Recently, my friend and I were recounting our beautiful hostel days in Andhra Pradesh. We got reminded of our dear Thatha , the hostel barber. Unlike the vast variety of options that one could go forth in life, we were only privileged to go to one barber during our stay.
Thatha was a man in his sixties, dressed in a white shirt and lungi tucked up to his knees. He was also an adept Naadaswaram Vidwan. A man of many parts indeed.
Now the fun part is that Thatha did not speak a word of any language other than Telugu. Just imagine the plight of North Indian students struggling to pick up the language to converse with him. I remember my first encounter with Thatha . I explained to him meticulously how he should go about with the hair on the sides, how much to keep on the front and so on, with some amazing presentation using my hands and lots of onomatopoeia. He deeply resonated with an ever-knowing look.
All was fine till midway when I realised some uninvited encroachment on the top. I looked in the mirror. I was aghast and in the agony I looked into his eyes, “ Thatha , what did you do?” He went about nonchalantly. It was like the dry fire that catches on in the forest during summers. You go later and see the remnants of the burnt trees. My head somehow resembled that.
We friends meticulously planned out a strategy to overcome this adversity. We hired a Telugu friend of ours and took an exclusive crash course on essential words in Telugu. We practised it in the corridors, we experimented it in front of other Telugu friends, and chanted it while taking bath. Finally the day arrived when the head beckoned me for a makeover and I, with a sense of achievement, walked into our modest salon. I went up to Thatha and instructed him with my newly picked Telugu words. Thatha was nonchalant but still gave me a confirmatory nod. I was finally relieved, the days of toil finally paid off. Thatha began the routine, but midway again, I got deja vu . I looked up in the mirror and I looked like the long lost brother of the priest king from the Indus Valley Civilisation. My floodgates were about to open but I resisted it while my eyes said, “Why Thatha , why?”
Thatha , again with an all-knowing glance, told me, “It looks good on you”, and continued his usual magic. I was dumbfounded.
From then on, I gave up. I trained my mind before every haircut and I told myself to surrender. Not many choices left. But slowly in the hidden language of silence, he started reading my thoughts. It was not any wild forest fire but a meticulous pruning done by an expert gardener. Just enough, and it amplified the beauty of the garden.
Thatha passed away a few years ago in an untoward accident, but this lesson would be etched in my mind for long. I remember December 2019, of companies who made those amazing plans for 2020 to become unicorns, giraffes or whatever. How many goals were made by people across the world, and all it required was an uninvited guest to smash it all. Thatha almost became a larger-than-life figure representing the teacher called life. We try to think we are in control of things. We think we can just game the system and conquer it. Sometimes we have to let go. As they say, man proposes and god disposes.
In conclusion, I remember Epictetus, who as a slave had faced adversity after adversity, echoed the same: “Do not seek for things to happen the way you want them to; rather, wish that what happens happen the way it happens: then you will be happy.”
