Kiss Me! Kill Me!! - Part I

Recently K narrated a hilarious incident that happened at his workplace. Now don't worry about K. He is one hell of a crazy, versatile man - anything goes from auto-driving in Chennai (there the craziness is explained) to almost making it to IAS (more crazy!) playing key-board (to generate what he calls as music, that is!) to pound key-board (to resolve system issues, he claims :). Well you get the drift...

Ting Tong: This part of the blog was sponsored by K; Want to be crazy? Be like K. Want to be versatile? Be like K. Ting Tong

It was one humid day on the equator. All air-conditioners blasting away to glory trying hard to keep the residents of the office cool, barely succeeding. Imagine a typical multi-national financial institution building. Don't cringe. More to come. Let the mind wander to that great place called 'meeting room'. A few chairs, a very expensive wood-topped/panelled table - Seinfeldish question: Why do they spend so much on a meeting room table when the per-capita usage of the same is probably one-tenth of the individual's table, which is usually the drab, pastel coloured, regular issue? Not at all inspiring!!! But then I am digressing...

Here K meets his European colleague face to face for the first time. After exchanging pleasantries about World Cup Football (about which K knows nothing - he is a Sachin fan, you see!) etc. they indulge in some IM (sorry can't expand that one!) on the project problems at hand.
Half way into the meeting, the European - let us call him Mr E for short - gets a call on his mobile phone. As my son used to write in his primary school essays, he 'fished' out his Nokia from his pocket and started communicating with the party on the other side with great fervour/passion/animation etc. - all the emotions that we do not usually associate with Mr E and his country-men.

K was busy trying to block his mind from what Mr E was saying - but he need not have tried. The entire conversation was in one of the continental European gibberishes (is there such a word?). For a man who had grown on speaking Royapuram Tamil, pidgin Telugu, worse Hindi and Peter English, what does it matter? It could be German, Greek, Latin, French... Who cares?

Presently, after what seemed like an eternity, Mr E ended the conversation with a series of lip-smacks aka kisses :)(: on the Nokia.

K was aghast. He can't understand the gibberish. But he can definitely understand kisses. He grew in an atmosphere which revelled in kisses. We in Tamil Nadu almost-banned movies for having explicit kissing scenes (remember 'Mael Naatu Marumagal' anyone?); to this day, heroines give very few head-aches to the producers on the scanty costume front - a couple of kerchiefs are enough! - but kissing? NO WAY! You have to show the flowers and trees and bushes for that !!! But songs are OK... Remember this 2002 classic from "Dhool" - where the hero and the lady-love figure out which is better, an English kiss or a French kiss ? (frankly, what is the difference?)

As an aside, I can understand the heroines' plight; one of the yester-year heartthrobs said this when asked why she would not do kissing scenes with a particular hero: "But he reeks of masala from a mile! How can I then do a passionate scene with him, unless I start to imagine kissing a goat or a chicken?" She had guts!!

Coming back to K's plight. While K understood kisses, he could not grasp the context. His mind worked overtime and came to the great conclusion. He linked the entire 'kissing conclusion' to Mr E's culture. His thought processes ran something like...

"In Mr E's culture, you have to end conversations with a couple of kisses; I have to remember to do this whenever I am talking to any of his country men and...women of course! This evening, I have a conference call and I shall exhibit my new knowledge with gusto!"

With this 'Aha', he turned to face Mr E wearing a knowing smile. Mr E was a bit red in his face, partly because of the spicy food that he had for lunch (Courtesy: K) and mainly because he just had had a reasonably-romantic call with his girlfriend. He was probably contemplating what gift he can buy for his girlfriend when he saw K's smile and he had to blurt out..."Sorry for the interruption! It was my girlfriend. You know how it goes? ! K! Why do you look so relieved? What happened? Do you need some water?..."

Nowadays K runs out of any room when somebody receives a call on the mobile. Reportedly, he asks for his son's permission before he kisses him!