Onion fever – Copyright – Machan

Onion fever.

NTTF & Onion (ulli)

Viral fever, normal fever, exam fever… we added one more; Onion fever .

The life in the Hostel was really pathetic. Getting up at 6:00 AM, waiting for the turn infront of the closed bathroom doors, getting dressed and getting ready for the classes which starts at 7:30 AM.  Most of the time no breakfast, and a fast brunch at 12:30. We were really pissed off. We get freedom at 5:30, but mosr of the time were forced to burn the brain and butt with the assignments till 11:00 PM. And we have to save time to wash the dresses and …. and…and…

After 7 years, when I look back, those assignments were nothing when compared to what are we assigned with today. Anyways those days, the assignment carried a lot of weight age. And we used to work hard on it.

“Sumith, why don’t you start writing the C programs” it was sandeep who always hated the programming language C. “Ok deal, but you have to get me the maths assignment from somewhere.”  He had a blank look at me “do you mean to say, i have to write the Maths assignments for you also”. “No need dude, get it from someone who already completed, and i will just do a copy”. “Ohhh.. I forgot your love to maths, don’t worry dude, I will get u maths sheets from some dick head”. “And jiju will do the Advanced Electronics paper?”. I looked at Jiju with the question. He was looking blank and irritated at the same time.

“Do you know what the hell I feel now?” jiju  definitely is frustrated. “No man, what the hell do you feel?”. ” I feel like an MSc student, who had been asked to sit in the 8th standard maths class”. Whaaaat ? why ? How ? all three questions came from my mouth is a stretch. “Do you know what, I did my 2 years course in NIIT and I learned JAVA and Oracle from there, and you see here I have to start from the scratch. That too learning C” he said it scratching his head. He is always like that, his left hand will be always on his hairs. Either jus touching his hairs or scratching his head. “Ok, then do something, Finish this C programs for me, and teach me how to do Programming in C?”. A sarcastic smile, that was the answer, and he took a deep dive in to the thick JAVA book which he flicked from NIIT. He is a genius, I am not joking, even now he is a genius, and the whole 3 years in chennai he was called “JAVA” by the jealousy mob.

“Sherin, do you have any idea about Hard Disk? What is it?” I heard the question from the next room, and I couldn’t make out who asked the question and i was lazy enough to walk to the room and see the owner of the question. But I was curious to hear the answer and i just gave green signal for my brains for the answer from sherin. “Dude, in our home town we see some round kind of a stuff hanging in front of some cars.. I think that’s a hard disk..”Ohh my GOD, I couldn’t stop laughing. what sherin told is just a CD, which some stupid use to decorate their cars.

I just went to the room, seriously I dint go there to make fun of sherin. Its just like a kite in the breeze. But there was something serious going on in the room. Abin was sitting very seriously and suddenly an eruption of words came from his mouth “What the **** is this, we don’t have time to eat, no time to ***** and on top of that there are two new instructions on the Notice board today. Are we here to study, or we were hired to fill the class room for ISO certification?”. Two new rules ? i was surprised, I did not see anything. “Abin when was the new rules announced.” I was innocent in my question.. “Man, You are always behind some 32-28-34, LOOK at the notice board some times, There are two new ****ing rules, You cannot take leaves for next 6 months and you should provide medical certificate if you miss one day.” Kadavulaee(GOD), this is too much. I planned to take couple of days leave to meet my parents. Now this is a shock.

“Ok Guys, the rules are meant to be broken, I want to go home, I wana watch the latest releases and I wana eat my favourite food, i wana get up at 12 and i wana rest for a week. Who else wana do it ?” It was an Inquilab from Abin. The wind of revolution was blowing on our faces, and I raised my hand with the wind. We were 10, but we did not know how to break the rules. I looked at abin with a question mark on my face.. “Yes dude, I got it, I got your question, and leave it to me, its my responsibility to make u sit in Madras Mail to Kerala. But all you dick heads please get up at 6:30 atleast. And sandeep, please come with me to the store room”.

We had a Kitchen in the hostel and we rarely used, and there were some vegetables which were at least a week old. I don’t know what sandeep and Abin were doing there. They simply said “Suspense” to my genuine question. I slept next to sherin only after believing his promise on waking me up at 6:30.

Daaaaaaaan, don’t beat on my butt dude. Its sherin’s way of waking me up. yes it is 6:30. I saw almost all are ready except the few; those few were the 10 rebels. I saw abin, jus wrapped in his bathroom towel, so was sandeep. Something peculiar on abin’s face, his eyes were damn red. And amazing I am the only one in my night dress.”Dude, remove your T-Shirt and come here. And just keep this in your arm pits.. yes under both the arms.” I was curious about the thing which he handed over. Pyaaaz, vengaayam, Ulli, eerulli, it was Onion. I dint want to hear “Dick head !!” early in the morning, so i just obeyed what he ordered.

We all were standing in the same saaavdhan (attention) position for almost 10 minutes.”Sumith, just come here and touch my forehead..” again an order, come on.. what all I have to do to go home for a week. “Abin, you are HOT man” that was my reply after touching his forehead. And yea, with his unique ability to act, Abin looked really sick and dull. Now here is the plan. We will split ourselves in 3 batches of 3, 3 and 4. The batch with four guys will go and meet the HOD, Mr. VNV first. We have to act as if we had food outside last night and we got severe fever. he will touch our body and because of the ONION effect, the body will be hot and the eyes will be red. And we have to act so sick and dull and he should grant us leave out of LOVE. On an interval of 10 minutes all the three batches should present their acting ability in front of Mr. VNV. And there was a last caution from Suveen, if this becomes a flop show, then the betrayers will be executed in the hostel.

“Sir, if we sit here with this fever, there is no one here to take care of us. There is no one to get us some hot water to drink. Let us go home for a couple of days sir, and we could at least drink “Kanji” made by our mothers.” tears were rolling down my cheeks after listening suveen, bravo dude. even if Infosys doesn’t select you, you can go and join Nasarudhin Shah’s drama troop. And I tried maximum to make a dull and sick face, as we expected Mr. VNV came and touched our fore head. Thanks for the onion, we were really HOT.

I, Suveen and Abin were the last to move from the HOD cabin. Other 7 were already in the hostel. By the time we packed our luggage to leave there was an official memo circulated in the classes on behalf of the HOD. ” Dear trainees, because sudden climatic changes in the city there are chances of getting diseases like Malaria and viral fever. 10 of your fellow trainees are already infected with Viral fever and they will be missing their classes for a week. So please drink only hot water and eat hygienic food. Regards, V.N. Vaidyanathan”

6:30 pm. Chennai central railway station, platform number #2. There were 10 seats reserved for us in the general compartment (yes, we do reserve our seats in the general compartments also). All 10 comrades standing and at the door steps and laughing badly at the memo which abin flicked from the Notice board before we left the hostel. “Dude, that was great idea, and this time I will buy your ticket from Shornur to Vadakara”. That loud brave offer was from sandeep, and abin was just smiling at him..

Me?? I was confused, hey we are starting from Chennai, and we have to reach Calicut,Vadakara and Kannur travellling almost 750 KMs.. Being so generous and great full to the idea, why sandeep is offering abin the ticket fare from Shornur to vadakara which is just 150 Kms. “Abin, do you have the ticket from Chennai to Shornur ? And sandeep, where im my ticket?”. I heard a howl, and then the siren. The howl was made by my comrades and the siren was the start signal for our journey. Red Alert signals flashed in my brain, an i understood “GOD WE ARE TRAVELLING WITH OUT TICKETS”

Epilogue: NTTF is an ISO 9001-2000 Standard training institution. Sherin who gave us the first definition of a Hard drive is a Tech Lead in Merry lynch London. After the onion fever Mr. VNV introduce a new rule, if you want to go on a medical leave, you have to get the medical certificate from a doctor detailing that you are not fit enough to attend the classes. (We made him to change that rule also).