SCISSORS,KNIVES AND DAMN THATS OLD SPICE

I am not so comfortable with Sharp instruments!


Just the last week, having spent six hours to watch a 2 hour english movie(should be trying to watch), i decided it was time to let go of my hair. Not that I had too much, but not for nothing was I known as snake in the grass, wave in the head etc. Never have I had a good haircut. Wait, there would be one. But it was back at Tirupathi, it would hardly qualify as a haircut. Still coming back to last week, I got up and had one last look at what remained on my head. Frantically adjusting the part of the hair on the front of my head, I set out to the nearby barber's.


I have always been fascinated by people who have cut and tried to style my hair. I say tried to because after all the cutting part, there's this small part of hair on the front that would refuse to budge either way. I have seen barbers spend the most of their time and their patience on it, in vain. Perhaps I am every barber's nightmare???


The one funny thing about my hair is its desperation. Everytime I start to the Saloon, it tries to feign obedience. Now , that is not so hard to spot. Ordinarily, my hair tries to align itself in all possible directions. Sometimes I feel that my hairline was the inspiration for the discovery of the fourth dimension. But I don't give in and bravely proceed to get it cut. I don't know if it's me or the barber, cos i never seem to get it right. But the funny thing is that I can get my hair cut as long it is still der on top of my head, however unruly.

I know a lot of my friends would agree with me when I say that there are very thin lines between youth and middle age (or kezhats as its called in colloquial tamil), in my opinion , there are two - Waist line and the hair line. :)

The Colonial Predispositon of Being Fair!

What is Fair and what is not!

FAN FOLLOWER(S)

This is in response to the overflowing fan mail and follower cults. I sincerely thank all my follower(s). Guys just keep following. You are my inspiration.!

SHANMUGHA SOCCER

Shanmugha Soccer

ஷண்முகா கால்பந்து குழு

What happens with 30 ppl and a football.

I have heard people say -Football was never my cup of tea. In my case football was always after the cup of tea (or what was supposed to be tea). Every evening, after sipping a cuppa hot water (read tea) and swallowing down snacks, we used to go out to play what everyone else called football and we called it, well foot on the ball.

Players, Positions

1. Ramgiri a.k.a Delay Bass – Striker, midfield

2. Auto a.k.a Felix – Defender (Full back, Left Back, Right Back, Gravity prone), midfielder

3. TP a.k.a Vijay Shankar- Defender(Own Goal), Midfield

4. Baski a.k.a Thotti a.k.a Bucketthaa – Defender (fullback –alex), Def Midfield (Essien), winger(Tata)

5. Kaushik a.k.a Kaushik – Forward (lone forward beside the GK)

6. Moota a.k.a Mahesh – Winger(Left or Right)

7. Endhu a.k.a Harish (myself) – Defender( Right , Centre), Midfielder (Right)

8. Amrith a.k.a Rajsekara – Midfielder(right central, Attacking)

9. Dutch Bonda a.k.a Beno – Striker (forward), Midfield

10. Bounce a.k.a Surakshith – Goal keeper ( Acrobat Keeper)

11. Puli a.k.a Prabhakaran – Defender(Left,Right and centre, wild)

Along with the above mentioned players there were guest appearances from Jackson (like) and his incredible roommate Salim, Defender Cuttu,Pathsarthi, Koundamani Thatha etc. Those who do not find their names on this list are either too good footballers or do not comply with our team requirements and the entertainment quotient.

Our misadventures and other reports continue in successive posts.

When the world was all Down and Across!

“Crossie?”

“Got any”

“1a 6d 30a”

These would be my first messages from my phone every day. My daily ritual used to be simple. After getting up, I would go to get my cup of coffee and the daily newspaper. Missing either one of these would make my day incomplete. Sipping on my cup, I would eagerly turn to the crossword page to see if I could make out at least one on the first glance. My assumption was that no matter how tough the crossword, I could make out at least one of them on the first glance. Usually I did. Then comes the routine of going to class. It never varied too much. Every morning I would take off the crossword page and set off to class. Once I settle on to my seat, I would open the sheet of paper and start pondering. That would set the tone for the day.

Crosswords were never my first love. Not even my third or fourth for that matter. I got smitten by crossies since KS’07. It was the first cultural festival in the college and so we decided to take a shot at the English events. I fondly remember the days when we formed a team of three – Myself, Thatha and Boraat. Our performance was pathetic to say the least. The one that we faired the best was in etymology. I loved solving the anagrams and stuff. So from the day after the event , I decided to give a shot at the Hindu Crossword.

I have to thank people who chipped in with me from the first day. Amrith, Gaddam, Borat and thatha were the original partners in crime. How can I forget days when we would take the crossword to every classroom and lab that we attended? Initially I would come up with two to three answers every day. Amrith would get around 6 atleast. Gaddam was brilliant, he would solve the cryptic ones along with Borat. (Now Borat would otherwise be engaged with the hibernation experiment that he conducted for the three years of class that I spent with him.) As days went by, we got better and so did the clues. Some of the clues would be well framed. My most favorite one would be – “A little bit of weight added to spoil the rules of the language (7)”. Some would be downright baffling. We would break our heads the whole day trying to figure them out. I remember going from one room to another in the hostel trying out possibilities on the dictionary software to solve clues. I was practically absorbed into crossies. As days went by, we got better. We used to dream of solving the crossie completely at least once.

In the third year, people like Bounce, Pathsarthi became classmates. Though the concept of classmates may be controversial with bounce , he was more of the hostel co-inmate, if you could use the word. In class we would spend hours and hours on crossies. If there was a time when we would forego them it would be the Bhajji break. Those days were great . And One day we did manage to finish a crossie. Happy days. Thanks to Nita Jaggi, who we are not sure is male or female. Years rolled on, we would do the same. The classroom environment was very conducive to solving crosswords. Nowhere else could I find the kind of ambience required to concentrate.

All credit to all my friends who have made my college life so beautiful. I will and do meet these people regularly (online), but it will be hard to find the situation that we found ourselves in. I still try solving crosswords every day, it relives the memories of a classroom where we would spread that black and white sheet of The Hindu on our tables to solve that little thing in black and white (at least most days!)

p.s – I may have forgotten TP kaapi and thatha’s role in our daily quest. But it would be hard to forget their collective responses. Thatha being the senior citizen was the repository of non-answers. You could eliminate his responses J. Just kidding thatha would stun me with some blinders too. As with TP, the wannabe kangaroo, he was more intent in listening to class and hence he was not too much of a regular.

As for our terrible trio at the cults, I remember sneaking out through the window during an event!!!!! J.

The Silk Route ..

Its been more than a week since India won its gold medal at the Beijing Olympics, the newspapers are aplomb with articles congratulating the medal winner. There is one fundamental statement being thrown out by people - Why do we fare so badly on the global sporting arena. As a country of more than 1 billion people watches,smaller and unknown countries zoom above with umpteen medals. Why aren't we winning more medals at the Olympics?
Unfortunately the thought arises only every four years. There has hardly been an improvement. I can still recall an Ex-sports minister's surprise visit to a "national" stadium that exposed ugly restrooms and "world class facilities" that were on offer. Will there be a change?

Once and for all!

How strange can things be in life? Atleast in mine. Well to start with there was a definite phase in my life where i felt that i was invisible for most part of it.