aaaa and lalala

I don't exactly remember which class in the very first term of our PGP1 days was it, when I was given this "aaaa" tag. The man behind this hugely famous tag is none other than hamaara neta Vaibhav Rampuria. I still can't figure out why did he do it. But it made me known as aaaa or made aaaaa know as Tapan.

I am still called Tapaaaan or simply "aaaaa" or "lalala"

The history of its origin goes back to the CP days of PGP1 in the first term when all were unusually active in class and hardly 3 to 5 ppl slept in the class. Courses like Marketing 1 and OSD drove enthu CPs whereas courses like FAM and Micro Eco drove forced CPs.

Irrespective of the course, my style of delivering a CP was unique. This unique style was advertised in a big way!! And following are the examples of how it was advertised and my aaaa (which is just a natural pause either between sentences or words) was made famous:

My attendance was never in the form yes sir/ma'am, but a loud "aaaa" from the crowd.

Whenever a fac asked me about my views, then it was preceded by an aaaa from the crowd

I actually was asked to sing a song "Kaun hai jo...." which had an aaaa in every line of its mukhdaa.....man that was something i must say.

In Mumbai, during our summers and in the first Mumbai meet, i was actually addressed as aaaa at CCD, Carter rd....thanks to Batta.

the first line in the Yearbook starts with a long aaaa!!! and my middle name in the year book is lalala.

GBMs, hi/hellos, Counter-strike, bakar sessions at Jaggu's and innumerable instances when this aaaa and lalala were used.

lalala has its own history.

I never played CS in the first year. I somehow managed to get a hand on it during the summer break where i used to stay in Wilson, Chowpati. I and Alton used to compete on our own machines as to who can kill the max terrorists at the same difficulty level and with the same no. of bots.

He never kept a name and i kept lalala.....maybe because of the music played in the room and i humming the tone. I never changed the name (and continued using it till the last time i played CS) and loved the response when my CS friends found out that lalala was me !!!

I never felt bad about it. In fact, marketing says, brands are recalled best by their distinctive characteristics which we imprint in our minds.

aaaa and lalala were just ways ppl used to recognize and turn around and look at me. There was an element of ridicule which initially was intended for. But eventually, these were just names (brands !!) which everyone used in those 2 lovely years to address me.

And everyone is definitely gonna remember these names in many years to come.

I want them to remember me as these names.