unity to
see him angry although we proof readers (which, of
course, includes me) used to give him a chance to be
angry almost every day.

One day when 'penis' became 'mightier than the sword',
he laughed at it together with the subs, and then,
after they had left, politely warned us to be careful.
He had no special training in people-management; he had
surely not attended any hi-fi seminars now conducted by
self-proclaimed management gurus. Yet, if there was one
thing he knew other than typing at an incredible speed,
it was to keep his juniors motivated. We owed our
productivity and effectiveness to him. He would
challenge the Subs to a rupee for a mistake in a report
or an article. On that count we didn't let him down, at
least not often, even considering that overlooking
errors in a straight read-through -- without the luxury
of checking print-outs, but doing the proofreading on
the flickering screen itself -- was a distinct possibility.

Ironically, on the few occasions, the editor, Rajan Narayan
-- he was not yet the super-man of the Herald then; he
acquired almost that status during and after the
language agitation -- entered the composing room, we
were just logs of dead wood for him. Not a side glance
even to acknowledge our greeting. My view: perhaps all
these years Mr Narayan was soaring too high on the
pedestal the management had seated him on, after
granting him a free hand. And as is the rule of nature,
every thing that goes up comes down. And he came down
with quite a bang.

But that was just a stray cloud in the silver lining
the Herald offered. That indifference apart, our Herald
innings is something to look back and laugh about. I
can still sense the taste of the first sip of urak at
an after-work session. Not long later, Remy and I
crashing into a cow with my rickety cycle on our way to
the Don Bosco Hostel. Time: around 3 a.m.

Another party we had in the office was a chicken party.
Nice dry fried chicken. Courtesy Jack. Everybody had
and there was still more to go around, much like in the
Biblical parable of loaves-and-fishes. But nobody
except Jack knew, until the next day, from where the
chicken came. The next day a notorious looking man
walked into the Herald office. To make bad matters
worse he happened to meet the 'patrao', the publisher
and then patriarch A. C. Fernandes. They talked a while
and he left. The next moment the old man came charging
and thundered, "Kal kombeo konnem ad