My Obra Days - Sweet Childhood

V. FRIENDS ARE FOREVER

"A good friend is nothing but the reflection of the generosity of the Almighty"

By God's grace, I am rich in the field of friends. I admire each and every friend of mine and I have sufficient reasons for this. The first and foremost and the final reason too: "A friend in need is a friend indeed". What I mean to say is, they've always become my shield against all odds in my worst days. Whenever I recollect about the moments I've spent with my friends, there is always a sense of delight on my face.

In junior classes, in the evening, I would go to take tuitions to Sharma Sir. There were four boys and three girls in our batch. I realized that Sharma sir honestly followed gender equality concept throughout his life. He never differentiated between the boys and the girls. Instead, took the same pleasure punishing girls as he sensed with the boys. Hence after the tuitions, none of us had a feeling of superiority over any of the other. The reprimands and the slaps were all equally distributed. His favorite mool mantra1, a famous Sakhi of Kabir Dass ji, lay behind all this:

"Guru kumhar shish kumbh hai, garhi garhi kadhe khot.

Anter hath sahaar de, bahar bahe chot."2

And we never showed any resentment over these punishments. Rather the reprimands and slaps were welcomed like the Prasad3 of the Guru. Our parents too, advocated of the punishments to reform their children. And above all, every moment we all carried a sense of gratitude for our teacher because he put the foundation stone of building of our present-day career.

The four boys in the tuition were I, Suneet, Santosh and Anil. They never called me by my real name. They called me with names like Pathak, Fatak, KK or my nickname W and I always found their great love behind all my names. After the tuition, in the evening, my friends who lived in the same colony used to accompany me till the halfway, where our school was situated. There was an open culvert behind the dismal colored walls of our primary school. We would relieve ourselves in that culvert competing to pee to the highest range. It was the serious most competition of my life; I gave my best always. Many times I emerged as a winner but sometimes.....well... it became hard luck too. Finally, we used to run after a donkey watching patiently his shadow under street lights. He met us every day without any bunk. Actually, we always tried to frighten him by going closer and closer to him silently and then shouting all at once and then chasing him. But this closeness once cost heavily to Santosh when the donkey kicked hard to him. After this very incident we learned the important lesson:

Never get close to a donkey

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This was the very first time when Suneet came to my home.
"Pathak!"

My father appeared out and said "Yes child."

The look on his face was priceless
"Good Morning Uncle."

"Very good morning, bachche."

"Uncle, I want to meet Pathak."

"Yes. I am Pathak" My father was an upbeat sort of person. He never failed to crack a joke whenever he got a chance.

My friend was taken aback. He couldn't think what to utter then.

Father just smiled and waited for his response.

Suneet cleared his throat and said," Uncle, I mean to say...."

"Well, Bachche. We are the three Pathaks in this home. I, Ramesh and Krishna. Now you tell me to whom you would like to meet." Father asked.

Suneet replied with a giggle, "I am so sorry, Uncle. I want to meet Krishna, the youngest of the three."

And then they both cracked up.

Suneet remained one of my best friends. He was a nice and humble guy. Although he was prosperous enough, he never showed it off. In the class, I usually sat beside him.He was that one who had things we didn't know of.
One day, I saw a beautiful maroon colored pen in his hands. My eyes sparkled.

When I asked, he lent it to me.

I wrote my name with it. It felt like putting a hot knife through butter. No friction, at all!.

It was like being in love, the only thing I could see was the maroon beauty.Still, It wasn't mine so I did the only thing I could, just looked at it, from afar.

And for a fleeting moment it looked back at me,secretly.

"It's a gift,you know", the moment was interrupted

Apparently,our gazing wasn't secret enough.
I returned the pen but the thought of making it mine drove me crazy. At night, I was unable to sleep. So, I had an idea. Looking back on it , wasn't my brightest.

The very next day after the lunch, we came back all together in the class and sat in our seats. As the class started, Suneet complained about his lost pen.

The math's teacher asked us to check our pockets and bags, for the pen might be placed there by mistake.

We all checked our bags and responded with a negative.

Suneet teared up in the memory of his beloved pen. Mine too

I realized the situation and absolutely did not push a certain obeject deep inside my bag. Key word being not here.

Our teacher then decided to check the bag of every student. My heart started pounding very fast. The situation was now going out of control. The monitor started and checked the bag of all the students one by one. I was the last one remaining. Some beads of sweat appeared on my forehead.

As he approached to check my bag, I started to see life in slow motion, but there's a twist ,
"He can't do such mistakes. There is no need to check his bag." My friend interrupted.

"I should check the bag of all the students, be this Krishna or anyone else."

As he opened the bag, it was game over, nearly.
I could feel the heat rising in my cheeks. "Oh God! Please save me this time only."

Suddenly Suneet growled "It's OK. Better you leave it. I'll check my friend's bag."

Monitor agreed. Suneet checked the bag properly and I bet I was literally caught red-handed. The fear was creeping at my cowardice face but to my surprise...
Suneet said "Sorry! There is no pen in his bag too."

I opened my eyes and turned towards the Suneet.

He was smiling and said once again," Sorry! My pen is not in his bag too. Let me check my bag once again."

"Oh my goodness! How foolish is he? He is not seeing the pen just below the books!" I thought.

He then checked his bag again and again and finally, he took the pen out from his bag. I was surprised the second time and was unable to understand the situation. But it was too late. The teacher was scolding Suneet for his behavior. Suneet turned his face down and had a little smile over it. I also turned my face down but there were tears in my eyes.

After the class was over, I was unable to make eye contact with Suneet feeling ashamed of my act but he came to me and said "My friend! If you liked this pen you could have told me, and I would have never hesitated to give you.
After all, the pen can be managed because they are only for a time period but friends can't be managed. Friends are forever"

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1: Religiously, it is the fundamental prayer. But in general, the term is used as a key to success.

2: This Sakhi of Kabir Dass Ji says that a Guru behaves like a potter with his disciples, students in this case. He shapes his students by being a strict disciplinarian from the outside but supports and takes care of them with a very soft heart.

3: Prasad is a religious offering which is distributed among the devotees after the prayers.

Fun fact: The story is very real but it was not Suneet. However, I didn't share such a bromance with that friend. As a result, I was screwed.