Lunch pranks at school

 Nostalgia


School day lunch intervals.

Taking offence ? No way !

In Malayala medium at Chennai in class VI and VII, I was the only vegetarian. 

We, classmates, used to eat lunch together. Mine was always butter milk rice with a dry pickle - a combo easy to swallow without much effort. The tiffin boxes of my friends opened to boiled eggs or pieces of meat nestled in parboiled rice doused with oil. My friends used to kneed rice-oil combo between their fingers and palm into perfect spheres with the rest of action in their mouths - thorough chewing. Pieces of egg/ meat used to go in seperately.

One of those days, as I was finishing my lunch, I found a shapeless rubberish brown lump at the bottom and stopped. My friends peered into my cylindrical tiffin box with a bucket type handle ( "chottu patram" ) and felt it was a piece of mutton. Some laughed in merriment saying " Subbu ate mutton curry !" while the rest picked up a quarrel with the merry guys while I sat around mutely. The matter was taken up with our class master by some ( not by me ). I had a fair idea who had played prank. My guess was right as "my suspect" owned up and apologised when our class master asked around.

Peeled boiled eggs looked shiny and appealing. I kept pestering my parents about how my friends enjoyed eating them. My dad boiled an egg, peeled it and gave it to me. I ate a small piece and did not like it. The rest went into the dust bin.

I shifted to English medium in class VIII where there were several vegetarians to provide balance and nobody played any food prank.

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