Hang On,This Too Shall Pass

“Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark.”

 - Rabindranath Tagore.

Faith is the reason we persist; the reason there is order in humanity; faith keeps one grounded and steady. Faith is the reason we still exist as a race. Faith differentiates between the strong and the weak. Faith can make and misplaced faith can break.

Human civilization has come a long way from the cave dwelling hunter-gatherers through being agriculturists and industrialists to the modern day man. This tremendous development of the species was possible not only due to the ingenuity of the human brain or its bipedal, multi-tasking physique, but also to the ability to believe; its faith in itself and the elements.

Faith is not an isolated singular attribute. It is but a derivative of numerous little events. Faith gets conceived and shaped in an individual from birth. The values passed on by the family, those learned from peers, values taught at school, form the ‘pig iron’ for building a person’s faith. It is but the wide world that forms the furnace for forging this pig iron, through experience, into steel. Endeavour on the path of self realization adds sheen to this faith and makes it stainless.

The present day world poses numerous challenges to man. The least conspicuous of these, is the lack of FAITH. Today’s ‘competitive’ world is driven by lust for material pleasures. Everything and every action are valued in gold or paper. Our materially conditioned souls crave no more for knowledge of the infinite, but for meaningless gains. There is no time or intent for inward contemplation. Malnourished faith degenerates and leaves one in distress in the face of adversity.

At a certain point in life our body signals its inability to put up with our cravings anymore. It is only then, that we look out in despair for our moorings. Then we realize how much we are disconnected from our ‘selves’. In a desperate attempt to reconnect, we start looking for short cuts. We place our faith in god men and their ilk. Faith in the god man is like a boat tied to the pier. The turbulence of the water tests the strength of the knot. But what if the pier itself goes down? More often than not, god men have been seen to have feet of clay. This is true especially in a country like India, where religion has turned into a shameless business for some and gullible electorate for others.

True faith in oneself is like a sailor’s anchor. It is like a direct connection to one’s ‘ground’, one’s own self. However strong the storm may be, faith keeps his ship from sinking. Even in the face of the wildest hurricane, the sailor says to himself, “Just hang on, this too shall pass.”

True faith comes from within. It does not require external embellishments. No temple or shrine can give true faith. It comes from belief on one’s own self; from random acts of compassion. Faith comes from renunciation. When one comes to realize his true ‘position’ in the creator’s grand scheme of things, faith comes to the humble. True faith is manifested in active detachment.

“karmany evadhikaras te 
ma phalesu kadacana 
ma karma-phala-hetur bhur 
ma te sango 'stv akarmani”

(Translation by Bhagvad Gita As It Is : You have a right to perform your prescribed duty, but you are not entitled to the fruits of action. Never consider yourself to be the cause of the results of your activities, and never be attached to not doing your duty.)

 - Bhagvad Gita, Chapter 2, Verse 47.

A Tale of Dental Despair

The sensation of a tooth being loose in one’s mouth is something everyone is familiar with. It can be a curiously engrossing for many people. One’s especially meddlesome human nature tempts him to run his tongue across a loose tooth all day long. The squishy feeling at the root of a loose tooth and the pain on being forced beyond its range of mobility is an exhilarating feeling for many.

Our protagonist is not an exception. In fact he spends an entire day meddling with his loose upper left canine.  The dull pain that spreads from his gums, through the mandibles, down his neck, through his spine almost intoxicates him. He starts prying the canine with his finger. The metallic ferrous taste of fresh blood on his tongue stimulates his primitive instincts no end. He pries and sucks harder finally bringing the canine to the brink of falling off. The canine eventually gives in. He examines the fallen tooth closely. The conical crown is gracefully shaped, widening down to its root, with some gum tissues attached to it. He tongues the newly formed cavity in his gum and suddenly realizes that the neighboring premolar and incisor are also loose.

He starts prying the incisor and it comes off; the premolar comes off too. He has lost three of his teeth in succession. To his horror, he finds the other teeth on his upper jaw becoming loose and as he moves his tongue over them, they start moving too. Now this is no longer funny for him. He is scared. Suddenly he feels two of his molars drop off, he spits them out. The force with which he spits causes one more incisor to get uprooted. It seems to him as if his gums are giving in. All his teeth are simply dropping off. He is petrified, he runs out of his room, his mouth full of blood and fallen teeth.

His small sister is playing with her dolls in the hall. He tells her of his predicament. She does not understand anything and resumes her game. He runs out of the hall into the kitchen, calling out to his mom. He starts sobbing and tries to speak but his mouth is full of blood and some more teeth have fallen off.

“Just go out of the kitchen. Can’t you see I am busy? We are having guests coming over in the evening. I have plenty of work now, don’t disturb me,” she says.

In utter despair he runs out of the room into the verandah where his father is sitting with his newspaper. He spits out a mouthful of blood and teeth and tries telling his father, but he can’t speak. With every effort one more tooth is coming out. He shows his almost bare gum and a couple of freshly fallen teeth to his father, with tears rolling down his eyes and blood trickling down the side of his lips.

His father looks at him with anger on his face as he says,

“That happens when you don’t look after your dental hygiene. Since the last twenty two years I have been teaching you how to brush your teeth, to floss properly after every meal, but you have never listened; now I can’t do anything.”

So saying, his father angrily puts his glasses back on and goes back to reading his newspaper.

Our protagonist feels that the world has ended for him, he sobs inconsolably as he runs out of the house spitting out a tooth after every few minutes. He runs hard across the road, up the hill. He keeps on running beyond the hill, across the green meadows. He stumbles and falls, but picks himself up and keeps running. Suddenly it starts to rain, he runs unheeding the downpour, his drenched long hair cascading over his face. All of a sudden he sees the girl in blue salwar kameez with an umbrella in her hand. She looks at him with her sad eyes. He drops down on his knees, face streaming with rain, tears and blood, a desolate look in his eyes, chest heaving with sobs, heart thumping out loudly. He stretches out his arm towards the girl. But with the same sad expression in her eyes she slowly walks away into the rain, into the wilderness.

Suddenly the earth starts shaking heavily; he tries to stand up but falls back; large trees around him seem to be falling down straight on top of him. He closes his eyes in fear.

“Abhi, hey Abhi, what’s the matter, get up,” he hears distant voices.

He opens his eyes and stares blankly at the three pairs of curious eyes peering down at him.

“What happened, are you okay?” they ask.

His eyes hurt, his head is groggy, and he tries to sit up but feels sapped of all his energy. He raises his hand with a lot of effort and feels his face, his mouth, and his teeth. They are intact. He is lying on his hostel bed and had been dreaming. A huge load of unhappiness and fear comes out in the form of a huge sigh of relief and he cries out. His friends are totally clueless. Tears of joy and relief stream down his pale face as he tells his bewildered friends about his dream.

He comes out of his room. The sky is overcast, it is going to rain. He puts on his shirt and runs out. He runs across the corridors, down the flight of stairs, across the entrance to the hostel, onto the street. It starts to rain, he runs unheeding the downpour, his drenched long hair cascading over his face. All of a sudden he sees the girl in blue salwar kameez with an umbrella in her hand. She is with her friends. They cross near the Telephone booth by the big Jamun tree. For a brief moment she looks at him, their eyes meet for a split second. To him the split second seems like centuries of togetherness. His heart brims over with indescribable happiness.

He walks as if under a spell, unmindful of the rain, into the football ground by the side of the road. He drops down on his knees and spreading out his arms, looks up at the sky. With all his being, he absorbs the downpour of heavenly bliss. His heart full of happiness, his mind calm, he feels so balanced, so ‘one’ with everything around.

The Manual of Laziness

Chapter 1: Basic Understanding of Laziness

The word laziness is used with very negative connotations. Beginning from childhood, you are egged by every older human being to refrain from being lazy. “An idle mind is the devil’s workshop” you are reminded every time. Sadly enough, people use the words lazy and idle interchangeably. Nothing can be far from justice, not only to English as a language but also to the proud people who personify the idea of laziness. Idleness is simply a state of ‘not working’. Laziness is an inherent loathing in an individual against a particular activity or any activity that can be classified under the heading ‘work’. An idle person may not be lazy. A lazy person however may often be found idling.

The laziest person according to the recorded history of the earth (post the age of the dinosaurs of course) was a man named Jerome Klapka Jerome. Having spent 27 years of his early life in absolute laziness, he attained enlightenment. Under influence of this new found Buddha hood, Jerome decided to compile his life’s lazing into a single manual for the reference and enlightenment of future generations of indolent people. He surrendered his virgin laziness (until then) to put together “The Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow”. And believe me guys he never got to be lazy again amidst one book after the other, amidst publishers and editors. The poor dude sacrificed his shiftless lay-about life for fellow lazy beings- Hail Lazy Jesus!

It infuriates me no end to see foolish people making generalizations about laziness and lazy people.  You call a guy who sleeps 15 hours a day, lazy? Come on buddy cut the poor guy some slack. He is just tired, let him sleep. A dude qualifies to be lazy when he lies for 15 hours on his bed listening to sparrows chirping outside his window, or looking at the ceiling fan trying to figure out in what probability it may fall off. Being lazy is not easy boss. Agreed, that every individual has potential to be lazy, but, it requires years of cultivation, nurture and practice to become really lazy.

Another outrageous thing about people is their tendency to stereotype. Dude, listen to me, all lazy people do not sit on the couch, eat potato chips and watch TV. Are you bloody serious, in thinking that? That’s racist dude, believe me. People manifest laziness in multiple ways. No two lazy people are the same. It’s just like the mutants in X-Men. However unlike the X-Men mutants, with practice one can imbibe other forms of laziness to become versatile, multifaceted.

The most common types of laziness you will see (apart from the lying-on-couch-watching-TV) are, ‘sitting-at-window-watching-road’, ‘missing-bath-till-seasons-change’, ‘not-sweeping-room-till-dust-allergy’, ‘counting-raindrops-on-telephone-wires’,’counting-stars-lying-on-terrace’,’not-taking-out-trash-till-becomes-ant’s-pilgrimage’, ‘lying-on-floor-watching-ants-foraging’,’catching-mosquitoes-collecting-in-a-jar’,’wearing-same-denims-without-washing-everyday-till-it-gets-torn’,’sitting-and-chewing-fingernails’…….. So on and so forth. The plethora of attributes is simply mind boggling. Believe me; you can’t count them on all your fingers, or toes, or even your families, or neighbors’ fingers and toes. You see, you should understand the diversity among lazy people before indiscriminately and often wrongly calling someone lazy. Please understand, you insult us that way and undermine our being.

It takes years of idling and laying about to become a Lazy-Master. People have spent life times in the pursuit of various forms of laziness to become Grandmasters. Having practiced the art for more than three decades, I can tell you one thing, Laziness is a gift, but only very few can sustain it. Believe me my friend, it looks easy to you. But it’s very hard being lazy and surviving in today’s competitive world. Your parents, relatives, peers will kill the god gifted laziness that’s inside you. In order to keep your indolence alive you have to adapt. You have to acquire a certain degree of spirituality to move forward on your chosen path of laziness.

The first thing that harms laziness is Ego. You have to let go of that to be happily lazy. People’s opinion about you must not bother you. As long as you are satisfied with yourself, the world can go to hell.

The second thing that is very important for survival is letting go. You cannot possibly keep all the reins in your hand and think of idling peacefully. Let go of the reins, and sink in into the sensation of deep relaxation.

The third thing is to stay away from needless physical luxuries that only bring weakness and dependence. Moreover if you are sensible enough you have already realized that a life dedicated to laziness does not offer you too many opportunities of luxury and sense gratification. Therefore you should not get too attached to having or using such means.

The fourth thing very important is your sustenance. My personal approach is maintaining good sense of taste in food (when someone else is preparing the food) but being a Spartan eater (I am not talking about quantity here), when you have to cook your own food. You cannot possibly stay lazy and yet cook yourself a three course dinner. Any lazy person’s guide book will tell you that the best thing to eat is a mash of every possible food ingredient boiled with ample amount of water. That way, you get all the nutrients, keep unwanted fats out and also the gruel consistency of the food reduces the need to chew. Moreover it saves you a lot of effort in preparation. The effort can be further reduced if you can eat right out of the cooking utensil, so you need not wash an extra plate.

If you are able to surpass these few obstacles, then Voila, you are ready to tread the path of laziness. I hope I have been able to impress upon you the fact that being lazy is actually very difficult. Please show us some respect, though we hardly care if you don’t. But please do not insult us by calling some random loser ‘lazy’. We too got some class, man! And we resist (though mutely) any sacrilege of the sanctity of our religion of laziness.

Okay guys that’s enough talk for a day….got some very important work to do…..downloading a movie on Bit Torrent…..got to track its progress.

Buen Dia.

The Tiger of BCKV

By the time I reached room number D1/1 (read D One by One), a couple of guys have already hammered fear into my heart. I have been summoned to this room by its inhabitant, a person I have never seen. The guys say he is the worst one in the entire block. They have narrated to me, their encounters in hushed tones. The picture they painted in my mind is a very dark one. My future is suddenly looking bleak. Why the hell has this creature summoned me? I did not get involved in any trouble. I can’t think of a single good reason why this guy wants to see me.

It’s been a week I joined this University. The hostel I am staying in is named after Dr. Prashanta Chandra Mahalonobish, renowned statistician. This hostel houses about hundred and fifty students of different semesters of B.Sc Agriculture. I am one of the forty seven that joined last week. Ragging is banned in this hostel, so we have heard. Instead what a fresher is subjected to is called ‘Boring’. It is something the seniors have emphasized as being extremely important for the well being of the ‘unity and culture’ of this hostel. An integral part of this process is to approach seniors in the hostel and request them for introduction. By the end of the ‘boring period’, one is supposed to know each and every occupant of this hostel. One also has to keep a record of how many seniors he has got acquainted to. The guys with the least numbers will definitely find it ‘difficult’, seniors have assured. What exactly they meant by ‘difficult’, they didn’t elaborate and we did not have the courage to ask.

A senior is privileged to take as long as he likes to reveal his name. He is allowed to make you do or say anything, however silly or humiliating it may be, as long as he does not physically assault you. Finally, if he is ‘satisfied’ with your ‘performance’, he may choose to introduce himself to you. Once he introduces himself, he cannot ‘bore’ you again, unless of course you have presented some opportunity in the form of a ‘disciplinary breach’. There was another perk associated with this system. The senior who ‘gets’ to bore you on a particular day has to take care of your evening snacks, that is, you get to eat anything you want in the evening, and it will be paid for by the senior.

There are different kinds of guys in this hostel. There are some who are too busy to be bothered. They just ask you your name and a few harmless questions; tell you their name and a few tidbits about themselves and off you go. These guys are good for your numbers. There are others who, like spiders waiting for their prey, are just itching to catch hold of a guy and ‘bore’ him. I am very afraid of these guys, the really noxious ones that derive fun humiliating a fresher. These guys are a real bad omen for you numbers. You have to be really lucky and extremely smart to satisfy these guys and get your introduction. But then there is a third type too. These are the ‘sweet’ guys. They are really pleasant guys, with whom one really likes to interact. With them, you don’t bother about the numbers. Getting a few such guys in this hostel is like finding an oasis in the desert. I have met a couple of such seniors though. The presence of these guys in this hostel is really comforting.

Till now I have kept quite safe. Though my numbers are not that great, yet I haven’t faced too many jerks yet. But now that I got summoned to that ominous D1/1 room, I think my ‘dream run’ is over. I don’t know what my near future holds in store for me.

I gently knock on the door. No answer. I pause for a couple of moments, take a couple of deep breaths. I take a look around. I am standing on the corridor of D1 lobby, in front of the first room. It’s five thirty by my watch. It is past dusk and darkness is quickly rolling in. My throat is dry; I don’t know what awaits me inside this room. I swallow some saliva, run my tongue over my lips, and knock on the door again.

“Yes”, says a deep rumbling voice from inside.

I clear my throat and say, “Dada, may I come in?”

“Come in”, comes the reply.

I slowly push the door open. The room is dark except for a small circle of yellow illumination on a table at the far corner- a table lamp. A tall figure is seated on the adjacent bed, hunched over the side of the table. I wait for a few moments. As my eyes get adjusted to the scant illumination, I see two cots joined together, placed against the far wall of the room. In the space between the cot and the left wall of the room, a study table has been squeezed in longitudinally. From where I stand, I see an old rusty table lamp, a steel tumbler, a small immersion heater, a walkman stereo player on the table. All the windows are closed, there is a heavy burnt, smoky odor hanging in the air.

The tall figure turns his head towards me for a long second, pulls out the plugs of his walkman from his ears and rises. The guy is much taller than I, standing almost at six feet and one. With him standing in front of the small table lamp, I can’t see his face clearly.

“First Year?” he asks.

“Yes Dada, my name is Abhigyan Saha.”

“Ok, Mathura Bagan?” he says in his deep rumbling voice.

Mathura Bagan is a Tea Estate not far from here. It is where my uncle stays with his family and is mentioned as my permanent address of residence. One thing I have noticed is that each of the seniors knows our names and where we come from beforehand. It seems they have done a sort of home work on us first year students.     

“Yes Dada”, I reply.

“Is it too dark, do you want me to put on the tube light?” he asks.

“No Dada, it is fine”, I say. The lighting is nowhere in my list of worries at this moment.

“Good”, he says, “actually the tube light is screwed up. But wait I will make it a little better.” So saying, he lifts the lamp shade upwards and directs it towards one of the walls.

In this newly adjusted illumination, I see him properly. A tall and lean guy, dark complexioned, with black wavy hair, wearing a dirty crumpled T shirt and a dirtier pair of crumpled white and black check pajamas.

He comes towards me, inspects me from head to toe in a searching glance. He has a very different kind of eyes. They are very big; in fact they are very beautiful, bright eyes. I can sense a feeling of curiosity and slight amusement in his eyes. He has a very particularly well taken care of moustache. And below that thin curved expanse of facial hair, he has a pair of thin lips darkened and chapped by excessive smoking. The lips that, in spite of the stoic expression he has on his face, are perhaps very minutely twitched with amusement. It may be a mistake though, can’t be sure in this dim setting.

“ICSE Board, so you studied in English medium?”

I have joined this University in the five percent ‘Other Board’ quota. Other Board includes all boards of secondary education other than West Bengal State Board of Education.

“Yes”, I said

“Hmm, stay right here, I will be back in a couple of minutes”, he says. So saying he turns back towards his table and picks up the steel tumbler. Inserting two of his fingers into the tumbler he fishes out something and tosses it onto the floor. Then with the tumbler in his hand he walks out of the room. I look to see what he just tossed onto the floor. It is a Bidi stub, wet with the contents of the tumbler. I can’t help flinching in disgust. The floor is strewn with hundreds of stubs. There is an empty glass of tea, probably from the hostel canteen sitting on the window sill with three or four more stubs extinguished into them.                          

I look around the room; there is a small wooden cupboard, the door of which is broken. On top of the cupboard is a beautiful earthen figurine with its maker’s inscription at the bottom. I can’t read the name, not that I want to. Every object in the room other than the table top and bed is covered in a layer of dust. The surface of the table is covered with old sheets of newspaper. The paper has turned yellow with age. It is burnt at one place, right through into the wooden surface, most probably by a forgotten live Bidi. The ceiling of the room is covered, no sorry, engulfed in cobwebs, a thick blanket of cobwebs. The room reminds me of Miss Havisham’s banquet hall, in Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations.

Presently, the door opens and the guy walks in with the washed tumbler in his hands.

“Do you want some tea”, he enquires in the same rumbling expressionless voice.

“No, thank you Dada”, I answer.

He pours some water from a bottle into the tumbler and adds sugar from a tin can he has taken out of his broken cupboard. He wipes the immersion heater lying on his table with the edge of his dirty t shirt, immerses into the tumbler and plugs it to the connection mounted on the wall beside the table. He now turns back towards me.

“I like to brew my own tea. It has a different taste. The canteen tea is very bland”, he says, this time with a twitch of a smile at the corners of his dark lips.

“Of course it will taste ‘different’”, I think to myself but don’t offer any comment. I just give him the most pleasant smile I can muster up.

He comes up to where I am standing. His eyes look down into mine from an altitude couple of inches higher than my own. His large eyes, having taken on a more prying avatar, are looking into mine; trying to break open the can of my soul and peek in.                

“Do you know that there are two tigers in BCKV?” he asks in a very somber tone, the words spaced out evenly to have a theatrical effect.

By now I have lost most of my fear of this person. He seems quite normal to me. But I am not one to lower my guard so easily. I put up an innocent face, make my eyes seemingly as wonderstruck as I can, and reply with faked curiosity, “There are tigers in BCKV? No Dada, I didn’t know that.”

“There have been two tigers in the history of Bidhan Chandra Krishi Vishwavidyalaya; one was Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy himself. Do you have any idea who the other one is?” he asks. His eyes are looking straight into mine. This time his eyebrows are arched upwards to give a mysterious look to his dark handsome face.

I widen my eyes slowly in a faked expression of alarm and nod my head in the negative.

“The second tiger of BCKV is standing right in front of you”, he says.

I blink my eyes a couple of times but say nothing. I bring a look of admiration mixed with apprehension on my countenance and look away from his eyes. If this guy wants to preen, let him do so. I am not a fool to tweak his ego by saying anything for or against and invite trouble for myself.  Till now I have performed very well, I think to myself.

However, tiger or not, this guy is definitely not like the others. The way he looks, the way he stays, his bohemian trappings makes me think of him as a renegade. His expressive, bright eyes set onto his dark chiseled face, his careless three day stubble and moustache, does give him a fierce look.

Then all of a sudden, taking me completely by surprise, he says, “I have heard you have a very good handwriting?”

Now from where does that come? Where does my good handwriting figure into all of this? I don’t say anything. I don’t know what to say. I do have a decent handwriting; I have spent years cultivating a handwriting that many have said could be made into a font. But I don’t want to come across having to do some letter writing job for this guy. It is really very boring having to write love letters on behalf of people simply because one is calligraphically superior with a decent stock of vocabulary. I have suffered this in school.

“I have some work for you”, he rumbles; the menace and theatrics no more there in his voice.

Just as he is about to say more, “Knock Knock, Dada can I come in?” comes a voice from outside.

“Yes”, says Mr. Tiger.

The plump figure of Sujit (one of my batch mates) waddles into the room in his characteristic white printed short kurta and blue pajamas. “Dada, I have come to introduce myself”, he says “My name is Sujit Kumar Ghosh. I am from Malda.”

“But brother I am already talking to this brother here”, says Mr. Tiger pointing towards me.

“Okay dada, I will come later then.” Sujit turns to go away, but then turning around, he says,” You are also from Malda, are you not?”

“Oh! You already know a lot about me it seems. Come then you can sit till I complete introduction with Abhigyan here.”

Sujit, with an air of familiarity and a satisfied smile on his chubby face waddles towards the cot and is about to seat himself on it when Mr. Tiger rumbles, “Not there.”

Sujit stops and turns around.

“Go and see what is there behind that wooden cupboard”, he instructs Sujit.

Sujit complies, but then not finding anything that can be used for sitting; he looks around perplexed and says,” There is nothing here Dada.”

“No there must be a bottle of Thums Up, I kept yesterday. Bring it out and sit on it”, Mr. Tiger rumbles in a very matter-of-fact manner.

My heart skips a beat. This guy is screwed, I feel sorry for Sujit.

Sujit looks with disbelief at the senior from his own district. His round eyes seem ready to pop out through the heavy glasses he wears to augment his severely myopic vision. Though I feel bad for him, I can’t help feeling amused seeing the comic expression on his face.

“Don’t waste my time. I don’t like saying something twice” says Mr. Tiger in a slow, menacingly authoritative tone.

Sujit takes out the bottle and with the look of a betrayed martyr on his face squats over it. Mr. Tiger inspects to ensure that my chubby batch mate’s round bottom is in contact with the mouth of the bottle. Having satisfied himself, he now turns towards me.

In the last six to seven minutes, the radical changes that occurred in the atmosphere of this room have left me shocked. I have realigned my position regarding any writing job that this terrible guy has to offer me. I am now ready to write a novel, let alone a letter for Mr. Tiger; in fact whatever it may take to save my glutes and hamstrings the torture of squatting on a 300 ml Thums Up bottle.

“So, where were we? Yes, I want you to help me write a couple of posters for my final presentation for the degree. I will give you the content you just have to write it neatly on chart paper.” So saying, he hands me a sheet with some scribbling on it, “this is what has to be put down on chart papers”, he says.

Seeing the scribbling, I understood, whatever this guy may be talented in, definitely it is not his hand writing. It took some time for me to decipher what was written on it.

“I didn’t ask you to get up, did I? Sit down”, booms his voice. I look up, and find Sujit with a destitute expression written over his face as he goes down on his haunches, back to squatting position. I feel very sorry for my comrade.

“So when would you like to get on with it, will you start right away?” his awful tormentor asks me.

“There is a group of people in my own room. It will be better if I work in this room. But it’s too dark in here to work. I can do it tomorrow morning, if it is fine by you”, I say.

As much as I would like never to visit this awful room again, I also understand that as long as I am in this room, Sujit will have to squat on the bottle. It will be better for him to quickly get over with whatever Mr. Tiger has planned for him.  Moreover, the guys from second year have asked us all to gather for some ‘fun-filled activity’ tomorrow morning. I will have an excuse to skip that tomorrow.

I look at Sujit. He is in a pitiable condition. He is crying silently. Tears are streaming down both his chubby cheeks and his glasses are clouded with vapor.

“So tomorrow first thing in the morning?” Mr. Tiger enquires of me.

“Definitely Dada”, I answer with all earnestness.

All of a sudden, there is a commotion outside in the corridor. It sounds like a couple of seniors are ‘boring’ Madan one of my other batch mates.

Voice 1: “What’s inside your pants?”

Madan: “Nothing Dada.”

Voice 1 and 2: “Nothing?” (Loud laughs are heard)

Voice 2: “Off with your trousers; let us see if you are telling the truth.”

Voice 1: “Haven’t you heard him? Take off your pants”

Madan: “No, dada please.” (Madan’s voice sounds choked)

Voice 1: “Then tell us what’s inside your pants, quick.”

After a long pause

Madan: “Anus” (Madan tries to answer in the most scientific words)

(There is a roar of laughter outside; a couple of more voices have joined in. All of them are laughing themselves into splits)

Tiger smiles in an amused manner, opens the door.

One of the seniors says to Tiger, “Krishna da, the guys coming from your district are real samples. There is another fat one. That guy too needs some treatment” Madan too is from Malda, like Sujit. The last sentence was for Sujit. I look at Sujit and he looks at me. I feel like laughing out loud, seeing the comic expression on his face, but I can’t.

Tiger brings Madan into the room. Sujit has moved away from the door with his bottle. His tears have dried up. His face now bears a look of curiosity. He too is relieved, I guess, since the attention now is on another guy. He has moved into a corner behind the new entrants, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible.

“Take off your belt.” Mr. Tiger, alias Krishna da (as I have just learnt) orders menacingly.

Madan takes off his belt, his gaze down on the floor, the look of a defeated man on his face. It seems to me he has gone beyond despair now.

“Now, unzip your trousers and lower it”, comes the next command in the same menacing tone.

Madan unbuttons his trouser, unzips it and is about to lower it when all the seniors shout at once, “Stop.”

“Now put your hand inside and tell us what exactly is beneath your trousers”, asks one of the other seniors.

Madan puts his hand inside and then in a moment of sudden realization he says, “Underwear”.

“That means you were telling a lie, till now?” thunders one of the seniors, while the others are holding their sides to refrain from bursting out laughing. It is with a lot of effort that I am preventing myself from rolling with laughter. My condition is like a novice on a tight rope, I can fall off any time. So I keep my act together. The four or five seniors who had accompanied Madan into the room leave. They take Madan by his arm and drag him along.

Krishna da looks at me and says, “Now you may go. I want you here tomorrow morning. If somebody asks you to do something else, tell him I have asked for you. My name is Krishna Gopal Adhikary. Is it Okay?”

I nod my head in agreement and walk out of the door.

As I open the door and walk out of the room, a barge of cool, fresh air assaults my senses. I sneeze a couple of times in succession. I gulp in a few lungful of fresh evening air to drive out the stale burnt air in my lungs and to revive my senses. I look into my watch, its five fifty five. I have been in this room for just about twenty five minutes, but it seemed like ages.

“Dada, can I go now?” I hear Sujit’s voice on the inside.

“You can go now, but I want you here in my room by five o’ clock sharp, tomorrow evening.” The rumbling voice of 'The Tiger of BCKV' commands.

I do not wait there any longer. I make my way quickly through the dark, empty corridors, towards my room.

Story Of A Weird (Weed) Night

(All characters in this story are purely fictitious and bear no resemblance to anyone. The story is purely imaginative and not meant to allude to any particular incident.)

Those days I was in Navi Mumbai. A few months earlier I had joined a very reputed pharmaceutical company in the city. Along with me sixty other young people had joined as part of an on the job professional training program.

I stayed with four of my colleagues. We had rented a small two bed room duplex house. I, Joy, Raj, Sanju were the first people to move in. Balu joined us a month later. His sister and her family were staying nearby, and he had put up at their place for the first few days. Balu moved into our house with an old bamboo cane sofa set, which was lying unused at his sister’s.

Our house had a hall, a kitchen and a big bath room on the ground floor. A flight of stairs on the inner wall led to the first floor where there were two bedrooms and a small bath room. There was a big veranda attached to the bigger bedroom. It was my favorite place to relax.

Joy was a stout and chubby guy. He was fun loving; bong by origin, but hailing from Gujarat. He loved food and would go to any extent to have good food. Every Sunday he would leave early in the morning, and roam around malls and shopping centers in various parts of Mumbai. Then he would find out a hotel that hosted a buffet, have his fill and come back. In the evening he would come back with stories of extraordinarily cooked tandoori, or a perfect glass of mocktail. He was a gadget lover too and preferred to be on the right side of the current trend.

Raj, the guy from Dehradoon, was a quite fellow, with dreamy eyes. You wouldn’t even realize his presence if his phone was kept in the silent mode. He had two mobile phones, one to receive missed calls from his girl friend and the other from which he made the calls. One or the other would always engage one charging point in the house. Nevertheless he would join in for any adventure or fun, and I liked him for that.

Sanju was a funny guy. He was an amiable fellow, a good singer, a simple guy who spoke fast and in a rather excited voice. He would sometimes hang his mobile phone from a band around his neck, and push it inside his inner wear to prevent its theft. He had an infectious laugh. I, Sanju and Raj, shared the same taste in cigarettes, Gold Flake.

Balu was a tall lanky fellow, with a baritone voice of extraordinary quality. I always felt he could have made his name in the theatre. But instead he chose to sit in our hall, and discuss worldly affairs, the effect of which would be greatly irritating, especially if it was late in the night. But it was good to have his sofa in our living room. We would use it for our telephonic conversations late into the night. I had also made some improvisations to use it as a bench for my weight training.

Joy had a number of relatives in Mumbai. He would visit them and tell us about the fabulous food he had, refrigerators full of chocolates in their house and such other things. Once he told us about his rich uncle who had a son, his cousin. This cousin was older than Joy and was a rock star in the making. Joy told us he would always be high on weed and sit in his room playing or listening to rock music.

We challenged Joy that he was telling lies. He had no such drug addict cousin and that he was making up stories. We dared him to bring us some of the stuff if at all what he said was true. All said and done, we had forgotten this entire episode, until one Saturday evening when Joy came up to us and showed us a packet. It was a small zip lock bag containing a single pellet of a grayish stuff. He said it was high quality ganja; he had borrowed from his cousin.

Ganja, cannabis, hashish, weed are the various names by which this narcotic goes.I had tried this stuff once or twice, during my hostel life, but had never really got any kick out of it. Even Raj said he had had a similar experience. I believed that either the guy who sold us the stuff, had sold us poor quality stuff, or it does not have any effect on me.

“Just this one pellet?” we exclaimed.

We hurled expletives at our chubby roommate for having brought such a stingy amount.

“This is useless, it will have no effect at all”, Sanju declared.

“You stupid fellows, you have this first, then I will see where all your bravery goes. But I am warning you before hand, don’t ask me for help when all of you are screwed up”, so saying, Joy handed us the packet and went upstairs.

The three of us got down to business immediately. Balu didn’t smoke. He sat on the sofa, with an elderly air and looked curiously at what we three were up to.

“This is too less for rolling up even a single joint”, Sanju said.

Raj said,” Let’s do one thing. Let’s not use up the entire stuff in a single joint. We will keep half for the night. Let’s mix the remaining with the filling of a cigarette and make the joint.”

So, I emptied a Gold Flake with care so as not to puncture the paper body at any place. I took the tobacco filling on a paper, mixed half of Joy’s stuff into it, by pressing it gently between my fingers. Then using a small paper spatula and a toothpick, I packed this spiked filling back into the paper casing of the cigarette. Our joint was ready. The three of us quivered with anticipatory excitement. Let’s see what trip this joint takes us to, we thought.

The cigarette was lit, and passed around after each puff. The packing of the cigarette matters a lot for it to taste good. I for instance have always found broken or folded cigarettes very bad tasting. Air pockets inside a cigarette make it very bitter and I hated the loathsome taste. The packing of this joint too had not been very good, but still, considering the adventure potential of the stuff inside it, we finished it off, taking slow but deep puffs and holding the smoke inside for some time.

Nothing happened. Damp squib again, I thought.

We went upstairs. Joy was sitting with his laptop, chatting with someone and smiling to his own self. We kicked him on his wide back side and hurled the choicest expletives for making fools of us.

Joy asked,” Did you have it?”

We nodded in the affirmative.

He just smiled and said, “Do you want some music?”

We sat down on his bed. This was the smaller of the two bed rooms. Joy and Sanju shared this room. They had their beds made out on the floor. Joy connected his MP3 player and put on some music. It was rock, metal he explained. I did not like this type of music, so when my phone rang out, I went downstairs to converse with the friend who had called.

How long I had been on the phone, I don’t remember. I remember the continuous cacophony of the unearthly noise from Joy’s MP3 player, mixed with Sanju’s laughing, and Balu’s deep baritone in the background as I spoke into the phone.

After sometime Joy started calling out my name, “Hey Abhi come and see what’s happening.”

I ignored, thinking he might just want to show me some funny You-tube video. I was in no mood to fool around. So I didn’t go upstairs and kept lying on the sofa. But he kept on calling me. Finally giving in to his replentless yelling I went upstairs. The music was still blaring; Joy was sitting with a disturbed look on his face. Balu and Sanju were sitting on the bed and smiling. Sanju looked at me and winked. Raj was sitting in one corner of the room and was head banging in rock star fashion. He was smiling.

I understood that these guys were playing a prank on Joy, so I left and again went downstairs. Within five minutes, Joy started shouting in his shrill voice. This time Sanju too was calling out to me. I went upstairs again. Raj was standing on the bed and head banging with full vigor. Something was not right, I felt. It didn’t look normal. He still wore that stupid smile on his face.

“Raj, it’s enough, stop it”, I said.

No reaction.

“Switch off that god-forsaken noise”, I told Joy. 

The music was switched off. But this had no impact on Raj; he continued what he was doing, only faster. I slapped him on his face- no reaction at all. He was still smiling stupidly and jerking his head. It looked as if he was in a trance, possessed by a spirit. The way he was jerking his head, I was afraid it might come off his torso. We forced him to sit on the bed and tried to talk him out of it, but to no avail. He was on a completely different plane; our words did not reach him. Now I was getting worried. I looked at the watch, it was ten thirty already.

“We have to call in a physician, guys”, I announced.

“No way. We can’t call anyone. If any one comes to know of this, we will get into trouble”, said Balu.

What he said was correct, our neighbors would not find it very funny, if they came to know we were experimenting with hash.

“Shit! it’s already ten thirty, or I would have gone to my sister’s house. You guys could have done whatever you wanted”, Balu spoke again. He was getting on to my nerves.

I was totally clueless what to do. I had no prior experience with this kind of situation. And if we did not do something quickly, Raj might definitely fall ill. At that moment I remembered that one of my friends was well known for being a very ‘adventurous’ sort of person. Why not ask him, I thought, he might suggest what’s best. So I called up Rakesh and told him about our predicament. He laughed out loud and said, 

“It is normal dude, just take off his clothes, and put him in the shower. Try to make him to lie down after that. Don’t let him get out of the house under any circumstance. That can be dangerous.”

We struggled to make Raj to stand. He was still smiling stupidly and moving his head. While the other three held him tightly so that he can’t move his head, I undressed him to his birthday suit and then took him to the bathroom. We held him under the cold shower. As the cold water hit his face, he resented it. He tried to force his way out of the shower but we managed to hold him. Finally he stopped resisting, and after a full five minutes of drenching, he said in a weak voice,

“Okay guys that’s enough, I am fine.”

We let out sighs of relief. Finally we were able to restore him to normalcy. I thanked God that he spoke. I had already started cursing myself for entering into what was rapidly turning into a misadventure.

Raj seemed very weak. The vigorous activity of the last hour had sapped him of all energy it seemed. We dried him with a towel. I dressed him up in his pajamas and T-shirt. We wrapped him up in a blanket and made him lie down. I rubbed his palms and the soles of his feet with my hands to generate some warmth. Raj went to sleep.

I had just started feeling relieved, when I observed that I had a strange sensation in my chest. I felt as if something was sitting tight on my chest constricting my chest cavity. I was taking shorter breaths, my chest felt heavy and my head felt lighter. I could see Joy talking excitedly, but his voice seemed to come from a distance. My conscious mind told me something was terribly wrong. I looked at Sanju. He was sitting at the edge of the bed, with a worried expression on his face. I gestured questioningly at him. He pointed at himself and then drew a line in the air across his own neck. I understood, he too was losing it. There was not much time to lose.

“We must immediately go to bed”, I said out aloud.

I went down and put the main door under lock and key. Then I locked the door leading out to the veranda. Joy asked me why I was doing all this. Sanju answered,

“Do as he is telling. I think we are also losing our sense. If we both lose it, it will be difficult for you to control us.”

“Whatever we do, just don’t let us out of the house”, I told Joy. “And today we will all sleep together in this bedroom. No one leaves this room”, I added.

Balu was not happy at all. But the prospect of having to control me (a ninety kilogram guy) gone berserk, later in the night, made him stow away his doubts. He complied without any argument.

Without losing any more time, the four of us lay down beside Raj. I checked out his condition before sleeping. Yes he had regained warmth and was sleeping peacefully. Thus assured I lay down with the others.

I still had that feeling in my chest, and it seemed more pronounced. In order to divert my mind, I started conversation with Joy.

I asked him, “What happened to Raj?”

“He was listening to the psychedelic rock music and started head banging with its beats. He just continued doing it. After smoking weed, you tend to keep on repeating what you are doing. You lose control of yourself, it’s like entering a trance”, Joy said.

“Actually he was trying to scare Joy at first. But even I failed to understand when his fake trance transformed into real drug induced trance”, said Sanju.

At last everything was under control I thought. I was feeling happy. My head was light and there was a sense of light heartedness inside me. I started whistling a tune. Sanju caught the tune and started singing. I added my voice to his. Our voices reverberated in the still atmosphere of our bedroom. I liked the sensation.

Joy whispered to Balu,” Forget about sleep now. These two have lost it. They will not stay quiet now.”

I heard what he said and smiled. I did not care anymore, neither did Sanju. We sang one song after another, I don’t remember for how long. 

In the morning I woke up the earliest. My throat was parched. I took a long drag of water out of the bottle kept beside the bed. I remembered what had happened last night. I thanked the heavens for taking us safely through the night. I checked Raj, he was fine. Sanju was sleeping like a baby. Balu and Joy too were asleep. I pulled the sheet over my head and flopped down to sleep again.