The man with an un-senior apron

Today’s world is completely ad-mad. Amidst the hustle-bustle of meeting deadlines, the client’s and your boss’s expectations, some whacky people, your parents’ dreams, you meet, also, well… the canteen boys. Wait! Does that sound like a Large Paper Dosa crammed in a soup bowl to you? If your answer is yes, aren’t they the ones who know of your mood foods? If your answer is still the same, try staying overnight in your office with them around. Or for once, order food from your regular joint without giving your name to the delivery guy and be in for a surprise. It’s the canteen boy’s wonder which makes the food come straight to your desk. If you still disagree, then you just haven’t bonded enough with them.

As far as spending time in an agency is concerned, most of it is spent discussing new ads done by frivals (friends + rivals), insecure lasses discussing Sushmita Sen’s “silicon boobs”, the weekend – how it was and how will it be (much, more, most exciting!). But that day Shefali and Vivek, while watching TV in the canteen (with Vivek ogling eyes on a firang dressed or rather undressed in a skimpy polka dotted swim suit appearing for a cement ad) and having their regular 5 pm snacks, started off on a different note. Shefali started talking about the weird-Robert-canteen-guy. His French beard and short stature would go around narrating incidents full of miseries. To someone like Vivek, who could stand no nonsense, Robert’s talks seemed like Priyanka Gandhi (Vadhera) wearing a red bindi. Hardly “there” and quite bizarre. (Priyanka, Robert, Gandhi and Vadhera in the same sentence and line… Coincidence is not just a word!). Shefali narrating her latest encounter with Robert to Vivek, while sipping her coffee, said, “This guy came up to me the other day and started talking about how he is underpaid and is still to get the apron that symbolizes seniority. And well, all I could say was a humble ‘Hmmmm’ to every sentence he uttered.” “Hmmmm”, muttered Vivek, “You are still considerate. But yes, he should be sentenced to a life deprived of that apron, for messing around with my fantasies. I was checking Tanisha’s Goa pictures; of her in a sarong, and see-through bikini tops, when this jerk comes up to me and says, ‘Saaheb, Goa ka beach kitna saaf hai na. Main bhi apna honeymoon udhar hi manaaunga’. I care two hoots where he goes for his honeymoon; I immediately minimized the screen and asked him to get me a CCD Espresso Coffee.” Laughing heartily at this, Shefali opened her mouth, full of half-munched sandwich, as Vivek continued. “At times, he is the Osama Bin Laden of my life. But then, I’m Barrack, because well, ‘Yes I can, Yes I can... get rid of him’.”

Just as they were about to get back to work after finishing their snacks, they found the head of the canteen standing right behind them, faintly listening to their conversation; the faintest words being the keywords, actually. They slightly nodded and said a soft hello to him. But Kailash wanted to go beyond that. Just as they went past him, he called them back. “So his uncle, whom he stays with, is isolated from the world and has all kinds of drinks to give him company”, said Kailash. “Why Robert gives his hard earned penny to him is only because he owes him his life. His mom and dad, who died in the same order, one after the other, were victims of bad advertising. His dad, who had a relation outside marriage, all thanks to the classified ads for “relaxation and fun”, fell into a trap of this lady who was the cause of his mother’s suicide. After her death, his father, a penniless creature by then, ended up committing suicide, too. Robert was just seven then. His uncle, who decided to stay a bachelor all his life just so he could take care of Robert, lost his job because he was, as opposed to his brother, just too ethical. He couldn’t survive in the corrupt environment around him and became a slave at the hands of the coloured water. And thus, this is the reason of the emotionally neglected weird Robert.” Saying an “Ohhhh...” to this touchy past narration of his, Vivek and Shefali got back to their desks.

That’s what advertising does. It affects you in more ways than one. And then again, it doesn’t affect just you.