Dorky Guffaw's Local 'Training'

Dorky Guffaw was about to die a horrible death.

Or so he thought.

Standing there within the compartment of a slow local train bound from Thane towards CST, he was supposed to get off the train at Dadar. The train had just slowed down to a halt at the station, and the people within the crowded train were pushing and shoving each other in order to get out while they still could, to make way for those that wanted to board the train.

"God help that poor bastard who will be the last to get off", read the thought bubble hovering over Dorky's head as he joined the mass of people pushing those in front for dear life, trying to disembark when it suddenly struck him that he was the last one to get out of his compartment!!!

There was nobody behind him that was pushing him and it is common knowledge that the last person to try climbing out is usually the recipient of violent blows from an agitated crowd trying to board the train, or is swept up by the crowd and not allowed to get off until the terminus station arrives.

Bracing himself for any possible eventuality, Dorky's entire life flashed in front of his eyes in those few milliseconds as he said a little prayer, hoping to get out of this mess he was caught in, in one piece while clearly acknowledging the fact that his clothing might not be as lucky. But one hardly bothers about clothes and other such minutiae when one faces the prospect of hanging out with the Grim Reaper in the bat of a few eyelids.

It all began twenty four and a half years ago for Dorky, when he was born in Ghatkopar, a sub-urb of Mumbai and thus began his long-standing association with the city which for some people is the city of dreams, while some others choose to call it the 'armpit of India'. To each their own.

Dorky spent his life in Mysore, but a significant presence of relatives there translated into periodic visits on multiple occasions, some joyful and celebratory while some weren't so. Life is a series of such events, as all of you would be obviously privy to.

Dorky's travels on local trains commenced from a young age, but living in Mysore where the population density was less than that of Mumbai by a factor of thousands meant that he wasn't exposed to the crazy kind of crowds that a regular Mumbaikar has grown adjusted to.

At age 13, he lost a piece of footwear while boarding a fast local from CST towards Thane along with his family. This was because the local was late by about twenty minutes and it was during the rush hour. Faced with no choice and the prospect of staying back in CST (then VT), group consensus was reached by the family to get back home no matter what. His sandals, new ones at that, were separated from him in the frenzy that ensued due to crowds wanting to get onto the train.

Lamenting the loss of his footwear (for its not like a 13 year old, slightly retarded at that, would bother too much about things beyond his immediate material realm), Dorky's apprehension at traveling on a local grew after that and though his chappals were replaced by some immediate alternative that he wasn't too happy about, he nevertheless wasn't able to completely erase this incident from his mind.

On another occasion, this time at age 15, when he was entrusted enough to not get lost despite progressively diminished mental faculties seeming to strongly indicate otherwise, Dorky was allowed to travel alone. In a fit of extreme stupidity that we shall assume to be naïveté, Dorky climbed into a ladies compartment that was filled with a few college going women.

Clad in a brightly coloured Tom N Jerry t-shirt (don't even ask!!) that would've spelt death for Dorky had a sniper wanted to use him for target practise in a crowd of about a hundred thousand, he was subject to significant 'Adam-teasing' by those women travelling on the train from one stop to another, as he sheepishly attempted to explain to them how he was new here and didn't realize his mistake until the train started moving.

With chants of 'Tom and Jerry kids, come on down to where all the action is' ringing in his ears, Dorky managed to get off at the very next station and clambered into the regular second class section, but not before he was traumatized for life based on the experience he had to undergo. Well, actually it wasn't like Dorky people ever engaged in eve-teasing, but this experience doubly reinforced his disinclination to even let that thought cross his mind.

These two incidents were what Dorky associated with local trains, and had even had the Chutzpah to brag about being 'Adam-teased' to the two or three people willing to put up with his drivel.

It was these precise two incidents that came to his mind as we left him standing in the local at the beginning of this narrative. Having paid a surprise visit to his relatives family at Thane on sunday morning, as part of a weekend trip to Mumbai, his uncle wanted to drop him off to the railway station.

As someone who had seen Dorky ever since he was a klutzy infant that had a perpetually big forehead due to 'cute' mishaps happening to him, such as tripping over flat surfaces and with hair forever standing on end due to his propensity to insert his fingers within electric sockets and throw on the switch, it was but obvious that his Uncle's protective radar went into high alert mode and he dropped Dorky off into the compartment of the aforesaid station, after giving anyone within the train who had bothered to observe the pair of them enough indication that Dorky was not from town and hence would be easy prey to pickpockets and muggers, by repeating his instructions to retarded Dorky in triplicate.

Without any untoward incidents that happened during the course of the journey (unless you call two people being thrown out of the compartment during transit because they were talking too much as something worth mentioning), Dorky's train came to a slow halt at Dadar, which is where he thought he'd die a horrible death.

Everything seemed to happen in slow motion, as the crowds started rushing out of the compartment violently, in a manner similar to how food would be thrown out of one's stomach in case of a bad case of food poisoning - high speed high intensity puke.

When Dorky finally made his way near the door, the sight that awaited him made him almost faint, and if not for the adrenaline that kept his newly mended heart thumping within his chest, he'd have died twice over. On the platform stood a huge crowd and the number of people to enter the compartment seemed to be more than the combined attendance for the Iron Maiden concert he had been to in March this year!!!

With a wholesome touch of Quixotic foolish bravado, Dorky launched himself full force into the crowd just as he heard loud whooshes made by about 300 people clambering into the compartment per second on either side of him, and just about managed to escape with his feet on solid ground on the Dadar central platform (too many people, he wouldn't have fallen down anyway) and brushed himself off.

He stood a little away from the train, and with a very inconspicuous gesture of gratitude towards the almighty, Dorky then plugged in his faithful companion (the ipod) into his ears and proceeded on towards another journey, thinking all along of how this fraud near-death experience would make for a reasonably entertaining blog post.

So much for his delusional assumptions.

Traffic Fatwas!!

Edit: This post has been updated to include 5 fatwas instead of 4 that you might've read previously. If you're reading this the first time around, apologies for having made you read two extra sentences.

After that vitriolic tirade that involved my wanting to kill four different types of people with irritating habits which, if implemented would cut down Bangalore's IT industry workforce by half, I have returned in a short span of 48 hours with another post, lamenting the state of traffic in Bangalore city, and on another fatwa imposing rampage.

Proper implementation of these fatwas and the corresponding punishments shall result in the other half of the IT workforce being eliminated, giving us a dual advantage of providing employment to those people that are seeking it, while reducing the population of our country by a certain percentage at the same time. Less traffic, easier to ride bike in these crowded streets. Hooray!

A friend of mine had made an interesting observation about how traffic in Bangalore suffers from an identity crisis. Two wheelers seem to think they are pedestrians, with most of them treading along footpaths rather than on proper tarred roads. Cars and other big vehicles on the other hand seem to be under the impression that they are two wheelers with the ability to manoeuvre through the tightest of spots while turning at awkward angles. Pedestrians, on the other hand think they are like trucks - huge and indestructable, as is evident from the way they tend to walk on the roads.

But traffic Fatwas are pipe dreams that will be relegated to oblivion once I churn out three more blog posts, rendering this particular post to the archives section that those normal people that are lazy wouldn't bother clicking to view, being content with reading the first two lines of each post, determining that their IQ levels are much below the cut-off levels desired to read, appreciate and truly enjoy the content s of this post and subsequently navigating away to some other blog that might be infinitely boring but one that they can connect to.

In any case, for those of you that have still stayed on despite reading the build up to yet another tirade, here is a list of traffic offense related fatwas I wish to issue when I become the Supreme Dictator of the country.

1. The first set of people that deserve to be abused are the traffic cops themselves. Just day before yesterday, I was travelling towards somewhere in Koramangala and had to stop at the traffic signal at the forum, for I had to turn right at that T junction but missed the green by about three seconds. Normally conscientous, I stopped my bike, much to the chagrin of some other junta behind me who weren't as conscious of following the rules while those idiots on my left whizzed past even as the signal had turned red and traffic from the other side was revving up to move.
   
   Amidst all this chaos, our honourable traffic cops chose to cut the signal to get to the other side, from another lane, proving to be such a pathetic example for people who have no qualms about not following the rules.
   Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?


2. People who use high beam lights within city limits are candidates for the guillotine. Their indiscriminate bright lights cause the unnecessary generation of iodopsin in the eyes of those that are unfortunate enough to travel in the direction opposite to the ones where said fatwa receivers are headed.
   
   Cars of the future should be equipped with some standard equipment that automatically disables the high beam button within city limits and will ensure that it can be used only under circumstances pertaining to flashing lights so as to engage in overtaking manoeuvres. The highways are good enough for those random sound and light shows.
   
   (Inclusion of bikes with wolf-horns as well as other shrill horns is strongly being considered for inclusion in fatwa issuing edict)


3. A fatwa needs to be issued against those lovely people who honk randomly when traffic is at a standstill near a signal, with about sixty more seconds to go for the light to turn green. What in the name of the Lord are they trying to communicate to other people standing around them when they go about on their horn blaring spree is something I fail to understand.
   
   We need snipers stationed near signals so that these people can be dealt with appropriately enough.


4. The fourth category of people are those that jump signals at night or when they think nobody is watching. If you don't want to follow rules, then your friendly neighbourhood sniper awaits you, failing which you should move to some other country where traffic rules are more lenient than the ones in our land.
   
   It is shameful, the way these idiots in fancy cars or on fancy bikes (and EVEN in non-descript forgettable vehicles as well ) go about jumping signals, while their full family is in tow, just because it is past ten and the probability of traffic from the other junctions crossing at the same time that they do has diminished significantly, though the possibility still hasn't been reduced to nil completely.



5. The fifth category of junta to make it to this superelite list are not those that ride on vehicles, but those on foot. This issuance is targeted at the new type of creature out there that I would like to call the 'nonchalant pedestrian', who deserves to be run down, if anything.
   
   If you're Indian, jaywalking comes as naturally to you as being a polyglot would, if your mother tongue is not Hindi or the local language of the state you reside in. It seems as though we have, as a collective people grossly misinterpreted the concept of the zebra crossing and that, to date in Bangalore seems to be the one stretch of road on the roads I've travelled where I have seen the least number of people walk across.
   
   Interestingly, apart from the total lack of usage of the zebra crossing path, the number of pedestrians that tend to cross the road is also in direct proportion to the speed at which one would be travelling on the said path.
   
   We all are used to jaywalking, and I have no hassles or grouses against those that run across the road after looking carefully and do their crossing swiftly. The nonchalant ones, who ostensibly want to be run over, are those that amble across slowly even in the face of oncoming traffic, without a care in the world, as though navigating through the significant number of vehicles that constitute Bangalore traffic is like a walk in the park are the ones that make me want to run them over.
   
   If life was like a Roadrash game, you'd know what I would be up to! The idiotic college kid wanting to impress some random chick, the former beauty queen who still thinks she is a traffic stopper in looks though she would be in girth and gait and (my favourite) the idiotic techie looking busy on his cellphone chatting up with someone who is trying to sell him a credit card with an ID card dangling around his neck to prove his superiority over those that aren't doing what he does for a living are the top 3 candidate types for being run over.
   

If anyone reads this, and also wants to help add to this fatwa list, it would be fun. Volunteers for snipers invited. Candidates who have had work experience in the MARCOS, Sayaret Matkal, SAS or Delta Force would be given preference over others, though enthusiasm from all quarters will be appreciated and suitably rewarded.

Kindly reply within the comments for your opinions as well as applications.

Drive / ride safely and if you've read this piece, maybe there is something you'd like to do if you don't follow traffic rules and ride your vehicle or walk on the streets the way you are supposed to.

Fatwa Time!!

Who says only Islamic Scholars can issue Fatwas? There is enough going on out there in my world that would prompt me to issue death sentences to people based on their transgressions that they might consider as peccadilos, but in my rule book are heinous crimes committed against my sensibilities.

I am the law, and in my own little head, when I ride bike from office to work and back, often staring at numbers and trying to see why they are cool or unique, or trying to find relationships between numbers of adjacent vehicle license plates, all these thoughts manifest into mine head and require some venting out, and consequently this post is it.

This is not an exhaustive list of Fatwas, and will be updated from time to time, or so I say. But you can rest assured that my laziness will get the better of me, and I will engage in more fruitful pursuits like doing the 'Walk Like An Egyptian' walk near the Big Bazaar at the Banashankari Ring Road, or alternately switch off the traffic signal during rush hour and stand by with a video camera to watch the mayhem that ensues, or perhaps I will just not shave and go the Rip Van Winkle way for all its worth it, only time shall tell.

Without further ado, here is a list of offences that are criminal in my book, and deserve the harshest punishment possible.

Of course, harshest punishment is subjective and varies from person to person and the standardization fundaes are not really applicable given the various kind of idiots that walk the earth, and it would indeed be a pleasure for me to smite them down with my vengeance in a customized fasion, or alternately write about it and have that little version of me in my hand rub my hands in imaginary glee at the plight that would have befallen these offenders, had I only had the chance to put things into action.

1) Offence: - excessive usage of the word 'leverage' in every arbit context possible like - "I am going to leverage the excess milk in my bowl to have an additional serving of cornflakes without needing to add more milk" OR "I am going to leverage my strengths to heal the world and make it a better place for you and for me and the entire human race" and so on and so forth. You get my drift, don't you?

Punishment: Life imprisonment in a cell that has a Bose audio system, that plays only Vogon poetry for eternity or until said person dies of a brain implosion. Talk about 'leveraging' on a super audio system's extreme capabilities to cause inflict untold misery on said person who uses that word copiously.

Feasible Alternatives: Try using monosyllabic words like 'USE'. That might rope in the hot women, or in the worst case prevent you from dying a painful death.

2)Offence: Having an MS Dhoni like haircut. It is reported that MSD lost a bet in the cricket dressing room when he was ogling at some random chick during a Bihar - Mumbai Ranji trophy match, circa 2002. Dhoni was dared to get her number, failing which he had to keep the same kind of hairstyle that she had for a period of five years. Needless to say, ladies and gentlemens, you already know the outcome of that bet. It is hard to fathom that people would actually want to look like some Bihari chick who actually sat through and watched Ranji trophy matches, at least from the back. It is our cricket One-Day captain, not Samson, for the Lowwe of God!

Punishment: Put tar balls on their hair, and no, I am not referring to Linux source files here. Chewing gum or Monkee poo would also do. But substance has to be sticky and should cause them to pluck off their hair. Another good idea would be to play a prank on them by sticking their head in a guillotine and then chopping their hair off - give them a tonsured head which for them would be worse than death that they would inadvertently expect.

Feasible Alternatives: Get a life. OR at least get a proper haircut.

3)Offence:Using SMS lingo while sending out SMS or full blown emails, or God forbid - company power point presentations or official emails. "U r nt as smrt as u thnk u cum across as." God, that was definitely the worst sentence I have ever composed in my entire life. It is NOT cool, it is NOT hip and it is definitely not something that sane people even in the third millennium would approve of.

Punishment: Death. Of course. No question about that. This is the most interesting part of the punishment. Make them read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged out loud for the rest of their lives. Should they finish reading those books and still live, make them repeat ad infinitum ad nauseum. To further compound their misery, they should be made to copy down letter by letter, with appropriate punctuation the content in these three books as well, for the rest of their lives. Jst4kix!

Feasible Alternatives: Have a little patience. It is easier to type out full sentences rather than spend time eating up vowels and find out arbit numbers to substitute good words in their place.

4)Offense: Cutting lines during breakfast/lunch/snacks at the office. People are supposed to be "professional" (another oft abused word, though nothing beats leverage) while at work and the hallmark of professional behaviour doesn't really require cutting food lines cheaply, something that people have inadvertently developed a tolerance to and as a consequence indulge in actively, at the drop of a hat.

Punishment: Death by starvation or death by chocolate. Their choice. Either way it will be painful and a lesson learnt well to sustain them in the afterlife.

Feasible Alternative: Behave.

Somehow this Fatwa Time post seems to be much longer than expected, and consequently, I feel it is time for me to bring this one to a halt with four categories of people that need to be annhilated from the face of this earth on a priority basis.

There is more to follow from my stables, and the quest is on for material that does not reek of redundancy and genuinely deserves max punishment. More revisions and additions and edits to follow - watch and wait!

"Mysore Mallika"

Here is a post, that I have put up to offer certain clarifications. A study of my sitemeter statistics have shown that my most popular post is the one that has the keyword 'Mysore Mallika' in it, and even doofuses from the British Telecom proxy server have been googling it to try and locate it.

I'm from Mysore, and I wish to inform you that THERE IS NO SUCH CLIP. The clip you're looking for is 'Mysore Mallige', but that is old hat. Now, there have been sequels, that star the children of the couple that were featured in the original video. Yes, it is that old, and the neighborhood video rental store would probably have more raunchy and exciting stuff.

This is just to tell you not to use your work ISP to check for this clip. Doing so will increase your chances of getting fired from your job from about 1 in 10,000 for incompetence and lack of libido control to about 1 in 0.005 for being a complete and absolute retard. Your call.

I had written a post onceupon a time ago when I was enthralled by the search keywords that directed people towards this blog, and that had included Mysore Mallika for some strange reason. That post by itself was enough to catapult search engine hits into the big league as idiots kept on piling up each week, clicking on my humble blog in order to see what it was that this poor little ranting space of mine held that could potentially titillate them.

No Mysore Mallika here. Go away. Shoo!

Uncle Shyam (your company's sys admin) wants you.

PS: The coupious usage of that two worded phrase in the title, and having peppered it all over this post will have the opposite effect and increase the page ranking of this post.