Tearmongers

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It is well said that when you laugh, the world laughs with you; and when you cry, the world laughs at you.

This is true for 99.99% of the world.

But there are certain rare individuals who are very curious and obsessed with the agony of others. I am not talking about perverts, sadists and voyeurs. I am talking about persons who are the best citizens of the society occupying high positions, highly regarded, helpful and genteel folks.

It just happens they are rather curious in a morbid way.

I was once escorting one of my friends to the Campus Hospital and waiting in the queue for his name to be called into the doctor's chamber. There was this female attendant sitting outside the chamber on her chair and presiding over the waiting line.

Suddenly there was a commotion outside and she pricked her ears and ran out like a surprised rabbit.

And returned after ten minutes with a highly smug look on her map as if her day was made. And announced that someone drowned in the nearby pond and she was watching the hopeless rescue operations; and returned only after inspecting the operations to their bitter end.

And called the next impatient patient as if nothing has happened...and was analyzing the why and wherefore of the event in a clinical Holmesian fashion.

And then there was this Professor X with whom I had a nodding acquaintance through our mutual friend Prof Y. Once when I was early to the Canteen and had the place all for myself, Prof X barged in on seeing me from a distance, and said with quiet satisfaction that he just then was witness to a road accident involving a campus scooterist Prof Z and a highway truck.

And described the inelastic collision in graphic detail ending with:

"It is not fatal,"

with some subdued regret almost as if he has been cheated. I nodded my head and walked out when X saw another Prof walking in and collared him,

"I just watched..."

One late night I was standing in front of my Quarters talking to my friend Prof Y when Prof X was walking towards us with his wife. They stopped and joined the chat. Suddenly my landline phone gave a long distance beep and I ran in. Those days call charges were a quarter of the phenomenal daytime tariff after 11 PM. After a couple minutes I rejoined them. Prof X took me aside to inquire kindly if everything is ok and there was no untoward news.

When I reassured him, he was almost forlorn.

Prof X gradually grew into the 'sad story informer'; and to this day we first hear via group e-mail all the campus obits from him; and they are always authentic.

DB told me of a Lady Prof family friend of his. This genlewoman is always smiling and in the best of cheer. But, apparently, any death news in the campus hospital drives her into a frenzy and she would love to lead a delegation to the hospital to protest wildly causing mayhem.

She just is a different woman then.

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In our families there are certain curious customs centered around death.

We are supposed to visit our bereaved family friends and relatives and console them...which is more often a formality.

But after our visit is over we should quietly quit like thieves, without bidding goodbye.

There is a curiouser reason for this. In good times, when we leave our friend's place after a jolly visit, we are not expected to say: "OK, we are going!"

Because in our lingo, 'going' means 'going for good up over there where everyone goes at the end of their brief sojourn down here'.

So, we are supposed to say: "OK, we'll come!", meaning, "We'll come again".

But if we say, "We'll come," at the end of a deadly visit, it is supposed to mean that we will gladly come for your next bereavement; which obviously is not gentlemanly.

So, we can neither say, "We are going!", nor, "We'll come".

And so, we should quietly slip away like so many culprits.

Since I didn't know all this rigmarole, I was caught on the wrong foot many times, and I stopped making these formal visits, making so many enemies either way;

"To go or not to go"

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In ancient times there was less hypocrisy and mobs used to be allowed to witness public hangings to their entire satisfaction cheering the hangman along the way. There is this lovely scene of public hanging in the film: Great Train Robbery.

And all of us have read about the Roman amphitheaters and gladiators and Androcles and the Lion.

Here is a cute item by the Autocrat describing a fictitious report from a Roman Age Correspondent filing his stuff on Cicero's weekly lectures in Rome, concluding with:

"...The lecture was on the whole acceptable, and a credit to our culture and civilization.---The Reporter goes on to state that there will be no lecture next week, on account of the expected combat between the bear and the barbarian. Betting (sponsio) two to one (duo ad unum) on the bear."

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No doubt the most celebrated video of the encounter between a man and the lion in his cage can be viewed at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79i84xYelZI

Enjoy!


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