The Myre

“Orru crypto, orru dollaraaa!” DM ended his speech, with one finger in the air like he had shown the path to victory.

The crown in front of him cheered and clapped, some lower class men at the back in multi-colour lungis even going as far as to whistle with their fingers in their mouth.

DM put his hands together and shook them on either side of his head, further pushing the victory look.

It was really a victory. He had given the speech mostly in English, with a few Malayalam words he knew peppered in here and there, as in his final emphasis and beginning call-to-attention. The crowd seemed to eat it up, oohing and aahing at points, and nodding along.

Even as the mayor put a thick flower garland around his neck, DM could see some men with lungis dancing in the back, their active excitement a nice contrast to the prospect of a passive crypto income.

“Very good speech, Sir Sasikutty,” the mayor aid through a huge comb-like moustache. He was a short man with a pot-belly, and thick dyed hair to go with the moustache, which had not been dyed to match, perhaps on purpose.

“Thank you, thank you,” DM said, still not sure about the non-de-guerre he had been bestowed by Kayo among the Kerala populace.

Regardless of his liking the name, it had been plastered on a placards and banners around the town square, hanging from trees and flagpoles everywhere along with green, blue, red and yellow coloured streamers.

“Any refreshments?” one of the mayor’s entourage asked DM, shaking his hand as he did so.

“Orru chayya?” DM asked, looking around for his friend.

DM had noticed Kayo yawning at the back a hour ago. However as he reached the crescendo of his speech, he’d lost track of his friend, who seemed to be nowhere in the crowd.

“Anything to eat?” the same aide of the mayor was asking.

“Maybe vadda?” DM said, thinking to call Kayo.

“Photos, sir,” one of several photographers said, motioning with his hand at DM and the mayor’s entourage.

As he posed with the mayor and his group, all wearing mundus with different coloured lines and various formal shirts that went with them, DM could hear someone yelling about a penis.

At least, that’s what he thought the yelling was about. Before a single picture could be taken, a very thin man with dry hair in a sort of Afro and thick moustache pushed his way through the crowd of photographers.

“Edda pee-pee surr! Nee fraud-aa!”

DM blanked for a moment, wondering why the man was yelling at him and that too about penis. But then he remembered that the new full name Kayo had given him was PP Sasikutty.

“Ee crypto ellam frauda. Orrum illathe kariyathilla kash idunne. Njan kettitonde Dubainne.”

DM did not need a master’s in Malayalam to guess what the man was saying.

“Sarr, can you please respondsh?” the mayor asked in his ear.

“Njan fraudalaa!” DM declared to the man. “Njaan genuineaaa!”

Without knowing enough Malaylam, it was hard to have said more. DM wanted to explain to the man that as a crypto-evangelist, he did not receive any sort of money to talk about crypto, but did so based on his own lived experience. But how to say that in Malayalam?

“Olla alkare kallipikua evan!” the man yelled, now turning to the crowd behind him, no longer addressing DM directly.

DM was sweating, not because the man had any basis for whatever he was saying, but rather due to the very large public condemnation taking place. The crowd that was just minutes ago eating out of his hand now seemed somewhat divided, with people nodding along with the man and asking him for more information. Said man was now saying things to people in the crowd about something while pointing at DM.

He had to think fast, even as droplets went down his back, staining the shirt. At the same time, the heat brought to his mind something his friend Kayo who had run off somewhere had said – about how his PP Sasi name was a chance to be a different person than back in Dubai.

Looking around him at the people and also lush greenness, DM realised this would be a response he needed to make as PP Sasi.

“Nee podda patti!”

The words almost sprang from his lips without him fully cognisant of what was going on. It was a phrase he had heard from neighbourhood kids decades ago in Dubai. Something to do with telling someone to fuck off, while also calling them a dog.

The crowd gasped. No one had expected such a response. The mayor stepped a bit away from DM.

“Nee podda thendi!” the man turned towards him and yelled, his eyes bulging in his head.

The scene was like two prize fighters smack-talking each other as the audience watched for the actual first blow.

Each second that passed seemed extremely long. DM, a normally conflict-averse man, knew the heat of Kerala was getting to him. The standing fans did not help much. He also kept thinking of what Kayo had said about his new personality. Let yourself become Sasi, he had said. DM thought of the many times in his life he had let things go – the barbs from his sister-in-law that did not like that he had been averse to migrating, the email resignation he had once sent that quoted Bill Gates when really he wanted to tell everyone to suck his dick, and so on.

Something clicked inside his head.

“Edda pulle!” DM yelled at the man, pointing his index finger at him.

“Podda kosheva!” came the retort.

DM knew he had to go nuclear. He reached between the folds of his mundu.

“Nee orru myre!”

Many minutes later, Kayo was sitting in a chayyakadda, ironically having a tea and vadda that DM never got to eat that day. He admired his Honda 350CB sitting outside as he sipped the without-sugar milk tea he had asked for.

“If only they hadn’t given it such a retarded name – Hness,” he thought to himself. “I get it. Highness, like his or her highness. But spell it properly.”

Just then his phone rang.

“Oh hey, how’s the speech?” he asked.

“Where did you go?” DM asked back.

“Oh, went for a ride and then chai and snack. How did it go?”

“I’m in the hospital.”

“What? What happened?” Kayo asked, putting down the ¾-eaten vadda.

“Speech went well, but there was some guy at the end yelling.”

“What did he yell?”

“It was in Malayalam so not fully sure, but he did call me a fraud.”

“Godamn.”

“So I said podda patti to him.”

“Holy shit man. Well done.”

“It kind of escalated from there.”

“Turned into a fight?”

“No. He called me something – I’m not sure what it was. But I knew it was time to top it, so I went for myre.”

“Nice man! Can’t top that.”

“Yeah, so I remember you’d said that when people call someone that, they pull hair from their arm to emphasise it.”

“Totes – really effective visually.”

“Well I though, if myre means pubic hair-“

“It might mean anal hair. Could be both.”

“Whatever. I thought if it means hair from down there, might as well grab a hair from down.”

“From your crotch?”

“No, I’m not that mental. I thought maybe from my thigh.”

“Makes sense. I can imagine the effect.”

“I reached in and plucked one, but accidentally got one from my balls.”

“Oh shit, you got a real myre.”

“Yeah.”

“Hold on. How did you miss your thigh and get your balls?”

“What do you mean, ‘How?’ I missed.”

“But your balls are not near your thigh.”

“They’re right in between.”

“Listen I just grabbed by thigh, and I didn’t get any nut on the way.”

“Congratulations.”

“Wait, how long are you balls?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, maybe you have elongated balls.”

“No.”

“You know, of the two of us, I figured I’d be the one to get that, on account of me wearing boxers so much, especially with mundu.”

“I don’t have that.”

“But what about this hospital thing?”

“Well, you know that thing they say about not pulling hairs from your nose?”

“Yeah, I have a great uncle who died doing that.”

“Well, same for your balls. So I ended up here.”

“Holy shit.”

“So, you gonna come by?”

“Which hospital?”

“Believers.”

“Well that’s ironic.”

“Yeah let’s enjoy the irony as we get the fuck out of here.”

“On my way.”