hierarchy

It all started with some boxes of ceramic tiles arriving one late evening in our house. No, not delivered wrongly. It was in response to a call from an interior decorator who was doing some work for a neighbour's flat.Some tiles were extra he said, with panic in his voice and he needed to hand over possession the next day.The tenants who were arriving the next day wanted the house clean and neat and empty, sans any left over tiles. I never thought through what i will do with a few boxes of assorted tiles. Somebody was in need and i said okay and invited the tiles over for temporary shelter.

They occupied pride of place in the front porch. I never realised that they were going to be in the way of our normal routines. The potted plants had to be watered and the maid said her hands dont stretch that far.The kola maavu for adorning the front portion of our house was in a nook there and again another place had to be quickly found for that, if our house should not go with kolam.And then we got a brand new lady bird added to our family! it had to squeeze itself between the tile boxes piled now all over the place. Y had developed a great knack to do the gymnastic but anybody else will have massive issues with extricating the same from the porch.

So the pressure was steadily building up on me to find some use for these tiles. I commandered the creative juices to flow and waited for the flood. It arrived no doubt, and I decided to have the walls of the rear verandah duly tiled . It also comprises the work area and the walls tend to get messy. I had asked for the 'family odd job man' through proper channel. He arrived immediately and said it could be done, but then wait for the 'tile specialist'. He seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth for all we cared. Numerous phone calls to powers that be elicited the response that it will be done the next day, positively. When this happened with fair regularity it left me wondering. I was told that tile work is a very specialised work and he would not want to employ any tom dick and harry but wait for that special specialist who will do a very thorough job. But more time elapsed and my wonderment grew! Dussera came and went and so did deepavali but still no 'tile man'. For the benefit of the uninitiated, these festivals offer excuses for any hired help in the informal sector.There is the north east monsoon of course which cohabits with the peak festival season in Chennai. It always comes in handy even after the festivals have come and disappeared from the seen not to be seen till next year.

But then two days back a pack of three arrived by 9 am with necessary tools and earnest looks and surveyed the scene once more. They said they will get the cement and be back. But then they did not come back. The family odd job man appeared in his motorbike and asked the whereabouts of his workmen. I told him the last i saw them was alongwith him going away from my house. He too disappeared.

Yesterday the three of them appeared again , slightly sheepish (could be my imagination) and said they would start the work.I was quite excited that the work would finally start. The entire rear verandah became like a battlefield and so did the entire house from the front porch, drawing room and dining area. There were these tiles of all shapes and sizes and colours which had to be colour matched . I thought this area could really be a kids playpen when they play 'colour colour what colour'. Y quickly surveyed the scene and said, yes there were a riot of colour tiles here but then the kids would feel cheated as the tiles were slightly short of some vital colours like red and dark green!

The actual job appeared quite simple to me. There is this 'senior techie' who will wait for the tiles to be plastered on their rearside with a liberal dose of cement mix by the 'unskilled asst' and then put it on the wall and gently tap it with a small hammer. That's it; the tile is fixed. So the operation went. The senior techie could operate a simple cutting saw which could cut the tiles in a jiffy. He could handle technology well, whereas the junior just sat and saw and mixed some more cement mix. The hierarchy appeared very strict; not for them flat organisations. The divide was most clearly visible when the lowly asst had to go and fetch tea. No, the senior will not demean himself to go for any fetching, even if a hammer is lying by his side, he would call out to the asst to fetch it and give it in his hand! All the time i hope the lowly assistant was learning fast, so that he could do the same thing to his under study some day.

I offered them tea in the evening and the same story was repeated, the tea cups had to be fetched and washed by our understudy.
But then i was left wondering if this was the skill level in short supply that I had to wait for four months. But i am told experts are those poeple who make a specialised job look simple.
It looks neat and clean now, this rear verandah. It looks so good that i will now have to look for another work area!

Besant nagar humour club

Adyar times, the neighbourhood newspaper has been regularly carrying this programme in their engagements of the week column for several years now. They schedule it on the first sunday of everymonth.I have always read it with interest and would file it away in my mind that i would like to go and participate in one such meeting.An uncle of mine is a member of a humour club and he has been going strong about it for several years now.But then the timing is the issue; 4 pm on a sunday evening is quite difficult to keep an appointment, however tempting the programme.But then I got around it and landed in the premises well before the meeting began this weekend.

I studied the members present; quite a few greys, as can be expected. A good number of ladies mostly middle aged; I was pleasantly surprised to see some children. It was only later i realised that they had a competition for children and that is the reason some children and their mothers were with them. It made me think that the mothers seem to be keen to enter their kids in any programme as long as you label it 'competiton'; not otherwise. Never mind that there could hardly be a few entrants and the prizes at best could be a pencil box which the child would have in plenty already.

There was just one young boy who looked like a college student. He was keenly interested in the jokes that were shared, though he kept very much to himself. I can imagine him remembering and narrating some of the jokes to his friends the next day and score a few brownie points.

Some members come as far away as Madipakkam; they must really be sold on 'humour' to travel so far on a hot chennai summer afternoon.

The format was like this; select members were asked to come on stage and share a few jokes. Most of them used a sheet of paper as a reference; some of them referred their palm and scribblings on it ; some of them were extempore and they actually reeled off more than 20 jokes at one go. I was amazed.The timing and presence of mind were crucial as I could see. We were also introduced to members of laughter club. They assemble everyday at 6 am in besant nagar beach.

I was narrating this to my niece who has just given her 12th exam, and she said she was not amused. She said her colony had a laughter club and when she would be rushing to school on a monday morning more so if there is an unit test and while getting into the bus, the forced laughter of the laughter club with no apparent reason used to be jarring. Different folks, different strokes....

The chief guest spoke on the topic, 'ethanai kodi inbam vaithai iraiva' and generously spiced it with thirukkural, bharatiyar songs and vivekanandar's life. My favourite topic and it was 'paisa vasool'.

Maybe i wont go there regularly; it is difficult to sit through more than two hours of 'humour'.But they do invite very good guest speakers and I might occasionally be tempted.
Yes, I have become a member.