This is
also an old story. However not as old as the previous one. This happened during
our under grad college days.
We famished
hostel girls were invited to one of our teachers’ daughter’s wedding. Ahh… a
wedding invite! We were all so thrilled. That evening, we discussed the rituals
of a Brahmin wedding. We knew the wedding would last for three days, but were
not quite sure if we were invited for all the three days.
“An
invitation is supposed to be for the whole wedding and not for just parts of
the function. Right?”, one of us tried to clear the doubt.
“Yeah,
yeah. Absolutely. I have heard that Brahmin wedding starts early in the morning
and will go on till late in the evening”, somebody was kind of sure about it.
“Oh! Is it?
Well, that means breakfast, lunch and snacks. Three days. Three meals. Wow; nine
times in a row, we can treat our taste buds”, she just couldn’t hide her
excitement.
While I had
a different point of view, “It is not only about food, you see. Our sir will be
so glad if we participate in their joy from start till the end.” I looked at
others and saw giggles and grins on all the faces. The next minute, there was a
burst of laughter!
A dozen of
us, decked-up exuberant girls attended the wedding with much vigor and fervor. Our
twelve heads were a common sight on all the three days. We kept ourselves busy being
the bride’s happy maids, posed for a number of photographs, consumed limitless starters,
main course & deserts and laughed our hearts out while we had lots of fun.
We showered
the bride and groom with our love and blessings; the grand wedding thus came to
an end. At the closure of each day, everybody was given a fancy pouch, with a
coconut and some tidbits in it.
We,
hostages of the girls’ hostel had no idea what to do with all the coconuts we
had collected. The idea of donating them to the mess was immediately rejected
as they were unkind and merciless folks who did not feed us well. So they don’t deserve any goodies from us! After a rigorous round of
brainstorming, we decided to give the coconuts to Subbannan the next morning if
he is ready to offer all of us free breakfast.
Who is
Subbannan, by the way? He is the God-sent alternative to the awful food served
in our hostel mess. Subbannan owns a small eatery very close to our hostel
building and we loved him because he allowed credit to the hostel girls.
The next
day, we skipped the ‘so-called’ idlies in the hostel mess and rushed to
Subbannan with the bag that contained our prized possession! Our man was seated
in his chair, all set to feed his hungry customers.
As we had no
time to explain, without beating around the bush we came to the point.
“Subbanna… Keep these coconuts. Instead, please give all of us breakfast”
saying that, I winked at him and we took our seats.
Totally
confused, for a couple of minutes he just starred at us. Then he shot, “Look
at you girls… lipstick and high heels. But to eat two idlis, you had to steal
coconuts. If you don’t have money now, you may give it later.”
We were
trying to understand what he was grumbling while Subbannan continued, “I wonder,
why they don’t lock the store room in your hostel!”
In shock, none of us
could react immediately. That was obviously the least
expected!
PS: This post is part of the Write Tribe Festival of Words 2. The challenge is seven posts in seven days and this is the second one in the series, on the theme Food.