The barber shop

Barber shop

I was staring at my reflection when the barber was busy in sniping my hair. I suddenly realized that barbers mirror has been reflecting me from the very childhood but I never noticed the infinitesimal change which was taking place in my appearance. The mirror reflected a boy becoming young man, then middle aged and now old. The hair started becoming sparse then grey hair started appearing and finally mostly grey which is now. This transformation was so gradual that I never noticed when my first grey hair appeared or when the bald patch at the back of my head started taking shape though every time after a cut the barber holds another mirror at the back of my head to know if anything more I want him to do.While thinking about grey hair and baldness I started smiling to myself as I remembered an anecdote ,the barber looked at me through the mirror and raised his eye brows questioningly, he thought I was smiling at his some folly,he stopped. I told him the joke.

An old man was married for the second time to a young woman though his first wife was still there. He had mix of black and grey hair. After sometimes his friends noticed he was losing hair fast. They inquired from him whether he has some health issue. The old man replied sadly that he was alright but the second marriage is causing all the problem related with hair.

‘How?” the friends asked.

“See it is like this, the night when I am spending with my young wife then she will pluck all my grey hair!”

“And your first wife? She was ok with your hair!”

“No dear that is the sad story. As her hair has become grey so the night I spend with her she will pluck all my black hair. Thus I am becoming bald!”He said with a sad face.

By the time I finished my joke I found that barber next to my chair laughed out loud as he too was keenly listening. I heard a snoring noise and found that his client was sleeping peacefully while he was sniping his hair. I looked at him and said,”the days I don’t get sleep I will come to you for hair cutting as you make people sleep!” I gestured at the sleeping customer with a wink.

So friends the barber’s chair gives us an opportunity to look at us dispassionately and observe those changes occurring which are inevitable and we have no control on ravages of time. No wonder many customers spent extra money at the saloon to get back that youthful look by putting all kind of hair darkening creams and getting the face uplifting massage done.

My barber is pretty clever guy, I have been going to this shop since more than 20 years so he knows my head better than me, the other day he commented that there is not much change in my hair. I winked at him and showed the expanding baldness of my forehead and the sparse front hair and asked,” What about these?” He knew he was caught but maybe he too did not notice the infinitesimal change occurring in me.
For me each visit to barber shop makes me a wee bit of wiser, that chair in the saloon is like seat in front of a great monk, at times i get self hypnotized by staring at me constantly. 

The Booby trap

The booby trap

This incident is about my alter ego Samaranand which happened recently.

Samaranand has just returned from a religious trip to Varanasi, where for the first time he could reach the sanctum sanctorum of Kashi Vishwanath temple through the VIP gate. He could reach the courtyard meant for private puja by VIPs and from there he could get a full view of the Vishwanath temple and the Gyanvapi mosque (this mosque was built by destroying the original temple by Aurangzeb) .That VIP entrance is known as Gyanvapi gate. As mobile was not allowed inside so he could not take any pictures.

However, he sat and meditated for sometimes in the temple courtyard, tried to achieve zero experience but the thought of catching return flight to Kolkata kept nagging him, so subconscious was wrestling with that thought.

After reaching Kolkata on the same day next day morning he could not go for his usual morning walk around the lake. He was relaxing in his drawing room when his newly acquired AI,Google Home was playing his favorite songs. His mind was still lingering around Vishwanath temple and failing to achieve zero experience there. As a matter of fact, he has never achieved zero experience which is the state of mind when it becomes a vacuum without any fleeting thought. The harsh ring tone of the mobile broke his reverie.

It was Babulal his assistant, readers already have been introduced to Babulal who was assistant of a street magician in Delhi and later on he was in the entourage of cheat Sadhu.

-Sir I was waiting for you at the lake.

-sorry today I could not go to the lake, I was too tired after my journey to Varanasi.

-Have you read yesterday’s paper?

-No, I have not read even today’s paper

-Sir, can we meet today?

-Yes, come within one hour to our usual location in Golf Green,central park.

-ok,sir,I am coming. Babula disconnected the mobile.

Samaranand as you all know loves solving problems and Babula assists him but Babula never comes to his flat, they meet either at Lake or at Golf Green, central Park.

They were sitting on a bench under a tree, it was spring, not much hot at 10 am. From a distance they looked like an uncle with his nephew talking mundane things. At 10 am there was not much crowd in the park, on other benches some retired persons were gossiping. Yes, Golf Green has a good number of retired persons whose sons have gone away for job to Bangalore, Delhi, Chennai or to some foreign destination.

-Yes,tell me Babulal , what news do you have?

-Sir,Do you remember we were discussing about spate of snatching around the lake, especially during evening time?

-Oh,yes, I thought we must do something about it.

With a big smile Babulal said, “This time I worked out a solution on my own.”’

Samaranad was pleased that his side kick can now operate on his own.

-”ok,tell” me, eagerly Samaranand asked.

Babulal’s narration:

As you know I have good contact with all kind of fellows so I hatched a plan. I got hold of a wrist watch, removed its internals and put some RDX putty with a wires connected through a button cell inside. The contact is made when one moves the winding knob of the watch, I put a dial which looked like a FM radio dial.

-Smart idea, Samaranand patted him and then looked around to see if anyone is overhearing their talk.

-Then what did you do?

-After making my special watch I started taking evening walk  at the other side of the lake near those cannons. I would hold the watch near my ear pretending to listen to a radio and would hum some Hindi songs. One evening a gang of four surrounded me and threatened me with knives, they asked me to hand over everything what I had. I gave them my purse, I hardly had any money then they noticed my watch and one of them asked, “Is that a radio watch?”

“Yes, it is but please don’t take this as I got it as a gift.’ I had to act as though I would not give that watch readily.

They laughed like hungry jackals, “Gift! Look at the stupid fellow!” Saying this they approached threateningly with knives, I had no choice so reluctantly gave the watch. Suddenly footsteps of evening guard were heard, those ruffians ran away with my watch and purse.I shouted,”Thief,thief!” The guards came running and I narrated my predicament, they asked me to lodge FIR. I said “Ok!” and then vanished from there.

That evening I watched in TV a news about a minor explosion in the slum of Tollygaunge and some young fellow getting injured. I rang up police from a public booth and told them that those were pickpockets where explosion had taken place. They were nabbed.

This details came out in newspaper yesterday.

-Wait, wait I know what happened after they snatched those from you, they must have gone to their den and then tried to operate the watch thinking that it was a radio. So by rotating the knob the internal connection was made  with the battery , those two wires embedded in RDX sparked and which triggered that explosion. That guy must have lost his arm.

Babulal shrugged his shoulder. Samaranand advised him to go undercover for sometimes as after getting released those rascals may try to hunt him down.

-No worries, I was in disguise with wig and spectacles. As a matter of fact, I was changing my guise every day before the incident.

Samaranand patted Babula for his smartness and paid 2000 bucks as a reward.