222 - WALK AWAY by Ram K

29th March 2021

Monday Morning means 10.00am Physiotherapy Appointment. I went for my Physio and when I got home took the Mobile Phone out of my Pocket and the display on the Screen Puzzled me. My Mothers Photo. Has not happened before. (My family group has my mothers photo in the Group Profile)

I showed the Phone to Mithu straightaway and said "There is a reason for this. Has to be a Kind of Message. Amma is probably saying "Don't worry Everything will be alright Ra". Mithu agreed.

Since 1976 I have had so many early morning dreams, which have come true and I have had many premonitions or hunches that have come true as well, like predicting my own hospitalisation one day before. It is a sort of Gut Feel but not Based on Logic. I have blogged all such premonitions like this earlier.

What was my mother trying to tell me ?

Been thinking all morning but I don't have a clue.

Had my brekkie and looked at whatsapp messages and guess what I saw first ? 

The Following Message

I am beginning to wonder if the above was the message from my mother.

She always told me to stay away from people who do not respect me or value my friendship, people who I believe are using me for personal gains. "Turn your Back on them and walk away" was my Mothers Mantra."No Point wasting your precious life with people who don't deserve you"

My Father's advice was exactly the opposite; "If someone slaps you on the face slap the bastard twice as hard, so he will never try it again. Don't try to be a Jesus Christ or Mahatma Gandhi" was my Dad's words of Wisdom.

Smart Alec me, the last seven decades I chose to use Both Options. If the trouble makers were men then they had a no holds barred fight with me on their hands. 

When it came to women who were the problem my mother's advice prevailed and served me best. "Turn around and Walk Away as far away from the individual as you can" 

Let me try and list a few unforgettable experiences

1953: Born in 1946 December, I was home schooled by my mother as there was only one Hindi medium school in Port Blair and I did not know Hindi. A new english medium school opened in 1953 January. I was a six years old weakling. Mrs Sandal was the head Mistress who gave me an English text book to read from, was impressed asked my mother how much arithmetic I knew and admitted me in the 4th standard. I was the youngest in the class and my classmate Patrick was 15 Years Old and Sister Zubeida was 16 years old. I felt like a mouse amongst cats but after the first lots of tests I topped them class and became a hero. But got zero very poor for Hindi. My mother forgot to tell the headmistress Mrs Sandal that she had not taught me any Hindi. I was learning Hindi alphabets and the class was being taught Poetry.

Now in the third standard was kid with a huge deformed rib cage that protruded in front and at the back. It scared me as I had never seen anything like this before. 

Just for representation only.

The Kid I am talking about had it worse both front and back. Was scary to look at

I used to feel sorry for him but he liked to pick on me as I was a puny kid who was scared. He used to come and nudge me with his protruding rib cage. He and his brother made it a point to bully me during recess. Not only me he bullied my younger sister Urmila and my cousin sister Hema Latha and her younger brother Shantaram. So we virtually could not play with our friends at recess and had to retreat to a corner to avoid this Bully. I forget his name now. One day my Burmese friend Mong Tua saw what was going on so he grabbed that kids by his shirt and said if I see you anywhere near these four ever I will break your ribs. Was never bullied again. My first lesson in taking on the Baddies, thanks to Mongtua.

1962 - I don't recall too many bad experiences at St Bedes High school in Madras, except one incident when my Classmate Abdul Khader Buhari son of the owners of the famous Buhari Hotels threw a party for the whole class and accused me of eating a second piece of cake, only because I was poor so had to be greedy in his opinion. His own Cousin and my "Good Friend" Jamal Buhari came to my rescue and told Abdul off saying Ram came late and has been with me and we have both not eaten anything and we just came to get some food.

Don't know where I picked up the courage, I threw my paper plate of food on Abdul's face. My Class teacher said I had to apologise  or she would report me to the Principal. My Good friends Narayan & Kodandaraman joined Jamal Buhari and defended me and I stormed out of Hotel Woodlands and walked home feeling sad. Teacher knew the truth so she did not report me to the Principal

The lesson I learnt is to distance myself from rich people as they are so full of themselves and self righteous and believe every one is after their money. 

1972 & 1974-  In Madras Corrupt Bosses and Contractors sent thugs who put a Knife to my throat first time on Peters Rd in Madras as I was cycling home from Work as Trainee in Housing board and next time was in Rameswaram as I was blocking my Asst Eng and Div Eng from getting bribes as I refused to prepare and sign bogus bills. 

"Never Say Die is my Motto and You can Die only once"

1980 - For that matter my own Brother in law in Sydney did not want his sister to marry a poor South Indian bus conductor (a holiday job as a student at Syd Uni) considering he was a respectable school teacher. He was Mithus only sibling who did not attend her marriage. Every one else came to Madras for our wedding.

1985 - At all Parties in Sydney, Mithu and I moved away from rich men surrounded by mathlabi Indian friends whom we call suckers. There was one gentleman Mr Amol Roy who was the MD of a Construction and Mining company in Australia and people would surround him. He would break away telling them I want to talk to Ram and Mithu and have a private chitty chat with us. He sort of acknowledged the problem. A few years back we ran into him at a wedding. He had survived a stroke and was walking with a stick. Mithu and I walked straight up to him and said Dada what happened. The Crowd that surrounded him for years were all seated but no one had the time for him as he was now retired..and of no use to them. Now you know what I mean by Mathlabi friends

1988 - I worked hard as State Sales and Marketing Manager and submitted a tender for a Million Dollar contract to supply Noise Control Equipment, for a Telstra Building. Of my own choice I included an alternative design that cost only $750K was better acoustically as well as aesthetic in looks. I dropped my tender in 30 minutes before closing time and the secretary told me I was the only one so far. So I sat there at the reception until One hour after the closing time and the secretary said You should go home now knowing there is just one bid Good Luck she said.

Two weeks later I received a strange letter on my fax machine. The letter was addressed to my Competitor asking him to submit a price for my personal design.

Obviously the Contracts Manager was doing something illegal to make more profits for his company but the Project Manager did not like what his boss was doing and faxed it to me as if by mistake.

I made an appointment with the Director of the Dept of Housing and Construction bruce briefed him on what had happened and gave him a copy of the letter a Good Samaritan head sent me. He was livid and said Ram I appreciate your coming straight to me. I too am a Civil Engineer like you but don't know any acoustics or air conditioning. Give me some time and let me get to understand this problem fully. I said good. I need justice and if I don't get it I will go to the Ombudsman next

A week later at short notice my Manager phoned me at home as I was down with fever and said we have been asked to attend a meeting with Director Bruce. We were shocked to find 18 people in the Conference room and the consultants trying to put me down and silence me. My Manager did not know acoustics so he just sat there. I tore the Mechanical and acoustic consultants (this chap I had interviewed for a job and rejected by me) to shreds. My Manager was not impressed with my aggressive attitude, so did not say much. The next day I got a sermon from my GM in Melbourne as the acoustic consultant had phoned and threatened to blacklist us for all future projects. I told my GM to go fly kites with the consultant if he wanted and not to intimidate me. To cut the story short Bruce recalled the tender and awarded it to me For $750k despite the opposition repricing their supply at $675K.. Not only that both the men representing the Mechanical and acoustic consultants got the sack.

Soon after my MD  sacked the GM after I gave him evidence of wrong doings.

1995: Anand by far was the best cricketer in his Trinity Grammar Prep School, but was not given the School Cap for Cricket. Instead he was made B Team Captain. I reported this to Mr Roderick West, the High School Head Master and informed him I was taking Anand out of Trinity Grammar as it was a racist school. He pleaded I should not do that and that he would give Anand Half a scholarship for Continuing at High School. Mr West was not aware that Newington College had given him a half scholarship already which we had declined and chose to join a public High school 

Soon after my meeting with Mr West, we got the news from other Trinity Parents that both head master and sports master of prep school had been sacked.

Anand decided he wanted to go to a Govt selective school so he could play club cricket. Guess what within one year Anand was selected for the State of NSW Blues Under 13 Age Group Team.


1996 - The Manager of the Bankstown Representative team that Anand was selected to represent played silly games to promote his own son and in the process we missed out on a semifinal berth. All Parents were angry including the coach and had a meeting at my place and wanted me to do something. I created a dossier for the President of the Bankstown Cricket Club and instead of accusing the manager of anything I wrote questions I wanted the President to ask the manager and why he did what he did ?. The President passed the document to the manager and gave him a week to respond in writing.

Guess what the manager gave the document to his lawyers to see how he could take me on. They could not find a way so he called me and yelled at me on the phone. Called me names and said my lawyers tell me you have only raised questions and not accused me of anything so you cannot be sued. Ha Ha

When the meeting took place all parents came in full strength to back me and the President rattled off the questions I had raised. Half way through the proceedings the manager apologised to everyone assembled in the hall and resigned on the spot admitting he had done the wrong thing by the boys and the club

2006: IITMAA...I had zero connection with IITM alumni assn from 1970 to 2001 what so ever. lost track of all my friends. in 2001 Gururaj Deshpande donated USD $250k to IITm to build the alumni network creating Yahoo groups and Raj Varadarajan was out in charge. I got to know him and in 2004 when I was in India I was invited to an IITMAA EC meeting on campus. I did not like what I saw but did not say anything.

The then President of IITMAA Prof Sunder Rajan poked me and said Rambo we are used to your straight shooting so tell us what you thought of the EC meeting. 

I said "No, I better not as you wont like what I am thnking" He insisted so I opened up. I said it was disgusting to find that the committee was not here on time and the VP came one hour late. It appeared most came here for Gulab Jaamons samosas and coffee and not for the meeting. The EC did not have any agenda and the Secretary of the association did not even have a pen and paper suggesting that no minutes of the meeting were published as per the requirement of the societies act under which the assn is registered. Not only that currently the President and Treasurer is appointed by the Director of IIT who is not even an alumnus himself and I find this illegal and this meeting was a total waste of time.

To calm me down and pacify me the entire EC invited me and accompanied me to a posh Restaurant for dinner and the Bill was paid by the alumni assn. I asked the President don't you think you are wasting the assn funds entertaining me an unknown.

That Day I took it upon myself to Open up the IITM Alumni association to Global Participation. EC members until them had to live in madras city to get elected. Then at a meeting I raised the question with Prof Anant, IITM Director as to why he as Director was appointing the President and Treasurer of IITmaa as it was against the Laws of the Society Act. he said he could not find interested alumni. I said it is not true. No one tried as you were appointing your fav profs to control the association which was illegal. The word Illegal hit the mark. He ordered an EGM or emergency General Body meeting and called for an election to all posts in accordance with the Societies Act..

Today IITM Alumni association is a Body independent of the Alma Mater. Truth and justice Prevailed but I lost a few friends in the Process. But they were not worthy of my friendship were they ?

There are many more fights I have won; I only fight for the right causes and never for personal gains

Nopw when it comes to Standing up to Women, a Man can never win a fight based on right or wrong.Not only will they argue and scream their heads off, they will also start crying to make you give in and give up. Remember I have six sisters three older and three younger. The older ones always pulled their age on me to win and the younger one either cried or stopped talking and all of them would call the Ombudsman my Mother to get verdicts backing them as they are the weaker sect.

When it comes to my Wife I am just a Boom Boom Madu (or Bull) with bells on my Horns saying yes to whatever she says, so I can get to watch cricket when a test match or ODI is on and also get fed

Always a No Win Situation with Ladies, so best to Walk Away