weeks I have been under some pain. I have had a niggling pain in my right cheek as I kept biting into it everytime I chewed on anything. To cut a long story short, my wisdom tooth, my right upper wisdom tooth, curse the devil, decided he didn't want to come out straight instead he came out sideways. Thank god he decided he didn't come out "bottoms-up". Someday when I donate my body to medical science, in all probabilty they will stumble upon a very interesting research topic, - the effects of beer drinking on the growth patterns of wisdom teeth. It has already been proven that people who consume alcohol, have a tendency to walk sideways, when under-the-influence, of course. But is there any connection between you walking sideways and your wisdom tooth growing sideways, can individual parts of your body too be under-the-influence? We'll just have to wait and see, I am yet to donate my body to science.
So, the story goes that I went to a dentist to have my wisdom tooth removed. Now as is always the case with the Puli, it didn't long to figure out that an ordinary dentist wouldn't do, we needed a Dental surgeon.
Now, why is is that everytime I go to a doctor, they are suddenly compelled to act all cool and they want portray themselves as "hep and happening" people? This man, the surgeon, said he had just returned from a holiday at Bandipur, where he saw plenty of panthers (they also go by the name Puli in Malayalam), and he ran into a Tusker that nearly gored him to death, and he escaped withing inches of his life. "My friend is a conservantionist and we have access to areas that other people only dream of". Two minutes later he gave me the number of his friend who runs that resort and told me that thay guy would take me to all these exclusive places, but promptly added that he would charge a fortune for it. Sucker. What a loser, stupid Show -Off. Doctors these days push the whole concept of references to a whole new level. I am sure he would also make a little off the side. Cheapo. So, automatically I discounted all that jack he told me about working with the tribals in the area and how Mr Goody-two-shoes does his bit to save the world. Now after he had established himself as a raring adventure junkie who knocks people's teeth out for a living, he decided to get working. I put up with all this because we had to wait till the anaesthetic took effect. The Jackass stuck me in some seven times, may be more, I lost count, he just kept poking that stupid needle in my mouth at regular intervals, and as it didn't pain as most of my mouth was alread numb, I didn't complain. But as usual, in typical Puli fashion, my tongue decided he wasn't going to go down without a fight, so we had to stick him in twice. This is why I hate doctors and people in the medical profession, actually I dislike a lot of people, but doctors would figure really high up on that list of people I hate or would go to great lengths to avoid.
He knocked out one of my wisdom tooth, Drunk Boy, in one clean move. He didn't put up much of a fight, he is street smart you see. You don't get into fights when you are high. He was a fast learner. Now, it was the turn of the second one, Bad Boy. Bad Boy had to be pulled out because he was being a bad influence. It was he who made the Drunk go "astray" in the first place.Else Drunk Boy would have, in all probability come out straight and gone on to discover pure and clean alternative forms of energy.
Coming back to the Bad Boy. Now you must realise that Bad Boy wasn't drunk at this point of time, so he wasn't going to go down without a fight. The surgeon ran his drill through him, hammered him about a dozen times, but in true Puli spirit, he didn't budge. Finally, the doctor, Captain Show-off, opened his bag of gizmos, typed in the secret code, and locked the co-ordinates of his most powerful weapon onto Bad Boy. Now Bad Boy becuase he had signed the infamous NTPT and was an active signatory of IAEA, no longer possed nuclear weapons, but Show-Off hadn't done any such thing. By the way, considering all the UN sanctions with all due credit, he was reluctant to resort to this as he feared " contamination". Finally, after several rounds of contemplation, the Loser aka Show-off, aka the surgeon, decided he was left with no choice but to go use his nukes, and he pulled out his drill bits. First, he beheaded poor old Bad Boy. That's when he realised that he wasn't named Bad Boy without a reason. You couldn't simply uproot Bad Boy, he wasn't going to throw in the towel that easily. In his infinite "wisdom", he had locked himself firmly into my jaw, making him unshakable, literally.
But the doctor, went about his business with his fancy drill bit. He cut up the now beheaded Bad Boy into three pieces, some postmortem this. Then, again he got working with his funny tools - a shiny screwdriver like device that he used like a crowbar to dislodge the remains of the Late Bad Boy, a shiny hammer like device and tweezers. I know if I asked him for more details, Captain Show-off would have told me that it's not called a screwdriver and a hammer, but it's called something else, it's made from the finest metals and it was forged in some special mould by a one eyed monster, who dwells in some remote cave that occasionaly receives a few blasts from hell that he uses to melt the metals and make this "magic" tool. Like his tweezer was called Forceps, as if I didn't know that, as if knowing it was called a Forcep made all the difference and we now can now solve the global food crisis. We can release a new version of the Puli, one that knows what a forcep is, only to realise that that word already existed in his vocabulary before the mighty Show off decided to give him an educaton into the fine art of naming surgical instruments. I was in no mood to listen to that shit, so I decided to keep mum. He had already given me a lecture on how Bad Boy before he decided to come up North and emerge through the gums, had secured his house firmly with a good Godrej 11 lever lock and locked himself against my jaw.
Show-Off toiled labouriously for some fifteen minutes. Throughout which, of course, he kept telling me that it shouldn't have taken so long, usually it's a two minute affair, a wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am sort of thing, but Bad Boy had sent him in search of the fabled g-spot. I lost track of what else he did, I just lay back, closed my eyes and waited till he had knocked himself out and thus Bad Boy was finally knocked out. I counted till ten, but he didn't not rise. A new champion was born, Captain Show-off.
Being a good sport, he acknowledged that Bad Boy had given him a fought fight. Respect, afterall he was born of the Puli. He formed a fist and held it out, hoping Bad Boy would do the same and the two could gently tap, a boxer's shakehand as one would call it, but it wasn't to be, Bad Boy was wasted. But in the spirit of the Geneva protocol, he offered to give Bad Boy a decent burial. Bad Boy now lay, or more aptly, where Bad Boy once lay, he built a tribute, covered the hallowed ground under six millimeters of flesh, held together by sutures. A lot of his "blood" relatives arrived by the truckload (don't ask me how by the truckload - the truckers strike has been called off you moron) to watch this great duel and their numbers "swelled" by the time he was finally laid to rest.
The sudden demise of Bad Boy and the Drunk has left an emptiness in my mouth. They will be missed. As for me, I am trying to come to terms with it. All the "blood" relatives have left, but the "swellings" remain and remain they shall for a whole week. Vultures, hoping he left them something in his will.... what has this world come to.
I have been given six days and a basket full of drugs to come to terms with this sudden loss. And, since Drunk Boy is no more, as a tribute to him, I have sworn to/had to/forced to, stay off all forms of his favoured drink for a full week, no easy feat considering this is the weekend. No beer, no liqeuer chocolates, no rum cakes, nothing. As for Bad Boy, he truly was a bad boy, he's left me without any hard food, without spice and not even warm food. True sadist he was, and even in death, he torments me. Now I have to spend the next seven days of my life eating bananas, cold rice porridge, drinking cold tea with the occasional ice cream offering some relief. Oh wait, I forgot to mention the delicious steriods, multicoloured capsules which tend to give you a tummy upset, some more coloured tablets to prevent a tummy upset, painkillers, who knows what else. The Show-Off wrote me two pages of shit that he would like me to do when he goes about doing his victory dance...... stupid Show-Off.
I just can't wait for the next weekend when I get to meet him. This time he'll be the one going home with a feeling of emptiness in his mouth, but the son of a bitch has put a hole in my wallet. Too many battles to fight, too little time. If those drugs do what they are supposed to, may be after some mind altering experiences, I shall forgive him. Isn't that what mind altering drugs are about anyway. I just hope there's some LCD or heroin in some of those drugs that he prescribed.
The End
*********************************************************************************************************************************************************
Characters:
Show-Off = the Dental Surgeon
The Drunk = My right Upper Wisdom tooth
Bad Boy = My Right Lower Wisdom tooth.
**********************************************************************************************************************************************************
My Modern Rock Conspiracy Theory - 2008
Over the last two years, I have done my fair bit of introspection. Besides the obvious things like may be I need haircut, a girlfriend or may be my existing pair of jeans is little too faded to pass off as cool and fashionable, may be there are people who are smarter than I, that I started using more Hindi words in my daily speech (unfortunately not the sort of vocabulary you would fancy picking up), and many other things like I'll need a lot more money than I could possibly ever make, homely good looking girls are not manufactured anymore(apparently god lost the mould he used to use, may be the feminist faction in heaven objected and the democratic set up that they follow up there ruled in their favour or it could be that he decided to put his best people to the test like he tested Abraham to offer his son as a sacrifice, so this is supposed be some test that I am expected to pass, as if 18 years of education wasn't enough)...... the list is long.
Hey, give me a break will you. Stop being so critical, I am sure you are still harping on the faded jeans and haircut issue. This is my comeback to the world of writing after a two year self-imposed exile, you should be jumping for joy that the king of good times is back, not cribbing about faded jeans, "Oh Puli, what happened to your creativity", "Puli you've lost it man", "Blah blah blah". Sheesh, grow up.
Now moving on, I expect a little more maturity.
As I was saying, among the numerous things I realised during my introspections, no I didn't turn Buddha, thank you, I figured that there is a total dearth of good music today. As I lay in bed, breast feeding my laptop, rummaging through my music collection, it dawned on me that I was stuck in 1989, plus or minus 3 years. New music, not songs that I haven't heard before but sung in 1974, but music sung in recent times, may be a year or two old, barely featured on my computer. I was disgusted. There was this picture forming in my head, Pulickal in bell bottoms, long unkept hair, smoking weed, listening to Bob Marley, wait, I can't go any further. I jumped out of bed and ran to my good friend's room. He's an avid rocker, and a great guitarist. He had good taste in music. As I stood in his room, expressing my absolute disarray about possessing barely 10MB of fairly recent music amongst 10 GB of music and all those nasty visions in my head, (oh there was one with me dressed in a fluorescent orange shirt with green floral petals all over them, absolutely hideous), we arrived at a conclusion that, somewhere along the early nineties, when good music ceased to be produced, there must have been some natural disaster like a drought in the marijuana or poppy growing regions of the world, we've all heard of bush fires….or may be all the distilleries got together and signed a pact, much to the delight of the feminists or human right activists, that every drop of whisky produced henceforth would be alcohol free; alcohol free whisky, alcohol free rum, alcohol free vodka, alcohol free arrack (just like you have alcohol free beer), now all they could do to get high was drink lethal cups of coffee or sniff gasoline, or may be, just may be it was Osama Bin Laden who is responsible. I am sure, Washington, if pushed, can link the two. Moreover you can't blame Deva Gowda* for everthything that goes wrong, one must be reasonable.Somehow, the first few obvious theories didn't seem feasible, because every third guy I run into is either drunk, or is describing that high he experienced when he smoked up and lay on his back side starring at the stars in the sky. One even told me how they waltzed around in the clear sky, while Super Bitch (the Moon) looked on. She's still single and likely to stay so for some more time to come.
( * Deva Gowda is this local politician in B'lore, a former Prime Minister and an absolute bastard.)
Can you even imagine alcohol free arrack? Alcohol Free Arrack........Damn, I am good! Two weeks in Bangalore and it's all coming back to me now.
Where was I, ah yes, we then propounded this theory that of all myriad explanations we had, the Osama one made the most sense. But why Osama? 9/11 came much later. The US was probably air dropping new consignments of surface to air missiles and AK47s to the Taliban at this point of time. Ok, so not Osama, but something on the same lines. We figured that somewhere in the late eighties or early nineties, some one in power must have got really pissed off with all these bands producing such good music; and that his ugly eighteen year old daughter couldn't even come up with a decent rhyme, or may be all the women's underwear that was mailed to his son cast a doubt that his son might be turning into a transvestite, may be his wife ran away with a guitarist if a rock band, may be he just liked to see cute, "little boys" squealing on the TV.; that he must have started some stealth organization to weed out all the good artists from the music industry, entrusted the job to the CIA or their equivalent. The artists must have been taken to some prison and tortured, given electric shocks, had their tongues cut off, and fed on vegetables. Actually I think they must have served them vegetables on Christmas, on others it must have been just Daal. I don't know how people in certain parts of my country eat daal on a daily basis. May be that explains why they have an IQ equivalent of a Pomeranian. Getting back on track, this went on for a while, and when finally released, their mutilated genes were responsible for creatures like Britney Spears.
The CIA equivalent in the music industry? Well, it must be, how else would you explain all the crappy music? Every once in a long while, when you find one good song to hear, why am I not surprised its by the Red Hot Chilly Peppers, R.E.M, Pearl Jam or some band of yester years. It's like they just sneaked out of their caves high up in the mountains to tell the jokers in the music industry, "You missed me motherf****r, I am still alive". We are dealing with rock stars here, they are not known to be politically correct.
To cut a long story short, I put this theory to the test with my close friend, no wait a minute, he put my theory to the test. He is this little-overqualified-but-could-do-with- more-qualifications close friend of mine. He has more letters running alongside his name than his name itself. And he's muslim. So, that means, he has seven middle names you may only be able to pronounce when you are choking on a fish bone. Don't worry, I am not a back stabbing beast. He's copied onto this email, but don't fear for my safety, I am safe, for now, for it'll take him a while to rope in all his jehadi friends.
As I was saying, no sooner had I presented this theory, he mercilessly tore it apart. Nope, I didn't present it in printed form, the usage is purely figurative. Idiots! Just keep reading. He kept telling me it was baseless! "Do you have proof?", "How can you make a statement like that?", "You need to back it up with evidence".
I think my retort was "Can't you hear what's on the radio?". "Its absolute garbage", and some very animated gesticulations to go with it. But it was in vain. I was humbled. All my arguments were flushed down the pot. He told me that today artists rely heavily on research and market findings. I tried arguing that may be it's all that research is what's screwing up all the music. In a new artist's first album, he sings whatever came naturally to him, he creates good music. Subsequent albums cater to the record companies and he is forced to follow research findings and what teenagers "want to hear", most popular themes, break ups and loneliness is "happening", and more bloody advise and they screw up.
Of course, my friend gunned me down because he said it was rubbish, "You can never defend yourself with a theory like that". Point taken. My theory is garbage. There are numerous good artists in this world, and I suffer from a generation gap. I yield. I take back my arguments.
In the meanwhile, enjoy listening to Justin Timbalake's "What goes around, comes around".
Evidence? Who needs evidence when Timbaland's is #6 in the Billboard.
Dire Straits' The Sultans of Swing - Enqueue All.
Hey, give me a break will you. Stop being so critical, I am sure you are still harping on the faded jeans and haircut issue. This is my comeback to the world of writing after a two year self-imposed exile, you should be jumping for joy that the king of good times is back, not cribbing about faded jeans, "Oh Puli, what happened to your creativity", "Puli you've lost it man", "Blah blah blah". Sheesh, grow up.
Now moving on, I expect a little more maturity.
As I was saying, among the numerous things I realised during my introspections, no I didn't turn Buddha, thank you, I figured that there is a total dearth of good music today. As I lay in bed, breast feeding my laptop, rummaging through my music collection, it dawned on me that I was stuck in 1989, plus or minus 3 years. New music, not songs that I haven't heard before but sung in 1974, but music sung in recent times, may be a year or two old, barely featured on my computer. I was disgusted. There was this picture forming in my head, Pulickal in bell bottoms, long unkept hair, smoking weed, listening to Bob Marley, wait, I can't go any further. I jumped out of bed and ran to my good friend's room. He's an avid rocker, and a great guitarist. He had good taste in music. As I stood in his room, expressing my absolute disarray about possessing barely 10MB of fairly recent music amongst 10 GB of music and all those nasty visions in my head, (oh there was one with me dressed in a fluorescent orange shirt with green floral petals all over them, absolutely hideous), we arrived at a conclusion that, somewhere along the early nineties, when good music ceased to be produced, there must have been some natural disaster like a drought in the marijuana or poppy growing regions of the world, we've all heard of bush fires….or may be all the distilleries got together and signed a pact, much to the delight of the feminists or human right activists, that every drop of whisky produced henceforth would be alcohol free; alcohol free whisky, alcohol free rum, alcohol free vodka, alcohol free arrack (just like you have alcohol free beer), now all they could do to get high was drink lethal cups of coffee or sniff gasoline, or may be, just may be it was Osama Bin Laden who is responsible. I am sure, Washington, if pushed, can link the two. Moreover you can't blame Deva Gowda* for everthything that goes wrong, one must be reasonable.Somehow, the first few obvious theories didn't seem feasible, because every third guy I run into is either drunk, or is describing that high he experienced when he smoked up and lay on his back side starring at the stars in the sky. One even told me how they waltzed around in the clear sky, while Super Bitch (the Moon) looked on. She's still single and likely to stay so for some more time to come.
( * Deva Gowda is this local politician in B'lore, a former Prime Minister and an absolute bastard.)
Can you even imagine alcohol free arrack? Alcohol Free Arrack........Damn, I am good! Two weeks in Bangalore and it's all coming back to me now.
Where was I, ah yes, we then propounded this theory that of all myriad explanations we had, the Osama one made the most sense. But why Osama? 9/11 came much later. The US was probably air dropping new consignments of surface to air missiles and AK47s to the Taliban at this point of time. Ok, so not Osama, but something on the same lines. We figured that somewhere in the late eighties or early nineties, some one in power must have got really pissed off with all these bands producing such good music; and that his ugly eighteen year old daughter couldn't even come up with a decent rhyme, or may be all the women's underwear that was mailed to his son cast a doubt that his son might be turning into a transvestite, may be his wife ran away with a guitarist if a rock band, may be he just liked to see cute, "little boys" squealing on the TV.; that he must have started some stealth organization to weed out all the good artists from the music industry, entrusted the job to the CIA or their equivalent. The artists must have been taken to some prison and tortured, given electric shocks, had their tongues cut off, and fed on vegetables. Actually I think they must have served them vegetables on Christmas, on others it must have been just Daal. I don't know how people in certain parts of my country eat daal on a daily basis. May be that explains why they have an IQ equivalent of a Pomeranian. Getting back on track, this went on for a while, and when finally released, their mutilated genes were responsible for creatures like Britney Spears.
The CIA equivalent in the music industry? Well, it must be, how else would you explain all the crappy music? Every once in a long while, when you find one good song to hear, why am I not surprised its by the Red Hot Chilly Peppers, R.E.M, Pearl Jam or some band of yester years. It's like they just sneaked out of their caves high up in the mountains to tell the jokers in the music industry, "You missed me motherf****r, I am still alive". We are dealing with rock stars here, they are not known to be politically correct.
To cut a long story short, I put this theory to the test with my close friend, no wait a minute, he put my theory to the test. He is this little-overqualified-but-could-do-with- more-qualifications close friend of mine. He has more letters running alongside his name than his name itself. And he's muslim. So, that means, he has seven middle names you may only be able to pronounce when you are choking on a fish bone. Don't worry, I am not a back stabbing beast. He's copied onto this email, but don't fear for my safety, I am safe, for now, for it'll take him a while to rope in all his jehadi friends.
As I was saying, no sooner had I presented this theory, he mercilessly tore it apart. Nope, I didn't present it in printed form, the usage is purely figurative. Idiots! Just keep reading. He kept telling me it was baseless! "Do you have proof?", "How can you make a statement like that?", "You need to back it up with evidence".
I think my retort was "Can't you hear what's on the radio?". "Its absolute garbage", and some very animated gesticulations to go with it. But it was in vain. I was humbled. All my arguments were flushed down the pot. He told me that today artists rely heavily on research and market findings. I tried arguing that may be it's all that research is what's screwing up all the music. In a new artist's first album, he sings whatever came naturally to him, he creates good music. Subsequent albums cater to the record companies and he is forced to follow research findings and what teenagers "want to hear", most popular themes, break ups and loneliness is "happening", and more bloody advise and they screw up.
Of course, my friend gunned me down because he said it was rubbish, "You can never defend yourself with a theory like that". Point taken. My theory is garbage. There are numerous good artists in this world, and I suffer from a generation gap. I yield. I take back my arguments.
In the meanwhile, enjoy listening to Justin Timbalake's "What goes around, comes around".
Evidence? Who needs evidence when Timbaland's is #6 in the Billboard.
Dire Straits' The Sultans of Swing - Enqueue All.
The Old ICFAI Days - Onam Greetings
As it has been my custom for the past couple of years, my subjects have always been in for a treat as we near Onam, which also doubles up as my Onam greetings.
For the past year and a half, and another half that's yet to come, Puli, like king Mahabali has been in exile, banished to this place called Hyderabad. The gentle soul was tricked into trading in all his pleasures and his generosity by an evil demon called "Education", who promised to bestow great prosperity and immense happiness to him and all those around him, if he made a small sacrifice. He, ie. the devil, elaborated how the world having become this really sad and sorry place to live in, couldn't deal with people who are extremely happy or extremely sad. On much deeper probing they figured that while the later were quite easy to deal with, the former posed a serious challenge. The later, they figured, took care of themselves. Let me elaborate. It's like this: whenever people would get extremely depressed, in America for example they would go on a shooting spree - kill all the people who pissed him off - kill himself too, or in Pakistan you would declare jehad, in Sri Lanka you can join the LTTE, in Amsterdam you can do enough dope and sex till you brains are just too numb to feel neither happniess nor pain. Then you have India. That's where the problem lies. India is not a free country, it's a democracy. You ae not free to shoo your neighbour. You have to get the approvals of all those concerned. Our version of the Hamas is the Left Party, the only thing those jokers get close to is killing noble ideas like getting more nuclear reactors. The other option is to dip onself in the Ganges, which along with killing your sadness will kill you too. So, we just export our "really sad" to countries that have lowered the bar. That doesn't mean they drink in the basements, stupid!
Enough of that detour. Now coming back on track, the really happy people, like myself, are a real problem to deal with, a recent survey revealed. They figured that the "really happy" were raising the bar and even normal people were under threat of falling under the really sad category. Accordingly, as part of a novel venture, it was suggested that the "really happy" shouldn't remain that way. Statistics revealed that people were willing to make small sacrifices for greater happiness in the future. The world would use that "time" to execute drastic measures that would bring the rest of the population on par by then. To cut a long story short, the "really happy" people were banished to live in crappy towns filled with ugly hairy women, eating veg food, without television, sluggish internet, cut off from reality and civilization as we know it today.
I signed the contract, for you guys.
You can thank me later. But then, on certain days in the year, the Banished are released from their misery. This year, I intend to use this limited time to travel to the Holy Land and talk to Mahabali, see if we can apply for bail, may be, we can escape. But you see that's where the problem lies. That fool Mahabali is serving a life sentence, while I am not. Mahabali was accused and convicted of being really really bloody happy. I didn't go that far, I was easy to get off with a reasonable two years rigourous imprisonment. God's are such losers. I don't ever want to be one.
Starting tomorrow followed by the next 6-8 days in this very time I was talking about. I am being let out on community service. It's a very auspicious time in the Puli calendar. It will see Puli running with the wind, jumping in clear waters, drinking to his heart's delight, eating all the animals the earth can produce. I didn't say I was serving the community, it means they will be serving me. Bring it on baby, Onam in Kerala, it's about time!
On a less dellusional note, I wish you all a very Happy Onam. Hopefully I will be spending the weekend, HOPEFULLY, on my return from the Holy Land, in Bangalore. Let's hope we meet. For now, I am off to Mallu Land. In the meanwhile, I am leaving you with this traditional song we all sing once we are in the Holy Land, as my gift to all the "yet to get really happy" people.
Enjoy.
For the past year and a half, and another half that's yet to come, Puli, like king Mahabali has been in exile, banished to this place called Hyderabad. The gentle soul was tricked into trading in all his pleasures and his generosity by an evil demon called "Education", who promised to bestow great prosperity and immense happiness to him and all those around him, if he made a small sacrifice. He, ie. the devil, elaborated how the world having become this really sad and sorry place to live in, couldn't deal with people who are extremely happy or extremely sad. On much deeper probing they figured that while the later were quite easy to deal with, the former posed a serious challenge. The later, they figured, took care of themselves. Let me elaborate. It's like this: whenever people would get extremely depressed, in America for example they would go on a shooting spree - kill all the people who pissed him off - kill himself too, or in Pakistan you would declare jehad, in Sri Lanka you can join the LTTE, in Amsterdam you can do enough dope and sex till you brains are just too numb to feel neither happniess nor pain. Then you have India. That's where the problem lies. India is not a free country, it's a democracy. You ae not free to shoo your neighbour. You have to get the approvals of all those concerned. Our version of the Hamas is the Left Party, the only thing those jokers get close to is killing noble ideas like getting more nuclear reactors. The other option is to dip onself in the Ganges, which along with killing your sadness will kill you too. So, we just export our "really sad" to countries that have lowered the bar. That doesn't mean they drink in the basements, stupid!
Enough of that detour. Now coming back on track, the really happy people, like myself, are a real problem to deal with, a recent survey revealed. They figured that the "really happy" were raising the bar and even normal people were under threat of falling under the really sad category. Accordingly, as part of a novel venture, it was suggested that the "really happy" shouldn't remain that way. Statistics revealed that people were willing to make small sacrifices for greater happiness in the future. The world would use that "time" to execute drastic measures that would bring the rest of the population on par by then. To cut a long story short, the "really happy" people were banished to live in crappy towns filled with ugly hairy women, eating veg food, without television, sluggish internet, cut off from reality and civilization as we know it today.
I signed the contract, for you guys.
You can thank me later. But then, on certain days in the year, the Banished are released from their misery. This year, I intend to use this limited time to travel to the Holy Land and talk to Mahabali, see if we can apply for bail, may be, we can escape. But you see that's where the problem lies. That fool Mahabali is serving a life sentence, while I am not. Mahabali was accused and convicted of being really really bloody happy. I didn't go that far, I was easy to get off with a reasonable two years rigourous imprisonment. God's are such losers. I don't ever want to be one.
Starting tomorrow followed by the next 6-8 days in this very time I was talking about. I am being let out on community service. It's a very auspicious time in the Puli calendar. It will see Puli running with the wind, jumping in clear waters, drinking to his heart's delight, eating all the animals the earth can produce. I didn't say I was serving the community, it means they will be serving me. Bring it on baby, Onam in Kerala, it's about time!
On a less dellusional note, I wish you all a very Happy Onam. Hopefully I will be spending the weekend, HOPEFULLY, on my return from the Holy Land, in Bangalore. Let's hope we meet. For now, I am off to Mallu Land. In the meanwhile, I am leaving you with this traditional song we all sing once we are in the Holy Land, as my gift to all the "yet to get really happy" people.
Enjoy.
Monkey Shot Into Space - April 2007
I awoke last morning not the sounds of birds chirping, nor the first rays of light signaling the end of night and welcoming a beautiful dawn, a city enveloped in gentle mist, the sounds of the milkman collecting coupons from baskets strapped onto gates and replacing them with sachets of milk, or the tingle of the paperboy's bicycle bell. Nope. I had traded in all my alarm clocks for an army of coal miners armed with heavy duty power drills, drilling holes into my flesh. They didn't even spare the bone. The pain was growing intense. At times it felt like they had grown tired of drilling and were resorting to sticks of dynamite to blast through the rock(bone and flesh), as I could feel miniature explosions under all those wraps of crepe bandage. For moment it stopped and I heaved a sigh of relief, little did I know that that lull was the calm before the storm, a moment's silence before they drilled into an underground lake that would go on to flood the mine, killing them all. My hand had started swelling up. It was barely 7 am.
I don't want to go into details of how I managed to catch a few hours of sleep that night as it would involve more trucks laden with miners being picked up from their homes, dropped off at the mine, gathering their gear, lighting their first cigarette, switching on their helmet mounted lamps, you get the point, don't you?
The next two hours were excruciating. Every ticking second was slowly transforming me from a sweet boy to a furious animal, filled with rage. Not any animal mind you, but into a giant pissed-off full grown Silver-back gorilla. As my dad drove me to the hospital, I sat like a caged animal waiting to run amok and smash anyone who came in between me and the consulting room, where the doctor better lay waiting, or else, pulp him with the fury and tenacity of a raging whirlwind the moment I set my sights on him.
All set, I stepped out of the car, and headed for the reception. The song playing in my head at that point in time was not "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" or "George of The Jungle". I think it was Metallica's "One" followed back to back with Megadeath's "Symphony of Destruction". There was a nurse behind the counter. I headed for her, like a lion creeping up on an unsuspecting wildebeest, no that wasn't it, was more like Arnold in Terminator. But the nurse was smart. She sensed trouble, and guided me straight to the orthopedic's room. As I walked towards the examination room, I was surprisingly getting calmer and calmer. My hot head, getting cooler, and just for the record, the air conditioner had nothing to do with it. It may have something to do with seeing a multitude of people who seemed to be in an equal amount of agony if not more. But that wasn't to last long.
After a very brief wait, I met the ortho. A scrawny looking figure. Now, I really wanted to beat the living day lights out of him. As he unwrapped my hand, I am not exaggerating when I say this, it looked like King Kong's. My palms were so badly swollen, I had stretch marks on my palms! Who the hell gets stretch marks on their palms? It looked like a water balloon, that was on the verge of bursting. I wanted to fist him real bad, but that's when it occurred to me that I couldn't make a fist with my right hand, because it was swollen up, and more importantly, it lay in his hands! That was a big let-down. I had no other alternative but to co-operate. So I did.
He told me that he has to put my arm into a cast. He then came to me with a bag full of stuff I was in no mood to figure out. By now, I was thinking worse case scenario, trading in the coal miners for some Pakistani militant outfit armed with surface to air missiles, machine guns, (surgery). Instead, he wrapped my forearm in a nice cotton carpet like thing. Then he put on gloves. He wriggled his fingers. Moron, thought he was "Dr. No" from that old James Bond flick, Mr Non-sticky hands. It takes great amount of self control and years of meditation and yoga to stop you from hitting such guys. I had none of these, but still, somehow managed to keep my temper in check. He pulled out this funky blue wire mesh, rubbery, sticky stuff. He started coiling that all over the cotton wrapped on my arm. The whole procedure took about five minutes. Then miraculously that blue mesh turned solid, hard as steel, and he said it was "That's it". He told me that it was some new wonder material – lighter and stronger than the traditional plaster of paris.
He made me wriggle my fingers and Lo!, the swelling disappeared. He had handed all those coal miners the pink slip, "You're Fired".
I think I am being experimented upon like all those monkeys that were shot into space in the name of science. Electric Blue cast made of new-age wonder material. Ladies and gentlemen, (There's the Stars Wars theme playing in the background) I present to you, the space monkey of our times, Sachin Pulickal.
Who needs Dan Brown? Dan Brown can go shoot himself. Better still he can take Stephen King and all his cronies with him and play Last Man Standing. Hopefully they'll end up shooting each other and they'll succumb to their injuries.
In six weeks, you lucky few will have the rare honour of reading the sequel to this, "The Space Monkey Returns". (That's when I get the cast off.)
Disclaimer: All characters mentioned in this short story are factual. Any resemblance to any character is intentional. All Right reserved. April 2007© No part of this article may be published or photocopied without the author's permission. If it comes to my knowledge that you did photocopy it or steal parts of this article and modify it for your personal use, it will not be pretty. Nor will your face, once I am done with it.
I don't want to go into details of how I managed to catch a few hours of sleep that night as it would involve more trucks laden with miners being picked up from their homes, dropped off at the mine, gathering their gear, lighting their first cigarette, switching on their helmet mounted lamps, you get the point, don't you?
The next two hours were excruciating. Every ticking second was slowly transforming me from a sweet boy to a furious animal, filled with rage. Not any animal mind you, but into a giant pissed-off full grown Silver-back gorilla. As my dad drove me to the hospital, I sat like a caged animal waiting to run amok and smash anyone who came in between me and the consulting room, where the doctor better lay waiting, or else, pulp him with the fury and tenacity of a raging whirlwind the moment I set my sights on him.
All set, I stepped out of the car, and headed for the reception. The song playing in my head at that point in time was not "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" or "George of The Jungle". I think it was Metallica's "One" followed back to back with Megadeath's "Symphony of Destruction". There was a nurse behind the counter. I headed for her, like a lion creeping up on an unsuspecting wildebeest, no that wasn't it, was more like Arnold in Terminator. But the nurse was smart. She sensed trouble, and guided me straight to the orthopedic's room. As I walked towards the examination room, I was surprisingly getting calmer and calmer. My hot head, getting cooler, and just for the record, the air conditioner had nothing to do with it. It may have something to do with seeing a multitude of people who seemed to be in an equal amount of agony if not more. But that wasn't to last long.
After a very brief wait, I met the ortho. A scrawny looking figure. Now, I really wanted to beat the living day lights out of him. As he unwrapped my hand, I am not exaggerating when I say this, it looked like King Kong's. My palms were so badly swollen, I had stretch marks on my palms! Who the hell gets stretch marks on their palms? It looked like a water balloon, that was on the verge of bursting. I wanted to fist him real bad, but that's when it occurred to me that I couldn't make a fist with my right hand, because it was swollen up, and more importantly, it lay in his hands! That was a big let-down. I had no other alternative but to co-operate. So I did.
He told me that he has to put my arm into a cast. He then came to me with a bag full of stuff I was in no mood to figure out. By now, I was thinking worse case scenario, trading in the coal miners for some Pakistani militant outfit armed with surface to air missiles, machine guns, (surgery). Instead, he wrapped my forearm in a nice cotton carpet like thing. Then he put on gloves. He wriggled his fingers. Moron, thought he was "Dr. No" from that old James Bond flick, Mr Non-sticky hands. It takes great amount of self control and years of meditation and yoga to stop you from hitting such guys. I had none of these, but still, somehow managed to keep my temper in check. He pulled out this funky blue wire mesh, rubbery, sticky stuff. He started coiling that all over the cotton wrapped on my arm. The whole procedure took about five minutes. Then miraculously that blue mesh turned solid, hard as steel, and he said it was "That's it". He told me that it was some new wonder material – lighter and stronger than the traditional plaster of paris.
He made me wriggle my fingers and Lo!, the swelling disappeared. He had handed all those coal miners the pink slip, "You're Fired".
I think I am being experimented upon like all those monkeys that were shot into space in the name of science. Electric Blue cast made of new-age wonder material. Ladies and gentlemen, (There's the Stars Wars theme playing in the background) I present to you, the space monkey of our times, Sachin Pulickal.
Who needs Dan Brown? Dan Brown can go shoot himself. Better still he can take Stephen King and all his cronies with him and play Last Man Standing. Hopefully they'll end up shooting each other and they'll succumb to their injuries.
In six weeks, you lucky few will have the rare honour of reading the sequel to this, "The Space Monkey Returns". (That's when I get the cast off.)
Disclaimer: All characters mentioned in this short story are factual. Any resemblance to any character is intentional. All Right reserved. April 2007© No part of this article may be published or photocopied without the author's permission. If it comes to my knowledge that you did photocopy it or steal parts of this article and modify it for your personal use, it will not be pretty. Nor will your face, once I am done with it.
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