I was an avid quizzer back home in Hyderabad in the late eighties. That was the era when quizzing was very a popular sport but was devoid of all the hype, showgiri and moolah that accompany it now. At that time I was part of teams that were among the best in business. Whether it was my school team or junior college one, we were the team to beat. In fact SPHS and LFJC were, in those days, synonymous with real high quality quizzing and my team and I merely continued the tradition. And boy did we continue it or what. I considered myself a real hot quizzer in those days but my team-mates were way better than I was. And as a team we constantly finished in the top three in most quizzes we competed in.
The usual format of quizzes was unlike the ones witnessed in other centres then. As in, we did not have written eliminations. Instead we would have about 70+ teams taking part in the oral quiz.
In this quiz the Quiz Master would be on stage and the teams seated in the hall. And the questions would pass from team to team. Some questions would pass all the way through the 70+ teams and still remain un-answered. Since this was a very time consuming process there was a policy of team members, of the teams that thought they knew the answers, raising their hands so that the mike would be passed on only to them.
Given that there were 70+ teams (each team having 3 members each) the hall (usually YMCA halls in Secunderabad or Narayanguda) would be littered with teams and even the passing of the mike was a time consuming one at times.
That was when we would, at times, get naughty. (such was the definition of naughty in those innocent times) We would raise our hands and pretend we had nailed the answer and since we were SPHS/LFJC, people would generally accept that we might indeed have the answer. And when the mike would ultimately be brought to us by the long suffering volunteer, we would very pompously say, "We pass the question." Basically kidagiri. Some people (read girls from NASR/St. Francis etc.) would giggle, the quiz master would look angry and the volunteer would glare at us. But we would be tremendously pleased with ourselves. This was a bigger achievement for us than winning the quiz. Fun times.
But why am I talking about all this now? Well, all this came back to me as I read a piece in TOI today about elections 2009 which read:
It was a painstaking exercise that left out nobody — not even the solitary voter in the Gir forest. Guru Bharatdasji Maharaj was the only voter there, but three poll officials went to collect his vote.
I just thought to myself that if Guru Bharatdasji is anything like what we were, he would probably have welcomed all the poll officials and then told them, "I pass. Me no vote."
The usual format of quizzes was unlike the ones witnessed in other centres then. As in, we did not have written eliminations. Instead we would have about 70+ teams taking part in the oral quiz.
In this quiz the Quiz Master would be on stage and the teams seated in the hall. And the questions would pass from team to team. Some questions would pass all the way through the 70+ teams and still remain un-answered. Since this was a very time consuming process there was a policy of team members, of the teams that thought they knew the answers, raising their hands so that the mike would be passed on only to them.
Given that there were 70+ teams (each team having 3 members each) the hall (usually YMCA halls in Secunderabad or Narayanguda) would be littered with teams and even the passing of the mike was a time consuming one at times.
That was when we would, at times, get naughty. (such was the definition of naughty in those innocent times) We would raise our hands and pretend we had nailed the answer and since we were SPHS/LFJC, people would generally accept that we might indeed have the answer. And when the mike would ultimately be brought to us by the long suffering volunteer, we would very pompously say, "We pass the question." Basically kidagiri. Some people (read girls from NASR/St. Francis etc.) would giggle, the quiz master would look angry and the volunteer would glare at us. But we would be tremendously pleased with ourselves. This was a bigger achievement for us than winning the quiz. Fun times.
But why am I talking about all this now? Well, all this came back to me as I read a piece in TOI today about elections 2009 which read:
It was a painstaking exercise that left out nobody — not even the solitary voter in the Gir forest. Guru Bharatdasji Maharaj was the only voter there, but three poll officials went to collect his vote.
I just thought to myself that if Guru Bharatdasji is anything like what we were, he would probably have welcomed all the poll officials and then told them, "I pass. Me no vote."
Now wouldn't that have been fun?
