Prologue

People often ask me, “What’s a chicken day?”

I don’t know, really. It depends. It is a multifaceted term, something best experienced than explained using adjectives. Inside the school I grew up, it was a highly revered thrice-occurring weekly phenomenon. In the realm outside, it is nothing but a fancy made up word. What I do know, however, is that it meant the world to our table captain.
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So big he was, the table captain, perhaps the biggest in our house. From how I saw him, I believed it would take even an adult five karate miakheri kicks to produce tad scratch on him. That size gave him an edge on all of us. It gave him authority. He entered the school’s dining hall like a lion ready to nab little creatures who broke rules of his forest. Oh and nobody dared to touch edibles in his absence. The fragrant fresh fried finger chips, yellow paneer curry, gravy, boiling hot soup, uncontrollably delicious juicy brown chicken pieces floating on off the surface of steel bowl. Until the captain was seated comfortably, nobody dared touched them.

For students on other tables, chicken days must have felt like national holidays. I know. We heard their c***-a-hoop stories all the time.

Yesterday, our table captain did not want to eat Rushvari. So he gave it to me. How generous of him!
4 guys in our table have not yet returned since the leave weekend. Our table captain has planned something special for tonight!
Tomorrow, despite a non-chicken day, our table captain is going to treat us. It is his birthday.


Well for us, our table captain was unpredictable; our table itself no less than Hitler’s bunker. We did not have birthdays and celebrations. There was no guarantee of even our legit share of Rushvari, let be expectations for extra. Every passing chicken day we entered that dining hall; it felt we were about to participate in the game of snakes and ladders real-time; only there were no ladders for us, just the vipers.

Once inside the dining hall, table captain performed three things. First he inspected if anything had been smuggled out of those bowls. Then he served each one of us half rations - half paneer, half rice, half yogurt, few finger chips – most everything in half. Then on his plate, table captain poured double of everything. Double of everything except chicken. For the chicken bowl and delicacies floating inside, he made us play a game. The Hunger Game.

So how did the table captain institutionalise this game?
A semester ago, he planted a ladle in rice making an acute angle so the tip of ladle touched the utensil’s brim. The utensil had spherical base, which on slight push, spun endlessly on the table. Like a spinning lottery trick, only with the world’s weirdest rules invented by our table captain.

“The game is simple.” He’d said. “There is one rule that’ll apply to everyone. When this utensil spins, it will rotate the ladle. When it slows and stops, the guy towards whom the ladle points in the end shall take away all the chicken.”

Initially, we got all super excited. The prospect of having whole bowl of chicken drove us mad! During first month, we had a total of twelve chicken days - three every week. I got the ladle four times. My best friend got twice. The others did, too. To his chagrin, table captain got none. So the first month was the best month for us, no doubt about it. On the days I won, I guzzled as if there was no tomorrow. I fed until my teeth couldn't chew anymore meat and my tongue couldn't tell the difference between yogurt and water.

But table captain was not some random ruler who’d give up. He was wary if the ladle game was to be like this, he might never get access to chicken. Hence new reforms emerged on the table. You could tell easily that these changes again curried favour to the captain himself. We were never part of his luxury. We were never meant to be.

During the second month, table captain called for a table meeting.
“Rules of the game have changed slightly.” He announced. “The winner is now supposed to split his win with any two other table members.”

We assumed table captain had learnt his lesson. After all, sharing is caring, right? Wrong. The next part of his rule gave us cancer.

“These splitters and the winner will be barred from consuming other delicacies. If you win, you win only the chicken. You lose paneer, chips, curd, sweet and things. The two other guys whom you chose to split the chicken with - they lose their goodies too. And I am not touched by this rule.” He shot a cunning smile, “I can still be the winner and not split.”

This went on for a while. We faced win-die situation every time the ladle spun. Meanwhile our table captain smiled with his plate ostentatiously full, intimidating us, three times every week. We couldn’t complain about this to the teachers. Who in high school complains about chicken anyway?

Luckily in a hostel, there are tricks to crack everything. There are tricks to eat extra biscuits. Tricks to borrow five books with single library card. Tricks to bypass punishments. Tricks to capture better cubicles. You name it. It takes time to figure’em out. But once you have it, bingo!

When words got out, boys from other tables devised a risky plan. We set up a decoy to lure the captain with the aid of what he loved most – chicken. We proposed him to do the spin and the receiver of the ladle would have to leave the table forever and go find another table. It would simultaneously reduce the table population and ensure better rations. For table captain was a math whiz, the bill got passed alacritously... Probability of ladle landing upon us was seven times greater than landing on him. But we had to take the risk somehow.

Next thing I know, table captain was pointing at me. “I can’t wait to see you kicked out of this table”, He said. I could not but simply comply with his scoff. Since the beginning, I was his very main target.

Eight pairs of eyes cocked on that ladle now, which spun unpredictably on the sun mica table. My choices were fairly limited. Either I was going to be the winner; else I would lose the dinner, forever. The same applied to each individual. But boy while the ladle spun, wasn’t I scared beyond my wits? My whole consciousness had swollen subconscious until after that one minute silence, when the gadget finally stopped. I opened my eyes and golly, hell OMG! It was, the ladle, steadily pointing at the table captain himself! We had won. I had won!

The table captain rose from his seat and walked out of the dining hall. We didn't hear from him for a whole semester. Even if lions are big and scary, many a time jackals get them down. Perhaps the captain forgot to account for that. There were rumours that he became captain in some other table and was taking his hegemony to extreme ends again. It didn't matter to the seven of us. We were one now; we had all the chickens for ourselves.
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Epilogue

So what is a chicken day? You see, it is more than just a meal plan. As years draw, it becomes a tradition for some, or a requirement, or in some cases even an obsession. For some it becomes good time with friends, wistful memories and a way of life. This is my response. If the table captain could tell it his way, I guess it would be a different story altogether.

As to why that particular day the ladle fell on the table captain and not any of us, I heard some of our friends had rigged the gadget beforehand. I don’t know how they did it. But well, in a hostel, there is a trick to crack everything.