Domain Maximus

Today morning I got a frantic call from Pastrami. Last I heard our investment banker friend was in Delhi on some personal work. Frantic is not like Pastrami at all.

He is always composed and calm, is Pastrami.

Sidin: “Hello… cough cough… hello?”

Pastrami: “Hey man… hows the tonsils?”

“Terrible. You tell…”

“Dude help me. Is there a flight from Delhi to Cochin?”

“Sure. There is that evening Air Sahara flight.”

“Can’t fly that. Anything else? Right now I have bookings for a Delhi-Mumbai-Bangalore-Chennai-Cochin flight…”

“What the… Why dont you just take the Sahara flight man…”

“Can’t. Won’t”

“Eh???!!”

“Yeah. Well… Um… I am sort of boycotting all brands that support Indian cricket.”

“WHAT??!! Just like that? One moment your in Delhi visiting the parents and the next you are a viral anti-endorser type person? Dude…”

“We have silently suffered too much, Our team has really disgraced our nation at an international stage man. It is a national tragedy.”

“You are taking this really badly aren’t you?”

“Obviously. It is such a HUMONGOUS dissapointment man. Our team has really let us down.”

“And that too continously since 1983 eh?”

“What? No man. You don’t get cricket. It is a funny game. Not winning anything does not necessarily mean that we are not the best team in the world. We are one of the world’s best teams man…”

“How much did we lose to Bangaldesh by? I can’t put my finger on it…”

“Shut it. My principles man. So I guess I will have to fly all those hops to Cochin. But better than been taken for a ride by those crass money-grubbing cricket-bastards… I’m hungry man…”

“Buy something from the restuarant in the airport…”

“Nope. They sell Pepsi too. I am not falling for that one…”

“Hmm… But wait… you always carry a packet of biscuits right?”

“Threw them away a moment ago… Sunfeast. That too FitKit…”

“Grab a bite on the flight then…”

“Can’t man. All low cost airline types.”

“Pastrami stop acting like a child…”

“Dude does anyone in our cricket team endorse Itch Guard??!!…”

“Sachin maybe… hehe… no not that I know of…”

“I haven’t changed in three days man. I’ve been wearing the same suit and shirt since I landed here…”

“Eh? No backup shirts?”

“All Westside…”

“Suits?”

“Mayur”

“Dammit… wear one of your t-shirts then man… wait… Reebok?”

“Hmm… sigh… Couldn’t bathe well at home either. Mom has loaded up on Mysore Sandal and won’t let me buy another one…”

“Tough being a principled man eh Pastrami…”

“But its all for a good cause man. You won’t understand. This will force change in our cricket establishment. Slowly when thousands of us true cricket fans band together the brands will begin to see the point. Down with commercialism and crass profiteering in world cricket!”

“Conserve your energy man. You can’t eat for another seventeen hours.”

“No no I was asking around. And apparently there is a small tea shop in Chennai airport that is completely endorsement free.”

“The sacrfices a cricket fan must make…”

“A TRUE cricket fan Sid…”

(Ominous beeping sounds)

“One second Sid…”

(Noise of pocket being rifled for coins)

“We’re back online Sid.”

“Pastrami… are you calling from a payphone?”

“Dude. I can’t use my Hutch connection anymore. Obviously.”

“Obviously.”

“I am hungry, itchy, thirsty, dirty and miserable. But I feel great man. I feel like I am already setting the stage for a better World Cup in 2011. I am making a difference Sid. I feel so powerful. This is real public uproar.”

“Good for you man… You are a complete idiot but anyways…”

“Hey you won’t believe this but I think I see Yuvraj Singh. The blackguard! He must be on his way back home…”

“Does he look upset?”

“Oh terrible. He maybe wearing Gucci, D&G and Abercrombie. But boy does he look dissapointed… Though he is trying to hide it with a huge smile…”

“Relishing this aren’t you…”

“Totally. And look Kim Sharma is here to receive him. She looks ravishing the little hottie…”

“She looks equally depressed I am sure.”

“Absolutely. She is crestfallen in her tight t-shirt and hip-hugging jeans. It will not be a happy reunion for them. And all this hugging and kissing in the airport is just a ruse. I know they are burning inside.”

“One cannot but feel terrible for Yuvraj. Does he have his limo waiting for him?”

“Looks like it. Is that a Lexus? I think so…”

“So I guess your plan is working already. So what if you’re hungry and a fetid breeding ground for flesh-borne bacteria? Yuvraj must be feeling terrible in his designer clothes and in his limo cuddled up next to Kim Sharma no?…”

Awkward silence.

“Ok bye Sid.”

“Tata Pastrami.”

(This post is very context specific. You might not get it. But Lover Boy most definitely does. Guahahaha.)

Don’t tell anyone. Not a soul. Nope not even your girlfriend. Parents are completely out of the question. Social networks are too strong to take lightly you know. (Orkut! Egads!) I dont trust any of you. So shush! Listen up. This is between us.

I am not sure. Well I AM 99.99% sure. But not completely. You know how it is. You are really sure but you must see it with your own eyes and spy camera before you can be sure. But anyways. Back to crux of the issue. The filling in the puff: I really really think a very close friend of mine is seeing someone. We are very close. Almost like roommates. But not quite. He lives in his office at Prabhadevi most of the time. Otherwise you can find him in the gym near his office. Or so he wants us to believe. By us I mean our friends circle.

In fact that is where this story of deception, subterfuge, perfumery, personal health advancement and clandestine lurve begins. The gym. Ah yes. Gyms. Wonderful places that suck out all your money and in return gives you torn cruciate ligaments in the right knee. But I guess I was an exception. In our friend’s case (after all my friend is your friend) it all began all too suddenly sometime last November. It was another muggy evening in Mumbai and the author felt like a quick trip down to the local Cafe. Not one for solitary socializing the author reached out to Pastrami and Lover Boy. Pastrami was too busy in the office. There was a new secretary and Pastrami wanted to show her some spread sheets. (He he.) That left only Lover Boy. Ring ring click.

You want to do coffee?
No.
What? But you always do coffee…
Not today…
Why not?
Err… I need to… you know
No
Oh I didnt tell you?
Tell me what?
That I am going to the gym now. Everyday. After work.
What? Why? You are a pipsqueek. (He is. Thin. Scrawny. Completely insubstantial. A shrimp.)
I need to put on some weight man. Get those muscles working.
Hmm. Good for you. Just tell them to keep their protein-shakey fingers off your cruciate ligaments.
Will do Sid.
Tata.

At the time it seemed like a reasonable thing. He really could use a little muscle all over. He was really very very thin. Not that he didnt eat or anything. Oh no, he worked through a stack of rotis and a bucket of Palak Paneer like a lumberjack. (The ones who like Indian food.) But he doesnt gain an inch. I know him from business school and he hasnt put on a bloody nanogram. In sharp contrast I merely need to walk by a the jalebi maker who stands outside my building and my buttons start to pop. Zippers screaming and all. Lover boy must have astronomic metabolism rates, we all assumed.

That night he came back home at midnight. Worked late and then the gym, he said. I nodded. The next day I nodded again. And again. And again. After a week I began to smell something fishy. He was gymming on the weekends too. For several hours. Finally I came to know that he had come back home one Monday at three in the morning. A rough back of the envelope calculation revelaed that he must have gymmed between three and five hours that day. “What crap?!” I told myself. Next day I dropped in after dinner at his place. Lover Boy warranted some careful observation. He came back at four. And not with his shirt ruffled, eyes dropping, hair tousled and pants crumpled as most overnight MBAs return. No siree. He had a twinkle in his eye, a spring in his step and a song on his lips. (Saat Samundar from Vishwaatma. The remix version. Beats and all.) Only his hair was tousled. And was that a rather too conspiratory crumpling of the collars? My spider sense began tingling.

The weeks that followed threw up even more clues. A most casual user of deodorant till then he suddenly began using Tommy Hilfiger and such premium fragrances. And lots of it. Once, in the course of a chance meeting at Phoenix Mills, he hugged me and I passed out after having run into a block of solid Fahrenheit.

He then began to buy new clothes. Till then he was a conservative dresser with a particular penchant for downmarket t-shirts made in assorted South East Asian nations. The types that had lines like: ‘Fashion Star 2003. Total Impact Garment” or “Looking Good. Emergency Style Attack.” emblazoned on the back. Overnight he became a high-priority customer at Charagh Din. Everyday he was in a new shirt. In a mist of premium scent.

All the while his dedication to the gym hit Limca Book of Records levels. By my back of the enevlope calculations he should have by now at least begun to look much fitter like, say, Brock Lesnar or The Rock. But he still looked the same. Shrimp. My spider sense tingled like a dab of Itchguard after an all-day football game in the Mumbai summers.

At this point you might ask why I was so curious. Why should I be bothered? Why should I poke my mallu nose into his personal affairs? What was my problem? Did I not respect his privacy? Would I have enjoyed this scrutiny myself had I been in the same position? But then considering you have read this post till this point you have no right to ask me such questions. At all. Nosey you.

But due to the same joys that one gets when someone leaves their email open in a netcafe and saunters off, or gives you there cellphone wrongly assuming you will not read their SMSes, I kept persisting in my quest to uncover the “Mystery of the Gym” as the affair was being called by a select group of friends by then.

Then one day Lover Boy made a slip up. He asked me to join him with “some of my office friends” for an evening out in town. We left in his car and picked her up from near his office. Did his eyes just shoot her a quiet message through the rear view mirror? I may have been mistaken but I swear I saw him say: “Hey Baby! I am really sorry about the water buffalo who is with us today. I had no idea he would agree to come. I was just being polite. You look so beautiful.” Hmm. Tingle. Tingle.

However the rest of the trip was uneventful. They shared no private jokes, did not stroll away into private corners and he did not seem to mind me talking to her with my natural charm and animal mallu magnetism. After a movie and dinner we were on our way back and we were back outside her house to drop her. In a moment of weakness, perhaps one of subtle indication, my friend spoke up: “Let me drop her at her place. Be right back.” They walked away. TINGLE TINGLE.

So that brings us to last week. By this time several close friends have heard about the Gym Affair. The circles are rife with rumours and conspiracy. And our friend is pumping iron like never before. And then last week several things happened together. Lover Boy bought a new cellphone and I was inspecting it when I came across several well-taken portrait shots of the fair maiden. Later while out driving around he refused to play the usual CD, a combination of the best Govinda and Manna Dey hits. “Too crass this music. Lets play this Kenny G CD.” I looked at him in shock, my eyes smouldering. His eyes, on the other hand, seemed to be focussing away into the distance. Dreamy. Romantic. TINGLE. Ah… Songbird…

And now, the final straw, I come to know that he has gone to a certain city in India to attend a certain friend’s certain wedding. And who has accompanied him? Yup fair maiden herself. And how long is he there? Six days. But what is clincher? Drum Roll… Fair maiden is from the same city herself!!!

What are the odds? What are the chances that something romantic is afoot? Do you think Lover Boy is actually in love? Yeh sach hai ya sapna? Is it all just a misunderstanding? Are they just friends? Platonic ones? When he said “I am going to the Gym” did he actually mean “I am going to meet Jim”? Does that make the whole thing more disturbing? Who is this fair maiden? What does she see in him? Can anyone else hit on her? Will he get angry? (Remember he has now accumulated seven thousand manhours in the gym).

I am puzzled. But please dont tell him I told you. That was just between the both of us. Completely secret. Shush.

The rhyme now has a reason!!!

I was thoroughly overjoyed to read recently that we have liberated our little little (nanhe munhe) children from the tyranny of western influence. Or at least the Madhya Pradesh government has. I hope this is just the beginning of a long series of reforms in our education system. The time is undoubtedly right; for too long we have stuck to the age old norms of reading writing and arithmetic. Today we know that this alone is insufficient to guarantee success in our society. In fact this is not even important in the larger scheme of things.

I encourage each and every reader of this blog to applaud this move. But this alone is not enough. We Indians tend to give our MORAL support to each and every cause but actually do little to further the cause or even help the champions of the cause to make any money. This is abominable.

I have decided to openly support this noble (Nobel?) initiative of the MP government by kick-starting the process of scripting nice, ek dum desi, and patriotic nursery rhymes. I encourage all readers of this blog to add to this short list with their own educative yet home-grown examples of nursery-ready lyric.

Rhyme Number 1: (Baa baa black sheep)
Aaa Aaa Arjun
Have you any a seat?
First you tell me
Your community!

22.5% for SC/ST
27% for OBC
And the rest for the forwards
Who will soon live on the street.

Rhyme Number 2: (Johnny Johnny)
Mika Mika
Yes papa
Hosting party?
No papa
Kissing item girl?
No papa!
I saw it on TOI cover
Ha ha ha

Rhyme Number 3: (Rain rain)
Rain, rain go away
Come again another day
Johnny Josesph wants to play

Rhyme Number 4: (Mary had a little lamb)
Rahul had a little coke
A little speed, a little hash
Rahul had a little coke, the stuff was white as snow
And everywhere that Rahul went
Rahul went, Rahul went
And everywhere that Rahul went, Sahil was sure to blow

Rhyme Number 5: (Row row row)
Sing, sing, sing through your nose
And wear a stupid cap
All the autos play your stuff
But you mostly sound like crap

Rhyme Number 6: (Jack and Jill)
My Chennai aunty always stood in line
To fetch a pail of water
She hoped things would change post-election
Instead of water she got free television

As you can see there is infinite potential to make nice bharateeya poetry for our young ones to learn in school. I encourage all of you readers to generously contribute to this just cause and help in the betterment of our education system. Please leave your nation-changing poetry in the comments… this is your chance to make a difference…

The best contributions will be published in Hafta to much… er… fanfare…