An Eccentric Summer

An Eccentric Summer

Something unexpected happened!

I became so close to this company of Vicky, Sheila and Asha that our lives were becoming so intertwined. There were no words to explain our friendship.

Vicky had always been criticizing the last results of our examination and was so sure that had his papers been valued realistically, he would have passed. He was so sure of his answers to some of the questions. Nevertheless he was preparing with me for the next examinations. There was no revaluation of papers, only recounting. This meant that if the examiner forgot to add up the marks in some sheets by any chance, we would be reprieved! No idea what it meant!

Vicky was bold enough to apply for this recounting. We also took it to one of the senior academics who visited our place for the crash courses. By that evening however the results of recounting were out and Vicky passed!

This meant I lost my companion for the next struggle called examination. But this incident went a long way in regaining our confidence in the examination process and boosted my morale for another try. We were really wondering about Vicky’s decision to go for a recounting. It changed all. There could be many who lost because of this lack of confidence! In fact there were many who lost the battle for a digit.

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It was very hot those days. The summer sun was blazing like a hot plate in a blacksmith’s work shop. There was no trace of rain or dark clouds for weeks. Most of the balsams and other plants I tried to grow in the flower pots at home had a desperate look despite watering them.

Tiny mangoes fell down dark and decayed before ripening. Paddy fields looked dried up and wore deep wrinkles. Most fields were now used for growing vegetable which was summer farming, but all were desperate for lack of water even for this.

On my way back home, I used to meet a person, who will always be there watering the banana saplings in a small orchard he took on lease. The bananas were for the Onam market.
He had oxen and buffaloes and he used to till our paddy fields. He and his wife used to work from morning to evening in such farms. He was an example of hard work, but he was still poor. He was very polite and decent. I have never seen him angry despite the odds against which he was fighting to build up his life and support his family.

He always showed interest in my prospects. He once asked me what I was doing. When I told him my doing, he was so upset. He suggested I should be in civil service because that could help many people like him.

My mom once told me that he was a brilliant student of her. He did go to school up to tenth standard and passed, but poverty at home forced him to start working. By then, he had to feed four brothers and three sisters, the youngest one just a baby. He even learned driving and other odd jobs but nothing worked and somehow ended up in petty land labor just like his father.

I have seen him acting in dramas in festivals and wondered what a good actor he was! The fact that despite all hard work, and learning many trades, one could end up in such penury due to sheer bad luck was unacceptable to me. These thoughts made me restless and more aggressive.

Grueling with the study material and texts, night after night apart from the days work had left me so tired. Vicky used to study longer into the night even after I left his room after a combined study. I have seen tiny bubbles on Vicky’s legs which became wounds because of his lack of sleep. He was sometimes unable to walk. During the few days we got leave from work for the examinations, we struggled so hard. Vick’s success was a proving one.

When we looked back, we felt that, what we lacked was mentoring. Once we decided our profession, we should have started working on this early after school. There was nobody to guide us. We relied too much on the system. We lost considerable time.

As the examination was approaching, I became more and more dejected and forgetful.

An evening, when it became so unbearable, I went for a walk. I walked through the main road, foreshore road, then to the marine drive and rounded the city. After having food from a street shop, I came back and started reading in my room. By nine, it was so unbearable for me and when it was time for going to see Vicky for our combined studies, I went straight to the telephone booth and called Asha.

It was a while of time waiting when she came on line. Probably the family did not like the idea of someone calling her during night. I didn’t care.

“Asha, I need to talk… I am so upset” I said.

“What happened?” she asked “What is the matter?” there was anxiety in her words.

“You will not see me anymore. I cannot continue this. I am so upset. I shall never pass this examination if we continue this. I need to pass. I am sorry I am telling you this at this point of time. But you should forgive me.”

“But… ” She did not complete. I was afraid what I heard was a choking cry at the other end of the phone.

“I... I am… I am sorry, but we need to part. I shall speak to you about...” Since the line was cut by her, I could not continue.

I stood there like a man in a trance. Then I walked to Vicky unwillingly. Each step was very difficult to make.

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I didn’t tell him at first what happened though he sensed something wrong and asked me what was the matter. But when I could not do any problems, I finally had to tell him. I was almost in tears when I told him, my situation, my feelings and what happened.

Vicky was very angry at me for doing this. He told me this was not the way of doing it even if I did not want to continue our friendship. “But after getting to this far….Why have you done this? You need to understand other’s sentiments…..” thus went his tirade.

I returned without continuing our study. I knew I could not go back to him anymore. He was so upset and I had done something terribly wrong.

But I did not care. I had to do it. We were getting more and more serious in our friendship and I was loosing track of my goals. May be my envy got the better of me.

I spend some more time at the shop near the Junction, when Vicky joined me with Joss. I had seen them coming along, Vicky whispering into Joss’s ears. He then talked to me as nothing had happened, but the zeal was not there.

I sat there sipping black tea, dejected and staring into the street and the darkness beyond.

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Futility of All Plans

A handful of students had not yet finished scribbling on the answer sheets. Some were tagging the sets. Examiners were running for collecting the papers, reminding to stop writing. I placed my set on the table of one and walked out. There was this empty feeling. I was tired.

Vicky was waiting for me outside. Normally we do not wait for each other and just sneak out after the exams, so we could study for the next day’s examination and also escape from discussing answers with others. There is no dearth for snobbish persons showing ‘one up man ship’ and suggestions of exaggerated ‘turns’ and ‘twists’ in the questions which even the examiners (who set those questions) would not have imagined.

If you stay for these discussions with them, you will be left with a strange feeling which causes inferiority complex. Nevertheless, these pseudo geniuses will be pat there even in the next examination! Our theory was that there is no point in discussing what was over.

Vicky, though he passed through recounting, supported me for the examination as a true friend and was waiting for me to pick me up for a bash on the last day. The recount in his case only confirmed what we had doubted all along. The objective and the conduct of these examinations and its procedure for valuation had to be changed thoroughly.

We relaxed under a tree and took company of two close friends, Sabu and Baju and decided to walk to the next Hotel. It was not yet noon.

We were coming out of the College compound when I heard somebody calling out to me. I turned to my right and saw Chandru walking towards me. He was from my village and quite senior to me.

He had already completed training at Bangalore even before I joined the course. Though he did not pass during his training period, he passed a public service commission test and became a civil servant somewhere in Bangalore.

Chandru was six feet tall and had a boyish, pleasant face and the color of wheat. He was a brilliant chap, a first class mathematics degree holder, first in our village and one who got caught in the charm of the profession and was about to destroy his future, but for the divine grace who saved him from the penury or who had the better sense to try the civil service examination, depending on one’s perception about such things or one’s views about locus of control.

I was glad that he escaped from the drudgery and I was surprised to see him there. I did not know that he continued writing. He was my tutor in ninth standard for Statistics and was hence a Guru to me. He became our hero of the village through a very special incident.

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He had just come home from Bangalore on a Saturday night and slept till about nine in the morning. He woke up hearing uproar outside. A group of children were playing football in the paddy field on the west side of his house.

Harvest was over and the season for planting tapioca began. In between the fields were left idle for some days as they arranged the tapioca twigs. Children used the fields during the day for their football matches. He walked out cursing them and rubbing his eyes.

“Chandru, help me to knock out a papaya fruit”, said his mother. “There are no vegetables for lunch. You need to go to the shop”.

He walked out into the courtyard, took a Pole and went to the orchard.

Chandru often told us what happened then.

Later on, it was fun to hear this from him. He said he would shiver down to his knees when he remembers the incident!

While he was trying to pluck the fruit, there was a scream from the group playing in the field. He dropped the pole and dashed to the place.

A little child was squirming in the field, choking and wriggling for breath and the onlookers were just wailing aloud. He saw many people running to the scene.

A moment of extreme tension, there was no time to waste.

He jumped in, took the boy in his hands, shoved his hand into the boy’s mouth and pulled out a whistle with his fingers. The boy choked, coughed and dropped to the ground. He started breathing. Chandru then massaged him back to life.

After this incident, he was the hero of youngsters like me.

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We walked together to the Hotel.

The restaurant was crowded. All five of us moved to the Bar. Being close to noon, there were only a few customers. We found a table. The waiter was impatient as he was hanging around our table. Vicky sat opposite to me and nodded to me.

I asked the waiter what beer was available. “KF” he said. It was costly. “No Kalyani?” There was no use asking further. In a minute, chilled beer was ready. Cashew pickles and ground nuts came really fast!

“For the health of everybody!” said Vicky and emptied the first glass.

We repeated and followed suit. Beer tasted good despite none of us preferring it.

“Girish said the question on break even included a step on…………..” Sabu was whispering to Baju who was seated next to Vicky.

“Nonsense” Vicky exploded. “I saw the question. It is a simple problem on Step Costs”.

“Yes. But he insisted. On the accounting paper also, he made a similar comment and boasted that he did it well”.

“Don’t worry. You will find him in the hall next time as well!”

“You mean I will also fail?” Sabu asked embarrassed.

“I mean, even when you write final, he will still be tiring it out at competency level!” He added a second later with a weary smile. We all laughed.

“I do not know what people gain by this” I said.

“Oh just leave it. The other day, Lal was telling me that V (a renowned professional who is also said to be a valuer for our examinations) just glances on the first page of an answer book to decide the total mark for the guy and then fills up the rest of the columns!”

“Ha Ha Ha” laughed Chandru. “And hello, so you drink beer!” Chandru exclaimed looking at me. “Let me reach home, I shall tell my mother. She was always chastising me, asking me to take you as a model. This will be real shock to her!” He told me.

“Beer?! He takes five peg at one go, on the rocks!” Sabu was exclaiming.

“Oh! No! No!” Baju told Chandru. “He does so only when he smokes!”

“Oh come on, have you ever seen him smoking except while playing cards?”

“Let us stop this! Chandru is today’s guest! Have a drink for his health!” Vicky spoiled the game and saved me.

“The other day, Shiv from Chennai was taking classes at the Institute. Somebody just offloaded a bagful of ‘Prasadams’ and told him it is fresh from Guruvayoor.
Shiv was saying “Kadavule (Oh! God)…” I said.

“What stupidities! He was expecting to get a clue for the examination as Mr. Shiv could be setting questions”. Sabu suggested.

“Next time I am writing at …….” Chandru was mentioning a not so well known place in the north.

“So you have decided, you will not pass this time?” Vicky asked.

“I was just suggesting” Chandru said with a yellow smile!

“You should be writing at ………….” Vicky said the name of the metro where better coaching is being given.

“Any way, if we have a next time, I shall be back early on leave. Let us study together. I have a nice question bank which I collected from abroad. I did not get time to work it out this time. Let us do it together” Chandru told me.

“Show me that!” I cried out. “I shall photocopy it and practice early. I am balancing on problems and theory. I made a mistake by neglecting the balance. That was because the first time, they reduced the importance of problems to mere theory and I could not write much. The second time, they simply reversed it and there I went right into the trap”. I said.

“True. But you could have completed the tuition and we would have passed in the very first chance. You bungled the chances of both of us”. Vicky said.

He was referring to the fact that we had started together and since I left midway for an audit, he had to go alone. He could not get through that chance, like me.

“But how could I refuse this chance of an external company audit when I was offered one so early?” I asked.

“So what? If you had passed, you could have done it all by yourself and with style may be somewhere else” Vicky retorted.

Together Vicky and I were a good team. He was saying the truth. In our firms, there was a general dislike of trainees who concentrated on studies and neglected work. Straight out of college, many of us found it difficult to adjust both. There were a few who concentrated on studies. They were lucky.

“What work are you talking about? For the first two years, I could not even complete my assignments” Chandru said. He did the training in a reputed firm in Bangalore.

“After each days labor, I was so tired I would sleep off reading the news paper at 10 in the night. I had no time. Do you know that a reputed firm gives no work for students in the first year? The seniors will just give the telephone directory and ask them to add up! They said sometimes they do not even give registration until they are convinced that the student will continue”. Chandru finished.

“And another one is happily giving dummy article ship and saving money” said Baju.

“That is what I said. We are living in a make believe world. There is huge injustice and high disparity here. One day we must speak against these practices”. Vicky said.

“Why do we fail so many students to restrict the membership? Is that necessary to show that this is a tough examination? Why can’t we restrict entry by way of specifying the number of seats and conducting an entrance examination just like other professional bodies? Why can’t we give all round training so all gets equal chance? Why don’t we invest in students?” I asked.

“This is decided by a few so they could ensure availability of cheap labor” suggested Vicky.

Even the so called stipend was paltry. It was not enough to buy even prescribed texts. It was a joke as there was wide disparity in the work available in different firms and there were some who even avoided paying the stipend.

“Do they understand from what backgrounds the students come? Is there a due weight age for that? At present I think those at the top would be pretty happy to restrict the members to a few people from similar backgrounds.” Baju said.

“We should plan something. We should do something.” fumed Sabu.

For about two hours we thought about drafting a memorandum which stated the problems faced by us. Vicky said he would draft it later with the help of his advocate friend.

This however remained in our wild imagination.

I had to extend my service by about two months (excess leave!) and we left the plan abrupt due to some unexpected turn of events.

Chandru was working some where near Bangalore. He used to go by the night train and reach there early morning. The train did not stop at the railway station close to his place.

Normally he used to get down at the next station and return by bus. This time the train slowed down in his station for some reason. Thinking he could save an hour of journey, Chandru took his baggage and stood on the steps and slowly jumped to the platform to run along.

Poor man! It was still dark, the train had picked up speed and the platform was over by then.

It was much later in the morning that they found the body. The wheels had just run over him. There was no other mutilation and he lay as if he was asleep.

For my friends who just met him last week, this was a rude shock.

I passed the examination that chance.

I don’t know if it is Vicky’s hard support or Chandru’s blessing.

Years after the incident, I still sometimes see Chandru in dreams and his smile will always haunt me.

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(‘An Eccentric Summer’ is part of The Inverted Tiq Marqs © By A P)