Chapter 2: HOST Krishnaswamy DOMAIN IS alphamale ALIAS IS Anand.

The days went on…

Although an alpha male I was nowhere capable of doing what I was supposed to, i.e. eat solid food (bloody perverts … I was a baby) so I used to survive on semi solid food and amuse myself by beating the hell out of an empty tin of “Farex” , that drove some of my neighbors crazy and caused others to fail in their mid terms, but that did not deter my enthusiasm with the tin, until I realized I could create louder noise by running a spoon over the window bars, I guess deep down there was a musician in me… well the one who never grew up.

That did it; I got my first recorded thrashing. I did cry, was a bloody baby... and it hurt. Later I realized that, it was the neighbor who complained that his daughter wasn’t able to concentrate on her studies because of my affinity towards the window and the spoon. It hurt.

And two days later the neighbors’ daughter eloped. They found pictures of a guy inside her textbook and when her parents confronted her to reveal his identity she took to her heels, so I wasn’t entirely the reason for her flunking her midterms, true that I was a hindrance to her concentration, but the text in the book was not what she was concentrating upon. That leveled my tryst with my conscience.

I always trust my conscience, it never fails me, and I also believe to this day that education is one of the best gifts that could be given to mankind, and a gift that stays till u draw the last breath. So you would seldom see me selling off old books, I might donate them to library but never sell them, u see knowledge is to be given not sold. Some day when I am well off I might as well start a charitable education trust. A little that I could give back to the society.

Now its almost a year since I was born, as you might have rightly guessed there wasn’t much activity around me, just the general ones… my relatives smothering me with kisses, perverted neighbors running a hand down my tool and deriving a kick out of juggling my nuts, my parents getting me the best dresses, food and quality of life that they could afford without running a loan.

Soon before I could know it, it was the time when I was to be introduced to a ritual called “Birthday” which essentially was celebrating the day when you were born and to keep a tab on the number of years completed till date.

My dad got up early that day… and went to order a cake. As my families financial condition was not very great, he ordered a cake with a small diameter, actually a heart shaped one, and wanted my name to be written on the same.

But when spelled out on the cake, the name wasn’t legible leaving aside the fact that it completely filled the vanilla area of the cake to give it a chocolate monotone.

Now that was depressing, the vendor offered to shorten the name to “Krishna” (which reminded my dad of his arch enemy at office and was rejected) “KS” (which was plain unacceptable as it was a popular condom brand then too) “Swami” (my dad wasn’t a R.K.Narayan fan which he would have been if we had a TV back then). So with all the options run out, my dad was asked if I have an alias or as we know it back in India a “pet name” and out of nowhere sprung “Anand”.

As to why “Anand” was preferred over Ram, Allah, Jesus or for that matter Jhambuvant, is a secret guarded as closely as the Coke Formula, the fact being my dad forgot it long ago and is not open for retrieval.

So I was rechristened as Anand, but for all official purposes I still stick to the longer version of my name as that’s what my birth certificate reads J.

My birthday went fine, a few eyebrows were raised at the name written on the cake, including those of my mom, but after my dad narrated the incidence and his lifelong tribute to Hrishikesh Mukherjee (by naming me Anand that is), I was given green and the party ended.