Nincompoop Diaries

Introduction

Nincompoop Diaries is a series of short stories where we follow a teenage gang through some of their most interesting encounters. Inspired from my childhood experiences, Noncompoop Diaries will have a perfect blend of facts and fiction. I hope this turns out to be an enjoyable read for you and this make you smile sometimes & laugh out loud sometimes. These short stories will be published in this blog in regular intervals and I will keep the momentum going, please continue sending in your comments & feedback.

This series is dedicated to all the nincompoops who grew up with this nincompoop and have inspired Nincompoop Diaries.

          

The Area

This locality situated in the northern part of a small town in Tamil Nadu referred to as “The Area,” is popular for two reasons – Cricket & Gang fights. Like the chicken and the egg story, its difficult to say which one came first, the cricket or the gang fight. A cricket match would lead to a gang fight which will again end up in a cricket match, however in all probability the initial cricket match itself would have been a result of a gang fight.

What started off three generations ago as a teacher’s colony, now houses the three most notorious gangs of this small town. While the first gang holds together a group of guys in their mid 20s, the second and third gangs contain a bunch of guys in their mid & late teens and a bunch of guys in their early teens respectively. The senior most gang takes every cricket match and gang fight way too serious and the junior most gang takes every cricket match and gang fight way too casual. That leaves us with the gang of guys in their mid and late teens, this gang manages to have a perfect blend of the other two gangs making it the funniest among the three. That brings us to the reason why we are here, we are going to explore the exciting encounters of this gang. But before we get into their lives, its imperitive that we familiarise ourselves with the characters and the lingos of this gang.

Bullet – This guy is the un pronounced leader of the gang. This guy will run faster than a speeding bullet when his dad or mom spots him hanging out with his friends.

Disguise – This guy has a mole in his cheek hence the nick name disguise.

Intelligent Fruit - This guy is one of the biggest comedy reliefs of the gang, he keeps coming up with stupid jokes on everything regardless of the place and situation. His original nick name was Gnanapazham, which means the fruit of knowledge in tamil. The english guy did a somewhat literal translation and named him the intelligent fruit.

The English Guy – This guy is way too obsessed with the english language, he reads a lot of english magazines  / novels and keeps using new phrases he comes across. In most cases, he won’t exactly remember the phrases and end up saying it wrong and when ever he remembers the exact phrase no one around him will understand.

Goat – The hair on his chin makes this guys look like a goat hence the name Goat.

Chicken – He is the most improtant guy in every gang fight, he never hits anybody but will make sure he is there to witness each and every gang fight. He stands in as the umpire in most of the cricket matches as well.

Rabbit – This guy's actual name is Murugesh and his father has 3 rabbits as pets. Since there was another Murugesh in the same colony, he was referred to as Rabbit Murugesh and with time the name shortened to just rabbit.

Road Runner – This guy borrows his uncle’s moped everynight and goes around the area honking. Everytime he honks, he honks twice like the Looney Tunes Cartoon character Road Runner. Hence the name.

Mosquito – This guy is simply the tinyest in the gang.

Robin Hood – This guy has an obsession towards guns and keeps collecting all kinds of toy guns. He always carries a gun with him and generally shoots people around when he is happy or sad or angry. His guns are never loaded but he makes the ‘Bang!’sound everytime he fires which is supposed to kill people.

Eye Thousand – This is the only guy in the gang who wears glasses and friends started calling him kanaayiram which in tamil means the one with a thousand eyes. The name was later translated as eye thousand by The English Guy.

Cannibal: This guy is the most mannerless and merciless in the gang, hence the name.


Sparrow: This guy's hair resembles a sparrow's nest, hence the name.

Cerelac Holmes: Everytime somebody in the gang gets beaten up alone by a different gang, this guy will ask a thousand questions as if he was a detective and he is trying to solve a murder case. The initial name proposed was Sherlock Holmes, but considering his baby face they gave him the name Cerelac Holmes.

Samantha Fox - She is the babe of the area. Once the english guy passed a comment stating she looks like Samantha Fox and as usual no one understood him. Intelligent fruit then clarified it to everyone saying, "You people don't know Samantha Fox? Its a very dangerous animal that lives in African forests."

Cylinder - She is Samantha Fox's friend and neighbour, she could be mistaken for an LPG cylinder if she comes out in a red outfit.

Ku – This guy's name is Kumar, people call him ku. Not because they like him but because ku is the widely accepted and recognised short form for one of the most popular swear words in tamil. Ku does not belong to this gang but he is the legal consultant for all three gangs. He spends most of his time in the court appearing as a fake witness.

Batman & Robin - This phrase is used to refer the strike and the non strike in the cricket game.

Teespty - Teespty is nothing but the coloqual form for TVS 50, the most popular two wheeler at that time. If one keeps saying TVS 50 continuously for a day or or two, he will eventually end up saying teespty.

Panchayat - This term is used to refer to a prescheduled gang fight that has been mutually agreed by both parties to settle dispites.

Panchayat Match - This term is used to refer to a prescheduled gang fight that has been mutually agreed by both parties to settle disputes.

The Hangout - The chai shop besides the main entrance of the area is the place where this group meets up. This is the place the gang spends most of its waking time.

Pi R Square - This is the code used by this gang for 'The Area.' Since the locality is kind of circular in shape, intelligent fruit came up with this name.

Machi - The tamil equivalent of buddy or pal. This is a phrase that is most commonly used by all.


Dey / Dai - These phrases are also used to address members of the gang.


Mouth - Mouth means death. For Example: Once Road Runner was explaining his experience riding his uncle's teespty - "Machi, i was going full speed in my uncle's teespty and I was turning like a race bike near that S-Bend, suddenly an old man in a cycle came in front. For a minute i thought the old man became mouth. Then I applied hand break and stopped the teespty." Now, you must be wondering about the hand break in a TVS 50. Well if both the breaks are working fine, you apply the break with your hands to stop the vehicle hence hand break. In case both the breaks aren't working you use you legs to stop the vehicle - leg break.


Lungi Time - While playing cricket or during a gang fight if anyone's lungi loosens up, one can call for a lungi time where the cricket match or gang fight is paused for 60 seconds which is sufficient enough to retie the lungi and then fold it in half and tie it. No pausing for lungi time during a cricket match or a gang fight leads to a Panchayat or a Panchayat Match.

 
What makes this gang the funniest and the most notorious is that they are extremely unpredictable. One can never say why the gang gets involved in a gang fight or a cricket match. There was once a situation when a woman almost took the gang to the police station because they beat up the woman's son. When the woman threatened to call the cops, Sparrow called Ku. Ku settled the dispute and when he asked why they beat this guy up, Cannibal explained, "The guy was walking towards the provision store and suddenly fell down." "So?" asked Ku still trying to figure out what happened. "How can he fall off like that while walking? He should walk properly right? That's why we beat him up" said Cannibal and the chicken confirmed that is exactly what had happened. There was once the gang got into a Panchayat Match with another gang because they had a dispute on whether Ramarajan was the biggest loser or T Rajender (both are self proclaimed superstarts in Tamil Film Industry).

In the next few editions we will explore the adventures of these nincompoops.

(Note: Images in this article are randomly picked from the world wide web.)