MY TEACHERS: V

Pappu: My Cousin and Sex Educator

Every summer I used to travel to Guna in company of my parents. My grandparents lived in that village and it was there that my summer vacation was spent regularly. I had friends over there – Titu who lived in the house to our right, Bina, Manju and Diggi, who lived in the house right in front of us. The walls dividing the houses were low and as one climbed the stairs to go over to the mezzanine floor, after the 5th stair, one could look over the wall into the foyer of the adjacent house. The houses were on both sides of a narrow lane. The sewers were open. As you stepped out of the house, there was one stair and then you stepped into the lane. Below that stair ran the sewer which was continuous from the first house in the lane and actually came from beyond that house from the main street. So whatever got washed upstream came flowing through the sewer and the last house could see the remnants from several houses and shops upstream. That in itself could be a nine pastime – sit on the door of your house with you legs resting on the out step and watch for the scum flowing in the sewer and find out what the others were doing and what they had to eat last night. Of course it smelled horribly and there were flies. But unencumbered by any knowledge of even the term unhygienic, it was not bothersome.

This summer was different from the other summers. Two of my cousins, Pappu and Guddu had also come over and there was real fun. Pappu was 5 years older to me and Guddu was my age. So it was with Guddu that I bonded better. Pappu was not only older, he was a bully of whom we were afraid. He could twist our ears for faults we did not know we had committed and could slap us too. So we avoided him. He smelled of cigarettes and used to go to the only movie theatre that was there in the village. Therefore he was to be respected.

There were several volumes of Mahabharata in our house. This was a wonderful thing. The text pages were interspersed liberally with plates illustrating characters and events described in the epic. So one could see Arjuna, Bhima, Draupadi, Duryodhana and Dushasan, scenes from the war, and several paintings of Krishna. One volume had many plates where Apsaras were illustrated. Apsaras are very beautiful and sexy girls who dance in the court of Indra in the heaven and cohabit with him. In the plates, the illustrations did justice to the famed beauty of Apsaras. They were clad in the scantiest of clothes with just a bra-like top and very tightly worn dhoti which accentuated the shape of the thighs and the hips. The torso was completely naked except for the brief top and the navel could be seen. To tell you the truth, we did not understand the significance of breasts and hips till that point in our age. But our curiosity was just getting ignited about these differences between boys and girls – just that much.

One evening when Guddu and I opened the Apsara illustrations volume to ogle at the paintings, we were rather surprised. A wheat-grain like tiny object had been drawn on each of the paintings just below the navel and just above the place where the dhoti started. What was that we didn’t understand. But I remember that we giggled at the additions. While we were still giggling, Pappu walked in and before we could stop, he caught us up by the ears and twisted the pinnae. We cried out in pain.

“So, you scoundrels, you have mutilated grandpa’s Mahabharata, hain! And what audacity, what have you drawn here, hain? Don’t you feel ashamed of yourselves, hain?”

We were all red in the face trying to free ourselves from the bully while simultaneously trying to make him understand that we were not the guilty ones. We pleaded with him to leave us alone and that the culprit must be someone else. But the guy held on to our ears and took us to where our mothers were sitting. There he told them that we had fallen into bad company and the evidence of it was in the inside room. He took us back into the room now accompanied by our mothers. Once inside, he encouraged them to look at the plates depicting the now wheat-grain sporting Apsaras. A look of horror came onto the faces of both mothers. After this, the remaining punishment was met out by them. They harassed us by their questions. They wanted to know how much did we know and what did we mean by showing our knowledge this way. They kept on enquiring about the source of our knowledge. It didn’t do that we protested about our lack of knowledge or lack of guilt as far as the wheat-grain adornment of the paintings was concerned. We were then locked up in the inner room. This was really bad because this room was very dark and the only switch was at a height we couldn’t reach. We were very frightened and started banging the door. After about an hour, there were voices outside. Our mothers commanded us to promise that we would not do the dastardly thing again. Although we had protested earlier about the accusation, this time we meekly promised to be good. That was necessary to get out of the darkness that held potential for god knows what kind of perils. We were allowed out of the room but our guilt was now confirmed.

Two days later Pappu asked us about the thing again. We started weeping now imagining that the whole thing would now be repeated again. But he calmed us down and told us that it was actually he who had done the thing. Armed with this revelation, when we started getting up to tell our mothers the truth about the whole thing, he reminded us that it wouldn’t be any good for we had admitted to the guilt already. Also, he would not own up the thing in front of them.

“Is it not enough that I am admitting it to you?” he asked. That was true, he did not have to admit it.

“I am admitting this so that I can tell you about certain realities. You kids are growing up, you should know about bigger things in life,” he said.

Now we were curious. Who doesn’t like to grow up? Besides, once we were educated by this big brother, we could go out and, in our turn, pass the wisdom to the others of our age. That way we would assert the right of seniority over them by dint of our superior knowledge.

“What you think are wheat-grains, are actually vaginas.” He told us conspiratorially. Actually he used the Hindi slang word for vagina. His voice was a whisper and our ears were totally tuned to that. We knew that we were being made party to the big secrets of adulthood.

“What, you don’t know their use?” he asked feigning astonishment over our lack of knowledge. “They use it to pee of course. You see the slit? The water comes out of that.”

In the afternoon when we went out and told the big secret to our friends, they poured a lot of cold water over our egos. They already knew that! Gradually we found out that they all had sisters and had seen them peeing. So they knew.

Soon it was time to go back to our respective towns. But almost in a matter of days after we came back, Pappu also came to Nagpur. I got educated further.

“Do you know how your were born?” He asked.

“Yeah, I came out of my mother,” I said. “Everyone does.”

“No, you fool. Who put you there inside your mother? You know that?”

I was stumped. I admitted I didn’t know that.

“You have that tube with which you pee, don’t you?” He asked, beginning education.

“When you will put that tube inside the vagina of a girl, a baby will get inside her!” he revealed.

I felt like puking. Yuck. Why ever would I put it inside the vagina of any girl? That is a dirty thing to do. Urine comes out of that place. No, no. This guy was joking. But he told me that there is another hole there where you put it. But it still appeared yucky.

Next day, I was sitting with Kalusingh karki on the mound of sand outside the school where some construction activity was going on. I told him about the revelation that had been made yesterday. His jaw dropped and seconds later, he asked me, “You mean, our fathers put those things into our mothers and that is how we got made?”

I told him that this yucky thing had kept me awake half the night and that I was not certain it was right. But there was enough here to make us investigate. It was impossible to ask any of our teachers. We would be severely beaten up. Who to ask? Kalu said that he knew of a bully in his locality. He was very worldly-wise fellow and he would know. So we went to him with hearts beating wildly. We found this boy called Bhuri. And Kalu straight away put the whole situation before him.

“Ha ha ha ha…. Ha ha ha ha..” the guy couldn’t stop laughing. When he did, he asked, “You mean you do not know how things are? In which class do you study?”

“Fifth,” we said as if we were ashamed of the fact.

“Hah! Fifth. And you still don’t know? I knew of this right then in the 3rd and then I left school.” Bhuri said indicating that we were real dimwits. He then told us that what we had been told by Pappu was indeed correct. We were crestfallen with the confirmation that we were both made in that ugly manner. And yet, there was this odd sensation of having accomplished something – the feeling that you get when you acquire some knowledge that is hitherto unknown.

“Avinash,” Kalu said while we were walking back after the school was over, “What if you feel like urinating when your tube is inside that?” That was the fundamental doubt that was plaguing him.

“May be you take it out, urinate, and then put it back for the time required to make a baby.” I said, speculating.

“No, no. I mean what if you urinate inside?” Kalu persisted.

I didn’t know the answer.

“Why don’t we ask Pappu?” Kalu suggested.

We found Pappu smoking behind a thick tree near the garden. He blew smoke in our faces when Kalu put the question to him.

“This is a wonderful question, he said,” and Kalu looked very proud of himself.

“You should not do that. You should hold your urine. But then if you can’t and pee inside, the child that is born has acne all over the face.” Pappu revealed.

“Karade,” Kalu said.

“What?” I asked, not understanding the meaning. Karade was a classmate of ours and had a bad case of acne. HE HAD A BAD CASE OF ACNE!

“My God!” I said.

At this point the things were rather good in school. Fifth class is middle school. So when I came to fifth, the teachers were all new and my previous reputation had not come with me to the new class. And my performance in the first few tests was very good and so I had claimed back my position in the elite group of which Kalu was also a part. The teachers were all quite happy with me again. For once, better times reigned at home too because my father was happy that I was doing well in school. My mother was happy that her son was proving himself.

Next day, during the recess, several of us were sitting on the sand mound and munching on tidbits and talking. As the conversation progressed, I picked up an argument with a friend. Things started heating up. Suddenly, Karade jumped into the argument on my friends’ side. Kalu joined my side. The things became very heated and at one point Karade told us that we were good for nothing kids and that our parents must be pigs. This cut me up and I said

“Now, don’t let me reveal something about you. That won’t serve you at all.” I looked at Kalu and he was looking at me.

“What do you have to reveal?” Karade asked. “You have nothing.”

“Your father peed into your mother’s vagina,” I told him loudly so that the others could hear.

“And that is why you have so many pebbles growing on your face,” Kalu finished off the matter.

In the next moment, a brick appeared in Karade’s hands and before we could understand, there was blood on Kalu’s forehead and he was lying unconscious on the ground. There was a lot of commotion. The girls’ group which was standing at some distance saw this. Some of them started weeping. Some others rushed to the teachers and Mr. Poddar came out with a cane in his hands. First things first. Some water was sprinkled on Kalu’s face. Bit by bit he became conscious. He was then taken for first aid by the peons who had also assembled there. Mr. Poddar found out that it was Karade who had thrown the brick. He caught him and took him to the Principal.

As the next class started, a peon stood at the door. He whispered something. The class teacher told the class that there was an emergency and he would be going to the Principal with Kalu and me and that the class will not make noise while he was out.

When we went inside the Principal’s office, Karade was standing there and on his face was a smirk.
“What did you say to Karade?” Shouted the Principal at us.

We did not say anything. But when the question was repeated, I told him the whole thing and also the sources from which our wisdom had been received. When this was over, the sentence was passed. Karade was set free and he smiled. We were severely beaten up by the Principal and reprimanded. We were made to take an oath which went something like this:

“I will pay full attention to studies.”
“I will read only the text books
and such books as suggested
by the teachers from time to time.”
“I will not read any literature
that is of a corrupting nature.”
“I will not talk to bad boys.”
“I will not indulge in curiosities
that are not proper for my age.”

We were made to repeat this oath ten times. After this we walked back to the class with Mr. Verma, our class teacher.

Once in the class, Mr. Verma pronounced us bad boys and asked other students to not to play with us. I had become a front bencher. But I was stripped of this right and was asked to go back to the back-benches. The same fate befell Kalu. Kalu fought with me because he thought I was the root of this whole thing. We fell out for some time. My reputation went back to normal, i.e., that of a boy good for nothing.

The back benchers received us with enthusiasm. But the girls shunned me completely. They lay a lot of stock by the teachers. Even the girl who was my neighbor and who used to walk back home with me from the school, refused to be with me. Soon she gossiped with other girls of the locality and the other girls also started shunning me. Conversely, I became a hero with the boys of the locality and, as a repayment for the acceptance, spread the wisdom among them. A whole movement to get to the bottom of the truth erupted henceforth and we spent considerable time in educating ourselves about sex.