Taste the Thunder!

Cheeniya · Mar 14, 2009

I know that the normally docile people like me do occasionally get very adventurous and want to taste the thunder. I do not know what others do in such a mood but I walk to the nearest Nair shop to get a bottle of Thums Up and drink it. With my spirit of adventure thus satiated, I beat a hasty retreat home. Having been brought up by my maternal grand mother in my early childhood days, the habit of chanting Arjuna’s name when the skies reverberate with the sound of thunderclaps is something I have not outgrown yet. So the closest I get to a thunder is sipping a bottle of Thums Up.

Incidentally those of you who like to go to the root of everything that they hear about, may want to know the genesis of chanting Arjuna’s name when they are overawed by the fury of lightening and thunder. Indra, the usually reliable sources tell me, is the Lord of all thunders. Arjuna is the offspring that Kunti gets by propitiating Lord Indra, and technically becomes the son of Indra. Whenever people fear the sound and fury of thunder, they chant Arjuna’s name to appease his dad so that they may get a little respite from the menacing thunder. It only goes to show that if you want to curry the favour of anyone, praising his/her offspring is the best and easiest way!

Let us move on from the subject of thunder. We are already privy to the information that the only way to taste the thunder is to have a sip of Thums Up. The important question that arises here is whether it is the mere consumption of Thums Up or the manner in which we get hold of a bottle of this beverage that equates it with tasting the thunder. Can my routine of buying it from the shop across be considered equivalent to tasting the thunder or it has to be the way Akshay Kumar has it? I mean leaping from building to building that will put Tobey Maguire attired as Spiderman, in the hottest pursuit of his enemies, to shame? If Thums Up is positioned as ‘bottled thunder’, then one doesn’t have to go all the length as Akshay Kumar does to taste it. It would just suffice if we get it from a shop and drink it. But since there is too much emphasis on how one gets the coveted bottle that enables you to rub shoulders with the likes of Indra and Arjuna who hold proprietary rights to all the thunder, I guess that the honour does not go to Thums Up. At the end of all his nerve wrecking stunts, if Akshay walks away with a bowl of porridge, even that would amount to tasting the thunder!

That brings me to the central theme. When we face an issue in life, should we look for a short cut method or an easy way to solve it or go for the toughest way to overcome it? Experts say that the former method will result in our acquiring a laid back approach to life and render us unfit to face any sudden upheavals in our life. We tend to scream like someone caught in a tsunami when we, being formally attired to leave for office, open the shower accidentally instead of the tap! Such ugly incidents leave a deep scar on our psyche because we are not equipped to handle such demanding situations in life.

Remember Inspector Clouseau in ‘Revenge of the Pink Panther’? He can never spend a peaceful moment in his apartment as his valet Cato may be lurking in any corner to attack him any time! This is Clouseau’s preferred way of keeping himself prepared to face any unforeseen attacks while performing his professional chores. This helps him in disposing off a real enemy through the window though it is a different matter altogether that Clouseau does so in the mistaken notion that the enemy is his own valet and it is part of the usual drill! This is as comical as Mr.Bean pulling out item after item from his jacket to prepare a sandwich sitting on a park bench! These people just love all the trouble!

Put a mythical salamander on a bed specially made for a fragile Arabian princess and it will start counting sheep but place it amidst some fiercely burning logs of wood, it will sleep the best sleep of its life! Some are made that way. They live dangerously looking for trouble all the time as they cannot do without that extra bit of excitement that unforeseen dangers bring along. Give them a can of Thums Up, they’ll throw it out of the seventh floor and leap after it. Don’t they know that it is available in the shop across the road? But will it taste as good as the one caught during the flight from the seventh floor? Ask them and their answer will be an emphatic NO! These are the people who believe that a hard life is a lot better than ‘hardly a life’!

Would you still prefer to buy it from the shop? Let me give you company!

iyerviji · Mar 14, 2009

Dear Cheeniya Sir

Good write up as usual. Learnt that we can chant Arjuna's name when there is thunder. At the strike of thunder people will get scared to go out.
Enjoyed your write up. I wanted to be the first to give fb. Lets see what others say.

Regards
viji

sundarusha · Mar 15, 2009

Dear Cheeniya sir,

I was wondering why you haven't posted any new topics lately. Now I am happy to read this post. My cousin taught me to recite 'Arjuna's' name when there is heavy downpour accompanied by thunder and lightning. She even had a cute song, which I can't remember.

Actually when I looked up thunder under Wiki, it shows all the thunder Gods with Indra listed, but there is no mention of Arjuna. They haven't yet realized that singing praises of the children is the best way to be in favorable terms of the parents.

My son is like you in the sense that the moment he hears thunder and rainstorms, he will dash out to take pictures, ignoring that his mother suffers from Astraphobia, the fear of thunderstorms.

The last paragraph is so absolutely funny!

I prefer not to buy thums up from the store. Before you think I am the adventurous type who might prefer leaping after it from the seventh floor, let me assure you. I stay away from soft drinks altogether.

Padmini · Mar 15, 2009

dear cheeniya,
this is the first time i write a a fb for your post. i am under the suspicion if i can match you in my writing.
but i want to convey my thoughts. starting from "thums up" you have clearly brought up the way of looking of the problems or trouble by different kinds of people.there are people who worry very much when they do not have any problem.some people make mole into a mountain. hereafter i will think twice before buying thumps up!!!! i will act as Surya,
standing and raising my finger!!
with love
pad.

Shanvy · Mar 15, 2009

Sri,

Actually, i read the whole thing, wanted to think a little more before replying. I even closed the browser, as i have guests at home and i cannot afford to sit in front of the system, right now..but the pull of the thirst to answer this post made me open the browser again..

Well I exactly understood what you are going to talk as soon as I saw the title. but i would have been happy if you had taken the tag of the mountain dew ..dar sabko lagtah hai..but nothing is lost until you try...

I really get crazy seeing the ads of the soft drinks taking so many turns..
were akshay does every stunt that belies the laws of gravity, when I had a discussion at home, the kids said, comeon mom, give the uncle a break, he is very good at marshall arts and had done a series on that in NAtional Geography...(I am not sure how many of these kids have the same notion)

Well, another talks about you know who is my father.....??..

Well though i go by the theory of praising the kids can go to the head of the parents, don't you think praises were rare those times.

This is my theory.:hide::hide:..guesswork...the bow of gandivam when strung was like the thunder..so Arjuna was called for losing the fear. the braveness of arjuna was remembered??

There is always a corollary to the regular that some live dangerously and there are others whom danger comes searching and zeroing on..

Just take the case of parents these days, we don't want our child to go out and play, quoting the traffic, the strangers, we want to be there all the time protecting them. we do not want them to learn to be independent and expect them to be one when they turn 24/30??

I agree, living the life hard is better than hardly living. Experiences make it richer.

Well let me stop here...will come back later..

Mindian · Mar 15, 2009

Dear cheeniya sir,

First of all very nice to see u here. .your periods of absence are getting tooooo loooong..

I too am a normal docile person like you and would in fact go a step further and maybe just make a call and have my thumbs up delivered at home(that is because we are denied the luxury of home delivery here)

It only goes to show that if you want to curry the favour of anyone, praising his/her offspring is the best and easiest way!

How true….., my poor father falls for it each time someone praises me or my daughter…...he really believes that person

We tend to scream like someone caught in a tsunami when we, being formally attired to leave for office, open the shower accidentally instead of the tap!

Hahaha happened to me quite a few times and that too in my starched cotton saree…

These are the people who believe that a hard life is a lot better than ‘hardly a life’!

No sir, I do not believe in that .if at all there is a simpler way of doing things I would use my brains and try to come up with it(not that I am successful every time)

But I have a friend here who is just the opposite…I prefer to take a walk of ten minutes(which serves as a compulsory exercise too) and get my veggies from a nearby shop(which is anything but fancy) but she prefers to take a cab and travel for one hour and spend the entire day in a mall..

Talking to her one would believe that the most commonly done act of getting married and raising a kid is a herculean task with troubles lurking around at every nook and corner of life…

Of course to each his own and I am not bothered but the trouble is she keeps on hinting that I ought to be like her. .that I am too cool and do not take life seriously enough…bonk

Someone here has a signature that says do not trouble trouble until it troubles you and I very seriously agree with that…

regards
Mindi

Cheeniya · Mar 15, 2009

Dear Viji
Thanks a lot for opening the FB account second time in a row! Let me see if you are going to be my lucky mascot! I may need all the luck since I am posting a new thread after a long time. I hope that the term 'out of sight, out of mind' will not be applicable in my case.
sri

Cheeniya · Mar 15, 2009

Dear Usha
I too could find a lot of references to Indra having proprietary rights over all thunders, but I could not lay my hands on anything linking Arjuna with them. I understand that nothing pleases Indra more than hearing his son Arjuna being praised and that's how perhaps he has come to be regarded as a safe bet to protect us from the hazards of his dad's potent weapon!

The song that your cousin used to chant was probably this:
Rain rain go away,
Come again another day.
Little Brian wants to play;
Rain, rain, go to Spain,
Never show your face again!

I too suffer from astraphobia but only when all the actions take place right over my head. I love thunder when it is from far away. There is something very enchanting about the roll of thunder from a distance. Ashani Sanket meaning 'Distant Thunder' was the title of a movie that Satyajit Ray made in the seventies. What a poetic title that was!
Sri

Cheeniya · Mar 15, 2009

Dear Padmini
A hearty welcome to my Forum!
Everyone has his or her own style of writing and why should one be considered superior to the other? I have the habit of writing long sentences which is not considered good by experts of the language but I can't change my style! So please don't say things like 'if I can match you in my writing'.

You are quite right that there are some who worry very much when they do not have any problem like the chief of a Police Station in a small town or a professional trouble shooter. Their very existence depends on some trouble or other cropping up from time to time. You can add to this category the script writers of TV serials like Arasi and Kolangal. They have to produce problem after problem so that the serial can run for a 1000 episodes at least to get the title of 'Mega Serial'!
Sri

Cheeniya · Mar 15, 2009

Dear Shanthi
Whenever I read your replies to various threads and blogs, I tend to agree entirely with the Valentine Award conferred on you. As I have stated earlier, your value addition to the original thread is always substantial.

Nothing is lost until we try is so very true of all our endeavors except when buying a lottery ticket!

While I concede that the soft drink ads are very gripping to the last detail, they all bear irrefutable testimony to the belief that brains and brawns can hardly co-exist! When we see Akshay Kumar in a hospital swathed in bandages at the end of all his stunts to get a bottle of Thums Up, we can't help feeling sorry for his stupidity! This feeling of sorry gets further accentuated when we see the spoofs on these ads from the rivals!

Praises were indeed rare in places like where I grew up in my younger days. The parents found 24 hours a day inadequate to brag about their own children and where was the time for them to praise other children? They only had time to criticise other children as the cause for any aberration in their own children!

I do agree that the children who grow up in a highly protected atmosphere find themselves inadequate to face the challenges of life later on. It is a pity that parents never realise the folly of such indulgence.

That dangers zoom in on some people is at least true in my case. I stub my toe against the same spot in my cot every day! In my case, it is not 'Patta kalileye padum' but 'Patta kattilileye padum!'
Sri