Ever since I was in secondary school (  i.e. the time when my brain started working a bit , if any ) my P.T. teacher , subject teachers , school prefects and even my parents had an issue with my hair . I never understood why long hair was considered a sign of indiscipline ??? or did they fear that I might use them for hiding cheats ( or any other potentially dangerous item for that matter ) .

There were two Yoga teachers in my school . We used to categorize them as “Chhote Yoga Sir ” and “Bade Yoga Sir” . The Chhote , as the name suggests was tiny in structure , a lot serious and used to mind his business . But the Bade one was an a*****e . He was a massive troll , a bully and used to disgust us with his PJs . We were forced to laugh at them because if he caught someone not laughing , he used to make that guy the protagonist of his next PJ , which was the last thing we wanted , to be laughed at by half of the school ( which included girls too , of course ) .

Sometimes when we were forced out of the classroom by our bully teachers , he used to target us in the corridors , again making fun of us in every damn possible way . Everyone of us was pretty sure of one thing . And that was that the monster used to sit idly at his home , inventing all the possible ways to trouble us . Now coming back to the point . One of the dreadful techniques he employed to torture us was the way he used to check if our hair were behind the “threshold limit” . He used to use his fist and rotate us by 360 degrees ( our hair being the fulcrum ) and then came the insult in front of everyone . The criminal in the scene was then tagged as “Uncivilized” , “Good for nothing” , “Parents’-money-sucker” , “Flirt” ( we used to consider “flirt” as an insulting word then ) and many other such cool adjectives .

Then there was the ultimatum part . A deadline of one day was given to us and in case we failed ……………. But every cloud has a silver lining . Thanks to the superstitions , we had three readymade natural excuses to delay the deadline by 24 hours . And those three excuses are called “Tuesday” , “Thursday” and “Saturday” ( As they say , you will be reincarnated as a donkey or horse if you let the scissors touch your hair on these days ) ………….. School days are gone . Professors here don’t care how we look , how we dress up and how we sit in the class . They even don’t care whether we are even present in the class . You are at total freedom …. only unless you cross the line ( like making them a target of your self designed fully functional rocket ) .

Prefects are gone . Teachers are gone . Even that yoga teacher is gone . But .. but .. but ….. There is a home … in which is a very worried lady …. a lady who thinks that even cold water is injurious to health …. a lady who thinks that you are always prone to accidents …. a lady who is always worried if her child is safe and sound . This lady , somehow tends to think that her child looks a lot cute and smart when his hair is trimmed down to the “SAFE” length …….

I have returned home only yesterday …. Yesterday was fine … infact it was great , nothing unusual happened and there were no signs of any danger …. But the volcano suddenly erupted today when around 1’o clock I was ambushed and forced out of the house …. Right now I am sitting in front of my laptop , writing this blog , but only after coming back from the barber’s shop … And now the wait begins …. the wait for my hair to grow back to the normal ….

P.S. In the meanwhile , Roger Federer has won his 16th grand slam title and 4th Australian Open …. defeated Andy Murray in straight sets in the finals ….. Undoubtedly the greatest the game has ever seen … Three cheers for the champion of champions …