Vengeance: Concluding Chapter

2 months ago, Sri remembered, it was Chitrangada's turn to publish the weekly journal, but the key of the main notice board lied with Vir.
Vir had told Sri that he was leaving for the town to buy some important things, and the things were not very important, so she need not come along with him. Somehow, the day had been quite hectic, keeping Sri busy all the way. Thankfully, Enya too had some work in lab, some register she had to make for the lab tomorrow. She wanted to relax today, and the whole room was for her, she was all in luck!
She remembered quite late that it was Chitra's turn, and she had to deliver her the key. She called Chitra from her room, and she sounded worried about tomorrow's issue. Chitra was cool as usual, she said- "Dun worry kid! I got the key from Vir 5 minutes ago! He came and gave it to me."
It was surprising that Vir didn't go to town. Well, he too might have been busy.

Sri would often help Vir to do his assignments, and she would take care for him, thinking twice so as not to do anything which might hurt him. She was a bit more sensitive than him, so she would often try to understand him. Vir would seem to be a bit worried about something, that's why he would often remain reserved, and for few months, he wasn't able to focus on his studies, so Sri made it a point to be of his help.

Yesterday, Vir had come to her, and asked her if she could draw the final of his plans, elevations and sections? It was very necessary for him to visit the town, as his aunt lived there who was serious and it was urgent for him to go. The assignment was also necessary to be submitted, as it was final assignment, and he feared it would be impossible for him to submit it tomorrow.
Sri smiled and said "She'd be all right, don't worry. I'd do the needful".
Next day morning, Chitra came running to Sri, she was pretty excited. "Hey Sri, Did you know, Vir got expelled!" Sri was struck by a bolt! "What? how?"
"come to the HOD's chamber. He's waiting for you. He asked me to locate you and send you there".
With weak knees, she went in the chamber, laden with grim air around her. The whole batch, class of '09 was present there. Vir was standing in the corner, red faced. Perhaps, he had cried. She could see him sweat in the air conditioned chamber.
The Head of the Department asked her in a calm, but serious tone, "Are you aware that Vir had copied your Design assignment? apart from the previous few assignments of detailings and Building Construction Techniques?"
"huh? No Sir! Was he?", she replied, wide eyed.
"Yes, I had already got the reports that he had been copying details from Chitrangada's sheets. Since he has failed in more than 2 subjects in a semester, he is not eligible to carry his studies in this premier institute. It is imperative for you all now to keep your sheets in locks from now onwards. You all may go."
She was the last to leave, and as she closed the door, she could hear Vir pleading the HOD to give him another chance, but she knew it was impossible, HOD was too strict to budge.
She calmed her sudden excitement, and came back to her room, at the end of the day.
Her room mate Enya was sad, apparently her day too had been bad. Sri held her by shoulders. Enya turned and looked at her. She was crying.
Sri asked, "What happened?"
"nothing"
"You sure, baby?"
"Yeah, I'm. Just one bad day won't hurt, right? It's some experiment gone bad..."

Later that night, Chitra came to Sri's room.
"Everything okay Chitra?"
"Yep. Is Enya asleep?"
"yes, she just slept, can you ask me whatever it is, on a stroll?"
"Sure".
On their way on a big 2.2 km long circuit, Chitra initiated the talk.
"Just wanted to ask you something- you orchestrated this whole scandal, didn't you?"
"What leads you to think of this?"
"My locker has number lock. The key to that lock is known to you and Vir only. Vir is not that a fool to copy it blatantly. You know, he always introduces a twist in something original."
Sri recalled the day about a month ago, when she was crying in the room, and there was no one to support her.
Chitra had told her that she had seen Enya and Vir strolling late night in the institute, when she had been to the department to change the Wall magazine in the noticeboard. They hadn't seen her.
Sri had been thinking of an adage "When faith becomes blind it dies". How was it, that she couldn't get the point of Enya asking her about trust and faith? Wasn't it the same day Vir told her that he was going to the town? Sri first didn't believe this whole thing. Seeing is believing. She started digging into the emails, and saw only one email of Enya to Vir, appreciating how smart and intelligent he was, with a reply of thanks from Vir. She cried the whole day.
She realised then that faith in a relation is like a principal sum in bank. It accumulates slowly, and steadily. It can not be given to someone in a lumpsum. It is more related to actions in the past, not the feelings.
She composed herself, and came back to her room, still undecided whether to let them go, or to avenge. She was convinced that she was cheated, and her right was denied. So Vir deserved an apt return gift .
Why did Enya hint her about her feelings then? May be it's completely human to hint their own actions in advance, which might satisfy their emotions. Anyways, it was foolish of her.

Next day, when Enya opened her eyes, she saw Sri smiling, "Good morning baby! How was your sleep?"
"Ummmmm... It was quite good, thanks!" Enya replied, stretching her hands.
"Water, in stagnation, rots. So should we move?" concluded Sri. Enya couldn't agree more.

Vengeance: part 1 of 2

"Water, in stagnation, rots." concluded Sri. Enya couldn't agree more.

6 months ago, Sri and Enya were sitting in a theatre, watching movie, when she said, "Enya, how do you like Vir?". Enya giggled, and said "Assure me I would live after I said I liked him!". Both of them had to be shooed into silence by the audience who were more interested in the movie, than in their heart to heart banter. They made faces, and started watching the movie.

Vir studied in the same section as Sri, and Sri, being the "master architect" was the pet of all the professors. It looked as if she just was revising the whole architecture course. Sciography, drawings, illumination engineering, waste water management, all the courses were at her tips. Often one would see her laughing and giggling around with Enya, her room mate, who was from electronics.
Because Sri also was good in mathematics, so Enya started to harness her ability into understanding the equations which required high degree of knowledge of calculus. Analog Circuits was her nightmare, and it suddenly became easy when Sri started dissecting the formulas. There was now no need to mug up. Soon their friendship grew beyond buck converters and Universal Serial Bus protocols and they started to share their small worlds with each other.
Enya often wondered how was it that Sri always had some time at her disposal, when all her batchmates would slog for hours and hours on the very same assignment. Sri preferred to keep the suspence with her smile. Often she would fill her cigarette with weed, as she would sit with the A0 sized sheet on her drawing board, and she would design everything with a single stroke. No need to draw the rough. She knew her hands, and her hands knew what she was upto. Six hours flat and she'd be done with it.

The second semester from January demanded she should do more courses from architecture than the common curriculum, so she started to take note of people who were in her department. And as the second sem started, the seniors started their regular drama of orientation periods, and extra- curricular activities. It was there, she had first noticed Vir. He would often be present in the Thursday's evening club (organised by the budding architects of the department).

Often, she'd find him in the library too, or in the canteen near the main gate of institute. Three months later, she was competing for the post of Journal secretary, when she found her team (for the doing the ground work) of the post also comprised of Vir, Rekha and Chitrangada.
Working for the post- printing arrangements, the 4 would often go for a night- out, and there would be long sessions of tea, which would be often taken care by Vir. The ideas were mainly of Sri, but Vir would often give a twist in them, making them even more interesting. The sheer brilliance versus the creativity would often make an interesting competition, and whence, they started to have an inclination towards each other.

They even exchanged their passwords of email IDs. Sri's self would never allow her to accept it in front of Vir that she often read his mails, for curiosity's sake. But soon she gave up checking into his account, as her own self would not permit it.

Vir was tall, fair, and his gait was free. Nothing bounded him, ever smiling. Sri often mentioned him with Enya, How the discussions on the ideology of Meis Van der Rohe went, and how charming but difficult was the life of Frank Lloyd Wright, and Enya was no fool to let it go unnoticed.

So, it was after the theatre, Sri decided that she, Vir and Enya would have a small get together. As Enya too wanted to meet him. He sounded interesting to her.

Next day, Vir, Sri, and Enya sat in the coffee bar, and were discussing things, Vir was sitting almost straight, Sri, leaning on his support, with her head on his shoulder and Enya in front of them. They chatted for some 2-3 hours, and thanks to Vir's smooth talking the time warped, and it never felt that long, had not the position of sun been a measure of time too. Vir wanted to become a good architect, and how he had been struggling for the rank in this institute, and some funny stories of his tuitions were quite funny to pay heed to.

That night, as Sri came back at eleven, switched off the light and fell on bed. The creaking bed announced her presence, and Enya asked her "Are you still awake?". Sri said "Yeah" with a sigh. "how did you like him?", Sri asked.
"How much do you trust him?" Enya questioned her in response.
"I love him a lot! Isn't it sufficient?" Sri fell asleep, getting oblivious to the next question of Enya.

... next part concludes

Circus

In the jungle of Institute of Indian Technologies, there existed two crazy students, with particularly varying interests. The Monkey was a detailed thinker, mostly residing in his own theme, and rarely peeking out to see what the world was doing. He'd get a screenshot of the current state of world, and will quickly recreate in his brains what must have happened, and then he would quietly get absorbed in his thinking. The Donkey was the one who was always on the roll when it came to foreign policies, polity, politics, and bureaucracy. He would always have a conclusion ready on the weirdest of the patterns and he would often extrapolate them to predict what the future held.

Two years later, both of them passed and joined the beautiful world outside. Their job description was the same. Only that satisfaction level was different. They would often meet and The Donkey would often narrate interesting affairs surrounding, or may be they would discuss the ideas of various people.
One day, while roaming, The Donkey mentioned a famous quote, "The god is a performer, performing before an audience too afraid to laugh". "Don't we remember something about an audi, performance, stage, and we all being characters?" The Monkey thought. Strolling in the great market place, the two friends were discussing this. The Donkey continued, "The Penguins at a far-away-land Antarctica often feel hungry at a time when there are too many fish in the sea. They dive to dine, and before doing that, wish each other bon appetit. The sharks too feel hungry at the same time, and they too wish each other bon appetit, and then hunt the penguins! Look at the comedy- they both feel hungry at the same time!!". Seeing the facial expressions of the Monkey, Donkey suggested another example- "The newly born birds which live near ponds often take their first flight after a few days of hatching. The comedy is that if they crash during their first flight, they often fall in the open mouths of crocs and other animals waiting for them. They become the feast of these animals in the first flight itself!", continued Donkey, " If you call it a comedy, it's a grim one".
"Take a third example- In Sundarbans, the jungle is so dense that humans often prefer to live near the shore of delta. The water level often varies markedly during the whole day, and there live piscivorous tigers, who drink that saline water. These tigers, often known as Royal Bengal Tigers are the smart and aggressive cousins of other indian tigers. They are big, and they are bad, they know their footsteps, and they will hunt humans, whenever they can. It is virtually possible to go deep inside the forest." Having laid a proper foundation, the Donkey took a deep breath, and continued "Now, the fun part is that honey bees also make their combs in the deep forest. The combs often are huge. Now, humans have to go inside to harvest honey from the bees, where their predator awaits!".
The examples started a train of thoughts in Monkey. So far, he believed world is an auditorium, and the god is the only audience. Now there is an opposite theory, the god is a performer, and we all, observers. How can it be? It seems like the trees are moving in a direction anti parallel, when we move.
To interconnect both the perspectives, we can shift our own. Imagine the world is a circus, with everyone being a performer, and god being the ring master. May be he's more than a ring master, he may be an organiser, who has put a constraint, a starting condition, continuing conditions for the act, and a terminating condition. The performers in circus are all acrobats, so they can not see their own moves, but can witness how the tight rope walker is performing, and how good the tigers are doing ball with the humans, etcetera. Now, we can safely say the god is performing, we too are performers, and yet, we don't dare laugh, because we are walking on tight rope ourselves. We laugh, we fall. Only if we are too busy to watch others than noticing our own steps on the tight rope.
Special Mentions: Chaitanya Vardhan for his inputs, Voltaire and Shakespeare for sharing their piece of perspectives, God- his circus is interesting.

Singing on a Lower Pitch

The Dog was lurking in the dark alleys of internet, and by chance, he ended up sniffing few write ups in a blog filed under the title "rant". The article writer definitely wanted to be heard, and she was being heard, with comments on her blog being double of The Dog's own. What caught again The Dog's sniffer nose was the unusual intensity of the word "rant". Technically barking- rant would mean too much of violence or extravagant, as would be the context when the word was used when it shouldn't have been. Everything was perfectly under control, with no emotion being out of control, as the label would claim, observed the beast. He had encountered a similar observation not so long ago, may be half a decade ago.

The Dog wanted to go for higher studies, for which he wanted to write a cover letter, shamelessly mentioning why he fitted that university, in a land far far away. He was genuinely interested in the subject and wanted to make it his career, and hence, to show his keen curiousity, he chose words he deemed fit to design the application. A wise and kind man lived next to him, who would often help him diagnose his inner self. The wise man perused through his application, looked up to the animal, and said "Everything you wrote is the truth, but your know, there is a problem. I call that problem overexpressing an emotion, for example- instead of "highly interested" may be you could have suggested some of your acts which depicted the same."

The Dog was gifted, actually, compensated to understand the human languages, for; he was unable to comprehend much of human emotions. He would never understand the rising or the falling graph of emotions, or understand the unsaid, so he would often tilt his head to one side, and stare wide- eyed, with a bewildered expression at men and women, who would often dramatise and romanticise the events.

Why did people often do that? His own kinds knew only a few notes to sing the famous lyrics of Baha men song "who let the dogs out". They were never dramatic, in fact, most of the animals, unless it was the mating season.

The only reason, The Dog, understood was that people often had a sense of awareness, which allowed them to realise they existed. The self also had an extension, which The Dog felt was vestige, known as ego. This part of self (illogically, but successfully) tried to convince the self that the being was a unique individual, with no one as special as him. This would often make him feel cherished, and would make him want more. The more meant even more, when it came to fame.

The fame rhymes with the word name, observed The Dog. That too wasn't without a reason (though that very same reason, however, didn't follow with shame, dame, game, blame, etc). The ego or the sense of self, allowed the humans to associate themselves with words which they thought were unique for them. If someone uttered that word, they would respond, as if someone had nudged them.

[Agreed, my family didn't have names, and we used to understand how to hunt a mouse or a poor small animal in packs, and everyone developed his own sense of responsibility in the team, by the games we often played in our childhood. But humans named everything, even their homes, cars, and pets, including me. I responded to them, because everytime i responded, I was given my favourite bone to suck, or a juicy piece of mutton. The reward is a big motivator.]

So, when humans name is called, they feel elated a bit, and this gives them a sense of being wanted by the person calling the word, that is, what they call name. If a lot many people would call their name, it would be a transaction in which the input is too overwhelming. To make people call your name, you need to be different, you needed to be dramatic, guesses The Dog. May be, you needed to be special, hence the usage of the word "rant" in the title of the article, when it wasn't necessary, to dramatise a simple event.

Humans, are the descendents of the great Ape family, and hence, they believe in copying what they find attractive. As a result, now The Dog finds all the world being dramatic in a way or the other. May be, for a change, letting the actions communicate would keep things simple, and clean. It may sound boring at first, but the closer look would reveal that since the things are easily understood, so it would greatly increase the pace of the work, and speed is more fun, The Dog guesses that's what the wise and kind man meant.

The Truth

Rakesh, or anyone would never know what the truth may be. It might be that his guesses [and the (wrong) guesses about the character] would be correct upto a pin point, or, it is highly unlikely that Ambuj must have turned so violent, or it may be that we all are in a Matrix, to begin with, with Ambuj in his capsule sleeping several miles away from me.

Ambuj was a simple day to day architecture student, carrying such big T-squares, like Rambo's sword on his back, and eyeing other girls in the professor's class, which by any standard provided him better entertainment than the lectures, which he anyway could not listen to- not due the substandard content delivery, but the content acceptance device malfunctioning.

We all felt we all knew he had a problem in his left ear. He would often nod vigorously if someone came to him, and muttered something feebly about the professor being a dimwit, and he would somehow stretch his audio capabilities to extract the information about the professor's name, and the word synonymous to dimwit, say Idiot. As a next step, he would often shout loud professor's name, and idoit simultaneously, so that the original speaker would wish somehow a bush would grow and he could hide himself there, when the prof would turn back and see Ambuj still trying to make out the correct meaning from these two words. Rakesh always sensed something was wrong in that part of Ambuj's brain where he had no circuitry developed dedicated to audio functions. He narrated it to me once- You know what happened! Ambuj kept his mobile facedown, and was chatting with me, and suddenly a truck honked somewhere far off, and he jumped and grabbed his phone shouting "wait! my cell is ringing!".

Recently, Ambuj had been trying to increase his optical power from 5 to 6 so that he could undergo some "Leejig" operation.

Having established the premises of my experiment, I decided once, on an Architectural Tour, in december, that I would try to test his logical skills as well, in my very subtle way, and this story revolves around that pivot.

That fateful day, we all went to study the design of Rajmahal theatre in Jaipur, and it was a grand theatre, with stairs running from both the sides, and every inch squared of the floor carpetted (i profess, i do not remember more than this about the architectural details there). The movie which we were seeing [so as to understand the architecture better] was a typical bad indian flick. Ambuj was sitting on the right side of me, paying his every bit of attention to the dramatic sequences unfolding, that hero was ailing from cancer, with his doctor being misinterpreted as his wife by the heroine. On my left side was sitting a junior of mine, let's call him Ramesh for name's sake. Sitting between these two guys, I was forced to enjoy the movie though I had undergone the torture the last week in Chandigarh's Piccadelli Theatre.

Out of blue, Ramesh passed a drawing book, which contained the horrible sketches Ambuj had, and asked me to pass it to Ambuj. This was a perfect opportunity to administer the experiment, with Ambuj as a lab chimpanzee, and observe how Ambuj would react, given that he was engrossed in some extravagant flow of emotions, with his left (faulty) microphone towards me. So, I told him to pass the notebook to Ambuj, deliberately using his own name, than simply shoving that notebook in his lap.

Usually, animals have a sense of self, which in some cases they assosiate it partially with their names, I guess this might be a reason, why people respond when we call their names, but as infants, we were never formally told what our names were, we just started to follow it somehow.

With all his remaining faculties channelised towards the silver screen, Ambuj took his own drawing book, and passed it on to his right, without any instructions, and the notebook kept on travelling till the far end, where Hasita noticed that it was Ambuj, her apparent suitor, whom she ignored, was the owner of his notebook. With Hasita's voice calling his name, Ambuj suddenly woke up from his trance, where may be he was the hero, going for the sacrifice for the country. He quickly realised his mistake, and shouted at me- why didn't you pass it to me? I replied- I passed it to you, with instructions to pass it on to yourself, why didn't you pay attention to me? In case you want to talk, talk to Ramesh. Now, finding a good reason, Ambuj almost verbally pounced on Ramesh, calling his names, and how he hailed from one of the worst places in Bihar, and what else can he do by bringing all the guns he had in his house, which his grand fathers used. Ramesh was quick to return the sentiments. Having no such history, he claimed that he knew how to make bombs and how he wouldn't hesitate to drop one on Ambuj's head, and given a chance, would certainly drop one on his native country.

With these two Biharis sitting besides me, flexing their muscles, I was having my own share of fun imagining the not- so- braveheart, thickly bespectacled Ambuj, fighting Ramesh, firing guns as big as him, and rusted to the core, with their wooden butts hollowed by termites, and Ramesh, with his pallid self hurling a granade, with swearings mutually returned. All of a sudden, with a tight slap, i came back to the reality.

Ambuj, in the semi- darkness, tried to hit his perpetrator who was keeping him from watching the film, and ended up slapping me. From a third person view, it was a mislanded slap, sending shivers to Ramesh, who found it worthwhile to flee from the scene.

It was not a long day afterwards: Rakesh suspects that it was another of my mischieveous plans to frame a poor harmless soul, like I did to butterflies, squirrels and other dogs and bitches whom I would lure with a bread and then shoo them away to derive a sadist pleasure. Another guy Swapnil, who all the way was sitting in the room, embellishing the whole scene with his guitar, and hiss- chik hiss- chik sound of drumming, as he produced from his mouth, made a mystery out of it, about whether Ambuj slapped me, as I claimed, or not, with his supposition that I was barking up the wrong tree. I spent the whole night shouting, swearing and fighting with Ambuj, and he, crouching in a corner, smiling obnoxiously.

Post Script: Recently while going to Tirupati temples, Ambuj accepted that he slapped me, as if it made some difference to me. But he was soon to deny of any such thing in the return journey. It was Rakesh's younger sister Alka, whose justification I'd find worth mentioning: "I guess he was going to the almighty, so he didn't want to lie, but while returning, he was in his own good harmless self again!".

Disclaimer: Every soul mentioned here is a figment of imagination of the semi- lunatic author. Even if they are real, it is highly doubtful, like the slap which the author received.

Falsifying Murphy's Law

"Anything that can possibly go wrong, does." -- Murphy's Law

Murphy's Law was not propounded by Murphy, it was Jack Sack who did it. Murphy just explained that in more than so many words. I was informed of this trivia about this law by one of my friends, in a book shop. He was complaining how the corporate world followed the Murphy's Law, one corollary of which he deduced was "whatever you don't know, will go bad at the right time". Like, he started telling me about a legacy circuitry block connected to a buck converter, and how it was drawing a huge current, which was affecting the Oscillatory circuit. "I didn't know anything about this circuitry, and you know, it was that one which went wrong, and i had to go around changing everything and then i realised it was this black box circuit which was the main villain" he explained the whole thing to me. Though i hadn't designed or studied about the buck converter, i realised it wasn't the circuit which is problematic, it was the superstition. Murphy's Law is as good as superstition, i hold this opinion. Let us try to understand the problem statement first, and then we can solve it by the root. Problem Statement: Anything that can possibly go wrong, does. What is wrong with this statement is that it is right! Everything human made is destructible, so everything is liable to go wrong. Consider the opposite statement "Anything which can never go wrong, works always fine", which is also true. How is it that the inverse statement is so important to us? Because it is imperical that whenever we try to open the bolt, we accidentally tighten it. This leads us to a very good mathematical question: "Given two ways A and B to move, what is the probability that we choose A?" and the engineering guys will pat give the answer "50% or 0.5". The answer means that if we randomly, without using our intelligence, choose one path, for a huge number of times, say 1 gogol times, then 50% of the times it would be path A, and rest of the times, it would be path B.

Two things are important here. One that human brain tends towards idiocy when left to itself (that after 3 million years of evolution) and thus without thinking, it can be 50% accurate. The second thing is- there is an agent who performs the task. if there is no one to walk, then no path is taken! Returning back to the bolt- opening- problem, if the agent (or the opener or the mechanic) does not notice the direction of the thread (idiot agent- so he introduces probabilistic model into otherwise a simple work issue), he can screw the bolt in any direction as his sweet will. Now if he twists the bolt in the opposite direction, the thread gets cut, and the machine breaks. Murphy's law is in action, he might say. But what about the other half of the probability? No one would notice anything wrong, because the machine is working all right. So Murphy's Law is defied half of the times which no one pays attention to, they only venerate murphy for his extraordinarily annoying law when things break, and count it as a 100%, which i find is injustice towards their knowledge of Probability. Let us take another example of Murphy's Law in action: The zip or chain or Handle of the luggage breaks whenever you are on journey. True, but how would it break if the suitcase is kept in some corner of your home? So naturally, it will break only when some agent works on it, and that happens only during journeys. Then why only during journeys, and why not when we are leaving or coming back, does the handles break? Again probability comes to the rescue. The total time of the journey is too long and hectic, if compared with the time spent leaving the home or coming back, so no one remembers Murphy uncle before the journey starts or it concludes. Having thought so much, the Donkey told his friend "Dude, i can not exemplify in terms of circuits, as i'm not trained in it, But since i'm adept at coding, i'll tell you my experience. Whenever I'm given a legacy code, i make sure there are no black box areas, so that i know what every line of the code is doing. Since i'm very clear in my working, so nothing goes wrong where it wasn't expected to, because i know where it will go wrong".

The Donkey never believed in Murphy and his pessimistic foolish law, and nor in probability, but he chose probability as a tool to defeat a bigger idiot, the Murphy's Law.

Pressing need

In the jungles of gangatic planes lived a donkey, who was quite happy to have landed a job under a washerman's kind guidance. The job however required him to be posted to some jungle down south where there was no river, and the place was all new to him. He was new to the place and in his leisure, he would roll on the grass and wonder all sorts of philosophical things. Some of the things would be strange, while some would be crazy, and between these thoughts, a thought would lurk that he was growing older every passing day. There was nothing new in getting older, even the washerman too was growing older, and so was every other soul- no one grew younger in this world (except the curious case of Benjamin "Braid Pitt" Button). So our hero, the Donkey, realised that as the world grew older, the tend to rely more on the memories they accumulate, which is also known as memory, and less of their common sense.
This world was different from what he had left behind. There, everyone would be too happy to help him, and everything seemed like Alice in Wonderland, but here his solitude seemed to grow more on him. A respite was that he had to do all the chores of den by himself. This would take up some lonely time of his and he would be saved from the dreaded silence of his den. It could also be the hormones at the nubile age which made him feel that illusive silence, may be there was no silence at all!
This tomcat lived next him, and they knew each other from his previous life, when he was chased in the same jungle by a dog, and successfully eluded him, just to be squashed by the passing elephant who could not see it. These old buddies would sit somewhere at the end of the day, on a cliff, seeing the red ball going down, and the tomcat would often tell how the world treat the jennies. "It is either about the brains, or the beauty- nothing about memory. Do you think people would have acknowledged an elephant, had he got no size?". The idea was quite fascinating. People would see the jennies who lived next door admiringly, and donkey would think they were no better than his goldfish, which got fed and reared because it was beautiful. In those circumstances, donkey would wonder what good would the brain be, if there were less of memory? Could everything in this world be derived out of it, even most of the things which memory did?
This was the first office day, and Donkey had finished washing his allotted clothes, and the question was- how to get the clothes pressed, which he never had to do back in the jungles of Kgp? He wasn't interested in ironing them. It was too much of a work for his languid self. He remembered that there was a small bazaar behind his dwelling, where he could probably find a press wala. So hopeful that he would be saved from a lot of work, the donkey took his clothes, and started off to the bazaar. There he could find someone to outsource this work to.
In the bazaar, he found one of the shops was decorated with pitchers of egg plants. The egg plants were donkey's staple diet, so he felt a bit inclined to outsource the work to that animal, who was sitting there, ironing a mountain of clothes. That animal gave him an appointment of next day to take the ironed clothes. The donkey went away happily, wagging his tail.
Donkey forgot he had to collect the clothes, and he remembered it after a week. The deadline was not an issue, so he went to the eggplant shop and saw a Tasmanian Devil sitting there. Well, he didn't remember which animal he talked to last week, and as if it bothered him! He was more interested in the egg plants than the Tasmanian Devil.
Today the Tasmanian Devil looked younger. Donkey cleared his throat and reminded the young devil that he needed the clothes, and it was urgent. The devil junior sweeped his eyes and saw this irritating creature who just appeared from nowhere and was demanding his clothes back. The li'l devil tried to search for his clothes but couldn't find it. However, it was delaying his work. So he said, "You go today, bring tomorrow 5 morning". Donkey tried to explain him, "i don't bring clothes, you bring my clothes!". Devil - "my daddy bring tomorrow 5, you too bring tomorrow 5 morning, daddy give you clothes".
"Ah, so he wants to keep my clothes for another day! must have given those clothes on rent", thought donkey. He banged his hooves on the table and demanded that his clothes be given to him now.
"Ayyo! Sir, bring tomorrow, daddy too bring tomorrow, go now!".
"But i have a pressing need, i want those clothes now!!"
"Go away sir! bring tomorrow, daddy bring tomorrow also.. GO, sir!"
Donkey left the shop feeling humiliated.
Next morning, he came at 8 to the shop. He found that Daddy Devil was at the shop. the same question, and the same reply!
Suddenly the Tasmanian Devil Senior said, "there is another shop who does the ironing job, is it possible that you might have given your clothes there?"
Donkey was confused. He looked at those egg plants. They looked beautiful. Tasmanian Devil said "I think you should ask Javelina, the owner of the shop."
Donkey went to the shop and when the Javelina saw him, he readily recognised the bundle of clothes lying neatly creased in a corner.
It was then the donkey noticed, that shop too had egg plants decorated!

Story of Inventions: Part Rest of n

The Invention of Orkut

Mr. Orkut Buyyukokten, the inventor is standing in front of the neanderthal audience, explaining on the multimedia projector, what is the idea behind his new site, they all are sitting around campfire, with a boar being barbequed.
Orkut: This is a new Website.
Ramu, The thick and pessimist co-worker: What does it do?
Orkut: It will help socialise people who have otherwise problems approaching others to talk.
Ramu: You mean approaching girls, right!
Orkut: I hate this planet. People almost always relate anything with girls! NO!!
Ramu: then what would be the use?
Orkut: People will make friends and send scraps to each other
Ramu: what is a scrap?
Orkut: A scrap is a message
Ramu: Is it? I thought mails were good enough!
Orkut: Look o naive Ramu! this thing is faster than mails, and you would never know who scrapped you until you open the orkut page, otherwise emails bug you in your messenger, as if it were the sole thing!
Ramu: then why is it that it's public?
Orkut: Dear Ramu, it's not! If you want, no one can see the scrap. It's totally upon you to decide who sees what!
Ramu: Oh lord Orkut! Pray explain then if people will keep everything private then how the hell would anyone socialise?
Orkut: erm... (takes a glass of water and gulps some)
Ramu:Another thing o great one! Are we copying from Facebook? It has a chat, we have a chat, it is a social networking site, we are the same, it has privacy features, we too have introduced it, like it's mail, we too have a mail, and same with applications as well...
Orkut: O innocent Ramu, we are not copying facebook, it's just a coincidence that we both share the same ideas! Look i've just now completed the module for chat which would enable various friends to chat, even if you didn't want them in your friends' list. see! (shows him a demo of this)
Ramu is awestruck. It's great, and also never demands for doughnuts!
Ramu: O noble one! I totally understood that Orkut is an original and a holy attempt to bind the world in a human chain, and that facebook is a cheap imitation! I bow before thou.

Some 5 milennia later, orkut became a great sensation in India, and most of the studious IIT guys can be found learning important stuff from it, collecting the pics of "babes" of their campus, in their computer labs.

noname.cpp - part 2 of 2: To C it from a diffrent view

6 years have passed since the happiness lasted, sans the C language. I don't miss C at all, to think of it, C is not needed in what I do- the language is excruciating, I believe.

After 6 years, i was supposed to be in MS, but due to some funny reason, i was not, in fact, i was neither in MS, nor out of it, so I was made the TA in Programming and Data Structure (PDS) course. I had a small group of students to deal with, their lab tests, answer scripts and all the routine things.

She was a silent girl in the class, so i did not pay much attention to what she had to say about C. The girl never complained anything about the marks, nor about the assignment, as I used to be in my first year- aloof.

Time: 1500 Hrs

The end sems were nearing and in the regular lab, i was resolving someone's doubt, when i saw she raised her hand to ask some question. I saw the professor go to her..... The professor should know about how his subjects are doing.

Time: 1530 Hrs

The prof is still explaining things to her, and she is nodding her head, as if it were connected to her body by spring. I am attending this guy who is having trouble understanding the question

Time: 1600 Hrs:

I'm solving this girl's problem who is debating with me about something which she felt was correct. The professor is now himself coding, and the girl seems to be taking an active interest (the way she was looking at the monitor, trying to read the broken english of C, with all the unexpected brackets and semi- colon, which make it a bestial language, was too good).

Time: 1630 Hrs:

I was done solving the doubts, and was hearing to stories of a TA, when this prof came from behind the pillar. "Nimesh!", he called me. "She doesn't know anything about C!", said the prof in a very worried tone, as if it was he who had to give the exam! The prof was a very good man, worried about the well being of this soul... I replied "Yes Sir! why, i'd talk to her right now." I went to her. "You!" I pointed my finger to her, standing in front of her desk, looking sharply into her eyes, "You will meet me after class." She looked at me, with a fright -mixed-with-laid back- look, said "Yes sir!". After the class,i said to her "I'm noticing that your performance is consistently poor, and unless you put in some hard labor, you'd be in a soup. What do you have to say about it? Koi load to nahin hai? (translates to: any problems with this subject?)" She said in the same tone "No Sir!". "So you'd be coming to my lab to study till your end sems, is it all right?" I asked in an authoritative tone, and she could not refuse.

The week coming was going to be nothing short of a challenge to me, confronting C, the hidden fear. This girl turned up the next day, with one of her classmates, as she too was having a lot of problems in the same. So i started with them, a baby step at a time- C made easy by a dummy.

The week was nothing short of a test for me- a lots of stories about C, a solid punch for making silly errors, rewarding for a good thinking and finally, understanding the mind of a student, which i were a few months back. I realised teaching was not just about delivering the knowledge, it was also about making the whole subject interesting and leaving good impression on young minds, so rather than developing an aversion to the subject for the rest of their lives, they enjoy the experience. I was trying my level best to cock up new stories about C to explain the fundamentals in a simple, friendly and a dignified way. Time passed, and with the end of a week, both of them caught up to the essence of C. By the end of second week, i could teach them advanced topics in data structures.

Shilpa, though could not turn up for the last 2 days, which i learnt was because she had to mug up mechanics the last night before the Mech end sem! However, since the basic of C was already covered, and advanced topics could be derived from there, so i didn't have to worry about her. The other girl Shalu continued till the end sems.

In the end sems, i saw the grade sheets, Shalu had secured an A while Shilpa had secured a D, still better than me, who secured a mere P (a just passed grade), saving my tail with it.

It is how i encountered my fear for C, and returned the gift Raka once gave me, and my prof PK enriched with his inputs. I believe, we must return twice of whatever good we got to the needy, this is the best way to repay it, and i guess i did it.

noname.cpp - part 1 of 2

Feels like an era has passed, and it has, when i have sesqui-tupled in age. It's a story when i was a lot younger, dumber, naive and a fresher. I was in first year, enrolled after a grueling session of studies and was in no mood to study any further. Just that I didn't get the branch and insti of my choice was enough an alibi to forgo classes... And a few words like "The subject is too boring to follow" were put in my mouth (yes, i still blame my friends for that, because i don't want to take the full load of charges...).

The subject was Introduction to Programming and Data Structures, and i was highly uninterested with the course the course was taking.
After missing a lot of classes this way, and getting some greater-than-zero single digit number (i guess it was the One, what else could i achieve with that infinitesimal knowledge about C, the computer language), i realised that a proxy attendance could be put so that i did not have to disturb my royal sleep to attend the classes. For this noble purpose, i asked Aman, the chinki, to sign the attendance sheet ma'm passed in class. He was a simple guy and it wasn't difficult for me to convince him for this.

One golden afternoon, when i was brushing my teeth and strolling in my wing, E- top, Aman came, and he looked flustered. I bid a "allo" to him, with the brush and froth filled in my mouth, and a dab overflowing from the side. I sucked it back inside with the help of tooth brush and asked him "How was the class?". "Ma'm took the attendance today!" he said, wiping sweat from his forehead, his face, red- "and i put up a sign on your behalf."
"Good boy!"
"... And then ma'm announced- There are some boys who are not regular in the classes, take for example , this guy Nimesh Priyodit, where is he- is he present today??". I was shocked with the sudden celebrity status i had recieved in the class, "Then?"

"To hell with your attendance, I had to stand up to cover you!" He said, " and the whole of the class was laughing their heads off that chinki is being thrashed by ma'm, and she was thinking she was shouting at Nimesh Priyodit all this while!!"
"What would have i done if she ever asked me for my ID?"
"You'd have simply told her that you didn't have it with you, what else!" I replied.

With the days passing in such mundane manner, came the night before end- sem. The night of survival, and the night of ultimate realisation that i should have studied for the semester than playing age of empires all day (such realisations then kept on coming twice a semester, one before mid- sems and another before end- sems). The survival instinct was down and i was lazing off in the bed, and told my best friend Raka- man "I'm thinking about the summer quarter in C". The summer quarter is sort of atonement and purification to the cursed souls who failed to perform in their subjects in the Institute of Indian Technology and had to spend their valuable summer in the nearby Hijli jail facing the torture of coal tar melting heat, and boring lectures of the wise ones.
"Why?"
"I dunno anything about C, just the declarations of the variables and the for loop. How would i ever pass this exam with this much knowledge!".
I was thinking of Swapnil, who had the habit of romanticising anything, and i never held him in high regards, and who had come to me earlier that day to offer me combined studies. Had i studied with him, i would have gained at least a small part of wisdom, but it was too late now.

Raka- man said, intervening my repenting train of thought- "Why would you ever fail! Let me teach you a few basics." And that night, starting from 2 O' clock, he kept on reciting C like Sunder Kand (from Ramayana) encompassing all the trees, forests, lists, linked lists, and whatever enigmas i felt about computer science. I kept on asking him about some terms i had gathered from the discussions from my wise neighbour Vamsi, who had me confused till now, and tonight i was being enlightened about the hidden meanings of those words. Prophecies like how a program would not give the desired result started dawning upon me, and by 4 O' clock, the whole show was over.

The exam started at 9 that day, i was not humming a song, for a change, and was attempting some question which i felt was at my level. It was a 5 mark question and i was excitedly solving it. I kept on encountering questions, in a random manner, and the three hours passed by. The only question i could not do was tree traversal, which Raka- man did not teach me,but i had no grudges with him.
I returned to my wing, and found people discussing the paper. When they saw me, they asked how much did i do, i sat there calculating, and i found I did 48 marks out of 50, which was the highest in the wing! They gasped when they heard. That afternoon was spent in critically checking my solutions and certifying them to be all correct.

Bottomline: I got a just pass grade- P in the course of Programming and Data Structures. I thanked Raka- man for his extensive help and asked God never to encounter this language C in my whole life.
And God gave me a lease of life, and I lived happily ever after...
... for a period of 6 years.

(To be continued)

The Thakurian Holiday

It is the story of 12th when Mr. R K Thakur used to teach us Thakurian physics for CBSE (central bored of second ejucation). There was this habit of his to experiment with the truth that we all were aspiring for IIT JEE and that he thought he had a cure for this epidemic which seemed to affect the bio guys too (just that commerce guys could not understand the JEE concept was the only relieving factor for him). He used to coin "new new" terms every week or when he pleased (whichever was earlier). His tall frame would enter the class and then look at the guys inquisitively (I guess he looked for some physics genius amongst us, but he forgot he passed 5 yrs ago). Then he would start his mahabharat.

Similarly that day too, he coined a bright new Idea "Dekhiye, is saturday ko class hoga, physics chemistry maths. sabko aana hai". Some lesser mortal asked from the back bench "Lekin Sir, saturday to chhutti hai!". Mr. Thakur stared at him as if he would barbecue that poor soul (or it could be that Thakur secretly compared himself with Amitabh because of certain skeletal similarities and was in angry baby mode). However, that shady creature went back into shades when he saw the fierce expression.

Saturday came and went and i did not show up, like Friday.

When i reappeared on Monday, Mr. Thakur was taking attendance. "Was you parjent on Saturday?" he shot a student. The poor guy was absent. "Yahan aayiye aur khade rahiye" he pointed out to a blackboard. The guy stood there, smiling, for soon others were to follow his fate. The Guys, who had a note from their parents (stating why they were absent) were relieved and the guys who were absconding were standing, with their faces beaming like martyrs waiting for their turn into the gas chamber, and i was in that group (it was a large group, about a third of the class was in that elite category).

Mr. Thakur had made a point to teach the group a good lesson. He took us to the Gas (read Vice principal's) chamber. He said, pointing to us "ye log diary likha ke nahin aaye hain madam! dekhiye in log ko!! Aur ye (pointing at me) to do din nahin aaye the, diary bhi nahin laye hain aaj!!! in logon ko chhodiyega mat! class mein ghusne mat dijiyega". And Mr. Thakur returned into his harem to teach new antics of Thakurian physics.

The Vice Principal was a wizened old lady, Mrs. Kar. After dealing with a few boring cases, took a break and called me up "Why did you not get a note for absence?" she asked me (it was her nth time in the day). "Because madam, sir said that if you are absent for a single day, then you need not bring any excuses, and Saturday was not an official class, technically speaking", I shot back. "And why did not you bring your diary?" she croaked. Perhaps she wanted to write my autobiography for such a repartee, and she was missing it badly. "because it is torn and if i bring it, the pages will fly all over", a bad excuse, but better than saying that i had lost that vestigial thing. She said "okay, like others, go and do not come back today in the class"

For an instance, i was sad that I was punished, but soon all my shame was displaced (and it precipitated instantly) by the joy of not being the part of Torture of Thakurian physics (where we were taught how the adiabatic processes had "Expansion at constant volume"). Following that we had double lecture of Mr. KK Sharma who taught us maths from a very original perspective (how to complicate a problem, and then solving it is an art i learnt there, and later realised that it helped people write Comic strips like Dilbert). Unable to contain the joy to myself, i almost ran from the vice principal's office,and shouting "yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee", i ran past my class. I am sure they might have noticed the doppler effect that how various frequencies change their identity when one is uncontrollable and happy.

To cheer other friends, i and some guys started playing handball, and seeing us merry and gay, the other people from the not secret brotherhood started playing table tennis and other sports. We were having fun, and it was doubled seeing Mr. Thakur and his follower students watching us longingly, but you can not have all the fun...

... And we can not have all the fun all the time. Mr. Thakur must have realised that we were too happy, because then he came to us merrymen and asked us to rejoin the class, as we saw Mr. Sharma get into the class. We didn't want to, but he was unrelenting. We even said that we wanted to get punished and we accepted that we were wrong in getting absent, so we deserved this punishment, but he seemed to have melted by this attitude of ours and applied some force on us, so that we could do some work in the maths class...

The Movie Show in Patna

I still remember that day when i had gone to Patna, my hometown, to meet my parents. It was then Farhan Akhtar's Don was released and I had planned to give it a try as a timepass. After reaching the institute where mom worked, i realised it was too early to accompany her back to home, as it was just quarter to three post meridian. So i was wondering what to do, when it struck me that if i somehow managed a rickshaw, i could go to a nearby hall to watch the movie, which looked promising, and anyways, mom could go back by herself if i was late enough. Having explained this to my conscience, i got a rickshaw and reached there.

Veena movie theatre is a busy area, a hub of all second-hand-book-lover's paradise, movie fanatics like me and the rest of the disorder was caused by the autorickshaws who were maneuvering around to trap more passengers from the exodus of the show which was just over.

Today was the first day of Don and it seemed to be going houseful with very big crowd in front of the gate. It is unnatural for the people here to be disciplined enough to form a queue (and respect the one which is formed), but this crowd was way too big. Almost when i paid the rickshaw, i turned to see the crowd move away and a person emerging from it, badly bruised. As soon as he emerged, he started shouting "10 wala 40 mein" (meaning tickets worth 10 in 40 now). He was peddling the tickets at a higher rate, he was a blackey. I reached him, out of sheer sympathy that he had to do this thing even after being severely beaten by the crowd.

After some 5 minutes of aggressive bargaining, he sold me the tickets in 20 only. I was happy to buy the tickets at a price double the actual. I read once
"The glass is half empty, it could be said that it is half full too."
"Two people look out of window, one sees the mud, the other sees the stars"
Combining these two sentences, i was prilog-ically happy that i got the tickets at half the price, who cared if it was actually double the price.

As soon as i started scrutinising the tickets, i could see that beaten shadow move away from me as if he was slipping by. I smelled something fishy in his behaviour, stopped my scrutiny and shouted "oye ruk!" and he started running away from me. I lunged after him and so did the crowd which had again gathered to bash him up.

Left to the crowd to bash him up, i was again scrutinising the whole thing again, and found that the date was wrong, 26th it was. I was happy to see him thrashed for his misdeed, my heart felt pure and pious now. I asked someone standing beside me the date, and he said 26th.

As if i was thrown back to the ground from the air, i felt pain and pity for the poor soul who was being bashed.

To nihilate that emotion, i silently entered into the hall to watch Don.

The Story of Inventions: part 3 of n: The Invention of Jewellery

Fantasy till now:
Ramu was in a dilemma, one was external- the rival tribes were always perpetrating his people, killing the female population as they were vulnerable and easily lured into an ambush, and his strategy fell flat on ground. The other problem was internal. It was something related to human nature of satan worshipping...

Idle brain is a devil's symposium, wise men said in the tribe, and ramu believed it. The way the women were jealous and kept on trying to slander each other to get his favour irritated him. He wanted to come home and relax after running before cattle everyday. And what he got was complaints that how someone wanted to split the milk which someone kept for him, and this definitely pointed that someone wanted to slander the impression. Ramu was almost program to get alarmed by the sign of danger and get started in the fighting mode. But the other party did not want him to take actions, instead, she expected him to sit and listen to her, which in his dictionary, was, at best, boring, if said politely.

Ramu noticed that he did not get the daily dose with the dinner when he came back, he noticed that the girl was too busy playing with the "medal". He called her Mau, and his Mau was busy looking at the "necklace" which he gave her yesternight.

For a man who was a free boy years ago, when he used to jump on elephants and play with other primates, thinking that they were kids of his kind, it was suddenly a vacuum. Ramu did not get his food, the deer was barbecued today, and it was to be served with honey, but Mau was in some other world.

Looking at the opportunity, he was served by Kau, the female humanoid, who had a brush with Mau yesterday. Kau in a complaining tone said Mau has been busy all day showing it to us, and madam hence excused herself for not doing any chore. I pitied that your son was playing in the afternoon sun, so i made him sleep, though he wanted to jump with your canine.

It was followed by more of some redundant issues like motherhood, mother-in-law's-hood, and neighbourhood, which sounded silly, because it was something else going in Ramu's mind. If Mau could be busy with the "thing" all day, so could be all of the ladies. now that he knew the source of such stones, so he had some special knowledge which he could use that to his own benefit.

Ramu then almost made it his rule that whenever he was pleased with some female animal, he would give her an ore to ornate herself, while the same ore was melted and used by his gang to counter the invading tribes. The days were passing by and Ramu was happily living. The only problem was for his neighbours and other males who did not have that "thing". They were having a tough time explaining their wives and partners that they really did not know about what "thing" was it.

The bolt struck Ramu when someone found a small nugget which shone brilliantly and it was more yellow and had a peculiar lustre, and now he was left with demanding wives who were busy comparing their weighty ores with that small nugget. The weapon which he tried to use for his peace turned out to be a hornet's nest which he had stirred.

Ramu could foresee the future: The women then, as opposed to their vocal tendency, decided to call that thing as ornament. With this word the world progressed into an age which had weapons of mass distraction, which could first attract some of the earthlings and then, those some earthlings could kill their partners for it, just like orkut.

Story of Inventions: Part 2 of n: The invention of Metal Weapons

Ramu, the Ramapithican beast had built a slinger for his little boy, who was busy shooting birds and squirrels with it.

This had given Ramu to think how to tackle the wifey animal which had suddenly come into existence. It was a warrior tribe of his- they were nomadic people, as they did not know that land had some better use of cultivation. In that era, stone arms were the panache, and they were in demand, and there was no country which could sell such weapons of mass destruction, it was all about the tribe. Ramu being the head of the tribe had all the worries of the world, as the rival tribes had been following his tribe for over a month now. Last time they fought, his tribe had to incur heavy losses of men and women's lives and cattle etcetera.

It wasn't this always, these primordial men were fighting and they had a good fight to their heart's content, and then, females of the tribe thought highly of those battles, so they too, out of sheer curiosity decided to join their comerades in the skirmishes to have a sense of contentment.

However, there was a blunder in this as Ramu noticed that more women got killed and injured in this battle of resources. It was Ramu's concern because if the women were hurt, his tribe would soon vanish. Though they barbecued the boar perfectly and that they reared the child wonderfully, apart from boosting the morales of the soldiers but they were weak in physical strength.

Moreso, there was another weakness of theirs, they talked a lot, and they could not continue with this silent gory business, and started chatting about the family and other worldly matters with their rival counterparts during the encounter, and then the males of the opposite army would hunt them down. It was a ploy to divert them, and they were succeeding at it. Ramu wondered if he could stop this chain. He tried to use women as an added force and now they were proving to be a bad strategy, as they did not enjoy fighting much, whatever be their level of attraction to glory and fame it brought. They simply did not gel into the picture.

It was a novel solution which once struck him while loitering in the meadows. It was a leisure hour and the cattle were grazing nearby, so Ramu had lots of time to kill. While roaming, he somehow came across a stone which had some stripes- colourful stripes across it. Ramu had never seen any such object in his life. So he took it and kept it with him. He showed it to one of the females of his group, who had taken his shelter as he was the ruler, and she was the most loved by him. After seeing that stone, she wished to keep it, and Ramu as usual gifted it to her. She was happy and kept it with her always.

This new and small discovery made waves in the tribe, as the maid went around showing this unique thing to her other friends who did not own this token of love of Ramu. This made other ladies of the group a bit green. It was not the stone or the love, it was the ego which pinched. One day, after the boar hunt, Ramu ordered some water and this lady went inside, keeping the stone nearby. One of the ladies saw her chance and slipped the stone to some crack of a nearby tree. The stone was lost. In the night, during the barbecue, the thief threw the stone into the fire, and the maid saw her do it, but it was too late! She gasped and flung a stone at her! And that's how started a cat fight. As there was no one at that moment, so it was a secret between these two.

Next day, both of the faces bore the bites and nail marks of fight and the scars told a lot, though they both met the others with a great sunny smile. In the ashes later that day, the girl found something which was as hard as rocks, and it shone the sun like a fireball, as if the sun had concentrated itself in the Red-yellow stone-like object. She showed it to Ramu.

Ramu at once understood the use of it- he now had the metal which was harder than the rocks, it was workable, and could be sharpened later on, and it did not yield easily. He would soon have a war with the rival tribe and make them run for their lives, avenging his recent defeat.

As for the girl, Ramu gave her another stone which she gladly hung around her neck to show off as a medal which she had earned....

(to be continued)