Potato Chips

by Anshuman Mohan

  ‘May I come in?’ he said coldly.

  We all stood up, our heads lowered.

  ‘What is this ruckus about?’ he asked, walking in. Typical of teachers, I thought to myself. I mean, if you don’t care whether we actually give you permission to come in or not, why ask at all?

  Madras-Calcutta walked up to him and whispered something in his ear. Bloody tattlers.

  ‘Saying obscene things about priests? What do you mean, boy?’ Reebok sounded furious.

  ‘I-I-I… sir-sir-sir…’ stuttered Sohan.

  ‘Sir, he said it… he read it off some paper,’ Sriniwasan boldly declared, pointing at Rohan. However, boldness was not something that Reebok appreciated.

  ‘Oho! Oho!’ he said and snatched the paper out of Rohan’s hands. Then he gave it to Sriniwasan. ‘So Mr Monitor, read it. I want to hear what made you laugh so much.’

  ‘Not me, sir!’ Sriniwasan pleaded, but it proved useless.

  ‘No. You must read it.’

  He looked like he wanted to argue some more, but disobeying teachers was something that Sriniwasan jusr didn’t do. He adjusted his spectacles and began. ‘Two priests decided to go on a Hawaiian vacation…’ he mumbled.

  ‘What was that? Oh for goodness’ sake, be LOUD and CLEAR!’ Reebok cried.

  Clearing his throat, Sriniwasan continued reading the note loudly. His south Indian accent made the whole thing sound funnier than before, but we were too scared of how Reebok would react to laugh. He listened with a stern expression, causing Sriniwasan to turn pale with worry and stammer a little. Finally, after many nervous stops and starts, he read out the last sentence.

  ‘The gorgeous blonde said, “Father, it’s me, Sister Kathleen.”’

  Reebok chuckled.

  We stared in stunned silence for a second, then broke into a mad bout of laughter and high-fives. Rohan had done the impossible—he had made a teacher laugh!

  The negligible work pressure post exams gave me enough time to go back to playing tennis again. I was really fired up about it, not only because I wanted to play but also because I really wanted to meet Shubho. I wanted to challenge him again. I wanted to enjoy his company and his game. And I really wanted to find some miraculous method to defeat the guy!

  As I stood alone, warming up and admiring the beautifully maintained red clay courts, Shubho strolled up to me. I was relieved because I had been a little afraid that I might not find him there. Just like before, he asked me for a game.

  We were good—everything was all right!

  I smiled in agreement and started to take position, amazed as ever that he wasn’t bothering to warm up.

  To the average person who is ignorant about sports, warming up seems like a waste of precious energy. This happens to be a terrible misconception. The muscles in our body are usually very tightly packed and tense. With the constant relaxation and contraction of play, the muscles loosen up. If they loosen up too quickly, the end result is a painful muscle cramp. The warm-up initiates the loosening process of the muscles, which basically enhances your game in the long run. Shubho had a very vigorous game— he had to run twice as much as me to compensate for his meagre height. And so he was very susceptible to serious injury because of the lack of proper warm-up. It could very well put an end to his game. I felt rather pleased that, even though he was a better player than I was, I would be able to give him at least one proper piece of advice that would help him in future.

  To sum up the match—I was thrashed, beaten and hung out in the sun to dry. But I must admit that it felt good to finally feel all my muscles being properly exercised—before and during the exams, the only parts of me that had been undergoing toil were my brain, eyes, neck and fingers.

  I sat on a rickety old bench at the end of the game, letting myself cool down. Shubho walked up, real casual, and sat down next to me. I said nothing. We just sat there. Me, panting like a wet dog, and he, fresh as a daisy. The disparity made me feel super-grouchy. Realizing that I was in no mood to start a conversation, Shubho broke the silence.

  ‘Should I show you something?’ he asked. Then, without waiting for an answer, he shot off towards a ramshackle hut in the distance. That was where Tapan Sir usually stored his racquets and other paraphernalia.

  Soon, Shubho returned carrying a bulky, faded old bag. He placed it beside me and started unzipping it. Slowly, almost gently, he started taking out various trophies and medals from it. ‘Shubho Halder’ they all said, proclaiming him the winner or runner-up (nothing less than that, I noticed in amazement) at various tournaments.

  ‘This one was in Jamshedpur,’ he said, pointing to a particular trophy with great excitement. ‘And this, in Asansol.’ He then produced a large collection of newspaper clippings and certificates. They all had his name on them.

  … Shubho Halder thrashed Nishant Sharma 6-1, 6-0 to move into the quarters of the floodlit hard court tennis meet at Saturday Club…

  … Results: Finals—Boys Under-12—Shubho Halder bt Udhav Gupta 9-1 (AITA organized tournament at SAI)…

  I was genuinely impressed. Shubho was not only good, he was an absolute star! He was probably just knocking me around during our matches while I was trying my best. No wonder he didn’t feel the need to warm up—his game with me probably was his warm-up! The weirdest thing was that he had been so humble about it till now, not telling me anything about how he played—and won—such high-calibre tournaments. In fact, we had hardly talked before. I had a feeling that he had only decided to share this with me today because he thought that I might disappear again for several months. I felt embarrassed about that once more. Slowly, we started to chat.

  When I finally stumbled out of the courts, I felt absurdly happy. Just as I reached the main gate of the club, however, I heard Shubho calling me. I turned around and waited as he sprinted to reach me.

  ‘Aman,’ he said. ‘I have a match tomorrow. It’s the finals of the tournament. Do you want to come and watch? It’s at eight o’clock, at the DKS sporting complex.’

  I was stunned by the offer. Didn’t he have any champion-level friends?

  ‘Er… you don’t have to come,’ he said, trying to cover up the impromptu invite as I stared at him. He had taken my awed silence as disinterest. ‘If you’re too busy…’ His voice trailed off.

  ‘No, no! I’ll come,’ I promised, grinning at him. ‘Eight o’clock, right? No problem!’

  He was still staring at me, trailing his foot awkwardly on the ground, as if he thought I was going to ditch him. To reassure him, I fished out a piece of paper from my kit bag and made a note of the venue and the time. Finally, Shubho smiled at me—a quick, joyous flash of teeth—and went back into the club, convinced that he would have one extra supporter at the tournament.

  Even though I’d promised Shubho I would be there, I had my doubts as to whether my parents would allow me to go.

  However, this was not a promise that I was willing to risk breaking. So I lied to my parents and told them that I was going to a classmate’s house to research something for an assignment.

  The atmosphere at the DKS sporting complex was electric. Hundreds of people were crowded around the makeshift grandstands of the Centre Court—there was barely enough space left for a mouse to squeeze in! But I poked and prodded and rudely kicked people in order to get to the front. Before I had made it there, someone made an announcement over the microphone: ‘Boys under-sixteen finals. Court No. 1. Shubho Halder versus Robert Fernandez.’

  Why the hell was Shubho playing under-sixteen, I wondered. He couldn’t be a day over eleven—he would have had far easier competition had he played under-twelve. Finally, all my pushing and shoving paid off and I managed to reach the front. As the court came into view, I saw that I had been right. Shubho’s opponent was a mean, muscular monster who stood at least a foot and a half taller than him. He was a total contrast to the short, thin Shubho. I gathered from the conversations around me that the opponent was seeded one—the favourite in the tournament. Ev
en the spectators seemed amused about the pairing. ‘Such a one-sided match?’ someone standing behind me whispered. ‘God knows how the little chap even reached the finals!’

  And they were right. The competition was indeed one-sided. But not quite in the way they had predicted. Shubho was like a panther on the court, gliding around instead of running. He made his long-legged opponent run in all directions, taking only a few steps himself. His strokes were fluid, relying not only on power but also on consistency and placement. Of course, his sixteen-year-old opponent wasn’t a wimp, but his capabilities were completely dwarfed by Shubho’s.

  The crowd was shocked by the amazing upset of the first seed. After forty-five minutes of sweating under the hot sun, Shubho emerged as victor, with a final score of 6-3, 6-2, 6-4. He shook hands with his lanky opponent, who looked absolutely stunned and exhausted. The big crowd started dispersing without much fanfare. They had mostly been supporting Fernandez.

  Despite the lack of appreciation from the crowd, Shubho scanned it carefully. When he located me, he gave a huge grin and waved. In a rush of emotion and admiration, I ran forward and gave him a big bear-hug. I was glad that I had watched such a superb game and also that Shubho had chosen to share this very special occasion with me.

  ‘Congrats!’ I said, thumping him on the back.

  Then I noticed Tapan Sir, standing apart from the crowd. He looked odd, wearing a shirt and trousers instead of the white T-shirt and shorts that I was used to seeing him in. In fact, this was probably the first time ever that I was seeing him without his cap. He seemed like a different person altogether! He walked towards his son and patted his head gently.

  ‘Besh khelechho,’ he said, congratulating him.

  Shubho replied in a stream of excited Bengali, giving his father a blow-by-blow analysis of the match. ‘He has a very powerful serve,’ he said, nodding towards his opponent, who was still hunched up on the players’ bench, his face in his hands. ‘So I adjusted my return just a little bit.’

  Tapan Sir kept the conversation going as we headed towards the clubhouse with comments about Shubho’s strengths and weaknesses. I was walking on one side, not wanting to intrude. After all, this wasn’t a small victory—it was worth many AITA points and must have involved a lot of preparation on their part. As I watched Tapan Sir joking with his son, I could see the pride in his eyes—he was Shubho’s coach as well as his father. All parents are really the same, I realized, imagining how my father would have reacted in a similar situation.

  Here, Tapan Sir wasn’t poor. He wasn’t a marker. He wasn’t someone to look down upon. He was the proud father of the star of the day. Here, Shubho wasn’t a marker’s son. He was just like any other kid. Nah, he was better—he was the champ. And when we reached the clubhouse and Tapan Sir ordered three Cokes to celebrate, I had no issues about sitting down with them and sharing a drink.

  ‘By the way,’ I said after we finished our drinks. ‘What will you do with the prize money?’

  Shubho had won a cash prize of Rs 2,000 which would be handed over to him the next evening at the awards ceremony.

  ‘I have earned myself a pair of shoes!’ he said.

  Catching my puzzled expression, he lifted his feet and showed me the heels of the shoes with which he had played the match. The soles had been ripped off almost completely and were hanging on by only a few threads.

  ‘You played the entire match like this?’ I asked in horror.

  ‘Arrey, ki korbo!’ he said, shrugging. ‘Couldn’t afford new shoes.’

  I can’t describe the emotions that flooded me then. It was a cocktail of guilt, shame, sympathy, regret—and god knows what else. Unable to deal with this overwhelming mix of feelings, I excused myself rather unceremoniously and left the club. Shubho and Tapan Sir were probably as surprised by my behaviour as I was.

  When I reached home, the feeling got worse. My mother had apparently thrown an impromptu ‘kitty party’, and the moment I stepped inside the house, I was greeted by some of Mum’s obnoxious girlfriends. ‘Hiiiiiiii!’ they went. I ignored them and ran to my room. The last thing I wanted to put up with now was a bunch of silly ladies bitching about their homes, their mothers-in-law and each other.

  The contrast hit me like a sledgehammer. God had created a beautiful world, but it wasn’t fair. While one half of his people sweated and slogged for the simplest of joys and pleasures, the other half complained about even the grandest of their possessions. Some people worked, others partied. Nothing was fair.

  Soon, the exam marks started pouring in. Almost every period, a teacher would march in and unveil our doom to us. Some of them were considerate. They were discreet about the distribution of answer scripts, only announcing the higher marks and asking us to applaud the achievers. They would explain each answer and make sure that everyone was satisfied about the marking before taking the papers back. Some were quite the opposite. They called out the roll numbers and announced the pitiful marks we had scored. Then they looked down at us with distaste, as if to say, ‘What can I do about it?’

  Our Computer teacher, however, belonged to neither category. He had, very conveniently, not finished the corrections and had disappeared into the staffroom. He had left us with a pile of classwork, which we were to complete for homework if we couldn’t during the period. So, naturally, we started playing games on our computers. Suddenly, out of the blue, a loud voice broke the silence.

  ‘Hey! You know something?’

  I looked around, confused. Was someone addressing me or the whole class?

  ‘I’ve just figured something out,’ Ankit said, his eyes big and his hair dishevelled. He was standing in the aisle that separated the two rows of computers so that everyone could see him.

  ‘Eureka! You know, getting all these rubbish marks has made me realize something,’ he said. And then he made the most ridiculous statement I’d ever heard—‘This entire marking scheme of ours is like an enormous dance floor!’

  ‘What? A dance floor? Are you out of your freaking mind?’ I exclaimed.

  Everyone else started making jokes as well and he had a hard time getting our attention back. Quickly, he climbed onto the teacher’s rickety desk.

  ‘I see I’ll have to demonstrate!’ he shouted.

  We all goggled at him in wonder. The poor guy had obviously lost it.

  ‘Imagine!’ he said, spreading his arms in the classic Titanic pose. ‘A huge dance floor! It has the best acoustics, the snazziest fluorescent lighting, the best music. It’s like a world showcase of dancing. Everyone can dance here. No age bar, no caste bar. However, there is one condition. You have to be a student and you have to dance.’

  The theatrical way in which Ankit was speaking would have made Amitabh Bachchan proud. Even though we thought he was completely nuts, we listened in fascination.

  ‘There is a powerful DJ on the dance floor. This DJ knows all the “numbers” in the world. He is the coolest, most dominating DJ around. His custom is to be rude to every one of the dancers. His name is Marks. Marks can twirl you around his little finger and make you dance to any number he chooses for you.’

  Our eyes stayed glued to the spectacle. From the way Ankit was speaking, you would have thought that he had just proved that the sun does go around the earth. On and on he went, about how only the students who got numbers above forty had a ‘PASS’ to dance. And how the ones who got forties could just ‘BREAK’. The ones who got fifties were only allowed to ‘TAP’ and the sixties and seventies could ‘DISCO’. The eighties guys ‘ROCKED’ and the nineties chaps were the super-cool ‘HIP-HOPPERS’.

  By the time he had finished, we had all broken into song and dance according to the numbers that DJ Marks had chosen for us. Siddhu and Sohan did a rather neat tap performance. Devansh, Dhruv and Yash, the nerds of the class, threw their arms and legs about to the song ‘We will rock you’. A couple of sixties/seventies guys, Mahesh and Mayank, did an obscene rendition of ‘Dard-e Disco’. Finally, Sriniwasan shocked us al
l by performing an Eminem number in his south Indian accent and jogging his arms and knees in what he probably thought was a hip-hop style. We had by now stopped caring about any teacher walking into the room.

  Throughout Ankit’s crazy performance, however, I couldn’t help but notice that Rohan seemed distracted— irritated, even. He didn’t laugh, joke, dance or do any of the things that the rest of us were doing. I was very surprised. This just wasn’t like the Rohan we knew. As soon as the bell rang, he shot right out of the room. It was the last period of the day and he headed for the main gate at a run. I followed him, hoping to ask what the matter was, but lost him in the crowd.

  All evening, I wondered what could be wrong. Wonder of wonders, even his cell phone was switched off.

  Ten

  Summing Up the Problems

  ‘It’s all a bloody farce!’ Rohan said as we dug into his delicious Mexican tacos.

  ‘It’s all for your own good, they say. Never get bored of preaching, do they? They have this never-ending list of dos and don’ts for everyone. But they have no consideration for me. After all, it’s my life, not theirs! They’ve wasted their lives, and now they are after mine. We are your parents, they say. What the bloody hell? I’m big, you’re small, I’m right, you’re wrong—those morons have such prejudiced, stereotyped, one-track minds!’

  Rohan had been raving on and on like this since morning. I had never seen him as flustered as he was now. I had no clue why he was behaving like this, although I was pretty sure it had something to do with his glum mood of the day before.

  ‘They want to make us carbon copies of themselves. Make us manage their businesses. Make friends with their friends’ stuck-up kids. What is their problem?’

  I was more or less convinced by now that Rohan’s parents were rather worried about his circle of friends. Clearly, they were not fond of his hanging out with Sameer, Ankit and me.