Of Wines, Whiskey, Weed and Cleo

Anish was a proud Syrian Catholic of the Pala Diocese. On one occasion when he was getting eloquent about the proud history of the Syrian Christians of Kerala over a bottle of Fine OCR Rum and the choicest herbs rolled in Rizla he was getting a bit unbearable.

Nitin all of a sudden burst out saying “Dude, you can’t be as much as a pure bred as you claim to be. You know that your surname traces its origin to Egypt? For all you know you might have got to the Mallu shores hanging on to a drift wood in the Arabian Sea. Or perhaps your ‘great to the power 20^th’ grandfather used to clean the deck on the ships that got spices to Egypt and he jumped out when the ship was parked for petrol in Kochi or Kodungalloor”

And Rajesh too quipped in saying, “Hey I’ve seen your grandmom and her nose does resemble Queen Cleo’s.

Anish (still not having regained from the shock of Nitin’s outburst): Cleo??

Nitin: Cleopatra you fool.

Anish: Dude that’s not possible. My ancestors were here in Kerala during the time of Jesus, and Cleopatra was probably in Dubai or wherever in Egypt at that time

Vipin (drunk as hell): Dude Cleo was in Rome. She was going out with Julius Caesar.

Nitin: I thought she was dating Augustus Caesar?

Vipin: Well you see they both lived in the same house, and once Augustus was working out in the gym Cleo saw him and fell flat.

Rajesh: And she used to terrorize us with her homemade Chakka Ada* whenever we went to her place.

Vipin: Who Cleopatra? Hic.

Anish: Please how is it possible that my ancestors be in Egypt at the time of Cleo. He would have been here in Kerala to get baptized at the hands of St. Thomas.

Nitin: Now don’t even get me started on that whole story. Man, even if the guy was here in Kerala I don’t think any ancestor of yours would have let himself come in contact with water to be baptized, at any cost. Just tell me when was the last time that you took a bath?

Rajesh: Maybe St. Thomas offered him a kilo of the finest ‘grass’ from the shores of lake Jordan

The whole group burst out laughing. And when the laughter and the smoke settled all of them looked at Anish. His face grim. Just as it was starting to feel as if the limits have been crossed he smiled and said, “Probably also a bottle of the wine left over from Cana”, and started out laughing himself.

Having had their fill of A, cut and diced the attention turned to Vipin. Vipin believed in balanced living. He balanced the barrel-fulls of beer that he consumed with hours spent in the gym the next day. Still he had a hard time balancing his tummy when he walked.

Nitin started: Dude hows that one pack ab of yours?

Vipin (struggling to keep his eyes open): Coming out good man. Round and fine

Nitin: Ahh I knew it. You were always an all rounder

Vipin: hehe. Hey you won’t believe it, I saw a sardar in the gym today

Nitin: So what’s the big deal. They have so much of butter chicken and booze, they got to burn it off

Vipin: No dude this guy was fit. He had six pack abs and everything

Nitin: A sardar with abs? Dude that’s ‘ab-surd’

Everyone started laughing again and Rajesh sprayed the beer in his mouth practically all around the room.

Another joint started doing the rounds.

Rajesh started getting up saying that he’s gotta drop a friend to the railway station.

Nitin: Dude which one? The girl friend? The partimer? The neighbor next door?

Rajesh: Oh shut up. She’s not my girlfriend

Vipin: Oh poor boy, don’t you worry I’ll advise you on some of my best tricks to make a girl accept your

friend request in Orkut. Start talking about your sick mother in home and the unmarried sisters…

Anish (cutting in): Ahh shut the F up V. Maavinte mandel irikkunnavanu aarelum mango juice kodukkumo (roughly translated: Do you offer mango juice to anyone who’s sitting on a mango tree?)

Vipin (obviously not pleased at being cut short): Why not what if he feels like having vodka mixed with mango juice when he’s on the mango tree?

Nitin cut in: Hey you two, FIDO.

Vipin: What???

Nitin: It’s short for F it and Drive On. Dude, Raj let’s just finish off this joint and take off.

Anish who had drifted off to sleep for just a few seconds suddenly opened his eyes and said, “Hey have you noticed that the best things in the world all start with the letter W. You know Weed, Whiskey, Wine…”

“And Women”, said Vipin.

Anish said: Women really are strange creatures, man. Yesterday a woman on the road called me a pervert. I didn’t know what that meant so I replied “It’s O.K”.

Nitin: Haha no surprises there, your face does fit the profile of a serial rapist

Anish: F off. It wasn’t that. This girl was walking towards me and just as she was a few feet away her dupatta just fell off. I swear I wasn’t looking anywhere.

And everyone just started laughing again. “We trust you Anish we trust you”.

Nitin and Rajesh got up and stumbled towards to the car.

*Chakka Ada – Something like a cake made out of jack fruit.