Colourful days

I leave home at 7 am every working day. My workplace is nearly 8 km from my home and I spend around 20 minutes on road to get to my workplace. At that time of the day, there are not many vehicles on the road and so the drive is usually smooth. But this morning, there were many lorries on the road. They were travelling in both the directions. The one's going ahead of my car were filled with gravel or mud. The one's travelling in the opposite direction were empty. The single lane roads made it difficult to overtake these large vehicles. So, I had to travel slower than usual and had to keep my impatience under check. 

As I was walking in, I saw three ten year old walking in tandem with their right hand placed over their left chest chanting "all is well". I watched with amusement the little villains pass by. Usually, all was not well when these three were around. Later that afternoon, I saw one of the three being carried away from the games field with his hands around two people's shoulders. Clearly, all was not well with him. One of fellow all-is-well-ers was walking right behind. He paused for a moment when he reached close to me and asked "How is hair golden coloured?" For the first time in my life, someone had applied colour on my head and I was not particularly happy with it. When this little devil asked about it, I decided to spin a tale. I responded "I electroplated it with gold". He did not understand but did not bother to continue with the conversation. The boy who was injured was recounting his accident. "I was running behind the ball fastly when it suddenly appeared right under my foot. I slipped and fell. I think I twisted my ankle". 

In the evening, the uninjured-all-is-well kid came up to me asked "so how did your hair become golden?" I responded confidently "electroplating". He asked "what is that?" I said "I put a plate of gold in an acid and dipped my head..." I stopped the explanation mid-sentence. Someone inside my head was knocking on my skull desperately while shouting "listen you fool". I listened "What are you doing? Don't you know this kid is capable of doing it himself? He will electrocute himself or burn his head in acid. Stop it now." I realized my folly. I said "Ha, ha, ha! Fooled you! I coloured it with golden colour, like others colour it with black colour. Ha, ha, ha!" He looked at me with disappointment pouring out of his eyes. He said "You have broken my heart! I was hoping that the root of the hair will become gold. Then I can sell golden hair and be rich." A colleague who was listening to the conversation came by and said "now I understand why he was talking about becoming rich by making diamonds grow out of his hair." I looked at her shocked. As they say in the radio cricket commentaries "mairizhayil thappinan".

In the morning, a few children presented plays based on trial scenes from four books. One of the plays was based on the climatic trial scene from the book "The Merchant of Venice". One of the scenes involved Shylock saying "You have among you many a purchased slave, which, like your asses and your dogs and mules, you use in abject and in slavish parts because you bought them. Shall I say to you Let them be free! Marry them to your heirs!" The boy who wished to harvest gold and diamonds from his hair was sitting next to me. His posture made it clear that he was not interested in the proceedings. I thought he was on verge of sleeping when child playing the role of Shylock uttered the words mentioned above. Suddenly, he sat up erect and asked "Did I hear him say asses marrying?" I responded "Yes! Asses as in donkeys." He gave a disappointed "oh" before going back to his slump.

An hour before the end of the day, I walked into the room. The children greeted me with a demand to be left free. I waved their demand away. Suddenly, I noticed a child at one end of the class looking intently at something in his hand. Soon he started licking a purple fruit gleefully. I should have felt happiness seeing his joy but I did not. I barked at him and he quickly placed the fruit in his pocket. Later, I saw him walking with two of his friends. One of them asked "What's in your mouth, da?" The boy opened his mouth wide. I did not see the world within it but saw a crushed purple coloured fruit. One of the kids uttered in amazement "Wow! Jamun!" The utter said "ewwwww!" in disgust.

During these months, a million jamuns grew in the tree. They fell on the ground regularly. To save the jamuns from death, a yellow sheet was placed underneath the tree. The jamuns that fell on the sheet were instantly picked up by children and crushed to death between their teeth. The children scampered around with purple tongues and screams of delight. Some of the jamuns fell on the pathway besides the yellow sheet, which resulted in grave injuries to the fruit. They were not fit for eating. The ones that survived the fall did not last long though. They were crushed to death under the feet of the children and adult walking along the path. During these months, the path besides the jamun tree turned purple. One felt intoxicated by the smell of decaying jamuns. In these months, the path became the high road to the gate.

The rich purple colour of the jamun resulted in someone getting an idea to dye a piece of white cloth with Jamun juice. The resulting dyed cloth was presented to us proudly. I looked at it with interest and said "Many jamuns dyed for this". Another responded "the culprit was caught purple handed". The people around the table laughed. The presenter of the cloth walked away displeased.

At the end of the day, as the children walked out of the room, I realized it was littered with small bits of paper. Some of these were chits that were passed around the class when talking was not possible. One of the chits was in the shape of Saudi Arabia and it contained the following conversation.
Hi Boss!!
Why are you quit?
Quit what?
Not talking
To whom?
You only!!!!!
To who I'm not talking?
Ayooo! Me daaaaa!!
Din't even call me da!!