Thursday, March 29, 2012

Beetle & The Beatles

My memory takes me back to early sixties, when March was the time for annual exams in schools and the results were declared on 1st April.At about the same time , small insects called beetles appeared all over from nowhere and were strangely enough called ‘tota’ or ‘totay’, strangely because, these bore no resemblance to ' tota’ or parrot as we know it. In between the waiting time , i.e. the time between the conclusion of exams and declaration of results, we used to catch a stray beetle and place it on the back of the hand , where it would creep and crawl.

We would keep repeating- totay totay main fail ki pass - and as it reached the tip of the finger nail and would fly off, we jumped with joy as it meant that we would pass . This was quite contrary to the Hindi idiom – hathon ke totay udna – which would mean total destruction and dejection. . About the same time, we saw the advent of The Beetles or The Beatles – the British Rock Band , consisting of Paul Mcartney, John Lennon , George Harrison , and Ringo Starr that rocked the music world for almost a decade till early seventies.