Thursday, 3 March 2016

Parle-G lady breaks her silence


                A false alarm of viral fever going by the stiff limbs and body pain made me bunk my run yesterday. It was a run hungry Hubli passenger which stood at the colony gates at 4:05 AM today. Biscuit may have joined me for a walk before my run, but, walk post-run has started to suit me better. Biscuit is still to adjust to his second walk after my breakfast getting subsumed in the post-run walk and keeps following me around till I leave for work. They are suckers for routine!
                A big crowd of young boys outside Hotel Park near Gemini flyover were discussing loudly among themselves and to my horror they fell completely silent after one of them spotted me and said something. I braced myself for some leg-pulling, but, thankfully was quickly out of the range of their hearing. I could sense some guffaws and was conscious that it could be at the expense of my running gear or the lack of it. I have often found that such groups have kids who want to talk to me, but, are afraid of being teased by the majority. Sure enough two of them met me on their scooter near the Petrol bunk. Their introduction was ‘which model?’(read what is your age uncle?), ‘kitna deti hai?’(how much do you run every day?). They were suitably impressed by my answer to the latter question, but, disappointed with the answer to the former (they expect me to be older!). I hope they start to run and be a positive influence on their gang or if that is too much to ask, hope they develop tolerance for respecting differences in appearance and dress!
                My Gandhigiri with youngsters is a usual routine, but, what was special today is that my cold war with the Parle-G lady (readers would remember the lady who wears lot of flowers in her hair and feeds dogs near Labour statue with biscuits and on my advice shifted them to cooked rice, but, never excused me for daring to advise her!) finally came to an end. I had been studiously avoiding her both when I cross her in my runs and in my dispatches. I was therefore surprised when she commented after I crossed her that Í look like a scare-crow’. I am glad of the ice-breaker even if it was not very complimentary! I only tried to laugh it off by replying that Í hope you are not scared!’. I also feel that my swollen head (literal not figurative, particularly after my Gandhi cut!) does give me a scare-crowish look!

                I had one runner leading me all the way on my return leg from Gandhi statue right up to TTK flyover, thereby, giving me a brisk pace. I did not break for water much to the disappointment of the parking lot guard outside Saravana bhawan joint who probably was expecting to gossip a bit! I reached home to the clock in the drawing room showing 7:30 AM. Given the time for stretching before run, it was a creditable 3:25 run setting the tone for a good day to expect in office!

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