Ramblings

Vini, vidi, vidi, vidi.... vici

Finally, I won a quiz. Yes, after years and years of getting eliminated at the prelims, I finally managed to win one. Though it was an intra-office version, a win is a win, right?! And with it, I have also finally made the cut as a Bonafide Calcuttan. For, if you happen to be born in the city, you grow up to realise that the only thing that will win you the respect of your peer group is your “trivial pursuits”. Nothing else matters. You can be a class topper, you can be Richie Rich or your daddy may be the city’s mayor… it just doesn’t count. Result: you grow up with a big inferiority complex. Because you are growing up with precocious 13-year-olds who will tell you that the Grateful Dead got its name after band frontman Jerry Garcia did a random dictionary search or that Thompson twins are called Dupon et Dupon in French.
So, you spent your entire childhood collecting the most arcane trivia, listening to the most obscure rock groups, trying and hoping to make it to the haloed circle of Quiz Royalty. Or, if you were like me you went for every quiz in town, got knocked out in the prelims, and sat in the audience furiously scribbling away in the hope that in some quiz in the future you would remember the answer to some “old chestnuts”. And thus it continued, till today…