The Bee vs The Bulb

There were days when the sun took off like a rocket shot into the sky, these were the days I cherished the most.

I had grown up into a rambunctious boy who had no fear, no worries and no baggage to carry.
Bouncing around my new found neighborhood like a grasshopper on “grass”….

My previous school was "The Carmel High". I must have had some friends whose faces or names I don’t remember.

What I do remember is that fateful “Christmas day”

The scene was set:

After the morning prayers,Which went something like this...
“Oh my god bless this day Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah” (memory issues again)

We waited for "The Big Red Panda" which was our principal “Mr. Joe Pinto” dressed up as the Man of the moment “Santa from hell”

I say this now because he was a hard nut ……with his usual punishments like "kneel down" and "stand up on the bench" .….

After standing on the ground with the Indian sun for about 45 minutes.
We were made wait for Santa to complete his make-up.
After about an hour came Santa dressed in his typical blood red “Santa clothes”.
I bet half the kids there wanted him to drop dead or be in a bull fighting arena at that moment.

Then the moment that everyone had awaited came.

Santa came with this coarse and grunt voice (Mostly due to years of heavy smoking).
The voice said “Ho Ho Ho Merry Christmas” when I think back now this replays in a more slowed down tempo. Just like when somebody shoots the hero’s friend and the way he says “No+3mins-oooooooooooooooo” in a slowed down tempo to make the scene look more dramatic.

Suddenly there was an unprecedented air ride.
"Stingers" were all over and they were on us like white on rice or must I say “like stink on shit”.
Kids ran helter-skelter like soldiers retreating from battlefield.
Many got hit and broke down immediately; the lucky few survived the onslaught.
I was one among the lucky few who made it unscathed!!!

No one would have guessed in a bazillion years that the bee hive that was hanging calm for years would rebel on the crowd below.

Now when I analyze the whole scenario;
I see a sociopathic kid not able to take a heat and humiliation of waiting in the sun for an hour just to get a lame toffee, hurling the very toffee at the bee hive hanging on the ceiling

I bet many among us would remember that Christmas at least for the sheer mayhem or the burning pain.

This was not all …..

In 1995 and I had moved to Widia Poorna Prajna High School.

As usual everyone was asked to assemble in the academic hall where our principal would deliver one of his “not so classic” trade mark speeches.

The mundane points would revolve around:

What wrongs we committed in the past
What wrongs we are doing at present
What will go wrong in the future

Basically a pessimist to the bone who would always end his speech with this usual punch line “I have said whatever I came here to say; now it’s left to you people and the god almighty”

He was like the iconic “Elmer Fudd” character, everyone hated him.
In one such incident we where asked to shut our pie holes till he was done talking.
And we were as usual lost in ourselves and in our wild imaginations, hoping the time to swing past us like a quick breeze.

Nothing new was said in that speech but as he approached his final words of his punch line, a bulb about 20 feet above his head flickered, as in synchronized swimming everyone’s focus simultaneously shifted to the bulb .The principal“Mr .Srikantaiah” uttered those final words of wisdom “now it’s left to you people and the god almighty” the bulb by some miracle unscrewed it self and started falling down. All the 400 eyes in the room tracked the trajectory of the bulb frame by frame. Until it found its final resting place to shatter, There was silence first then the peeps, snuggles and then finally it was free flowing laughter.

The bulb had landed on the bald patch on our principals shiny head.
Call it “bête noir” or "Divine comedy" .But these are the things that tickle me when I look back.

Just like beer tastes kinda bitter but it still kicks ass…………………….. Isn’t it?

These memories inevitably lead me in to meandering thoughts making my past look like a dream dreamt in a state of insomnia.