CHAPTER 41 - Fond Remembrances

His Old Maruti 800

Arindam Moulick

Back in ’99, a small car like Maruti 800 was still the stuff of a legend. The same old car of Manpreet’s Aunt came in handy for him when Sexy Devee, TD Suraj, and I drove in his car to Satyam Technology Center at Badourpally to attend the final day of our roaming division’s annual seminar. The return journey, especially, turned to be an unforgettable experience for all of us.

Not wanting to miss out on having a jolly good time at STC was quite natural for us to be excited about, and to be at the seminar – which was well-attended by clients and spearheaded by our bossy old gad called GG Howdy – where lip-smacking luncheon was arranged at the poolside of the Club House was another icing on the cake of our extraordinary Satyam life.

I clicked several pictures of our clients enjoying poolside snacks with my Canon SLR Junior camera. (No question of fashionable ‘selfies’ or time-wasting Facebook-ing during those days). When I think about those days now I can’t help but get completely perked up reminiscing about the kind of dedication we brought to our work and the sense of great bonhomie we have had.

Clients were happy and upbeat about the kind of informatics we provided; they made sure they acknowledged it in the annual seminar we conducted at our Satyam Club House, a specialty retreat for IT professionals to get together, talk business, and enjoy. It was all such a great treat! Satyam offered them everything, right from the scratch-to-the-finish service. A finished product, with all its essential delights, is what clients always love to talk about and get appreciative about. We were all a big happy house of professionals partaking scrumptious lunch there at the nicely-mowed green lawns.

Driven by Manpreet, the tiny little trophy of a car was his best travel companion. He was evidently enjoying driving his car back to the city that day along the old battered, neglected highway. When we drew near the signal point at the 8-point intersection close to the old airport terminal, he slammed on the brake pedal so hard and the ensuing sound responding off the hot tyres underneath gave everyone one of us in the car a vicious jolt and we flung forward and then backward like Daisies on a wind! I was sitting in the front with Manpreet at the wheel and TD Suraj and Sexy Devee were at the back, with our hearts in our mouth! After we banged to a stop, tyres screeching and rubbers burning hot, Manpreet glimpsed at us one by one, first me, then Devi and Suraj, and said, “What…?” before adding mischievously: "Kaisa laga…?" His trademark shameless Laughing Buddha-like grin broke upon his face which widened majestically to expose his well-arranged oral piano, his ivory teeth, all shining together! Teenk, teenk, teedink...!

I quickly turned to peek at Sexy Devee and TD Suraj and saw both giggling away to glory! I couldn’t resist giggling like a child too.

First-Time Pillion Rider!

Obviously, he was uncomfortably seated on his great bum and felt very funny of himself. He was a good sport no doubt. I, in my turn, was finding it extremely difficult to control my silly amusement at seeing him reel in sheer discomfort and was fighting mighty hard not to burst out laughing! Somehow I controlled myself.

My bike wouldn’t move forward. It wouldn’t budge at all; the engine cried out in an almighty growl as if traumatized by this sudden enormous overload on its back; the unexpected misery of it! I was bewildered at the unfolding scene thinking: just why wouldn’t the bike move? If at all Manpreet ceases to feel funny about himself and stop being shaky and all then perhaps we can make a move. And thank God I was still able to stifle my laughter inside my equally aghast pair of lungs. We knew we were getting late for the movie!

Manpreet’s broad abdomen overhanging on his mighty legs which happened to be spread-eagled on the pillion seat had kept me totally amused! It was quite a bother for him to adjust and readjust himself in the small elongated seat of my Splendor. But thankfully, nothing seemed to have worried him anymore once he had found himself hoisted up on my bike in a state of delightful inconvenience. He soon settled down on the back seat like a colossal pigmy with a maroon pugree that he often wore to office draped around his head. I thought it would be really funny if someone took a picture of the two of us riding on the Raj Bhavan Road without a care in the world!

I knew his discomfiture is not going to deter him whatsoever from enjoying the ride all the way to Skyline. On the contrary, I had to be extra cautious riding the two of us folks; giving a wide berth whenever possible to the rash movement of traffic on the roads as we merrily honked our way through the 5-point Crossing via the Raj Bhavan Road. It was such fun. We rode past the Nizam’s Club on the left and were on the approach road to the Stadium on the right and by taking a quick short-cut route that lay adjacent to an under-construction flyover we arrived at the famed Skyline movie theatre where new English movies were a staple. Thanks to Manpreet and my riding skills, the ride here was really fun. I knew that someday I’d recount this outing as those set of remembrances that can never be forgotten.

That was the first and the only time we went to a movie together during our long and wonderful working years at one of Satyam’s unforgettable and truly great office branches: Tesser Tower.

A Fond Remembrance

Skyline is not very far from the place where Arinvan had first met his lucky mascot Shruti T., his matter-of-heart person from his doting college years. A little far from the place where he came to see a movie with his colleague Manpreet is where he had his short but precious little dining experience with Shruti and her friend at the acclaimed Alex’s Kitchen.

Alex’s Kitchen, the place had never been forgotten after the first and the only charming meeting Shruti and I have ever had there. Forgotten in the sense that never again has I been felt able to dine there nor did I mention about our little rendezvous to anyone, after she went away. Never before, never after, but until now. That small paradise of a place had been sanctified to the dazzling memory of Arinvan’s love with Shruti. Talking to anyone about her, as Arinvan had believed, would’ve spoiled the sanctity of the unique memory he still had of her. She was special – her voice, her smile, her eyes, her laughter he’d heard on the phone was special. He didn’t want to share their love story with anyone; maybe that was the only way he wanted to keep it private from any unwelcome scrutiny. During those days, she was everything Arinvan had dreamt of her to be. He nurtured Shruti in his heart like a precious little gem lest anyone steal it from him. And these days her voice still rings in his ears and those old sepia-tinted memories come flooding by every so often.

(To be continued...)

By Arindam Moulick

- A slightly different version of the above article has been published on EzineArticles.com. Click on the below weblink to read the article: http://ezinearticles.com/?Fond-Remembrances&id=9085687

Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. All incidences, places, and characters portrayed in the story are fictional and entirely imaginary. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. No similarity to any person either living or dead is intended or should be inferred.

CHAPTER 40 - Three Amigos, Pizzas and a Film!

Arindam Moulick

Never was there any opportunity that Arinvan, a resident of Paliwall Estate and Manpreet, a resident of Ranjhana Hills could let pass a chance to entertain themselves while working away at their individual workstations put next to each other. They cracked jokes, talked about their personal issues, and regularly went for coffee together, chatted with Sexy Devee and the ‘Truck Driver’ Suraj at the cafeteria on the 6th-floor terrace, even ordered Pizzas on the phone from Domino Pizzas, a newly-opened store on Raj Bhavan Road – on Saturdays or Sundays only.

On almost every weekend, Renzo Anny Munny, one of our associates of the roaming division, and her fun-loving amigos Merlene Thumas and Elizabeth Bernadette Soomi (Elzy, as she was lovingly called by that name) would regularly drop by. Merlene worked with Satyam on the 4th floor of the Tesser Towers and Elizabeth, a guest companion of Renzo and Merlene, often came by to have an inspirational chat with us pizza-loving gentlemen on the 5th floor Satyam office. It was fun. Elizabeth ended up having private feelings for Arinvan; he could intuit about it as much. She fell in….no no…liked him a bit and almost came to confess it at the Domino’s the place he took her to talk to her and do a reality check of sorts while they dined on a freshly made with deliciously soft, buttery, and chewy pan-baked pizza.

A Day-Dreamer Friend

Elizabeth Bernadette Soomi was an itinerant day-dreamer. How? Let me explain: In the quest to fulfill her dreams, she left her native soil Ernakulam in Kerala in search of a life less ordinary that not only, she dreamed, will serve her purpose of becoming preferably an IT professional but also a woman of substance. She was on the right path if you ask anyone that. After completing her graduation, she began achieving her goals one by one by doing a professional computer course here and a degree there, and completing them to be able to chase another goal of hers was her intense desire. She nurtured ideas of getting admittance to a professional college here in the City of Pearls which would eventually help her land a decent job here. Since job opportunities were hard to come by, Renzo – Elzy’s dutiful friend and a peer-loving fellow Ernakulamite – began loaning some well-meant assistance to her chum Elzy; a helping hand here and a shoulder to lean on there for Elzy’s professional goals to bear fruit was a quest that Renzo too had shared wholeheartedly. Elzy was after all as snug as a bug in Renzo’s rug!

Arinvan had a stock situation-specific limerick for Elzy which went something like this:

Elzy, Elzy, from Chelsea,

Elizabeth Taylor ki darzee!

Banaye kapde jaldi jaldi.

Renzo, Merlene ki friend Elzy,

Is healthy, wealthy, and stealthy!

Apparently, Renzo’s helping nature had done a world of good to Elizabeth Soomi’s both personal and professional prospects. Of course, it was really nice for Arinvan and Manpreet to be aware of the fact that Elizabeth was not only thankful for her friend’s unreserved moral backing but also was deeply gratified to have Renzo Anny Munny as a dearly loved friend. Elizabeth was no doubt fortunate to have such a blessed life in relation to Renzo, a like-minded darling friend of hers. The other ‘best friend’ from the trio (three amigos) of ‘Kerala’s Best Buddies Syndicate, Exclusively for Girls’ club was Merlene Thumas, who in her own happy-go-lucky way led a life of niceness, poise, and polished decency.

On Seeing Gladiator

Back in the year 2000, the film Gladiator was just released and was being shown on Skyline. Manpreet and Arinvan had been looking forward to catching the movie in the latter half of the day when Dilnawaz came in to start his work at 3pm. As soon as the guy came in, we sat him wonkily at our workstation and headed off towards Skyline. Last seen, Dilnawaz’s toothy grin on his face gave away his feeling of being mighty amused about how awfully gung-ho we were to see the new film Gladiator.

Manpreet hardly ever rode pillion in his life. He had his own black Kinetic Honda and his aunt’s beige-coloured old Maruti 800 for his daily commute to the office. Not since Manpreet’s substantial weight gain every passing year that had been no less than a grave problem for him to deal with, had he ridden pillion! 

So we decided to peruse my decent bike instead – a red Honda Splendor – for the long ride to the movie theatre. Funny is not the word I would use to describe the way he looked hunkered down behind me on my bike. It was funny! More than funny! Out of the world funny! Just crazily, astoundingly funny!!!

(To be continued...)

By Arindam Moulick

- A slightly different version of this article has been published on EzineArticles.com. Click on the below weblink to read the article: http://ezinearticles.com/?Three-Amigos,-Pizzas-and-a-Film!&id=9085639

Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. All incidences, places, and characters portrayed in the story are fictional and entirely imaginary. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. No similarity to any person either living or dead is intended or should be inferred.

CHAPTER 39 - A Boss with Unchecked Authority!

Not even his right-hand man Balzie Gigamorthy, whose better coordination abilities worked OK with each one of us at the roaming division, was completely favorable to Mr. GG Howdy. 

Indeed, even TD Suraj, Mr. Howdy’s other left-hand man, could do no better in the likely job of boss-appeasement. How could he, for GG always showed the poor guy his place by one deathly stare at him and poor fellow, Suraj that is, couldn’t even dare to adjust (in case if he felt like) his long prehensile GG-worshipping tail in his greatly bothered underpants! Poor guy, it was that bad for him! 

That leaves our temptingly red-lipped front office drifter Merion Roz Reyo whom GG had the exclusive affections for offering smoothies/chocolates he regularly brought from his business trips abroad. Merion on her part was game for it. We found her to be obstreperously delighted every time when the penny-pinching curmudgeon of the roaming division – our gruesome boss, preferred to deluge her with his unbridled affections.

In many ways, Merion and GG shared similar mental make-up. With regard to their mental conditioning and approach towards sociability issues, both complemented each other’s presumptuous temperament towards their fellow colleagues at the workplace.

GG obviously had an upper hand at this sort of game of fanatical one-upmanship. We knew he was cunningly trying to figure out how to make us boys jealous while he covetously showered Merion, the front-office Minnie, with chocolates bought from abroad. Needless to say, we simply dismissed GG’s such worthless manipulative exploits as a shamelessly fraternizing Oldie’s unchecked bossy mindset that could, regrettably, never have given a small bit chance for his warped, prejudiced mind to know what plain human behaviour is; but of course, he never knew that such a thing ever existed. We think he never had it in him to be a good chief.

Must say, such benign bossy gesture bursting with the romantic prospect of imported milk chocolates stuffed in the dumpy hands of Gudumba Gongura Howdy used to leave Merion Roz Reyo eternally blushing from one side of her face to the profound other all throughout her long and roving association with keeping front office desk. A GG-sighting was well-neigh possible and there he was unexpectedly flushed with the flow of his adrenaline-pumping big time in his elderly pot-bellied self. Merion’s squeals of joy were GG’s prerogative delight to take a wholesomely-satisfied swim in, and clearly, he enjoyed his escapades very much! His platonic need to see with his own travel-weary pair of bespectacled eyes that get instantly affixed on this well-endowed woman luxuriating in a splendorous exhilaration was worth a planeload of chocolates, Boeing or no Boeing!

GG’s phoren chocolates – all for the partaking of his cutely smiling Merion, exclusively! Sometimes (just once rather) there used to be chocolates offered to us folks as well, and we, believe it or not, took to chewing them dutifully in front of him – just to show our solidarity with this pompous ass!

GG Howdy was in a raging-bull position of excessive authority and no one thought it fit to investigate it and help make amends. The power has likely gone straight to his head and that was part of the reason why he kept up his tempo of authority in full gusto. Since his friend was a blood relation to the Managing Director of Satyam and no one to object to the kind of fanatical subordination he had us committed to, he bashed on paying little regard to what kind of opinion people might have of you. I specify the word ‘likely’ because I am being nice and sober to not to speak really ill of this sickening individual who happened to be our Consultant. To be frank, someone ought to have ‘clipped his wings’, but nobody came forward to pull GG up and make him cease his confrontational behaviour… at least for the sake of the greater common good that was hard at work at the roaming division. It’d have been truly justified had someone taken that first step forward regardless of the trouble one could or could not have faced to clamp him shut.

Everybody gave up on him like a lost cause. Shiv Charan Joey didn’t feel at all to interact with GG unless it was really required of him to do so. Dilnawaz Khan abhorred GG as much as he possibly could. Arinvan Maliek took it as a professional hazard thing. Manpreet Singh couldn’t care less unless it was expected of him to care more. Balzie, Sexy Devee, and TD Suraj - all of them considered GG as some kind of an intolerable dingo that by a twist of fate happened to come to their way woof woofing! More of a bad luck thing that was playing itself inside out! Gory, absolutely gory!

GG has never been gentlemanly in his life; so expecting him to redeem himself was akin to trying to straighten a Dog’s (or a Dingo’s) permanently twisted tail. He couldn’t be resurrected. No chance. Not even a bit. For GG, the world was not enough. He wanted more of it according to his taste and suitable convenience to plunder. But first, he had us in his savage harem as sitting ducks to have repeated potshots at!

Even the slightest aversion to his unwritten decree was tantamount to losing one’s professional prospect at Satyam; therefore, we thought it would make better sense to somehow prevail over the barbarities that he perpetrated on us day in and day out, and accept the so-called ‘reality’ of the dire circumstances we found ourselves in as offbeat career lozenges for slavish upstarts like us to chew on. Get to be as snug as a bug in the rug? That was a savvy thing to do forthwith or perhaps not. Yet, it was tough enough to resiliently deal with such a horrible character whose level-headedness had always shot through the roof! That is to say, how does one deal with a coldblooded haranguer like him? Like hell, I know! Call me if you have a better answer. I surrender the pretense of needing to answer that question effectively.

Open Heart Forgeries

On a lighter note, there’s just one person that escaped GG’s bad temper and that was the front-office femme fatale Merion Roz Reyo, who excelled at committing Open Heart Forgeries! She was one fluky miss. She was lucky in a way because she was not reporting to him. That fact of her life had saved her a lot of headaches; never mind GG’s tender chocolates to subside any such thing that troubles his favourite pupil, even heartaches who knows! The poor enchantress had majorly been spared from a god-awful situation that she, we were certain, couldn’t ever have handled on her own accord had she not hoped to carry on living a long uninterrupted professional life, with some chocolates thrown in.

Remember Savitha Tandavi? You do, don’t you? Oh, Man! She had shed a ridiculous amount of tears to get over GG Howdy’s almost psychopathic attitude towards her. And mind you! She wasn’t all that successful either aiming at her leaky tear ducts every time GG threw a barb at her that she couldn’t duck. If she thinks she has gotten over the unutterable horror our boss GG had put her through, she’ll find herself at fault. It isn’t over yet! Well, I am only just totally kidding about that! Trying to defuse the tension with humour you can relate to!

One feels that it doesn’t matter anymore whether GG lives or becomes deceased. For Savitha at least, or for that matter for anyone who happened to know him (even if by chance), he is better off dead, decomposed, and gone. R.I.P. GG! Take rest forever!

(To be continued...) 

By Arindam Moulick

Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. All incidences, places, and characters portrayed in the story are fictional and entirely imaginary. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. No similarity to any person either living or dead is intended or should be inferred.