34. Learning with Experience

Following are the five major incidents that changed my attitude towards life.


Reader discretion / excretion is not needed for reading this post.


1) When I was in class two, a family planning advertisement appeared every now and then in Doordarshan. Two people (male and a female) would walk with an umbrella in the rain with the famous music “pyar hua ikraar hua hai…” being played in the background. I associated rain with that popular song. So when ever it rained, I used to take the umbrella and use to go out and sing the song. My neighboring kids also used to join me in the singing sessions as the song was very popular among the masses. I finally stopped singing the song when my science teacher slapped me when I suggested singing this song for the group singing competition in school. I never knew why I was slapped till I entered class 8. I was so innocent then.

2) I was so scared to shake hands with a girl till I was in class 4, because I thought that a guy shaking his hands with a girl resulted in child-birth. When I was in class 3, I discovered that a baby needs to be inside the mother’s tummy for a default period of ten months. The discovery made a big impact in my thinking prowess. I would rate this discovery as the discovery that revolutionized me. My discovery was disproved by my neighbor aunt’s son who did not have the patience to stay inside her tummy for more than 6 months. When I was in that confused state, my girlfriend, Renu took advantage of the situation and shook hands with me. I was so petrified for the next ten months and I would often check Renu’s tummy for any bulging effects. Even I gave her two grace month as the time limit and when she did not deliver a baby even after one whole year, I was convinced that shaking hands doesn’t result in the evolution process. One fateful day when I was just nine years old, my teacher started nauseating through the window. During her throwing out process, one of her co-teachers came to lend her a helping hand. Later she announced to us that our teacher was pregnant. So I came to the conclusion that vomiting results in baby birth. But a few days later when I puked, I had a doubt whether Boys can also become pregnant. It was a great mystery then. But then when I was in class 8, we had this sex education classes in school and I enlightened myself with all the necessary information with my never ending questions which often resulted in the teacher blushing in front of us.


3) When I was in class five, I had a habit of sleeping in the bathtub with Tintin comics. We had a sliding door translucent door that acted as a partition between the bathtub area and the toilet platform. My dad’s colleagues came to spend a weekend at our place during that time and as usual I ended up sleeping in the bathtub. Morning when I woke up, I saw one of the uncles on the other side of the partitioned mirror. I had fever for two weeks. Still he doesn’t know that I was the only witness of a major conspiracy. I am planning to tell about it in the toast I am going make for his daughter’s wedding. His daughter is getting married next month and I am the MC for the reception.

4) When I was 10 years old, I started developing a crush on Renuka Sahane of Surabhi Fame. Surabhi was a lovely program which was telecasted in Doordarshan in the early nineties. I used to wait for every Sunday to watch this program. During those days robbers used a new strategy of using small kids to steal valuables from houses. Seeing my ever increasing habit of staying up late to watch Surabhi, my parents came up with a new rule at home. The new rule shattered my love into bits and pieces as the rule did not permit me to stay awake after 9.30 pm. I was banished into my room every night after 9.30 pm. So I missed my favorite programs, "world this week, Oshin, Byomkesh Bhakshi and of course Surabhi”. But my love for Renuka would often make me sneak into the drawing room and I would hide behind the curtains and watch Surabhi. On one such sneaking and peeking incident, my dad happened to see my leg under the curtains. He took me for a robber. Being a brave man unlike me, he jumped from the couch like Tarzan and landed in front of the curtain, wrapped me around along with the curtain and what happened after that was pure disaster. No one has ever thrashed me like that in my life. Was Renuka, his crush too? (My Mom reads my blogs too)

5) I was a hunk when I was in class 9. The girls used to flock behind me to have a glimpse of me. They were very jealous of my THEN-girlfriend, “Renu”. She used to tell me that they always troubled her with sarcastic remarks. She even told that they used to scribble funny remarks about me in the girls rest room. She even gave me a list of remarks that were written there.

a) Chriz is a hunk
b) Chriz comes in my dream every night
c) Amazing arms! That fellow Chriz has.
d) Renu is indeed lucky to have Chriz.

One day she came running to me and said that the girls have written something bad about me in the girls’ room. After much pestering, she told me what they had written about me.
“Chriz wets his bed in his sleep”. I did not take it seriously, because I had gone through insults that were worse than this. I carried on with my studies like a perfect gentleman that day. The very next day, the school management dragged me out of the class for interrogation. I was told that they found something scribbled on the walls of the girls room that read, “No! I do not wet my bed in my sleep”.

Now, do you guys doubt me too?

-Chronicwriter