Monday, November 27, 2006

Of Black Tongues and Other Mishaps

Today I had a conversation with a friend about kari nakku.This friend is planning a trip shortly and I happened to mention in jest that if something untoward were to happen, I would lay a wreath on this friend's grave. Now , this friend did not share my lighthearted take on this and was plainly offended. And this got me thinking ( no mean feat, those who know me will agree ).

An incident that happened in Chennai some years back sprang to memory. A friend ( who for want of a better name we will call Mr Puli ) and I were going somewhere by bus. Mr Puli happened to remark that it was a wonderful thing that there were no bus strikes in Chennai. An off-the-cuff remark you would say, one which did not deserve a comment much less valuable bytes of storage in my memory all these years. Patience , dear reader , patience. To continue from where I left off ( those who know me will vouch that I can go tangentially any time which is apt to confuse the enraptured listeners waiting with bated breath for the nuggets of wisdom to fall from my pearly lips ) ...uh oh where was I ?

Oh yes, the bus trip. So we continued on the trip, reached our destination ,did some shopping and were ready to return ( see , I can be curt and to the point if I want to). And here , gentle readers, ( Editor's note: Hold on tight. Shocking surprise coming up ) you will Iam sure get the shock of your lives when I tell you with an Alfred Hitchcocksque air that there were no buses to board due to a lightning strike. And from that day on we had a new term - Puli yude nakku. Which brings us to the end of the narrative on Black Tongues.

On to Other Mishaps. This is another incident when I and Mr Puli were returning by bus from office. Since we were housemates , one of us would get the tickets. On the day in question, unluckily for me , Mr Puli got the tickets. Now just before reaching our bus stop , there was a speed breaker. Unknown to me Mr Puli had used the drop in the bus speed at the bump to hop lightly off the bus. I continued on merrily till the bus stop, where I got down and was greeted with elation by a crew of ticket checkers.

What did I have to fear? I waited for the passengers to get down, among which would be my dear friend Mr Puli with the tickets, seeing which the ticket checkers would stop looking at me like I was a you-know-what and fawn on me respectfully like I was a you-know-who . I waited. and waited. and waited. The bus was nearly empty and then I realized how Buddha must have felt when he attained Nirvana. For you see, light ( tubelight probably, since it took so long ) finally dawned on me. Mr Puli had disappeared. AWOL. There was nothing to do. I had to swallow the righteous indignation I was spewing out and pay the fine.To add insult to injury , I could hear one of the passengers commenting loudly "Thiruttu rascal" , "Thiruda" etc - in short showing off his by-no-means-limited vocabulary. I contented myself with giving him a dirty look and walked away in dignified silence ( not too easy when you consider I had just been picked for ticketless travelling ).

p.s : The story doesnt end here, you dear readers will be pleased to note. By a happy coincidence, I was carrying the house keys. Needled with this affront on my pride, I headed straight for the barber shop. And one hour later ( what was the hurry anyway :) ), when I f-i-n-a-l-l-y reached home, Mr Puli was still waiting outside.

8 comments:

Scribbles said...

Right-o.
Happens always..
Happened more than once when we discuss about our present boss/lead .. we d be praising him sky-high,...and presto..the next day he d fire me/frens for something silly or show his true self..
So nowadays afer talking high abt some1 I touch wood... Yeah right Touch-wood might not be meant for this purpose but it makes me happy...And it seems to work :)

silverine said...

LOL :))
"spoken too soon" as they say. Happens to me all the time!

Panther said...

We all had a good laugh along with Mr.Puli in Chennai.Mr.Puli also indicated that the author himself used his black tongue 'effectively' on the eve of Mr.Puli's first driving licence test.Hope you would have something to say about the driving classes that both of you attended together.

Panther said...

Flash news... Mr.Puli also thinking of entering the blogosphere to presnt his version of the story..

Sachin R K said...

@Scribbles - happens to all of us

@Silverine - you said it :)

@Panther - Pls tell Mr Puli the gloves are off.

YeshaswiBhava said...

Serves you right, bugger !!!

Sachin R K said...

Welcome to my blog , SSV :)

Anonymous said...

Athu kollaamaayirunnu. Never heard this story in any of our kallu kudi sessions!