New Leader True Story

Academy Escape Story

That Sunday we did not have to run the 8.5 kilometer Marathon because all 10 of us had passed the mandatory swimming test. It is a true story for the ten cadets including me. We were in all ten Aviation Cadets out of the four hundred odd Cadets in the Academy.

The ten of us had joined as Aviation Cadets which means we will be going to enjoy flying aircraft with in just six months of joining after the basic Orientation training at this Academy. The rest three hundred and ninety of them will have a tough time in the ships at sea.

The ten of us were expected to leave the next week for another orientation course the next week. So the Academy allowed us to skip the Marathon and go out into the town on the last Sunday we were going to spend in the Academy.

Ten cadets, dressed to impress the girls in the town, went out of the academy gate at 6:00 am on liberty, walking past the entire lot of Cadets of the Academy, lined up at the start point for the Sunday marathon. We wanted all of them to envy us.

We never wanted to come back to the academy again, where we were allowed to sleep less than 2 hours a day by our senior cadets. We were put through so much physical exercises and unwanted routines at night that we were dead tired by 2:00 am when the seniors in the academy leave us alone.

But in two hours it is time to wake up again. If we do not get up in time then we would be late everywhere because water comes only for a few minutes in the bath rooms.

The seniors wake up and take a bath inside the overhead water tanks. That means all those who reach the bathroom after the seniors will have to brush and take a bath with dirty soap water coming from the over head water tanks of the building, which the seniors have used like bath tubs.

No one wanted to wake up in three hours after sleeping at 2:00 am. And invariably we end up sleeping during the armed drill in the morning and during the classroom lectures, because our bodies were dying for sleep.

Most get caught sleeping and were awarded more punishments by the instructors like standing on our hands with our legs up on the Windowsill. Some Cadets learned to sleep even in that position.

But our seniors and instructors would make us believe that we need to endure everything to make us rugged and sharp to be able to survive a tough life we would be facing in a ship thrown around by the huge Ocean waves, like a paper ball in a storm. They were making us tough guys ready for fighting a war the moment we graduated as Officers.

I am sure by now you would have understood why we were all happy and eager to go out of that academy at the earliest. And we were happy for one more reason. We were leaving the academy for good, the next day.

But today too we are leaving the academy gates in the morning dressed to impress all the ladies we are going to meet in the towns and the three beaches nearby. We had to return before sunset.

We looked at the hundreds of cadets who had started running past us as we walked through the academy gates. We were free. We could go anywhere in Goa and do anything. We had not yet planned what to do and where to go. But just leaving the academy gates behind itself gave us some sadistic pleasure.

We walked the road down the hill to the bus stop a few hundred meters away completely happy and intoxicated in our new found freedom which was going to last a full day.

But if we reach back after sunset there will be the Academy duty Officer, waiting to punish us the worst way. So the only planning we did was that we will be back inside the academy gates before the sun goes down.

Travel To The Beach Story

As we walked down the hill merrily after leaving the academy gates behind as the marathon began, cadet nick named Kaps who was our leader, suggested that we will go to beach first.

Kaps was such a talented guy, that he created and acted in a full ten minute skit, including script, dialogues and direction, a few days back at the Academy, with all ten of us Aviation Cadets participating in it during our farewell ceremony. We were convinced that he is a born leader and we all need to learn leadership skills from him.

The skit was a super hit in the academy and everyone in the academy remembered and talked about the skit days after we did it. He in fact had earned respect from the entire academy with that skit.

Now when Kaps our leader, announced that we are going to the Beach, he got all of us excited as he mentioned it was a beach where foreign people roam around without wearing anything. Police was not strict in those days as they are today.

After a few months of living like captives inside the academy except for our Sunday morning marathons, a beach was the place to go. We were actually going to take a bus. But Kaps, our leader decided that we should take two taxi instead of a bus as it does not befit us to go in a bus as we were all supposed to be training to become officers in a year.

The drive from the academy to the beach was going to cost us a lot. Secondly, there were five of us in each taxi which could take only three passengers in addition to the driver. So there were four of us in the rear seat meant for two and the two were sharing seat with the taxi driver sitting in front.

The taxi ride was so uncomfortable that the moment the next bus stop came, Kaps our leader who was sharing the seat with the taxi driver, sopped both the taxi. We had to pay the taxi drivers a ransom, because we had lured them with a big money for a long two hours ride and now we were cutting our taxi drive short.

After that, we waited for a bus, which came by in a few minutes. The drive to the beach was picturesque and we enjoyed the two hour bus ride.

The Beach Restaurant Story

The bus dropped the ten of us to nearest bus station to the beach from where we walked. We reached the beach early morning by around 8:30 am. The beach looked completely deserted and all the excitement we had was gone in a few seconds of the sight of a deserted beach.

Everyone cursed Kaps our great leader with the best leadership skills as someone had praised him just before we came out of the academy gates. Kaps did not know what to say and where to look.

We started walking silently in one row beside each other, as if we were doing morning walk on the beach. We walked over a kilometer. We were not very keen on continuing to walk. Our leader sensed the frustration and lead us into a small hut like restaurant somewhere in the middle of the long beach, which was still being cleaned up. Those days the beaches in this town were full of such small huts working as restaurants.

We asked the waiter cleaning up the tables, if it was a holiday for the beach. The hotel guy said that tourists come only by around 11:00 am after a lazy breakfast in their own hotels. They just come to sun bath after breakfast and may have only lunch in the beach. Most business in these beach restaurants happen at night, when the tourists take drinks and dinner.

We sat on one of the round tables in the restaurant. After an hour or so the waiter took some orders from us and with whatever money we could find in all our pockets, we had a decent breakfast and tea still keeping aside the bus fare to go back from the beach back to the Academy.

We were sad that we were not getting to see some female beings without wearing anything, which was the biggest excitement this so called leader had made us believe. And here we were sitting in an empty restaurant with not even a couple of dressed up people in an empty beach.

Kaps looed gloomy as we all looked at him with a look of ridicule at his great leadership. He too could feel it in our eyes, but he said nothing except look away.

Getting back to academy before sunset was important and beach being over two hours away we had to start at least three hours before sunset. The other reason was that we had to pack our stuff as we were supposed to be taking a train early morning, the next day.

We sat in that empty restaurant for almost two hours talking about our academy life and cursing all our seniors and instructors who humiliate us and don’t let us sleep peacefully even for a couple of hours a day. For us getting physical punishments were not an issue at all because we were all used to punishments in those few months in the academy. It was lack of sleep which was our biggest problem in the Academy.

A completely demoralized set of ten Cadets sat talking rubbish in an empty restaurant and in an empty sea shore or beach. We had already spent over three hours cursing Kaps our own leader and his useless leadership every five minutes. We had hardly any money to spend at the beach after paying for the breakfast.

We were totally fed up with whatever had happened in those three hours that we were all bored and ready to go somewhere else rather than spend our valuable last Sunday on that empty beach.

And that was when we saw a French woman in two piece walk into that restaurant. She came and sat on the table next to our table. She opened a book and started reading.

Kaps and French Lady Story

The French lady was too busy reading her book. She was probably reading a fiction novel and certainly not a true story as she was too engrossed even to see the restaurant waiter come and stand next to her twice to take her order and go back.

The French lady was now our center of attraction. Ten pair of eyes were not even blinking whilst looking at her. The sad part was that the French lady had her back towards us. Probably the French lady had sat on a chair facing the sea shore or was a deliberate attempt to avoid us stare at her.

I was sure the French lady was used to Indians looking at her as if they were hungry and looking at some good food at lunch time. Notwithstanding that, we were going to have some leadership fun.

One of us said, "Hey Kaps, you keep telling us stories of your encounters with older ladies before you joined the academy. Why don't you just go and start a conversation with this French lady. We would like to see you in action. This is also your chance to establish your pride lost today, on this beach."

The leadership thing stuck. Kaps moved. We knew Kaps was going to attempt to recover his lost pride. We waited silently.

Kaps the great leader, got up from his chair and reluctantly walked towards the French lady sitting just two meters from us. The great leader did not look confident. But, Kaps tried to conceal it. He smiled at us as he walked up to the French lady.

Kaps stood there for sometime. Then he pulled a chair next to the French lady and sat down. The true story of a great leader was starting to unfold.

We were all silent and contemplating what is going to happen next. But nothing much happened. The French lady just sat there and our great leader also sat there next to her, not even able to look at her or start a conversation for a few minutes.

The French lady had crushed whatever pride our leader had in him. Finally, he asked her something which we could not hear. And the french lady replied and continued to read the novel. He sat there for a little more time and came back because the french lady showed no interest in him.

This lady had shattered all the leadership and communication skills of Kaps our leader. His leadership failed to impress lady miserably. We did not want to ridicule Kaps or question his leadership because it was a lady deciding if she liked him or not.

An hour or so later, the foreign tourists both men and women who wore nothing, started coming into the restaurant and have breakfast there. It was a good sight for ten guys in their early twenties. Most of us were embarrassed even to look in the direction they were entering the restaurant.

But including Kaps we had three carefree guys amongst the ten of us, who had no shame or embarrassment of any sort keeping their eyes pinned on what their eyes wanted to see. Then we coaxed another Cadet to go and have a go at the French lady. His name was Tom. We waited for his reply.

Tom and French Lady Story

Tom was a thick friend of Kaps. Since both these people are always talking of girls we had asked Tom to try his luck with a French lady. Tom has a pleasing baby face anyone would love. We were sure girls would love Tom, if he was as smart and confident as Kaps.

Promptly, Tom without saying anything, went and pulled the chair next to the French lady. A different True Story was going to unfold. The moment Tom sat, the French lady looked at him and smiled. In no time the two of them struck a cord and the lady kept her novel down. Tom seemed to have a good time with the French lady, as she kept talking to him continuously. We tried to read their lips as we had a side view of both Tom as the French lady had turned towards Tom.

As Tom was busy with the lady, the restaurant owner will come and tell us if we can vacate the chairs, so that more foreigners could come and sit boosting the hotel business. So, five of us would order a tea to extend the time holding on to the chairs. Fifteen minutes later the restaurant owner would come again asking us to leave when we would order a tea for the remaining five of us.

We had three tea each by the time we finally had no more money to spare for tea without eating into our bus fare back to the Academy, which is two hours away by bus and there was no way could we walk sixty kilometers.

We vacated the restaurant and walked out of the restaurant and waited for Tom to come out of the restaurant after his interaction with the French lady. He made us wait for a long time. After about half an hour Tom came out calm and smiling.

But we did not know Tom had a sad story to tell us. When we heard his sad true story Tom had to say after he came back from the French lady, we could not stop laughing for a long time.

But Tom was sad from inside. We asked if the French lady had called him over somewhere. Tom said in sad voice, “No pal, she said she had a son close to my age and was talking only about that idiot son she had. I could have left her. But you guys will mock at me. So I was forced to listen to all that woman was blabbering about her son.”

We all stood dumb stuck looking at Tom. We were all thinking that Tom was having a great time with a French woman. But after hearing Tom one of us asked him, "Then what were you talking to her all this while. We saw both you and the French lady talking very seriously."

Tom said, "Pal, the French woman was narrating the entire true life story of her boy from his childhood through his school and college days. I did not have much choice. So I was asking her about her husband and home. She told me about her home and dog. But the french woman did not say one word about her husband who seems to have abandoned her."

Then Kaps said, "I told you this French woman was useless. She destroyed my reputation and now Tom was her second victim."

Tom did not like that and said, "Pal, there are somethings this French woman told me. That is absolutely personal. She is going to visit the same place we are going tomorrow in train. So when we reach the day after, I am going to look her up. I am so excited, man." Everyone went silent after hearing that from Tom.

In our morning episode inside the restaurant we had forgotten to look outside the hotel. We had missed a lot of action happening outside on the beach in those two hours spend drinking tea after tea for no reason, except to hold on to the restaurant chairs. Kaps was absolutely right. All along the beach there were foreigners lying in one row as far as the eyes could see.

Now this was something we had not expected to see. A new true story was about to happen that was going to make and destroy somebody's reputation.

We walked along the beach without wasting anymore time to feast on what we had really come to the beach on that Sunday morning.

The Key Chain Story

The foreign tourists wore absolutely nothing on their body. This is a true story. All these people without clothes, lay facing up at the sun with their eyes closed, sun bathing. And a few meters behind these men and women without any clothes, there were dozens of local families in full cloths from head to toe, giggling away.

These fully dressed local females were completely embarrassed even to look at these sun bathing foreigners. They would turn their heads for a moment towards the foreigners and then immediately turn away in another direction and start smiling and laughing.

The ten of us walked along the beach in a single row at 90 degrees to the sea shore, enjoying the cloth free scenery. Kaps had his key chain in his hand which he was rotating slowly. We did not know why did he take out the key chain and why was he rotating with a sinister look on his face.

But we were all too innocent to know the trick Kaps was planning with his key chain. After all he was our leader till that moment even though his leadership was crushed by a french lady a few minutes back in a deserted restaurant on that beach.

Kaps being on the rightmost end, could have the closest view of what we all that he wanted to see. AJ, our third friend was on the opposite end of the line closer to the sea and the rest of us were all in between. All of us were trying hard to look at the people without clothes sun bathing, as if we were inspecting a ceremonial parade.

But we were all too embarrassed to look at them directly. The leadership and confidence in all of us except the three namely AJ, Tom and Kaps were gone with the wind.

Other than Kaps on the wrong end of the line, nobody else had trouble looking to their right. We all were smartly talking to Kaps who was walking on our rightmost side, so that we all can have a good view of the beach beauties. But Kaps had to look left towards us towards the sea, to talk to us.

But Kaps was a super smart guy. Kaps realized this mistake of being on the wrong side of the line the moment we had started walking on the beach and wanted to fix this problem. We came near a beautiful woman with two bodybuilder like men on her sides. All three people without clothes were sun bathing with their eyes closed and all limbs spread out. This was what Kaps was looking for all this while with his key chain rotating on his finger.

As we came closer to these three people without clothes lying on the beach, Kaps started rotating his keychain very fast and casually launched it to his right. That was the start of a new leader story. Kaps had not thought how he was going to retrieve his key chain which had the keys of his trunk in the academy barracks.

Kaps had thought that he had achieved his aim because the Key chain landed in between the legs above knees of the woman and she had two body builders on her sides. Kaps wanted to go and have a closer look but lacked the confidence.

But by throwing the keychain, Kaps had actually landed up in big problem. Kaps was now scared to go and get his key chain back because the key chain was too close to what he wanted to see. Putting a hand there to pick it up means getting bashed up by her two body builder friends. All of us became alert to the situation. Kaps started sweating.

A New Leader Emerges True Story

Anyone trying to pick up the lost key chain, will surely have to face her bodybuilder friends. Even all ten of us combined were no match to either her Humpty or her Dumpty lying next to her. Kaps said, "Friends lets get out of here fast."

AJ asked Kaps, "Why, you don't want your keychain? How will you open your steel box, after we get back to the academy if you leave its keys here?"

Kaps said, "I will break the lock to open my steel box. For God’s sake, let us walk fast and get out of here".

A few naughty ones encouraged, "Kaps, opportunities don't come again and again. Go and get your keychain."

After all Kaps was our leader and we were expecting some leadership display from him. But Kaps was so scared at the proposal that, he just wanted to run away from there somehow or the other.

We did not know that Kaps who could write, direct and act in a play over night, giving all ten of us a role to play in it in the academy, was such a shy character in real life. Here Kaps was, with a keychain that crushed his confidence completely.

AJ said, "Kaps, come on, don't say you are shy or afraid. You have to fetch your keychain. Prove you are a man, OK."

Kaps our smart leader, threw the challenge back at AJ and said, "OK, I dare you. You go and get my keychain."

To everyone's surprise, without a second thought, AJ breaks the line, walks confidently up to the lady lying barefoot till her forehead, and loudly says, "Excuse Me Please". This was a true story scene we could have never expected in our wildest dreams for AJ to be the hero who was going to replace Kaps as our leader.

The AJ bends down slowly as not to provoke the two hulks on her either side, picks up the keychain and walks back as confidently as he had walked up there. Neither the lady nor the two body builders sunbathing next to her say or do anything. The lady who was probably intelligent enough and knew everything that was going on.

The lady opened her eyes as AJ said excuse me and picked up the key chain. She smiled at AJ as he bent down to pick up the chain. I did see her eyes following AJ's actions. And neither of her body builder friends ever opened their eyes throughout this episode. They too knew.

AJ came and gave the keychain to Kaps and said, "Are you happy now?”

We all stopped walking and stood speechless for a few seconds. Without any formal announcement, from that very moment, Cadet AJ became our new leader. We had a new Leader taking over the command from Kaps, at that very moment. The rest of the day was eventless.

We discussed all that had happened as we took a bus back to the academy from where this true story had started. It was just about a minute past sunset when we reached the academy gates. We were spared the punishment for entering past sunset by the Officer of the Day, as we told him that we are leaving the academy the next day and we need to pack our stuff.

At night as I was packing all my stuff into my steel box, I saw Kaps our leader, who had lost his leadership on the beach, with a sad face.

Then I looked at AJ who had become our new hero and leader. He looked cheerful as usual.

Then I looked at my friend Tom who had an excitement clearly visible on his face and his actions.

After all, he was going to meet the same French lady we met on the beach, once again the day after, as she is going to fly down to the same place we were going by train the next day.

The New Leader, is a true story written exactly as it happened in the late eighties.

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