Mathany, Go Belt Them

When I read Mathany Saldanha's statement asking tourists to leave Goa, I was disappointed and at the same time, a bit amused as well. I don't think I need to tell you why I was disappointed. The amusing part is more interesting.

Mathany Saldanha taught me Biology at Don Bosco a long time ago. In fact, 16 years ago. You tend to remember some things about your teachers, especially things that "hit" you. With Mathany the thing that "hit" us was his belt. He was notoriously known to belt the shit out of kids. When I say belt, I mean the thing you put around your pant to keep it from respecting the force of gravity. Other teachers had other instruments. For example, both our PT teachers used their whistle chords, which by the way, wasn't any better. One other guy had a specially crafted piece of wood that he carried with him at all times because he wasn't satisfied by the effectiveness of the common wooden ruler.

My sincere advice to the Goa Police is to relieve Mathany of his belt before they do anything else with him. Because once he gets it off, there's no telling where he will swing it. But every cloud has a silver lining. The good thing about him using the belt as a means of inflicting pain is that he cannot do it for long. After all, belting someone with one hand while holding your pants up with the other is not something you can do for long. Not even Sir Mathany.

I Want...

Reuben, my older son, is at that age when he wants everything he sees. At times, I wonder how my wife puts up with him. Yesterday, he saw a cow on TV and proclaimed to his mother, "Mama, I want cow". My wife wasn't in the best of moods and she blurted out, "And where do you want to put it? On my head?".

Reuben gave her one of his confused looks and calmly said, "No, Mama. I put cow on the floor".

School Reunion

Last night was the long awaited school reunion. It feels great to meet so many friends in one place, some after 16 years. As the night progressed and the levels of intoxication increased, things just got better and better.

The best part is that this now going to be an annual event.

click image to enlarge

The full web album can be found here.

Mumbai Nightmares

I am sitting at the Mumbai airport waiting for my flight which is running half an hour late. My business travels often take me to Mumbai and every time I come back with weird experiences of that city.

At the outset I like to say that my brain doesn't work properly in Mumbai, thanks to the state of utter chaos that the city continuously finds itself in. The traffic is a bitch. The noise levels are enough to awaken the dead. This time around, most of my meetings were in the suburbs where it is faster to move around in a rickshaw than a cab. However crazy the cab drivers maybe, they simply cannot zigzag though traffic like rickshaws, while making your heart beat stop at regular intervals as you cling on to dear life and get thrown all around your seat. One rickshaw ride did wonders with my internal organs. When I was done with it, my liver found itself shaking hands with my lungs, both of them.

Since Mumbai traffic is such a pain, I usually stay in a hotel which is equidistant to all the places I have to visit. Since I am not familiar with the city, I always leave it up to my travel agent to use his best judgment, something which in this case, came back to haunt me. My travel agent booked me into a hotel close to the airport. I mean the planes literally flew above the hotel. And to add insult to injury, the hotel was bang adjacent to the railway tracks. When I arrived into Mumbai yesterday afternoon, I was already running late for my first appointment. So I dumped my things in my room, splashed some water on my face and ran out. I returned only after midnight to find what was in store for me - planes landing and taking off, and in the bargain, making unearthly noises and rattling the window panes. And the occasional silence was broken by Mumbai’s local trains yelling their guts out while passing by my window. I cannot remember how many times I was woken up last night. At one point, I dreamt of being woken up by the combination noise of a plane landing and a passing train. On second thoughts, I think it was the real thing.

I will post this when I get home to an internet connection because Café Coffee Day, where I am right now, is offline today.