Go Gentle on the Giant

(People,
This was published in the The Hindu NXg and intended to be humorous, so if you are feeling serious, go to a hospital ! - after that poor joke you ought to be sick !!)

‘Go gentle on the giant’

(The Hindu NXg byline: THE OTHER SIDE With all the talk about how obesity is an imminent problem, here’s a guy who tells you the story from a different perspective.)

Being fat in a malnourished country like India is a hassle, to say the least. Everywhere you go, people stare at you in awe, mischief and fun, exchanging precocious glances on how George Bush is going to combat this new monster on Earth, or perhaps he was a weapon of mass destruction (given his mass, so energy, since e=mc^2…for you physicists out there). Went a bit off-track there, not a good sign when you are just into your second sentence…perhaps I need a snack. I wouldn’t mind these glances if they were not accompanied by imaginative puns and snide remarks — ‘why did you cause the tsunami?’; ‘do you cause solar eclipses?’ and the likes of it. Then comes school, which I suppose is better than college since by the time you become bulky enough to be noticed, you’re already in the higher classes so you can beat up most people who poke fun of you, except teachers, whom you can beat up, but wont…..Why? I don’t know.
Fun times
The real fun begins at lunchtime…aah…my favourite hour in school, and I am no humbug so play along to the pun and games (I’m a chronic punman - one who creates puns, I suppose…but don’t get me started on that). Here I have to speak out to the student community (okay, its cheesy but worth it for the cheese - ignore this pun, please for MY sake…and there’s a lot of ME in the world) — Just because I can eat a few lunches (haha…you couldn’t get me to say lunch boxes), doesn’t mean I can eat more lunches; well, maybe a few more but that is immaterial considering the number of lunches I actually eat.
To be honest, I don’t mind these offers, but I have a certain dignity….or do I? (Please skip to the next sentence once I start this crappy rhetoric unless you are fat (who am I to call anybody fat, but ya know what I mean) in which case you will identify with this] And as you walk…amble around, people are wary of the mass of fat you fling along; you are made fun of by even those lower class students in groups, for safety purposes. But looking at the positive side, people make way for you and students have a certain respect for you for endangering the school building’s structural stability.
The downside
But on the other side (I have many sides, edges and corners you see…), there are those well wishers; I wish they jumped into a well. They come along from the other side of the corridor; as they see you, their eyes light up in glee and knowledge. They throw stats at you about coke bottles or chips or…; not your stats mind you, which as a fat guy you ought to be aware of. I do not dare question their burning desire to burn off my calories and I do enjoy their jokes (that’s part of the problem) like — “if you don’t knock off those paunches, you can’t sit on your haunches” (ignore the grammatical errors).
Then, there are relatives, over-riding with concern, advising you at every family function; and premature talk on how you will be married (hey, I’m still in school) and besides, the easiest way to a man’s heart is through his stomach and I have my heart in my stomach. All I have to say is “spare me”. Frankly I don’t care if I have six pack abs or just six packs. It’s not that we are not aware of the grave health risks, but we are too lazy to care and the gym didn’t refuse to accept me, I refused to accept it. Being a fat guy, thus teaches you the virtues of patience, tenacity and gluttony (from my own testament; newer than the new one). I am a hopeless optimist or just plain hopeless (doesn’t saying that make me a pessimist…?)