Once a thief......

Feburary 1992. We had made Ganapathy nagar, as our new abode. I was doing my second standard. School was a good 7 km from our home. To commute daily, an Auto was arranged. Everything was new to me. Till then, i walked to school mostly accompanied by someone from home. New faces in auto, and new trends to follow....

There were pupils of all ages and classes in the auto. I was given a pocket money of 5 rupees max...POCKET money, that was the first time, i had the privilege of receiving one. I did not know, people called it POCKET money then...So were the other fellas in the auto....each had their own pocket money...

Well the intentions were simple...Either i should be able to catch a bus and reach home or call them from a public phone when required....Well what do u think i used it for???? I used to buy sweets which cost just 25-50 paise in large quantities...then what???just eat them:):) There was one sweet which had tamarind in it plus something else. There was a round shaped chocolate for 50p enclosed in a golden wrapper. the myth was that, occasionally there could be a one rupee coin within the chocolate!!!!!!!!!!! That is how they marketed it!!!!! There was one more famous chocolate fondly called as suthu mittai!!!(சுத்து மிட்டாய்) This was my favorite. It is a round solid chocolate with two tiny holes at the center. A small tight cord runs through each hole and has no open end. When given enough pressure by wounding the cord, on release of pressure, the cord unwinds and the chocolate rotates. Though a simple mechanism, it always fascinated me:):)

As days went by, most of the fellow travellers became my friends. buying things in the noon became a habit...And i was enjoying every bit of it...Over the days, i felt i did not have enough capital to match other guys. We played a small game where each of us will buy the suthu mittai and ferociously play with it. The person who had the large number of unbroken mittais at the end was the winner....

Since i had only few rupees, i always lost. After few days, it was difficult to handle the daily lose and lose of the so called dignity:):):) So i decided to increase my capital!!! but how???? The first day, i took an extra rupee from kitchen :):) without my mom's knowledge....

As days went by, one rupee became five, then ten finally twenty.....mom's kitchen, dad phant,shirt....NOTHING WAS LEFT BEHIND. Since these mittai wala's will not accept rupees, i had to take pain to find coins of 50 and 25 paise and collect them.....With such money in hand, i was becoming popular as well as winning games among my fellow travellers...

Once after bath, i was trying to hide a lot of coins in my towel, well when i kept a leg forward, each coin with distinct sound fell down and scattered to all corners of the room...MOM found it out...My mom was always soft...she always made me feel comfortable even in my nightmares!!!! She gave a warning and sent me to school...Later that evening she enquired about me to the fellow travellers....

How can they guess my mom was enquiring what i was doing with money!!!!They were happy that i was buying them a lot to eat and they happily told my mom, i am provided with more money and i feed them all!!!!!!!

For next few days, i didn;t think about it...but soon, i caught up with it...this time, with experience, i planned out what i did, how i handled things....Soon it was our school annual day...As usual i geared up for the day with lot of coins in my pocket...I reached school enjoyed the day again every minute of it....While returning back, i slept on my way back home. My parents had accompanied me and when they took me to bed, they found out the coins in my pocket. I was snoring peacefully then...

Next day morning, when i woke up, my dad was sitting patiently next to me. I got up, when to toilet...My mom gave me boost with her usual smiling face....After i gulped every bit of it, my father took me to terrace....I was puzzled by his behaviour!!!I realized what was happening as i stepped on the terrace.

Dad: என்னடா திருடரிய? (are u steeling?)
Me: ????!!!!!!???!!
Dad: இது கெட்ட பழக்கம். காசு வேணுனா கேளு டா. தரேன். இப்படி திருடாத. என்ன வேணாலும் கேளுடா..இப்படி திருடாத!!!. (This is a bad habit.If u need money ask me i will give u. Dont steel like this. Ask me whatever u need, i will give u)

That was the last day i ever thought about stealing money....till date, if i knew it is not mine, i ignore it...those words were really powerful. He neither scolded me nor did he beat me.....