Foibles of Adolescent Teenagers

This happened when we were in the 10^th standard at school. Whenever I recall the incident, I have a quiet chuckle.  By ‘we’, I mean, my classmates, Rahul and Anamitra and me. Thrice a week we walked to our tutor for tackling an enigma called mathematics, the single most fear invoking subject for us. It was actually a desperate attempt to master the subject and thereby avoid the predicament of being branded as “mathematics failed” students. This collective resolve united us in activity and spirit.

On the way, there was a sweet shop which was kind of avant-garde as it stocked sweets which were not available elsewhere in the small town. It was a routine for us to stop at the shop and try the different types of enticing sweets displayed in glass-covered display counters. While having sweets, we discussed anything from cricket to other interesting things that caught our fancy, and of course the girls in our class. There was one particular girl, Madhuchanda, who though small and petite, packed a lot of punch through her speech and body language. We often sat discussing her new exploits.

All the while we continued with our discussion over pieces of “Jolbhara Sandesh”, “Cham Cham”, “Kheer-kadam” and some occasional “samosa”, the good natured shop owner, whom we called Ajit da, encouraged us to try new sweet flavors and creations. Occasionally Ajit da came up with smart quips, but he was careful not to intrude upon our privacy.

One fine evening we found Ajit da in an overtly generous mood. He welcomed us by putting his big arm around our shoulders and pulling us close. We felt overwhelmed and all of us instinctively realized that something exciting was going to happen. We looked at him in anticipation and asked him why he looked so happy that day.

“Well, I have a new creation for you people to taste, and I am sure you are going to like it”, he said with a broad smile on his face.

 “All of you are very familiar with its name”, he continued adding some twist to the already built up excitement.

He pulled out three paper plates and placed an oval sweet that looked vaguely familiar. Still, the euphoria of trying something new made us dig our teeth into the juicy sweet as fast as we could. The taste bud received the sweet halfway on our tongue and signaled familiarity. All of us felt it was some known sweet, but could not recall its name. In unison we asked Ajit da “What is the name?” He smiled even broader and after a long pause said “Madhuchanda”. For a few moments we were unsure if we had heard him right and then realized that indeed we had because he had said it out slowly and distinctly.

It was the naïve nature of three adolescent boys, which prevented them from realizing the fact at that moment. Ajit da was having a laugh at their expense; he had heard the discussion about Madhuchanda and had used the name to serve us with this concoction. The sweet was actually no different from a oval shaped Bengali sweet made out of Indian cottage cheese, popularly known as Cham Cham, this, unfortunately we understood much later.