Comedian

The restaurant was filled with people. It was five minutes to eight. More people were rushing into the restaurant. The waiters were busy making seating arrangements for the newly arrived customers. The tables near the windows which opened to the park beside the one storeyed restaurant were quite in demand. However, the tables nearest to the stage were the ones which filled first. The bartender on the other side of the stage was working hard to make drinks for people, most of whom he had seen before. The waiters were taking orders for food. Nobody opened the menu. Nobody needed to open the menu. It was hardly possible to be a citizen of the city and not know that this place served wonderful sizzlers.

Five minutes passed by soon. At sharp eight, the spotlight was switched on and focussed on to the stage. A man sitting on one of the tables nearest to the stage got up and went up to the stage. It was him, the Comedian, as he was known. There was a mild applause. He started.

“Hello all. How are you, people? It’s been a long time. I would like to tell you all that I am with my friends here today. Those four sitting at that table that I was just sitting on are my friends.

Yes, I too have friends. And for those of you who don’t know, ‘Comedian’ is NOT my last name and ‘The’ is DEFINITELY NOT my first name. I was sort of feeling insecure about my image in public. People are slowly forgetting that I am a person. The other day I was in the city mall and a guy with his son walks up to me and says, ‘Hey comedian, my son is feeling a little depressed. Can you make him laugh?’

What the hell was that? Am I an instrument to make little kids laugh now? He could have at least asked for an autograph before asking for a favour! Humour is an art. It needs a lot of homework. At that moment, the chances of me making that little kid laugh were as bleak as that of his father having a heart! For all I knew, I could take him to a corner and tickle him to death. But I hardly think his father would have appreciated that. But then, you never know. These times of global economic recession do tend to bring the worst out in men. You wouldn’t be fully wrong in expecting the father to say ‘Dear Lord! That is a fortune saved. How much do I pay you?’ after you tickle his son to death.”

There was a mild response from the audience.

“Yeah, I know. Most of my jokes are based on exaggeration. I hate the person who invented that word. Now my jokes are described in chapter two of the joke book, the title being exaggeration jokes. I hate being classified. It is bad for the business. You see? People tend to like things that they can’t really describe when it comes to art. We get to hear expressions like ‘i have no words’ and ‘i am speechless’, etc. Now I will never get those types of comments on my jokes. Now they will always be like ‘yeah so what?’ and ‘been there, done that’ sort of comments because people have a word for my jokes now, the word being exaggeration.

So anyway, coming back to my life, I brought my friends here today because I wanted to prove it to everyone that I too have a life. I too have friends who come all the way from different parts of the city to watch me perform even though they have such tight schedules. Younis, for example. That tall and thin guy sitting there with a philistine smile etched on his moronic face. He is a computer engineer His job is really demanding. Do you know why? I will tell you. His job is to go to the city theatre every Friday and give a review of the latest movies to his colleagues. And there are many constraints while performing this overwhelming task. One of them is that he has to take a girl with him every time he goes. He is really good at his job. In fact he was just giving me a briefing of what he learnt from the latest movie 3 Idiots. It seems he learnt that he should never try to hide anything that he is doing FOR his friends FROM his friends, just for the sake of surprising his friends. It seems a guy did that in the movie to surprise one of his depressed friends but then before his surprise was ready, the friend had committed suicide out of hopelessness. Poor guy.

Anyway so Younis today told all of us what he is doing for us behind our backs so as to make sure that we know that he will always be there for us. He is doing a lot for our friend Rahul there, the guy wearing goggles AT THIS TIME OF THE DAY. So anyway, Younis has been doing a lot for Rahul behind his back to “surprise” him. He is thinking of buying night-vision goggles for Rahul. Yeah. Night-vision goggles. It seems they cost around fifty rupees. And Younis is going to buy one for Rahul, who by the way does not carry a handkerchief because he hasn’t found one which costs more than five hundred bucks. Rahul acted all surprised and happy when he heard of this.

But Younis, I must tell you one thing. I don’t know how to say this. The only way of putting it is, if you care even a little bit about Rahul’s welfare, please, for God’s sake, don’t buy the goggles. It is a horrible gift to buy for a person like Rahul. I mean, look at him. Just turn to your right and look at him. Look at the way he is wearing that jacket over his body tight T-shirt, the way his denims are torn at the right places, the way his hair is spiked. Look at him and just ask yourself the question, why should this creature not squeeze the blood out of me for getting him night-vision goggles. I mean, there are more chances of Rahul dying out of depression after getting that gift.

By the way, Younis, if you have already bought the goggles, I can suggest you a person who you should gift it to. Our very own Abhay. Ladies and Gentlemen, I would like to introduce Abhay to all of you. He is a very close friend of mine and he was the easiest for me to persuade to come here today. I told him that we get to dance with a lady of our choice from the audience after my show. Abhay, I am sorry I lied. But more than that, I am sorry your mother dropped you on the head on a hard place when you were a kid. Who gets fooled like that? I mean, these are real royal people sitting in front of us. How could you even think that I was telling the truth? I say the same thing to tempt my pre-matured twelve year old kid and he will say ‘Nice try, Dad. I am twelve’. You need to stop trusting people man. It’s always been your problem. You trust people very easily. Remember that time when that guy on the street said he could make you fly if you get undressed. Thank God I came there on time. What? What is it Abhay? What is it that you are saying? Heights? Scared of heights? You are scared of heights? Okay let me get this straight. You are thanking God that I came on time because you had forgotten that you were scared of heights and did not really want to fly? God that’s sad. You are real sad man. I am going to write a book on you. And it’s going to be titled, ‘The terrible consequences of having hard places in the city’.

Anyways ladies and gentlemen, time is running out. I better start my apology speech before it’s too late. I would like to thank my friends today for coming to my show. Younis, Rahul and Abhay. Obviously the things that I said were not really true. I just want to thank them for being there for me always. That’s from my heart guys. No jokes there. Thank you people. Hope to see you again soon. Take care.”
He left the stage and went and sat with his friends. A singer came up on the stage for the next performance of the evening. The comedian had a peaceful dinner with his friends and soon left.