We only knew the location of the class, but didn’t know the exact place. I looked around hopefully. The only sign of music around there was a guitar hanging on the outside wall on the 1st floor of a building. But how on earth could they possibly carry a piano up there, I wondered.
The name at the bottom of the stairs read Victor Albert. So, this was the right place.
We climbed up the dingy flight of stairs and walked into what looked like a mechanic shop. No it didn’t have tools spread all over, it just reminded me of one, don’t know why. On the left there was a Sitar and a guitar, to the right of us was this kid who was playing the keyboard and a man sitting next to the kid, with his back towards us. There were a couple of guys there, one of whom handed me a diary and asked me to fill in details like my name, address, phone number and the instrument of my interest-- which I did diligently. “Please wait, he’ll be with you in 10minutes” this guy said and left.
All these years I thought 10 minutes was like 600 seconds, which went by real fast. Only today I realised when some people say 10 minutes, they subtly mean an hour or so.
There we were waiting to speak to the master, enroll and if possible start with my first lesson today itself. Little did we know what was in store. Patiently we kept waiting while Mr.Albert (who shall henceforth be referred to as he /him as the case may be) spoke on the phone. All of a sudden, we heard weird shhh…ing noises. This was him, still speaking over the phone. “Where had we landed” we wondered.
Then the maid came by and had to clean up the place. So we got up so that she could sweep and mop the floor. “Why doesn’t he talk to us, and get it over with” amma asked me. How I wish I knew. So there we were still patiently waiting for him.
Finally at 12.20 a man who looked a lot like what Jesus Christ would in today’s time, showed us to the table where Mr.Albert sat.
Well, this Mr.Albert didn’t look anything I imagined him to be. First of all his name didn’t suit him, maybe a Sayed or a Mohammed would have suited him better. Anyway that didn’t matter. He opened the diary where I’d jotted down my details and in a very accusing tone said “Why have you not written today’s date?? It is the presence of mind”
Eh??? Excuse me??? But I kept my mouth shut. He then scribbled down the date and shut the book tightly mumbling “This is for our records”.
Thus he begun “Let me now make a presentation to you, I’ve been doing it this way for 35 years”. So, on and on he went about the individual, undivided attention that students here got. “Yeah-sure, I saw that” I thought to myself.
Finally he drew a line on the page and wrote a few numbers, which was the break up of the fees that I was required to pay, and said, “now this is what it is. So once you have finalised if it is going to be worth it, and you really want to join, you can come back take the application form and then enroll for classes”.
The only thing that I blurted out was, “I have already decided that I want to join. The reason being I WANT to learn, so could I please have an application form and could you tell me when I can start”
At this, he turned to Jesus Christ and told him to give me the details.
Whew! There, it was over and the time was already 1.00 pm and appa must be wondering where on earth we were.
Man! Did we rush back home, gobble down lunch and dash to watch the movie.
Say Albert and I only remember the Aaal-bert of the movie “Samsaram adhu minsaram”
As Manorama puts it Aaal-bertu.. come naa commu.. come-naati go!
Cheers!
The name at the bottom of the stairs read Victor Albert. So, this was the right place.
We climbed up the dingy flight of stairs and walked into what looked like a mechanic shop. No it didn’t have tools spread all over, it just reminded me of one, don’t know why. On the left there was a Sitar and a guitar, to the right of us was this kid who was playing the keyboard and a man sitting next to the kid, with his back towards us. There were a couple of guys there, one of whom handed me a diary and asked me to fill in details like my name, address, phone number and the instrument of my interest-- which I did diligently. “Please wait, he’ll be with you in 10minutes” this guy said and left.
All these years I thought 10 minutes was like 600 seconds, which went by real fast. Only today I realised when some people say 10 minutes, they subtly mean an hour or so.
There we were waiting to speak to the master, enroll and if possible start with my first lesson today itself. Little did we know what was in store. Patiently we kept waiting while Mr.Albert (who shall henceforth be referred to as he /him as the case may be) spoke on the phone. All of a sudden, we heard weird shhh…ing noises. This was him, still speaking over the phone. “Where had we landed” we wondered.
Then the maid came by and had to clean up the place. So we got up so that she could sweep and mop the floor. “Why doesn’t he talk to us, and get it over with” amma asked me. How I wish I knew. So there we were still patiently waiting for him.
Finally at 12.20 a man who looked a lot like what Jesus Christ would in today’s time, showed us to the table where Mr.Albert sat.
Well, this Mr.Albert didn’t look anything I imagined him to be. First of all his name didn’t suit him, maybe a Sayed or a Mohammed would have suited him better. Anyway that didn’t matter. He opened the diary where I’d jotted down my details and in a very accusing tone said “Why have you not written today’s date?? It is the presence of mind”
Eh??? Excuse me??? But I kept my mouth shut. He then scribbled down the date and shut the book tightly mumbling “This is for our records”.
Thus he begun “Let me now make a presentation to you, I’ve been doing it this way for 35 years”. So, on and on he went about the individual, undivided attention that students here got. “Yeah-sure, I saw that” I thought to myself.
Finally he drew a line on the page and wrote a few numbers, which was the break up of the fees that I was required to pay, and said, “now this is what it is. So once you have finalised if it is going to be worth it, and you really want to join, you can come back take the application form and then enroll for classes”.
The only thing that I blurted out was, “I have already decided that I want to join. The reason being I WANT to learn, so could I please have an application form and could you tell me when I can start”
At this, he turned to Jesus Christ and told him to give me the details.
Whew! There, it was over and the time was already 1.00 pm and appa must be wondering where on earth we were.
Man! Did we rush back home, gobble down lunch and dash to watch the movie.
Say Albert and I only remember the Aaal-bert of the movie “Samsaram adhu minsaram”
As Manorama puts it Aaal-bertu.. come naa commu.. come-naati go!
Cheers!
well have you joined the classes????
and about the colours of life.. i would prefer it to remain as colorful as it is...
but we also need that shade of black which tells us how beautiful white is..