Ladies and gentlemen, introducing you to Kalaam. He is not the famous scientist, APJ or the politician, Maulana. He is our own Kalaam.
His sister has been pestering everyone for a write up for some time. I am going to pay him a tribute in my own way.
You might have developed the picture of tall, handsome, muscular guy. But he is none among the three. He is just an average guy next door. He is a kind of Jughead, and doesn’t give a damn about girls. I believe the two women he admires is his sis and mom.
Kalaam
I had the privilege to get to know him from my school days. Back then I went for early morning tuitions. It was supposedly the time your mind was free from evil thoughts. The class would have been dozing off silently when the serenity would be broken by a goat bleat. It would have been normal but the bleat sounded something like, ‘Sir, May I come in’. The class would burst out laughing. That’s how Kalaam unwittingly spiced up the procedures.
During those days he was given the name ‘odichu kuthi’. The huge bag he carried on his back would bend him perpendericular.
My fate decreed that I would study with him for another four years. In fact I was quite surprised to meet him again at the college. We were just formal friends till then. The next four years became a Kalaam-Reloaded.
Kalaam-Reloaded
Kalaam’s favorite weakness was gaming. He used to sit up entire night online gaming and then went to bed in the classroom while lectures were raging on. In fact he was the darling of every teacher as he caused little trouble. I am going to narrate out some of the great incidents we witnessed:
Our class was the epicenter of many troubles, trouble makers and fights. Every quarrel would turn out nasty and someone would get hurt real bad. Once during such an incident all the teachers went to the Head of Department threatening to boycott our class. Our Head of Department was in a dilemma. If he picked out anyone in particular, he would be accused of partiality thus aggravating the situation. He looked around and picked up Kalaam by the collar, ‘So you are the troublemaker, huh?’ it turned out to be a clever strategy as teachers fought together to prove Kalaam’s innocence. The case was dissolved.
Kalaam taught us every problems could be solved in a peaceful and non-violent way. Once an unpleasant strike turned violent. Few skulls were broken and police were called in to the campus. The police threw us out hurling at us the choicest of expletives. Students stood outside the campus, knees knocking in fear. To everyone’s surprise Kalaam went to the pot-bellied policeman with a huge moustache standing at the gate and said ‘Uncle uncle can I take my car from inside. Uncle, please uncle please’. The policeman must have been taken back by the ‘Uncle’. Kalaam was the only one to get his vehicle out.
Another one of Kalaam’s passion was Japanese anime with the name ‘Manga’. In fact he learnt to speak Japanese very well. Everyone would make fun of his Manga craze. But many, including me, started watching Manga after he persuaded us to watch some trial episodes. Some of the series that became a hit among us were the ‘Death note’ and ‘Kensin Himurai’
Kalaam was not as innocent as he seemed to be. He had an anime porn collection too. Believe me guys, it’s a fabulous stuff that can stretch your imagination.
Kalaam is very much shy of girls. Once Kalaam’s sister’s friends came for a visit. Kalaam was peacefully watching the anime porn upstairs. He heard them coming up and ran away without closing the porn window. The girls came and saw the porn running and it was bit too farfetched for their innocent imagination. A few of them fainted and the other few vomited all over the floor.
Kalaam’s reputation wasn’t confined to Gaming and Manga alone. He was an expert at race driving his Premier Padmini and later the Maruthi 800. The reality is he was rather inept in driving slowly and surprisingly wasn’t involved in any accidents either. He drove the car in the way Messi dribbled his football. The potholes and other vehicles became the opposite team when he severed the car and did the semicircular curves. For us NFS became more than a game while driving with him. Another weakness of his was indulging in animated discussions while driving. He used to indulge in thoughts and conversations taking both his hand off the steering wheel and at the same time foot pressed firmly on the accelerator. It was the duty of the person riding with him to hold the wheel at those moments.
Kalaam was brilliant but never bothered to study. As a result he ended up with many back papers while most of us finished our graduation. Most of us moved to different parts of India for higher studies, job searching, working etc. Like all good things in life the friend’s gang broke apart. Kalaam ended alone in his home. He plunged more and more into gaming. I remember going to his home in the mornings to see him sleeping on the floor in front of his PC. He used to get up for 20 minute breaks to chat with his partners online on the strategy and go back to sleep.
One fine morning he got the enlightenment. I believe it has got something to do with the gaming server crash down. He stopped gaming all of a sudden. All the back papers were cleared together in one go. He cut down the manga also to some extent. Thus began the era of Kalaam revolutions.
Kalaam Revolutions
Kalaam enrolled into a JAVA course at a premier institute. He was damn good with the computer stuff. The uncertainty prevailed even after the course, so he enrolled for the next one. Kalaam finished up all the courses in the institute one by one.
Kalaam was not at all interested in earning a living. His dad had found a job for him in a factory. But he was too bored for the paperwork.
The principal of the institute called him up and told that they had nothing left to offer him; would he consider taking up position as a faculty member? Kalaam ran away from there. By then he had already become ‘The Master in Computer’. Although Kalaam was well qualified than anyone else to do an IT job, he simply hadn’t grown up to do it.
That’s when his cousin in Bangalore asked him to go there for a networking course. So Kalam set out for the great Metro. Staying away from home did wonders to his character. The next time we saw Kalaam he had started combing his hair and the sandals made way for NIKE.
But Kalaam continued to woo people in Bnagalore too. They started a blog in his honour. Here goes one of his famous stories:
He was on a train to visit some cousin of his. Mistakes happens to genius but they turn around situations to make the mistake look real genius idea. He learnt from a fellow passenger that the train doesn’t stop at the place where his cousin stays but the next station which is just a few kilometers away. Kalam didn’t stop to think. He took out his baggage and jumped out of the moving train. If you are thinking how brilliant the idea was, wait till you hear the rest of the story. Kalaam was suffering from pain all over. He went out and took an X-ray of his body. We ordinary mortals would have gone to a doctor. But he hated doctors with big syringes and knives. Kalaam and went out and googled for the X-ray of a normal man. He self diagnosed that he was quite okay and there was no need for a surgery or plaster. He just has a side effect he can’t raise his arm much. But genius has to make ultimate sacrifices for the sake of humanity.
Kalaam is a teetotaller. He has never known what a ciggarette is nevertheless abeer. But one day his friends in Bangalore persuaded him to drink a bit of beer. Poor Kalaam took a sip. It was too much for him to bear. He called up his Mom and confessed with tears all the eveil things he had committed.
Time flew by and Kalaam wasn’t still willing to work until his dad decreed that his allowances will be stopped within a month. And within a few weeks we were surprised to see a tie-clad , hair trimmed, full sleeved Kalaam in Technopark.
He is a famous Network Engineer in Kerala today.
If you think Kalaam has changed, I would say, ‘not much’. He demonstrated that when he was shifting out of Bangalore. He set out from Trivandrum to Bangalore to fetch his things. And he came back with just his PC.
Time for wind-up from me... Long live Kalaam!!!
Happy B'day
Wishing you a very Happy b’day!!!de, plse pass this on... "at 14 u made yourself appear in doordarshan in the very famous anti-porn documentary(featuring in and as a victim of porn), at 18 u convinced anusri(a sexy gal in our batch) to be your partner(badminton mixed doubles), now you are 25, and its 7 years since your last magic... so i'm waiting for one (sumthing else which is less tragic than jumping from trains or over bridges and doing a self diagnosis), dont delay it..."
Long Live Kalaam.
