An eventful encounter with Joe de Franc

“Da nakki, enthdutteda m***** ithu. Purathottokke irangi nadanoodeda m****. Ethu neravum murikakathu computeril irunolum. Nee enth’da athinu garpham undakkan nokunno”. I was in front of my computer when Werel, came to my room and told this.

It was a lazy afternoon, about 3 pm and wirel came to my room wearing jeans and shirt. In hostel werel’s dresscode was just a lungee, worn half mast, whose top edge lie 12 cms below his navel and bottom edge was always 20 cms above kneecaps, just like the skirts worn by Deepika. Seeing him in his shirt and jeans, I guessed, that he is back from Kottayam, but was surprised to see him come to my room straight from Kottayam.

After a few seconds of chit-chat, to my second surprise, weral invited me for a drink. Thinking of weral two things that come to our mind are his miserly nature and ability to obtain money from others by fooling them. Knowing weral for past 2 years, I humbly declined his invitation. Knowing what was in my mind, weral took out a pint bottle from his jeans pocket and said “Nee cash kodukendada m****, ithu ente treat aa”. It was ‘Joe de Franc’, which was categorized as “expensive” by us at that time. I should say it was my third surprise in a short span of two minutes. Weral has become very unpredictable, I thought. But later towards the end of this story, I understood that weral could never change; he is all what he is.

Weral was a celebrated drinker who could simply take 6 to 8 pegs in a stretch and I, a novice who got contented with 2 or 3 pegs maximum. After lot of assurance from weral that I need not pay even a single penny from my pocket, I accepted the invitation and we moved to our RIT canteen to savor the drink. Though cautious of some concealed, puckish and hideous plan under this treat, I was deeply moved by werals hospitality and his genial gesture to offer me a drink. We talked about RIT, our hostel life, teachers etc enjoying the Joe de frank. It turned out to be a nice evening and we were at our third peg.

While making the third and last peg, weral asked me about my DOM (Dynamics of Machines) exams. I graciously told him that I expect a decent 75+ for the university. “So you could get more than 70% with your 28 for internals, right?” I was astonished by werals’ strong analytics and his knowledge on my internal marks. He was a mark savvy and keeps an eye on everyones’ percentage but I never thought he knew everyone’s internals. Could be that he guessed, as all of us got somewhere between 25 to 35, yet 28 was six out of six. “Are you going for an improvement?” I was wakened from my thoughts as weral asked it. “No” I said promptly.

He offered me the last peg and said “In that case it shouldn’t be a problem”. I started smelling a rat. All those fears I had in deep in my mind surfaced. After all weral could not treat someone from his own pocket. Werals’ face had that very old, very same, wicked smile. The two pegs I had didn’t allow my cheek muscles to frown. I slowly learnt that the Joe de frank was nothing but my DOM textbook.

I could do nothing but relish the last peg peacefully and silently. With the gratitude towards weral for sharing his fortune with me, we walked towards hostel in each other’s arm.