KICKSO MIANGO ROGA REGA !!!!!!

This is a hilarious tribute to the charm and convincing powers that Manoj had....

Most of you already know of this and are probably laughing your heads off just looking at the title. To those who arent aware of it - it is a tale that is nostalgic, charming and in its own way exceedingly funny...

We were still in Elementary School those days and Manoj had this knack of convincing me of stuff and exceedingly naive and stupid that I was - I generally fell for all his tricks and cons !
When this incident happened, he had pilfered my storage draw full of stationary (pencils, erasers, rulers etc) that I had collected with great love over the years and I was at boiling point....

Manoj convinced me that he had used all the stolen goods to buy from his friend an amazing robot which would do everything we asked for and that he would share this robot with me as all the stolen goods were my property. He showed me this real small lego bot which had a backpack and removeable helmet and was in blue ( After ages I discovered what it actually was !!) and said that this was the robot that he had bought from his friend and it can only be activated if you spoke magic words when no one observes you. He said, "Repeat KICKSOMIANGOROGAREGA over and over till it comes alive and then it will do whatever you ask of it !" Stupid me , took this inch tall bot and went up to the terrace stairs at 1406 and did this for almost half a day before giving up and accepting that it was a royal con ! When I confronted him with it - he said "You probably got the magic words wrong or someone must have been peeping on you which is why it didnt work !!" Yet another hour passd in vain and still a dead de-activated robot... When I got back to him the utter improbability of such a thing happening coupled with the realization of my own folly had me in a laughing fit.... and needless to say Manoj got off for his thievery....

Years later - whenever I felt he was lying.. I would still confront him and ask whether this was another "Kicksomiangorogarega" ... It became our code word for a huge con. :) and the very mention of the word would induce bundles of laughs...

And that my friends is the story of Kicksomiangorogarega......

Shalini

Heaven in 7 !!

This stream of memory stems from the good old days when the family was headquartered at No. 7, Chandrabhanu St.

Lot of people would not know that originally his name was meant to be Narendran / Naresh. Nick name Nandu. It was changed for school and stuck....

Manoj had a tough time letting go of the feeding bottle :) He used to be the nadaswaram of our family :)

We went to school in Egmore - Me (Shalini) @ St. Anthony's and Manoj @ Nagle preparatory school. We used to love buns from bakery and special trips to Baduria store. We had little chairs made from iron and plastic wire. His was Orange and mine of course pink :) There are so many things I remember from back then - which would be relatively unheard of to most reading this blog...

Once we were absolutely ridden with flies and there were fly trps with bait laid out for them in the mittham. Manoj came up with this contest of hitting as many as we could with a little plastic gun that shot arrows with flat rubber tips (those that stick) and we spent an entire afternoon spelling doom to those pesky flies.

Dadu used to dissolve soap water in coconut shells (kottangucchi) and we made tubes out of spare paper and spent many days blowing bubbles squabbling over whose tube got the soggiest ! and whose bubbles were the biggest!

There was this one time that we sprayed talcum powder all over the floor of the "room" and put our socks on and danced and skated away before we got caught and soundly scolded !

I remember where we had one afternoon where we refused to get down from the steel cot claiming that the floor is full of crocodiles and sang adho andha vaanilae (MGR song) and pretended to be pirates....

We also self produced a drama based on Ramayan with fake beards and mousetaches ( talcum powder and water !)

Those days Manoj intensely disliked coconut and the only way he used to eat it was as thogaiyal :)

For a long long long time, we did not use the term green to describe the color - it was always "chedicolor" for us......

More to come...........

Cohort in Crime, Co Gemini - u live on in my memory....

Shalini

Paal la kalappadam

I think the people who know about this epsiode would have started laughing already. Its for the benefit of the ones who do not know so as to get an insight on the witty side of Manoj Krishnamoorthy.

Yes he liked to address himself with his full name.

The venue was 4/786 Santhosh Apts. Residence of Bhaskar/Shalini and family. Bhaskar's mom was watching or rather trying to watch a movie called "Pasumponn". She was a die hard Sivaji Ganesan fan and wouldnt miss it for the world. The others in attendance were Manoj, Shiva, Bhaskar and Shalini.

The room was pitch dark and the movie was nearing its climax. It was building up into a big time tear jerker. The scene of interest was where the son was meeting the mother(who is in her death bed) after a long time. Its a tradition in southern villages to feed the dying person some milk to quench their thirst for love and affection and so the scene begins where friends and family request the son (Prabhu) to feed an ounce of milk to the mother (Radhika) so that she can die in peace. The son refuses sighting his mom will leave him if he does so, but finally relents, to let his mother die in peace . Its a real gripping scene with some awesome performance from Prabhu and Radhika. It was real gripping at home too with Vijima (Bhaskar's Mom) almost on the verge of tears (a small drop was threatening to break out any time). Eyes glued to the television. Every one is expecting something to happen.

Phat came the reply from Manoj that had all of us in splits. Vijima herself could not stop laughing. The reason????!!!!!

Well Manoj figured out that it was going to be a tragic end and did not want to go to bed with a heavy heart and out of the blue with a serious face he came upo with this dialog

" Paal la yedho kalappadam pola, oothinadhum aatha pottunu poita".

Boy we laughed to sleep that day and Vijima was so pissed of at having been denied a good climax to a nice movie". He had both the traits of humour (suble and over played) and he knew when to use them; which was special and so was he.

In my heart you will always live on
Shiva

Manoj, my brother

Manoj
...Mojo...
Wake up.
Its me.
Its us.
Wake up.
For a bit.
I am sorry i didn’t have my hand to offer
We are sorry we kept ours in our pockets.
I will remember you, wild one
How can we forget, prodigal son?
I cheered in my heart, when you ascended pedestals
We all cheered , believe us
I am sorry i had to hide to speak to you
We are sorry , we spoke in whispers when we spoke of you
I am sorry my tears have to be forced
We are sorry, we suppose
I am sorry for the lost years, unsaid words
We are sorry we shut our doors
...Its twilight.
Sleep now, Mojo
My brother, my hero.
Sleep now Manoj
Our 30 kilo burden of guilt.
Sleep as i search for tears
sleep the sleep of peace
and we, our sighs release.

Andha naal nyabagam nenjilae vandhadhae...

Manoj

This blog has been created as an emotional archive for housing any memories of this man called Manoj. It is not intended to be judgemental on the way he lived, the things he did or didnt, or the way he left.

To try and remember manoj, brushing away his habits and issues like dusty cobwebs is a must. as the dust settles we will see silhouette and soul.

A simple belief that through the retelling of various incidents, events, escapades and adventures, manoj lives again, through their recollection.