Mehernosh's mother ensured that her son never read a school text book, at least never in full. At best, Mehernosh read every alternate page, the right-hand page- as you stare at a book. The page to the left could never be read as the last few letters of every sentence disappeared into the stitching. The mother's intentions were noble and unquestionable- she wanted the book to remain intact through the school-year and had all of Mehernosh's textbooks nicely bound. His books stood out- with a canvas binding, a thick, hard cover and never in tatters.
But every silver lining has a dark cloud- binding the book meant that it could never be laid down on the table and read normally. The moment you selected a page and laid down Mehernosh's book, it would protest, much like him and simply snap shut with a recoil-spring action! It required counterweights- either your left elbow or the compass-box had to nail down the left page so that you could read the right page. The left pages though, like the dark side of the moon always remained elusive. It's not as if Mehernosh made no effort- at times he held up the left page- at right-angles to the right, bent his head to one side as if he was peering through a pipe and tried hard to read. But it just wasn't easy and probably he gave up. Instead of complaining to Mrs Clare that her son was a "gaddha" (Parsi pronunciation for a donkey!) and couldn't read, his mom could have fixed the issue so easily. It's a case of child abuse to an extent, but more importantly, a case of book-abuse!
Book-abuse is too strong a word; we just want to "customize" the book at times and give it our personal touch. To that effect, the ink pen came handy. To amuse ourselves and break free from the grind of the History class especially after the lunch-break, we drew out our pens and drew... right on the textbook. Certain candidates in the text-book lent themselves to caricature- we picked a Lord Cornwallis here or a Lord Curzon there. Some characters were decorated with a Chaplinesque toothbrush moustache, others with a Chinese version- no moustache at the centre and a few stray whiskers trailing down each side. Figures suddenly grew large side-burns which extended to a copious beard or sported a bulbous Rajasthani turban over English wigs. Icons of the French Revolution resembled our own Panchapakesha Iyer and Varadachari- with prominent caste marks on their foreheads- complete with vibhuti and tilak! The urge was irresistible. The text-book ceased to be the staid, uninspiring tome that it once was. By the end of the year, it came alive- albeit with a new set of pictures- of pirates, bootleggers, drug-peddlers and beggars!
Hell broke loose when Mrs Fernandez forgot her textbook and had to borrow one of the student's books- no one wanted to share the textbook for obvious reasons. When she finally managed to get hold of Sridhar's textbook, she was aghast to see how far his fertile imagination carried him.
Evidently, Shah Jahan had been well provided for- instead of 3 wives, it now read 3000000 wives! "Please omit" was corrected to "please vomit"! "Moral Science" was selectively blackened to "oral Science"! Against the line "Garibaldi married Anita", a string of hearts and arrows decorated the margin.
That line tickled us to no end- Bang in the middle of the Italian Revolution with its grisly details, a line in the textbook apologetically read "Garibaldi married Anita" with no reference whatsoever on Anita's credentials- no lineage, no place of origin, no pompous titles, absolutely nothing. It looked as if Anita could well be a girl next-door or perhaps a maid-servant. In a way, we felt sorry for Anita. Couldn't Anita have found someone better? Why did she have to marry "Garibaldi" who was both "garib" ("poor" in Hindi) and a "baldy" to boot!?
Sridhar had a habit of underlining "key sentences" in the textbook. It perhaps helped him to focus on those lines before the exam. The problem with underlining lines in a textbook was that after a point, the distinction between important and unimportant details got completely blurred. Sridhar in his over-enthusiasm had taken a ruler and pen and scrawled a line below every sentence in the entire textbook! Mrs Fernandez, already turning a shade of red and purple as she leafed through the book with its grotesque figures, found it impossible to read the sentences. The strain was a bit too much for her.
Library books had a personality of their own. Someone would have a treasure-hunt organized to enthuse the reader and lift his sagging spirits. Page 7 would have the following line written in a flowing hand on the top margin- "Turn to page 18". Page 18 would promptly say, "Go to page 117". The trail had to be pursued and we turned the pages in feverish excitement. Page 117 sure had a message- "Go to page 100". Page 100 led to 256, 256 to 971, 971 to 301..... We leafed through the whole book to find the culmination... written in bold- "You idiot! Don't you have anything better to do!?"
A few enterprising blokes would complicate the contest by sending us on a wild goose chase- we were to be trapped in an eternal loop! Page 971 would say "Now, go to page 18". After an hour, we finally realized the futility of the exercise as the page numbers became increasingly familiar and repetitive!
A rookie had read the first chapter of a Wodehouse novel rather meticulously at the University of Roorkee library. He had taken the trouble to underline each word that he did not understand and had the meanings written at the top. It was laborious work. "chum"-> "friend", "capital"-> "mark of exclamation", "sow"-> "female pig"... It went on and on. Abruptly, it ended after the first chapter. Probably, the reader gave up or had improved his English to the extent that he didn't need the dictionary any more. A more advanced reader expressed his contempt for the novice at the end of the first chapter rather openly- "Moron! If you don't know the meanings of so many words, you bloody well shouldn't be reading this book!!"
The worst book-abuser surely was that scoundrel who borrowed books from the Abbas Library, Mumbai. With great interest, we followed Hercule Poirot as he systematically dissected the case. Just when he was about to reveal the assassin with his customary flair, the book came to a frustrating, abrupt end. The most important page was missing. In its place, was the handwritten message- "Serves you right!". Those were times when the best of us felt like wringing the rascal's neck!
"I don't want this book brought inside the house. Leave it in the passage and pick it up when you go to school tomorrow!" my mother screamed. The context was simple. I had casually mentioned that the teacher had used some saliva to turn the pages of my notebook as she corrected the homework!
That was simply not done. "Isn't the book Saraswati?" mother began, disgust writ on her face. "That you know and I know, but does the teacher know? Does Saraswati care?" I protested. Till a moment ago, everyone at home treated me and my notebook just fine. Suddenly, it became an object of revulsion- to be picked up gingerly, with outstretched arm, between the thumb and the forefinger with all the pages flailing over... as though a dead rat picked by its tail!! My sister felt that some pages were still moist and exuded an offensive smell and had to be dried in the veranda! How could she be so sure? It's not as if someone slobbered the book! It appeared an easy way to torment my sis... I just had to stalk her from room to room, with the simple threat to touch her with the book!
Anyway, I had the final say- "Forget it! I am not going to take a head-bath to cleanse myself and in the process, come down with a bout of pneumonia now.....just for this notebook! And how do you think I am going to convey this point to my teacher- not to use a little lick to flick the pages of my book? Can I extend a piece of moistened sponge ...when she starts correcting my notebook!!? Be reasonable! This book is going to stay and that's it!"
But every silver lining has a dark cloud- binding the book meant that it could never be laid down on the table and read normally. The moment you selected a page and laid down Mehernosh's book, it would protest, much like him and simply snap shut with a recoil-spring action! It required counterweights- either your left elbow or the compass-box had to nail down the left page so that you could read the right page. The left pages though, like the dark side of the moon always remained elusive. It's not as if Mehernosh made no effort- at times he held up the left page- at right-angles to the right, bent his head to one side as if he was peering through a pipe and tried hard to read. But it just wasn't easy and probably he gave up. Instead of complaining to Mrs Clare that her son was a "gaddha" (Parsi pronunciation for a donkey!) and couldn't read, his mom could have fixed the issue so easily. It's a case of child abuse to an extent, but more importantly, a case of book-abuse!
Book-abuse is too strong a word; we just want to "customize" the book at times and give it our personal touch. To that effect, the ink pen came handy. To amuse ourselves and break free from the grind of the History class especially after the lunch-break, we drew out our pens and drew... right on the textbook. Certain candidates in the text-book lent themselves to caricature- we picked a Lord Cornwallis here or a Lord Curzon there. Some characters were decorated with a Chaplinesque toothbrush moustache, others with a Chinese version- no moustache at the centre and a few stray whiskers trailing down each side. Figures suddenly grew large side-burns which extended to a copious beard or sported a bulbous Rajasthani turban over English wigs. Icons of the French Revolution resembled our own Panchapakesha Iyer and Varadachari- with prominent caste marks on their foreheads- complete with vibhuti and tilak! The urge was irresistible. The text-book ceased to be the staid, uninspiring tome that it once was. By the end of the year, it came alive- albeit with a new set of pictures- of pirates, bootleggers, drug-peddlers and beggars!
Hell broke loose when Mrs Fernandez forgot her textbook and had to borrow one of the student's books- no one wanted to share the textbook for obvious reasons. When she finally managed to get hold of Sridhar's textbook, she was aghast to see how far his fertile imagination carried him.
Evidently, Shah Jahan had been well provided for- instead of 3 wives, it now read 3000000 wives! "Please omit" was corrected to "please vomit"! "Moral Science" was selectively blackened to "oral Science"! Against the line "Garibaldi married Anita", a string of hearts and arrows decorated the margin.
That line tickled us to no end- Bang in the middle of the Italian Revolution with its grisly details, a line in the textbook apologetically read "Garibaldi married Anita" with no reference whatsoever on Anita's credentials- no lineage, no place of origin, no pompous titles, absolutely nothing. It looked as if Anita could well be a girl next-door or perhaps a maid-servant. In a way, we felt sorry for Anita. Couldn't Anita have found someone better? Why did she have to marry "Garibaldi" who was both "garib" ("poor" in Hindi) and a "baldy" to boot!?
Sridhar had a habit of underlining "key sentences" in the textbook. It perhaps helped him to focus on those lines before the exam. The problem with underlining lines in a textbook was that after a point, the distinction between important and unimportant details got completely blurred. Sridhar in his over-enthusiasm had taken a ruler and pen and scrawled a line below every sentence in the entire textbook! Mrs Fernandez, already turning a shade of red and purple as she leafed through the book with its grotesque figures, found it impossible to read the sentences. The strain was a bit too much for her.
Library books had a personality of their own. Someone would have a treasure-hunt organized to enthuse the reader and lift his sagging spirits. Page 7 would have the following line written in a flowing hand on the top margin- "Turn to page 18". Page 18 would promptly say, "Go to page 117". The trail had to be pursued and we turned the pages in feverish excitement. Page 117 sure had a message- "Go to page 100". Page 100 led to 256, 256 to 971, 971 to 301..... We leafed through the whole book to find the culmination... written in bold- "You idiot! Don't you have anything better to do!?"
A few enterprising blokes would complicate the contest by sending us on a wild goose chase- we were to be trapped in an eternal loop! Page 971 would say "Now, go to page 18". After an hour, we finally realized the futility of the exercise as the page numbers became increasingly familiar and repetitive!
A rookie had read the first chapter of a Wodehouse novel rather meticulously at the University of Roorkee library. He had taken the trouble to underline each word that he did not understand and had the meanings written at the top. It was laborious work. "chum"-> "friend", "capital"-> "mark of exclamation", "sow"-> "female pig"... It went on and on. Abruptly, it ended after the first chapter. Probably, the reader gave up or had improved his English to the extent that he didn't need the dictionary any more. A more advanced reader expressed his contempt for the novice at the end of the first chapter rather openly- "Moron! If you don't know the meanings of so many words, you bloody well shouldn't be reading this book!!"
The worst book-abuser surely was that scoundrel who borrowed books from the Abbas Library, Mumbai. With great interest, we followed Hercule Poirot as he systematically dissected the case. Just when he was about to reveal the assassin with his customary flair, the book came to a frustrating, abrupt end. The most important page was missing. In its place, was the handwritten message- "Serves you right!". Those were times when the best of us felt like wringing the rascal's neck!
"I don't want this book brought inside the house. Leave it in the passage and pick it up when you go to school tomorrow!" my mother screamed. The context was simple. I had casually mentioned that the teacher had used some saliva to turn the pages of my notebook as she corrected the homework!
That was simply not done. "Isn't the book Saraswati?" mother began, disgust writ on her face. "That you know and I know, but does the teacher know? Does Saraswati care?" I protested. Till a moment ago, everyone at home treated me and my notebook just fine. Suddenly, it became an object of revulsion- to be picked up gingerly, with outstretched arm, between the thumb and the forefinger with all the pages flailing over... as though a dead rat picked by its tail!! My sister felt that some pages were still moist and exuded an offensive smell and had to be dried in the veranda! How could she be so sure? It's not as if someone slobbered the book! It appeared an easy way to torment my sis... I just had to stalk her from room to room, with the simple threat to touch her with the book!
Anyway, I had the final say- "Forget it! I am not going to take a head-bath to cleanse myself and in the process, come down with a bout of pneumonia now.....just for this notebook! And how do you think I am going to convey this point to my teacher- not to use a little lick to flick the pages of my book? Can I extend a piece of moistened sponge ...when she starts correcting my notebook!!? Be reasonable! This book is going to stay and that's it!"
This is not the worst treasure hunt!!! In our version, clues read - Page 339, 119th word!! One,two,three... we count feverishly only to lose track of the number we're on and start over. By this time the other team would have obviously won!
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