The Average Tam-Bram - Episode Three - The Crumbling Cookie and other assorted condiments

...or "How I learnt to ignore the water shortage"

Episode Two here.

Episode One here.

We continue our story from where we left the ATB grinning at the board on the side of the highway dreaming of decadent debauched trips to Goa. Thirty seconds later (this is the average day-dream duration of the ATB), the ATB comes back to reality and hefts all his luggage thanking his stars that his foot-putting-down on no table fan was worth the complete silence and cold looks he got the previous night. The ATB trudges to the hostel office to pick up keys for his room and do the paper work. The line at the hostel office on days like this is infinitely long for various reasons - prime one being that anyone paying fees in 500 or 1000 rupee notes is required to list down the numbers on the notes to prevent the hostel office being cheated (quite unlike the manner in which they cheat everyone else by procuring only rotting vegetables and sacks of grains that are home to maggots).

The paperwork to get enrolled and be marked existent in college records is a complicated process that require knowledge of advanced Fourier transforms, multi-dimensional non-linear mathematics and the ability to live through extreme boredom. Having learn the first two during his coaching the ATB manages this task pretty well by substituting cribbing with other ATBs in while waiting. Most often the ATB will crib about the lack of women - preferably the single and looking types, failing which he will simply crib. The crib must not be taken as an idication of misogynism, but just as an indication of lack of other things to worry about - like world-economy, the next album 'A Perfect Circle' promises to cut, the food/water situation in the hostels or lack of clean underwear. Either he knows the answers to this ('Obama','Soon','Terrible' and 'Flip' are the answers in that order, in case the reader is interested) or he just couldn't care less (any question that contains 'Britney Spears' without 'Madonna' or 'kissing' falls into this category).

The ATB's cloistered upbringing usually tends to make him wary of strangers and this is best reflected in his interactions with his room-mates and hostel mates. What the reader needs to understand is that the initial hostility is but a defence mechansim - much like the initial gagging over the first sip of Old Monk and cola. Very soon, one learns to appreciate the apparently vile cough-syrup tasting concoction and looks to it for solace. A reservation that an ATB maintains is that of eating etiquette - one does not touch other utensils with the hand that one uses for eating (typically the right), while the specimen from the north of the Vindhyas believes that the right is for the top end of the ailmentary canal while the left is for the other end. Both perspectives are, of course, reasonable and eventually using the spoon or understanding that soap cleanses resolves contention (at least, temporarily, but breaks when there is roti and dal to eat). The authors will not elaborate on this and this is left as an exercise to the reader to understand his perambulations into the psychology of the ATB and/or the North Indian.

These initial differences slowly begin to fade away, usually over a few months and generous helpings of potable ethanol which may be sourced from the nearest watering hole. The watering holes near colleges are most often exactly that - waterlogged and absolute shady holes - frequented by truck drivers and construction workers. A typical bar of this kind will have various animals chained outside to poles, including poultry and dogs. Upon being informed that the food menu consists of chicken 65, chicken kabab and chicken soup and mutton biriyan, mutton 65 and mutton kabab (and the sudden disappearance of the aforementioned chained animals), one must exercise caution and stick to peanuts which have lesser probability of being tampered with.

If the reader wonders why the authors venture into the realm of meat and alcohol, which by ancient rules, are taboo to the ATB, the reader must realize the fact that such rules come lower in the list of priorities compared to survival. One must then question 'Why? Doesn't the mess serve wholesome edible vegetarian food?". At this point, after two semesters of pain, the ATB will (with characteristic display of elegant wordplay) tell the reader that the question is incorrectly framed. One question mark and one capital D are redundant and the question should, in fact be, "Why doesn't the mess serve wholesome edible vegetarian food?" And to this question, by means of logical reasoning, the ATB has, as expected, an answer. "Fresh vegetables cost more than rotten vegetables and rotten vegetables are breeding ground for various vermin including cockroaches. Hence rotten vegetable cooked into food are non-vegetarian by this axiom and any place that is called 'mess' cannot be, by definition, a place to eat." It is most often this that leads an ATB to take up eating meat considering that number of people who relish cockroaches is vastly outnumbered by the number of people who relish eating chicken - thus, chicken must be safer. To be further sure, he will down some Old Monk since alchol is used as a disinfectant in Dr. Parthasarathy's clinic.

The authors shall not delve deep into the academic activities of the ATB since academics is a well-explored theme and to be honest, extremely mundane boring and pointless. Interested readers are directed to consult various textbooks on subjects of their choice, with the minimum requirements being that the textbook be at least 300 pages or thicker. Or, alternatively, the reader may proceed to bang his head violently against the nearest concrete wall. Both are known to produce the same effects.

The reader must have observed some radical changes in the behavior of the ATB compared to his behavior at home in more conservative and puritan surroundings. This is just the beginning and the reader shall gradually see much more marked changes - for the better or for the worse is left to the reader to fathom. Also, the reader must bear in mind that the ATB is chameleon and will change back to the old ATB while at home during vacations.

We bid a temporary goodbye to the ATB while his wallows in the humidity of the coast worsened by the lack of electricity. We shall, on returning explore a very important topic - girls. The reader must note that this shall be a recurrent theme and an area of concern for the ATB through all his life. We end Episode Three here with the ATB considering the relative advantages of taking a bath once every two days as opposed to the once (or twice) a day rule followed at home. The primary advantages that the ATB determines are more time to sleep and lesser expenditure on soap etc. (which translates to an extra OMR every weekend) - reason enough to skip the walk to the bathroom and continue dreaming about eating 'thayir saadam' with Trisha while reading aloud sections from The Hindu's book reviews (the three important T's of an ATB - thayir saadam, Trisha and The Hindu).