Ragging the Awesome Professor and the Sweet Kitten

Ragging is banned in colleges in India. But most students do indulge in a little harmless teasing occasionally.

Last year in our college, a final year boy walked into a first year classroom. Their professor had not still turned up and the freshers were wondering what they should do.

Seeing his brazen attitude, the scared first year students thought that he was a professor and greeted him. He played along with their misunderstanding and pretended to be their tutor for that hour. He started by asking the juniors their names. Then he turned to the black board wrote, “The professor is AWESOME” on it.

He searched for a timid looking girl. He espied one who looked like she had come from a small town school. He called the newcomer to the board and asked her to read the sentence out loudly.

The frightened teenager read it out in a trembling voice: “The professor is …is…” and not being familiar with the word tried to pronounce it as best as she could. She read it as “AAH-WAY-SUM”

“AAH-WAY-SUM” in Tamil, (our mother-tongue) means “angry and full of wrath” which is the very opposite of being ‘awesome’

Poor guy, he was fishing for a compliment but became the butt of a joke instead. He never lived down that word and to this day carries the sobriquet ‘angry’ before his name.

Another instance of ragging that happened in our college ladies hostel was also quite amusing.

A bold final year scholar called a scared first year student who had come from a small village in the south of India and said:

“You look cute. Do a CAT-WALK for us, down that path”

The terrified girl, who had been termed cute by her senior, immediately went on the ground and started crawling on all fours, with her hands and legs, mewing like a kitten.