Heroes

My cousin’s FB profile photo is him standing next to Shahrukh Khan..Knowing him, chances are that he has the same photo enlarged and framed and it is kept in the living room, perhaps all the rooms in his house!!

I was once send a youtube clip ( I am a Malayalee song) and was told to watch for the guy in the back ground..because he is a friend!!!
The logic being,I know him, he is in the famous clip, he is a hero,therefor I know a hero and I am famous!! ( convoluted, I know !!)
And if you really dig deeper..you will probably know that he knows him, because he is a friend of a friend of friend…you got the drift..

Years ago, I knew this Mallu dude. He was working at the Banana Leaf shop. My friends ( including some Aussie expats) and I met at the restaurant every Sunday morning for Dosai. Because the dude and I spoke Malayalam and Aussie accent is very hard to understand, it was me who ordered the food..all worked well..till the mallu dude decided to be more friendly..
One day, he asked the Aussie expats, “which company do you work for ?”
“John Holland” They replied
“Oh really? Only last week I had beer with John Holland at his house” replied the mallu dude..

There was a moment of silence,then all eyes were on me..
Once the shock settled, the fair dinkum Aussies, took the guy for a jolly good ride..encouraging him by pretending to believe him and making him spin more and more tall tales about meeting John Holland.
The mallu dude really didn’t know that the Aussies were having a good time at his expense..
I was so miserable, On one hand there was a need to protect this innocent dude, who has been taken for a jolly good ride by my friends..on the other hand, the knowledge that our dude got himself in the bind..( I did have a strong urge to beat the mallu guy in to a pulp for lying and getting in to such unnecessary mess!)

I still meet some of the expats from that time once in a while..and none of them have forgotten my ‘close’ friendship with someone who had beer with John Holland.

Why this fascination of knowing famous people? Are we so insecure that we need to hold on to ‘famous’ people to be someone??

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