In Celebration of Mediocrity

After several years, we celebrated Deepavali in a big way this year.

Nobody had died over the last one year. No deaths of random relatives, whom one only had a vague recollection of, but whose death needed to be mourned. Sure, people had died. But none of them were folks from Bharadwaja Gothram, so it was time to celebrate.

This year was T Anna’s thalai Deepavali, so there was a need to have an extra celebratory air anyway. The fact that he is away in a far away country, where he needed to drive to some place that was two hours away from his house to see fireworks meant that, we needed to make up for him and infuse more cheer.

Delhi Atthai and the cousin A’s presence meant more quantity of sweets that made one sick needed to be prepared.

Why are we not putting up lights, A wished to know. We do that in Delhi, she insisted. Ram (not Rama) returns to Ayoydhya, she said. The little sister S, a bit tired of A’s general snootiness informed her in no uncertain terms that we celebrate the slaying of the demon Naragasura.

After their discussion got a little heated, I was forced to mediate. After all, S needs a high JEE Rank and A, was not just any cousin, but an atthai’s daughter. I needed both of them to feel happy.

We celebrate mediocrity, I told the two of them.

Not the answer that they wanted to hear and they chose to resolve it their way.

Nobody takes elder sisters seriously, do they?

Ever since the time I turned ten, a ritual got established at home. It was one that was followed religiously for over three years. Every Saturday morning, Appa would write down twenty mathematics problems that he sourced from several books and give it to me. After that, he would take amma and paati out, either to visit some relatives or for some shopping. When he returned, he would correct my filled sheets and give me marks. If I got all of them right, I would get ten rupees. I used to wait with a mix of anticipation and dread for the moment.

I think over a period of about three years, which must have included over 150 Saturdays -- I had a very mediocre record. In all, I made 870 Rupees.

I think it broke amma’s heart each time I didn’t earn the ten rupees.

The eight-hundred odd rupees that I managed to save up, in many ways, only heightened and served as a proof of my mediocrity.

However, all was not lost, for there was one person who benefited because of this – T Anna. I did spend a fair sum of the money in buying him stuff that he would need, and often not need. T Anna never made any money. His mathematics skills were never mediocre enough to be rewarded. At age ten however, I only felt rich and looked forward to those Saturdays.

It was one such Saturday – 4th August 1996. I was thirteen years old. We used to live at Bazlullah Road, in thatha’s somewhat dilapidated but completely lovely house. It shall go down as one of the most important days of my life - the day we got a television into our homes.

It was the year that T Anna had made it into IIT. And to all the elders of the family, the many years of deprivation had got the desired result, so it was time to open up the world of make-believe and let our household also experience the bloodbath of sentimentality and high drama. I was too excited to bother myself with computing the GCD of polynomials. This especially, when I could watch highlights of Leander Paes win a bronze medal at the Atlanta Olympics. While we were (and continue to be) an average Tamizh family, with no great love for sports (unless it involved mathematics), even we were excited and felt most happy that we won something. We attributed the Leander Paes win to two things:
1. We had got a TV on THAT day and were therefore responsible for the medal
2. He was trained in Madras and therefore, we the Tamizh people owned him and it was a Tamizh medal

Seventeen (assorted clan folks, who were secretly feeling superior for having been early adopter of this technology, unlike us) of us sat in the hall and watched the closing ceremony of the games with much awe and excitement. We had different reasons for the same:

… Amma was excited as this was one of her first glimpse into the world that she knew her son will eventually go away to. Nope, not sporting glory but the promised land.

… Thatha because he was the only one in the room who had heard of Rosakutty Chacko and Beenamol Matthew, athletes from the 400 metres relay race who didn’t qualify. Hearing those multiple news bulletins on radio had helped. We were all mildly envious of thatha.

… Me and S were most excited when we saw Leander Paes lead the Indian contingent, Tamizh pride filling our hearts.

… When Stevie Wonder came and sang John Lenon’s – Imagine, Posh Chitappa not only claimed to have recognized the song but insisted on singing along. Posh Chitappa was a perfectly normal person who had a brief stint in Tanzania and acquired a special fondness for English music. Since, none of us understood non Tamizh music (unless it was Carnatic Classical), we took his word for it. When I was thirteen though, I just found him to be very annoying. Wait, he is still rather annoying.

Once we got the TV, mathematics was dumped. And my Saturday tryst also tapered.

The TV gave us a start. After that, we began to accumulate several other laziness inducing and mediocrity encouraging products. But, we were middle class folks. We thrived in wearing our middle class badges.

How can we afford that, amma would announce to anyone who would care to listen?

Deepavali came every year. The time to buy new clothes and eat murukku and marundu. But people kept dying, so we didn’t eat any of that or buy new clothes. But Vasanth & Co as well as Viveks insisted that we buy some hugely discounted durable item during Deepavali. Amma reasoned that, dead people will forgive any prudently made purchase, especially if it was some utility product. And so, each Deepavali we acquired several things:
1. Three-burner gas stove
2. Rice cooker
3. Wet grinder
4. Music system
5. So on

We had survived for thirteen years without them, but the TV gave us the start. And that is why we celebrate Deepavali – to tell ourselves, this was the day when mediocrity triumphed over ambition.

One Month After

I completed a month of working last week. And I have acquired a couple of things in the process. Of course, there is the salary. I have also found a friend in my colleague, M.

To have someone at your place of work to watch over you is important. Especially a woman friend is most nice. After all she is the best person who is likely to lend you a sanitary napkin (of the same brand that you use), should you need one.

I liked M, from the very first day I met her. For one, she went to the same college that I did. We even went to the same school, albeit different branches. Teachers, who gave us grief, make for fantastic lunch-time conversations.

Most critically, she is a very good journalist. And a brilliant and envy inducing writer. That is very important. It is years of conditioning. Tamizh-Brahmin snobbery, I suppose. One only associated self with people who were brighter than you. You know, in school it was the kind of people who could solve the most complex of mathematics problems faster than you. Or in college, those who knew more Shakespeare Sonnets than you did and would quote them at will and with immense feeling. It was like, if one also did breathe the same air that they did, it would magically rub off on you and lead to dramatic change in one’s own skills. So you become like a moon, basking on all the reflected light.

M is what people would call a Global Citizen. Her world-view is large. Her heart is big. And she loves the non Tamizh world too. She sings Hindi songs. She thinks that Iyengaar boys are better looking than Iyers. She did her Post-Graduation from Bombay. She had not heard of the movie Paruthiveeran till I told her about it. And she also thinks that going away to Bangalore is the best way to spend her weekend.

I can’t relate to any of that. But let’s just say I am not spoilt for choice here at work. So I have chosen to like her. At least, more often that not, we speak the same language.

However, I was wondering last week, why would she want to hang-out with me? I think, now I know.

I, she and a batch-mate from Journalism school went to see this play at the Museum Theatre, Flame of the Forest, based on Kalki Krisnamurthi’s novel, Sivagamiyin Sabatham. Of course it is a wonderfully nuanced story, seeped in Tamizhness and English can never do it adequate justice. But M kept whining all through. The sudden rains were a problem. The audi was a problem. The music and dance were a problem. And she kept referring to Sivakami as a moron. I found it annoying. How can we complain about North Indians making fun of Rajni, if we don’t love our heroes?

When we met at work on Monday, M tells me, you know I cannot wear my Tamizhness as a badge.

She is perceptive and I am not terribly subtle, I suppose.

Having spent a few years in the North of India, she thinks that being overtly Tamizh is both unattractive and also makes other people dub you a racist. When she was 20 and traveled from Bombay to Madras in a train, co-passengers would be shocked that she was from Madras, because she was pretty and fair. Rather, fair and therefore implied prettiness. That opened the world of non Tamizh to her.

And then she tells me that secretly she would love to have my little Tamizh world view, but simply cannot because she wants to please more number of people and be loved by them.

It is a bit strange. I somehow feel sorry for her that she must sing Hindi songs so that more people can be happy. But she is a very clever journalist. I hope to grow up and become like her. So, I must forgive her. I must like her also.

If she were a Hindi songs singing Tamizh boy, I would find it much more difficult to handle.

The good part is, I finally seem to have become somebody’s sun.