From August 2001 - Do I Yahoo?
'Do you yahoo?' Whenever I see this question sticking at the end of some of the e-mails I receive, it sets off a train of thought beginning from the early periods of my yahoodom (also of my bro, cousins and friends) and traverses through the peak periods during the late teens and most part of twenties and in the end unceremoniously crashes into Aojiru and Yahoo Appu.
Do I yahoo? No, I don't. However, for a period of 16-17 years starting
from the age of 13-14 I yahooed, but not anymore. This is an age (13-14)
normally considered underage for anything (fun) in almost any society.
On hindsight, when I analyse my own reaction nowadays to Japanese teens
with cigarettes etc, I think I'm getting closer to understanding what society
was trying to tell us then. Like, "You have lit the filter-end of
your cigarette, son." No, that is what society tells you when your
cigarette bursts into flames in the corridors of movie halls. What society,
comprising of my mother, aunts, uncles and other assorted relatives plus
the general public who take undue interest in your affairs for no reason
whatsoever, was really trying to tell us was that "Cigarette smoking
is baaaad". They weren't yet aware of our drinking habits at that
point of time.
Without any of them knowing, we were following the "catch 'em young"
or rather "catch ourselves young" philosophy. From one pint of
whisky and 6 guys with a take-out pack of fried beef from Kamal Cool Bar
and water from the public tap in a dark corner of the Museum gardens we
quickly progressed to days when the number of pints outnumbered guys 2
to 1 and food enough to feed a small village, we did Yahoo. Now, I drink
'Aojiru' (a green health drink made from crushed kale leaves) to keep down
my uric acid levels and other such acid and alkali levels with which doctors
threaten you every time you see one!
That brings me to Yahoo Appu. He runs a cloth store called Yahoo in Trivandrum,
thus the name Yahoo Appu. I think it's a bit unfortunate that he's Yahoo-ing
in Trivandrum. If only he had his shop in Texas or Tacoma, he would have
become a multi-millionaire now by suing the doodoo out of Yahoo.com. He
had this name for his shop (even the design of the logo looks eerily similar)
long before Yahoo.com came into existence or for that matter, long before
Al Gore 'invented' the Internet. Maybe I should try putting him in touch
with one of those lawyers in America and ask for a small share of the prize
(which will help me in my quest for early retirement). You never know.
Well, it's summer again in Japan. The cicadas are screeching, the soumen
noodle is here, the hanabi taikais (fireworks) are here and above all,
the stifling temperatures are here. Last months average high in Tokyo was
the same as in Delhi; 33 deg. C. The top Japanese delicacy to fight summer
fatigue - the eels - is being flown in from Taiwan. Talking of eels, even
Eric 'The Eel' Mousambani from Equatorial Guinea was here for the World
swimming event in Fukuoka. For those of you who forgot, he was the man
who almost drowned trying to swim in the last Olympics in Sydney. This
time he managed to learn to swim properly and finished in front of 3 other
dudes. Let's all Yahoo for him.
P.S.: FYI: May, 2006 addition - I met Mr. Yahoo Appu when I was in India
last time. He's now running (what else?) a gold jewelry shop. Didn't ask
whether he named it Yahoo gold.