The Order of the Crutch

There are times when you are so confused and shocked at things people say it takes about a few dumb minutes to realize, if you should be offended or not. Today was one such day..

So I get down from the bus in Chennai after an overnight journey from Bangalore. Koyambedu it is and Auto Drivers scamper around and snatch the suitcase while you watch helplessly. One screams out “saaar, I have dropped you before saar. I have dropped you before and I will drop you in your doorstep saar…”. So I think I should write off the price of my elbow crutch to this prick today, instead of the ones whom I don’t know. Known devil is better than an unknown angel it seems, as the proverb has enlightened us from 4th grade schooling.

So after graciously agreeing to settle for Rs. 300 from Rs. 350 (not before telling me how nasty velachery as a place was to drive in & live in was) I get into the auto only to stop 2 minutes into the ride. Now I’m thinking this dude is stopping to take a leak or put thoppukaranam in front of pillayar kovil or something. Then I hear a conversation in the background involving the driver but im engrossed why the EDGE network on my cellphone isn’t getting activated despite rebooting the phone. I mean who does not want to check Office email + Gmail on a Saturday morning at 6.30 AM?

The Auto driver walks closer to the vehicle and the conversational volume gets louder and clearer, it finally ends with..

“Madam, avaru handicapped thaan madam. Onnume illa madam, summa thairiyama okkaarunga. Problem illa! 2 nimishan thane!” (Madam, he is physically challenged. He is of no harm or trouble. You can sit confidently. After all, the ride is barely 2 minutes..)

This guy jumps into the drivers seat and before I realize what’s happening there is this cute girl staring at my face with a “are you going to move your behind to the other end and plaster yourself to the auto’s wall or what?” look. Blame the testosterone, probably… I move over to the other side and continue fiddling with the EDGE settings and the Auto Driver adds lately…

“saar, avanga okkaaralaam illa saar?! onnum problem illaye?” (Saaar, can she sit. This isn’t any trouble to you, right?)

I’m thinking, if this question is a bit too late or something or was it a mandatory obligation that he had committed to as a result of his circumstances. Unfortunately, the maramandai works very slowly after being jolted for 7 hours in a cramped bus with lousy seats that I shelled Rs. 550 for a ticket.

So here is the deal. What exactly did this guy imply? Did he imply I’m incapable of any sexual advances I could make or hit on this girl because of my physical condition? How did he arrive at this idea and by what logic? I can assure this isn’t the first time I’ve been ‘described’ in such a context as a “harmless and / or useless” with reference to my sexuality. One part of my crocodile brain tells me I should just grab this girl, kiss her and before she realizes it kick her and send her flying out of the auto which is already flying at 80 Km/h. At this rate this guy cannot even break properly and before he knows it I would have pulled my Swiss pocket knife and stabbed him in the neck and tell him he was so wrong to make such assumptions about me.

For the record, technically speaking, all impotent guys are physically challenged but not all physically challenged guys are mandatorily impotent, although I admit there is a high possibility if your limbs or your back is affected we could be shit in bed, by all means. I mean its Physics and sex isn’t what you see in Porn.

I fail to rationalize what gives people the audacity for them to comment on other peoples sexual potency or capability in broad daylight? I fail to understand how someone can take that as a valid reason as well and comply with the idea, in this case this girl who sat beside me for a brief 2 – 3 minutes. I felt sorry for a moment, that she was ripped off Rs. 50 for a bare 1.5 Kms and she looked so shocked in disbelief as the Auto Driver insisted “Madam, minimum charge-e muppadhu rooba” which sent me into shock as well. When did this happen, I was never told so! She didn’t look like she was from the city. From her looks and from her accent she was probably of an orthodox / conservative origin, but then I concluded she deserved it anyways.

I mean if you could buy one bullshit, you gotta buy the other one as well right?

It seems like, the problems with the effectiveness of my courting and copulative capabilities are not my business anymore. A Times of India style analysis of this subject is everyone’s constitutional right. At least that’s how it seems to be from how its handled and discussed.

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I was driving home from work, to my cousins place to have dinner with her before i leave for delhi the next day morning. She is here from the USA on a vacation and going back soon. I drove through habibullah road and just as i reach the junction at usman road i see a furry cute little creature run across the road. I know what i saw, a cute grey striped kitten. “how cute” i think and before i knew it there were 3 stray dogs behind it.

The kitten leaped and caught a thin branch near the compound wall of a house. The branch snapped and the kitten swung like spiderman and fell across the road near the road behind the ramp where Vishwak solutions office is. The dogs gave chase, i did. Accelerated the bike to 70, skid hard to my left and stopped and got off the bike. Sharp searing pain on my right hip. I need the crutch. Unstrapped my crutch off my bike and before i knew it i saw two dogs biting into the kittens backbone. Fuck the crutch, i crawled like a baby on the road and yelled at the top of my voice and the dogs backed off a foot.

Went close and saw dog saliva all over the cats fur, it was wet and sticky. No blood but i know the damage was done. The cat had its mouth wide open. Having raised more than 50 cats in my school days i know a cat does not live for long when it has a permanently open mouth and no noise from its mouth. Its the pain of dying, i can see it.

I picked up the kitten carelessly and it ferociously bit my thumb and i bled. I slowly unhooked the tooth of the kitten from my thumb slowly. I placed the kitten on my bike and drove far away from the incident. Laid the kitten to rest near a roadside temples trash dump. I went, had dinner with cousin, drove back at 11 pm on the way back home. The kitten was dead.

I’m a cat person, i don’t really hate dogs but i do now much since this moment. I know it sounds irrational but i cant help it.

It would have made a difference if i had gotten off my bike 5 seconds earlier, i did not. “The Order of the Crutch” it indeed fucking was.

These are the times i hate my miserable fucking existence. Life is not worth living with this shit. Its all so pointless. The crutch makes all the difference. If not for this crutch, that kitten would have lived to see the daylight. Fuck this, i’ve had enough.

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Dear People of various kind who come from all sorts of places that have one thing in common, you want to hate Chennai but you don’t know how. All you can say is “Chennai Sucks” on twitter, blogs and forums/websites i empathize with you and i feel your pain.

Here are some pointers that will not make you look like a fool that you may be for real, instead it would make you appear that you really do have a valid reason to be hating Chennai. If you follow the instructions i give you carefully in this blog post, you would look cool amidst your Amitus Abeyarus kind.

If you follow my 5 points you will certainly be someone. Someone whom people think have some masala in their talks and its not pure gas, the ones that come excessively post a couple of butter parathas & aloo mutter.

1. Auto’s in Chennai suck, they fleece and cheat people and they are rude to them. Really, this is possibly the best point one can make against Chennai & you cannot find a valid rebuttal from none of the losers living who live in Chennai when they try defend their city as and when you abuse it. I mean why do you care that there is a language issue and you cannot bargain with auto-karans (wallas) like them stupid Tamils do and get a better deal. You cannot bargain in Tamil & that’s the end of it. You are too holy to ask some dark skinned smelly Tamil guy on the roads who maybe friendly enough to speak to the auto guy for you and help you with things but no, not really needed. Keep your fair skinned supremacy to yourself and don’t let them blackenese get close to you. Why do you need to use the public transport, especially the trains which are far less crowded than Mumbai or the MRTS which is a fabulous facility when speaking of public transport. Auto’s are bad, its a historical fact that cant be changed tomorrow and Chennai needs to be hated for that, now go get it!

2. Nobody speaks the National Language of India, “Hindi”. Yes, unruly, uncultured, ill mannered and unpatriotic Tamil’s. No it does not matter that India does not have the concept of National Language and Hindi is not the national language of India. We have Official Languages and Hindi/English which definitely is but so are the regional languages of the state that are official languages for government communication as well. Its okay, do diss Chennai for this. You can’t find a madrasi complain that no one speaks Tamil in New Delhi or Mumbai but so what? Despite the fact that tamilnadu has never been invaded by any of them mughals and they have never had the need or come under the circumstances where they’ve had the need to communicate in Hindi. Those non-hindi speaking Chennai’tes are definitely country brutes and they deserve all the flack they get.

3. The Chennai weather sucks. What do you expect? Its just like the bleady food they eat, its hot as hell! Yes, people in Chennai have no control over the weather, it is naturally so because that’s how the topography works out to be. Chennai is hot and sultry and its humid and its complete turn off for anyone. Chennai people do not have a weather machine to control their weather, nor can the north indians control their uber freezing winter but what the hell. Chennai is hot and chennai sucks and its your birthright to complain and insult chennai for something that it cannot help change or that it did not cause in the first place.

4. Chennai food sucks! You cannot get good dhal and roti here anywhere. It does not matter if the population of Chennai majorly consumes rice. You have the right to hate dosa (btw its ‘dosai’ actually) just because, well you need something to hate so why not? No paratha’s, no aloo ghobi. Chennai food sucks. Why? Because it does, period.

5. No hot girls in Chennai! Can’t see them tight salwar wearing big round booty showing jean clad girls in Chennai. Nor can you talk or make comments obscenely at girls in Chennai roads without getting thrashed. Even the prostitutes you find here are so black skinned and dirty. Yes, Chennai has lesser of the sexual harassment on the roads and the violence as well but who cares. You cannot find girls that show skin, nor can you find good prostitutes. Chennai Sucks!

There you go. If you follow these five pointers and build on top of it using your creativity you are one of the elite Chennai hater who would be respected and admired in the internet on communities on orkut named Chennai Sucks which have awesome topics to discuss like “Lungi Hatao Poongi Bhajao” that elevates your intellectual capabilities to the stars.

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After Krish pointed out Lonely Planet about some of the facts on Chennai, our beloved city, Lonely Planet did put a shabby effort to re-write the piece which does not look as miserable as it used to before.

Lonely Planet however, does have another interesting Article. They call it the Cities you really hate and they list a lot of cities and its anybody’s guess Chennai is on it too and it repeats again, like it did in the previous article…

We describe it as lacking Mumbai’s prosperity, Delhi’s history or Bengaluru’s buzz.

I’m going to merely repeat what has already been said before by many people on krish’s blog.

1. Mumbai’s Prosperity – Sure yes, they have bollywood. How come our Kollywood, the second most largest movie industry got ignored on this front? How come Chennai being the backbone of Indian automotive market got comfortably ignored? In Chennai, we don’t have Benz SUV’s running over people sleeping on the platforms and killing them at large and the driver walking away scot free. The poor get a little less poorer here some of the times and maybe richer too occasionally compared to mumbai’s “rich getting richer & poor getting poorer” as our super star rajinikanth would say. On one side lies five star hotels and Benz SUV’s (which are manufactured in sriperumbudur – an industrial town setup near Chennai) and on the other slums where people undergo untold pain and hardship. Ever heard of sustainable development/progress? That’s Chennai for starters. Finally, we definitely don’t have to worry about the underworld that bollywood is so famous for.

2. Delhi’s History – I will quote from Chandrachoodan’s words since i can never top him when it comes to Chennai’s History…

What history can Chennai claim? Besides being the first major city the British built in India, besides it 1000 year old temples and 500 year old churches and 200 year old mosques and ancient port towns and stone-age settlements, what history can Chennai claim? The city has absolutely no history, which is why even the Portuguese thought it not wise to give Santhome away as dowry to the British king, opting instead to give them Bombay. The city has no history whatsoever, which is why almost all of Independent India’s institutions had to be founded in Madras. The city has no history or why else would the British pioneer the architectural style of Indo-Saracenic, fusing Muslim/Persian styles with the classical styles of south India, in Madras?

3. Bengaluru’s Buzz – For starters, how about Chennai being the Second largest software exporter in India, behind Bangalore being ignored without any sort of hesitation? Secondly, how about Chennai being the backbone of the Indian Automobile industry with over 40% of production + distribution happening in plants setup in and around Chennai by Hyundai, Maruti, Tata, TVS and Mahindra. Answers where all those damn cars in Outer ring road (that clogs the narrow Bangalore roads and make the city hell to drive around) comes from, don’t it.

My only question here is this. “How do you hate a city?”

I mean i can understand if you are a foreigner and you are asked to relocate to a new city and you find the food and the culture and practices hostile and you hate life for that moment of time while you get adjusted to it or try and fit in desperately. I’ve been through that in Bangalore and i can accept that but then i eventually moved on and now i love that city and would not hesitate to move back if conditions favored. But as a “traveler” or a “tourist” how can you hate a city? I mean, if you get mugged or robbed or raped its one thing, still hating a city on the whole? I mean why would you even have an article that says “hate” on your site when your intent is supposed to be promoting factual, neutral and unbiased information about a place. I don’t get it, seriously.

The whole point of travelling, i feel personally is to experience. Its agreed not all experiences may be pleasant or something everyone would like. However, just because a few people wanted to play it too safe and never got to know the real local things to do and have fun in a place, does that make the place hated? Wow, this is possibly the first time im hearing such an idea.

Finally you also say…

Even the Movie stars are ‘not that hot’

As you put it and you even claim you are being kind. Kind for not being more sexist?

You seem to have this thing for rating a movie star based on looks and sexuality and nothing more, probably. While looks and sexuality are a major part of a movie star, which i completely agree on.. its not everything. I can agree with the fact that we brown and black skinned Tamilian’s are not as appealing and sexy compared to the white skinned north Indians. That’s the only way i can put it. I fail to see it in any other terms. I do agree our heroines are fat and yes, we like them that way. We prefer them to anorexic women with oversized implants whose silicon in the breast weighs more or less their own body weight, they diet so hard like “oh my god if i don’t eat one more meal i may die of starvation” looks. We have this fetish for some oversized women and i certainly do not deny that. Why else would Shakila be the most famous porn star in the country? Oh wait, did i say country? Wow, yes that includes my north Indian friends who are truck loads in number that love some shakila porn on their comps and always keep asking if there is something new, quite embarrassingly.. one has to admit, being south indian.

Nevertheless, if you knew who Trisha, Simran, Asin, Shreya are and if you ever looked at how our women swoon to see topless Surya or scream on seeing our Superstar Rajinikanth who is loved for his charisma on screen and Ulaganathan Kamalahasan’s exceptionally directed movies and acting skills, you would not really have made that naive statement. I guess sweaty Cleavages, almost nipple revealing clothing and always bare bodied hero’s of the north is what you are fond of, probably. I will admit, i get excited too, looking at deepika padukone or aishwarya rai’s [who by the way entered the movie industry via a “Tamil” kodambakkam (a place in chennai) film] frame but i do snap back to reality and don’t get carried away. There are to many lovely pairs of women’s bosoms and i cant be stuck with a few all the time. After all, variety is the spice of life. However when it comes to the movies, we like the usual masala flicks like any indian but get very serious about quality performances, script, story-line, sequencing, editing and playback which are all things we fight and argue about over a cup of filter kaapi at saravana bhavan or karpagambal’s mess. If you wanna know more on this read this too. If you still aint satisfied, i invite you to karpagambal’s mess where i will treat you to the world famous in chennai filter coffee and masala dosai to discuss this matter seriously with another 20 of us chennai’ vasi’s (fuck chennaikers) who will fiercely debate the issue with great passion.

I know, if at all i have any chance some Lonely Planet writer will drop by and put a politically correct statement in a decent manner (unlike the flair with which i use expletives and im so infamous for) stating some stuff which obviously will mean “that’s what people think abt Chennai, its full of shit so get lost” kind of remark that was already posted like this in Sharanya’s blog.

But hey, its a blog and unfortunately it happens to be mine. We are a democracy and everyone has the freedom of expression (unless you are messing with the real baddies in which case thou shalt be wrong) to say what they want, so there goes my 23 minutes of ranting on a random blog no sane person on planet earth would waste time reading or comment to result in futile results.

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