Shaant, Shaant, SHAANT

My dad and I are the two most astoundingly wela people on the face of this Earth. Were you to be sitting besides someone who knows us while reading the statement and were you to shake your head and say "How ridiculous" or something representing that sentiment, our acquaintance would look at you and say, "No, no; it's quite true." THAT wela. If this acquaintance were to be my chacha, he would animatedly discuss his case with a frightening zest.

So we are at our idle best during Dad's daily rounds of drinks in the evenings. Now, it often happens that there is a special event, occasion or person that we wait for, in great anticipation during a particular time in our lives. And in our wait, we tend to discuss the matter to such lengths, covering such minute details that we quite shred it to pieces.

These days Ramu's wedding is THAT topic for us. Day in and day out, we talk about nothing but who would be invited, what would we wear, where would Dhoni stand during the wedding, which car would be given to which guest and more importantly, where it would come from and so forth.

After the guest lists had been mentally prepared and the menu decided, we found-one fine evening- that we had nothing more to talk about in context of THE wedding. We had covered the minutest point. Never before had the 2 of us ever reached a point so close to the event of our conversation falling back on finances, politics, history or such important issues.

As we frantically scanned our minds for a saving grace, it came externally in the form of Mom, who noticing the sudden hush that had descended over the house, came into the room; said, "Bohot shant ho tum log"; and unknowingly saved our minds from getting caught into the quagmire of what is wrong with the world, and the rather uncomfortable conscience-stirring it causes.

"Shaant", I mused, "is a good name". "Shaant". "Shaant Kakkar". "Interesting". Dad caught on. "Ramu's first son should be named Shaant".

And then it started. We discussed the possibility of the child being a girl and decided to call her Shanti. We also discussed the widely-believed rule (actually, just believed by 2 very wide people- dad and I) that a kid turns out to be the exact opposite of what is name represents.

So Shaant would invariably be cranky and screechy and Dad and I gleefully noted that when he would pull at my brother's rapidly diminishing hair and scream his baby lungs out, we would be able to shout, "shaant,Shaant, SHAANT".

Of course, if the baby in question is an equally cranky Shaanti, our phrase then would be "Shaanti, SHAANTI".