Boys on the Vespa
Life is like a short story; and a short story never goes for very long and nobody gets to stick around it indefinitely. We’re all on this temporary ride through time.
Time is immortal but we are not. And this is the beauty of this fact, knowing that our time is limited makes each moment special. It’s like a reminder to cherish the present, connect with others, be thankful and relish the true essence of significance. Even though no-one will be here forever, the impact a person makes can last beyond our time, kind of like leaving impressions in many hearts and minds.
I’ve just entered my 50s. And in this phase of life news of the passing away of our own parents or our friends’ parents comes to make us sad but it does not surprise in a big way. When kids have become half a century old then suck King of news are as common as rain in the rainy season.
Last night Tamanjeet shared the news of the passing away of father of Parvindra Singh Brar in the friends’ WhatsApp group. He was not keeping well for a long time. This news saddened me immensely. To come to know about the passing away of him made me feel like the passing away of my own dad.
It’s always difficult to come out of the grief of losing anyone from the family. May God bless the Brar family with the strength to come out of this shock caused by such immense loss of life. My heartfelt feelings are with the whole Brar Family.
Of course no one in this world comes to live forever but still the news of the passing away of someone you know hurts. They leave but their memories stay with us and keep stirring our mood and mind.
I feel myself to be a lucky person who is blessed to be a beneficiary of learning some lessons of life and gaining some Wisdom from Senior Brar Sir. I must tell you all about how I got lucky to learn some life mantras from him.
Context of the Talk
There is an interesting anecdote about the incident of being lucky to meet Beloved Senior Brar Sir. We called him Brar Uncle.
Here is the Anecdote :
Migration of Birds
In July of 1994 a bunch of happy go lucky boys and girls from LNIPE Gwalior landed in the campus of DAVV Indore for their further studies. These were those students of LNIPE who either couldn’t secure a place for themselves in the PG course or who chose to shift elsewhere for their further quest for studies.
The happy go lucky bunch of kids consisted of Anil Tanwar, Prince Dhaliwal, Parvinder Singh Brar, Deepak Lal, Adnan Jameel, Vibha, Monica, Geeta and Anita. I also was one amongst them, but I was like an extra player as I spent most of my time sleeping and eating.
To them, just coming out of a regimented life of LNCPE, coming to DAVV was like, as if a kid, who only knew how to swim in a swimming pool had been thrown into an ocean. In the pool you swim to enjoy life but in the ocean you are forced to swim to save your life.
At LNIPE, where their life was running like a tailor-made plan in the same way as a strict Mom makes her naughty kids work very hard but along with this she also takes care of their tea, breakfast, lunch and dinner at the right time. Every strict Mom scolds, threatens and says harsh words to her kids but she also ensures that her kids never get off the track of life.
But coming to DAVV made them realise as if they had become orphans. But in the beginning, life at DAVV felt like a cake walk as there rules of life weren’t strict like in LNIPE. For some time they lived their life like some naughty kids who are left alone at home when parents are out for work. They were having the time of their lifetime.
Here, there was no one to scold them and stop them from doing anything. They were flying in the sky like a newborn baby bird. They soared through the boundless sky, akin to a newborn bird experiencing the thrill of flight for the very first time. That was so exciting and thrilling for them. The way they were enjoying their moments in Indore, it was like their bread was buttered on both sides.
What Real Life Looked Like
But after having a short spell of fun, soon they realised that fun is not the only thing in life, you need proper fooding and lodging also to live a good life.
In everyone’s life a phase comes when they realise that every glittering thing is not gold and troubles in life are not always to kill us.
Here they were enjoying a restriction free life but at the same time there was also no one to ask them to eat or to cook for them.
The boys who used to find faults in the food after eating 3 full meals a day in the mess of LNCPE, were looking for a cheap dhaba in the streets of Indore to eat one cheap meal a day.
And the gorgeous girls who once used to live with tantrums in LNCPE, were living in a rented house in a mohalla of Indore and buying cheap aalu, gobhi, lauki and bhindi for cooking in the evening. And the interesting thing was that they did not even know how to cook.There was no one to pamper them.
Too Much Sweetness Spoils the Health
In the beginning, for them, it was happening just like a Mom’s good boy tasting the Drugs for the first time, where a strange type of euphoria begins to permeate his body and mind, giving him a peculiar sense of pleasure. He enjoys it a lot but in reality it ruins them.
The happily ruined creatures like Anil, Prince, Deepak, Jameel and me too were enjoying that newly found taste of life in tits and bits. But Parvinder Singh Brar, the happy go lucky freaky Sardar boy aka our very own Brar Saab, was the boy who had started enjoying that mindless liberty with a fully open heart and hands.
It was like we were enjoying a drink of life sip by sip but our Brar Saab, the fun loving Son of Sardar, had plunged into the pool of drinks. And pimple upon an ulcer was his bolstering chemistry with Anil Tanwar, another next level lovely and softly explosive creature.
Boys on the Vespa
What Anil Tanwar, fully loaded with Haryana vibes, did first in Indore, he bought a secondhand green colour LML Vespa scooter. He used to love his scooter like his girlfriend and always proudly introduced his scooter to everyone as a ‘Half Kick Start Scooter’. In Fact we also fell in love with LML Vespa as from time to time we also used to take its ride. In those days, for a college boy, owning a two wheeler used to be like a rarest of rare type of luxury a college boy could have.
After the arrival of LML Vespa in their life, the pair of Tanwar & Brar became the free birds flying in the roads of Indore. That green scooter became their green card to enjoy in the wilderness of fun and thrill.
The boys who used to yearn for riding a bicycle in LNCPE were now flying a scooter in Indore like an aeroplane.
Where there is garbage, flies also come there. In those days that was the power of having a scooter. After they got a scooter, Brar and Tanwar, both of them started staying busy as if they were the overburdened CEO of some company. Many boys of the city whom we never had seen, had become their close friends.
The gang of some outlawed boys of the colony where they lived had become their close aids, and every evening, they would come to their room to enjoy shots of beers and puffs of cigarettes.
Every evening there would be a huge round of binge. After a few shots and puffs they would look ready to conquer the world. We were terrified to see the newly found terrific lifestyle of our happy go unlucky chaps.
Time was slipping like sand slips from hands. Now they were spending more time with the local outlawed boys, we would see them only in the late evening surrounded by the gang.
Where Was Parvinder ?
One day I noticed that we hadn’t seen Parvinder Brar for quite some time. I enquired Tanwar, his soulmate, about him. But his answer looked somewhat fishy. His words and body language were not talking in unison.
Teachers also had started asking about Brar as he had not been coming to class for the last many days. Was he out of Indore, we had no idea. Some bad taste rumours were making rounds in the market regarding the sudden disappearance of Brar.
Meeting Sr. Brar Sir
After a gap of a few days I found a good-looking senior slender body Sardar ji gentleman was talking with teachers at the department.
As soon as I saw him I knew that he was Parvinder Brar’s father.
I was right, Senior Brar Sir had come there all the way from Faridkot as he must have been informed about his son’s disappearance. He met us very fondly, just like a father meets his sons.
Later uncle ji joined us at the ground during our activity class. He was continuously discussing things about his son. Perhaps he wanted to know about the grey and dark shades of Parvinder’s life at Indore. He was concerned to know the microscopic details about his son’s life.
After listening to what we told him about Parvinder, Uncle ji must be thinking how innocent his son was. The detail we provided him was too good to be correct.
A father is always a father, he knows his son inside out.
We Got Wisdom
After listening to honey coated talks about his chilly like son, he looked at us with a bizzare gesture and said, “Son, I want to hear the truth”, he said authoritatively.
Then he presented a good dose of some enlightening thought provoking words to us which opened up all the clogged drains of our brain.
Now the next moment we were revealing the secrets of greatness of Jr. Brar in front of Sr. Brar Sir.
Though it did not make him happy, he looked satisfied to know the real things. May be, he already knew everything, he only wanted to confirm this from us.
We spent that day and night under his patronage.
We got to listen to lots of golden words from the man from the land of the Golden Temple. He was so open hearted and straightforward, listening to him was a blessing. Listening to him had given us a clue of why Brar was such a happy hearted bullish boy who never took anything seriously.
Next day after settling the issues with some ‘out of campus people’ who were in touch with Brar, he left for his home. He left us with some lessons to remember for a lifetime.
Sometimes I realise that I went to LNIPE where I got some education and the mind-blowing company of some mind-blowing friends. But switching to DAVV Indore helped us to see the more real face of Life and World. For all of us who migrated from LNIPE to DAVV Indore, if LNIPE was a station for an education but DAVV Indore was our station to get some Wisdom for Lifetime. At LNCPE we read chapters but at DAVV we read Life
Listening to Brar Again
Since then I never heard of Brar, but later, years after completing studies we entered into the era of Facebook and WhatsApp which made this world look so small and the overstretched timeline of time shrunk and got fitted in the mobile screen.
Lost friends started reuniting through Facebook. Oneday face of Parvinder appeared on the screen of my mobile. Suddenly a forgotten story got alive, numbers got shared and next moment I was listening to the voice of Parvinder who had disappeared years ago from Indore.
There was same vibrant vibes in his voice. He started the conversation with the same fun and flavor from where he had left it incomplete years ago in Indore. Suddenly all lost connections started sparking. The boy who had lost in the streets of Indore was speaking from England.
After a bagful of talking about an affair called life, he ended the conversation with a sentence which blew me away with an explosion of amusement.
Parvinder said, “Bhai main Angrez Singh ka Beta hu, dekh aaj main Angrez ban gaya hu, ab England me rahta hu”.
(Bro I’m son of Angrez Singh, and look now I’ve become an Angrez, I live in England)
(“भाई मैं अंग्रेज सिंह का बेटा हूं और अब मैं भी अंग्रेज बन गया हूं, मैं इंग्लैंड में रहता हूं”)
Angrez Singh Brar was name of, Parvinder’s dad, our beloved uncle ji.
The news of his demise left me shocked. What else can I do?
I offer my heartiest regards and heartfelt condolences to the person who not only gave us some lessons and wisdom for lifetime but also gave us a wonderful mind-blowing friend in the form of Parvinder Singh Brar.
Thanks! Uncle you’ll stay in our hearts and minds forever and your words will keep guiding us.
My Pranaam to Parvinder’s Mom, Aunty ji, too 🙏