Rented Worries...

Rented Worries..

If Laxmi is the goddess of wealth, Viswakarma of profession, then house owners are the Gods of houses. My House owner even looks like Kali Statue.

People living in their own houses may never know this. But a person who lives in rented house always faces the brunt of these land lords. In the hierarchy of biting power, house owners will surely come after Wife and Boss. They will show you hell on EMI basis and enjoy tormenting the tenants like a pig in the poop.

First Step into the hell : “Vacancy boards” on the gates can be seen with conditions like...
No bachelors - as they are the terrorists of the nation.
Small family - Earlier it was “Only couple”. After 377 Supreme court’s order, it changed to “One Husband and One Wife only“. No two husbands or two wives.
Decent family. One who doesn’t look like King Kong or talk like one.

House owner must love you at first sight. Otherwise the standard answer is ”Sorry already booked”.

Second Step : If the landlord considers you worthy of renting his house, then the interview would begin. It is easier to pass all other tests like UPSC, driving test and even pregnancy test but not this.
You have to narrate your biography starting from your grandfather. Whether you are part of any caste, religious based group or union. After taking the house on rent, I told my house owner that my grandfather once murdered his house owner over a dispute!!
Occupants should not be more than four. House owners are stricter than the government in enforcing family planning.
No babies. Too much noise or they would spoil the walls. So send them to hostel or give them on adoption.
Where do you work? If there is any benefit to the owner through this. Rent was increased by a thousand when I told that I was in revenue department. When I tell these house owners that I am a Customs Officer, they always think that I work in TASMAC liquor shop or Burma bazaar electronic shop. So either they ask for booze or electronic items. My house owner keeps pestering me for phone, laptop, TV, fridge and ATM machine.

Last step : If the Almighty is happy to rent you the house, then you have to sign a lease document consisting of 100 conditions. You can violate Moses’ Ten Commandments but not these. He expects you to obey all conditions better than his dog.
Guests should not come often. Your parents and relatives can visit you when India retrieves black money from swizz accounts. If guests come, water scarcity would follow. Even Karnataka wala may give water but not house owner wala. If the landlord takes bath once a week, then you must do the same. Or “you are consuming too much water.”
Curfew would be implemented after 9.30 pm. All must remain under house arrest till morning. Sleep walking and sleep talking is also not allowed.
During holidays he would gladly take “your” newspaper, read it and share with you. He would take your wifi password as well and always would remind you when the net pack is over.
My house owner is a Modi admirer and charges GST on my house rent as well. When I asked him why he was not paying income tax, he curtly said that it was invented by Congress.
You must show your smiling face to the owner’s child, relatives and dog also except his wife.
As of now, my only ambition in life is to build a ‘gated community’ with ten houses in Chennai like Puzhal prison, rent them and rule my tenants like Hitler. I am ready to sell my left arm, one kidney and my rented house also for this. Any takers ?

ashoka-the-2nd.blogspot.in

A day like Sherlock Homes....

A day like Sherlock Homes... 🕵️‍♂️

A lady must have invented inspection when her husband was his subordinate. This has spread everywhere like Musically Chitra Ghajal’s fame.

When it was decided to visit airport for inspection by Chief Commissioner Office, Customs, the “Detective” inside me woke up and started chest thumping like Gorilla. I had always been at the receiving end of inspection teams arranging refreshments. Its my turn now.

A handful of elite, smartest, brightest etc etc Officers were selected to bear the baton of CC Office. We were subjected to rigorous physical and medical examinations. Physical test involved staying awake for 4 hours straight and medical test involved staying away from drinking 10 cups of Siva’s tea. Siva is our tea(m) man who provides a cup of tea every hour and one tea in between. Only married officials were selected in the team as married men are habituated to undergo interview and married women in conducting the interview.

To be a successful in any inspection, one must know about one’s team members thoroughly. So I learnt who all don’t eat samosa, have sugar and pass on their samosas and sweets to others.

What is inspection? An inspection is nothing but unearthing the lacunae which the Officers trying to hide so that it could be hidden better and never found again.

There are three "R" in any inspection. Responsibility, Resolution and Reverence to work. I got all. So one day before the inspection, I approached my boss and asked...
I : Are we going to airport for checking the Kuruvis sir?
Boss : No, DRI will do that.
I : Are we going for checking the officers ?
Boss : No, CBI will do that.
I : Are we going to check airport bathrooms then ?
Boss : No. Airport Authority will do that.
I : Then, why are we going Sir ?
Boss : We are going for airport inspection.
I : Oh! Understood. We are going to check the beautiful
crews.
Boss : No, their Vigilance Section will do that.
I : Then why are we going?
Boss : We are going for airport inspection.

I looked at my boss and left. As I was coming out, my boss shouted “Don’t tell anyone why we are going to airport for inspection!”.

Later I came to know that we were going to inspect files only. Files or Piles! I was happy to escape from bio-metric attendance and my daily work i.e answering RTI applications. The reason is...

Nowadays my Office queue for bio-metric attendance stands upto nearby collector office. At this rate we may have to build cubicles like in Tirupati Tirumala temple and send officials one by one. “Jaruhandi, Jaruhandi”.

Secondly these anti-Indians are asking all type of questions in RTI forum.
(i) How to make soft idly Manchurian?
If you return the application, they question “Why didn’t you send my application to the concerned department as per so and so rule?”
If you tell “Don’t know”, they question “Do you Customs Officers work at least sometimes? Say Yes or No” as per so and so rule.
(ii) Did Vijayashanti underwent training when She acted in Telugu movie “Customs Officer?”
(iii) How to grow hair on the bald head?

I geared up and took bath also. While talking about bath, I wish to express my anguish that...

People in states like Assam and Bengal where water is abundant bath once a week or month. So is it advisable to bath daily in a water scarcity place like Chennai? People must wake up. I am tired of bathing daily. It seems like I bathed yesterday only and again its time. Modi ji has to pass a rule that how many times Tamilians at Chennai must take bath in a week. Tamil culture has already so many baths like oil bath, stream bath, sun bath and now added to the list is mann ki bath as well.

When I entered airport, I was nostalgic for a moment. This is where I spent my best years of service without doing any work. Each and every chair can tell a lot about my butt. When my boss allotted offices to inspect, I told "I will check Duty Free Shop and authenticate the quality of liquor sir. My boss told "No, I will look into that. You should have been enlightened for that.” So I asked how to attain enlightenment. My Boss told “You have to distil your thoughts, brew good memories and peg away from desire. Now go and take care of our refreshments. R for refreshment too!" Yet again Sherlock Homes was sent for catering.

The airport was calm. we entered. The End. As the team grilled and drilled the office bearers, I too noted my observations. The changes were visible to my trained eyes. How the ground crew girls had put on weight, how the kuruvis had reduced in number and how DFS had added new varieties of booze. The day flew.

About Inspection....
My Boss told me not to reveal anything...

An eventful day...

I have never reached Custom house so fast. Yesterday the roads were deserted and the shops were closed as the state was mourning the demise of Dr Kalaignar. No holiday for Central Govt Offices. I was getting ready for office and my son enquired “On whose death will you be given leave ?”

I started as usual and rode on my bike to Office. The situation was very tense with variety of problems and I was thinking where would I get my lunch ! When I entered the custom house gate, the sepoy stopped me and told “Sir Rajaji hall that side!”. I told him “Yar I am working here and have come to office”. He saw me like a lunatic and opened the gate. I too thought of taking leave. But my sixth sense scolded me “No one would be present in the office including your boss (!) and Why should you take leave?” So I packed my ipad, hindu paper, one novel and came to work. As my house was also mourning, I was thrown out without lunch. If I had asked for lunch, I would as well have been placed in Rajaji bhavan or Marina beach.

I entered proudly as I was the first one to enter custom House and found the biometric itself was mourning and refused to work. It often happened in our tech-savvy Central Govt office where the arrangements are foolproof like aadhar card security! In some days we had to stand in queue for 15 minutes and still the machine wouldn’t recognise me like my wife during TV serial time. I ran helter-skelter to imprint my finger prints to all floors including nearby collector office. I could finally mark my attendance at 9.40 am. Feeling relieved, I sank in my chair and found my colleagues arguing about the possibility of holiday in whatsapp group !! I prayed to every God that NO holiday should be given at any cost.

The office was like "booth bungalow". So I loitered in the corridors like a Gurkha blowing my whistle to find someone to talk. Three skinny people were coming and I asked them “Who are you?” One replied “Skeleton staff sir. Today all commissionerates are working with skeleton staff only”. I went ahead and saw two large/ fat persons coming. I assumed that they must be dinosaur skeletons! All men were in Canteen. Like "work from home" this was "Work from Canteen" culture.

In the normal days itself, getting lunch from the canteen used to be like getting freedom from British. Queue used to be there like Tirupati Balaji darshan. You could get a plate of rice after lathi-charge and teargas was resorted to. Today no one had brought lunch and no shops outside. So lunch coupon was given on MP's letter only. Canteen staff told that they had sold more lunches today than any other day. I was really happy that my colleagues’ wives also didn’t provide lunch. Normally school going children’s left overs are thrown in our lunch box. But my eyes were tearful when I saw one of my colleagues had the courage to get the lunch made from his wife. I approached him respectfully and enquired. He replied that he regularly came to office after cooking food for the whole day and used to pack his lunch. He had the habit of feeding his first roti to crows. As no crow came that day he had brought that and gave it to me.

Staffs trickled in but all were gents. It turned out to be “Men’s Day” as no madam was present. It clearly showed how much gents are dedicated and value their work and office. They risked their lives to come to office kept the nation ahead of themselves is a thought to ponder. Hope the society recognise this someday and provides lunch at least.An

Fair & Lovely man...

A fair journey...

Fair colour has always been an obsession with south Indians. There can never be a southie who didn’t bleach or done facial at some point of time.  Society itself is partial towards white. That's why white is auspicious and black is the colour of sorrow here. All white things are considered to be good like White lie, white money (!), and white Rum whereas black is looked down like blacksheep, blackmail and black list.

I too tried to become a ‘whitie’ during my younger days as my father had told me to be ‘fair’ in life.  My experiments with ayurvedic, acupuncture and grandma tips failed like cases against Salman Khan. So I had always longed to be White like a European or golden like Chinese or wheatish like North Indians. 

Recently I was taken for a ride by a dermatologist.  He became my friend in the line of duty.  He assured me that my tanned skin colour could be turned into ‘white’ if I knew how with foreign cosmetics. He explained to me about melanin, pigmentation and how to eat healthy foods for glowing complexion. I am a simple fair and lovely man but my obsession with foreign things got the better of me. When he promised to give me 60 shades of grey in 60 days, I followed him like hutch dog.

My doctor, like Rajinikanth, told me that my physical system had to be cleaned up first and gave me a tablet to clean my stomach. Foreign tablet ! Last time I took an “Sudheshi” tablet to clean my stomach, it had failed miserably inside my six pack stomach.  It was time for foreign tablet now!! Thus the "Swachh Ashok" campaign began.

I took the tablet on a weekend which turned into a weak end. Stomach cleaning started slowly and gathered stream!  What started as a locomotive soon turned into a bullet train with sirens blaring. It was like Niagara flooding inside rest room. My six packs were shredded into pieces.  Intestines, bowls including my soul went down the drain. Rest room became my living room for that day. I was exhausted but impressed with the quality. Foreign product !! 

I was mentally ready to turn fair. After getting foreigners’ colour, I thought of changing my name to ‘Ashok Alexandre’ or ‘Ashok Clinton’. 

I took my photo before starting the course as it could be useful for the “Before” and “After” still.  

My doctor prescribed and I bathed in foreign soaps, applied gel, coated cream and powder on the face and ate tablets like pop eye, the sailor man. I stopped going out in the “goddamn” sun light like drakula as it would be detrimental to my ‘wouldbe’ fair complexion!  It went for a month but nothing was changing except my back balance.   So I went back to my doc.

My doc told me that it would be a slow process like straightening the dog’s tail and gave me a different set of kit box. Tom Cruise was there on the lid of the box and my “Mission Impossible” dreams resumed. In the meanwhile some boils popped up and it boiled on my face. I returned to my doc.    

  

        The doc told me that my body was not accepting the changes like my family and prescribed some more Sodium, Potassium, Cyanide and Bleaching powder to stop the problems and assured that things will be rosy thereafter.  I reluctantly reduced my dream of getting French colour to north Indian colour.  

At least after getting North Indians’ colour, I can change my name to ‘Ashok Agnihotri’. But after 15 days, when I looked at the mirror, my colour winked at me like Rahul Gandhi and told “Don’t be childish”. 

 But after a month, it was itchy bitchy all over and patches came in batches. I rushed to my family doctor.  He listened to me for five minutes and scolded me for twenty minutes.  He told me that our skin need not be white but our heart must be. He made me to understood that good things also start with black like “Black Label”. 

Now I am looking for a way to change my heart into white, gold or wheatish colour.  Please suggest.

Scratchingly yours,

Ashok.

   

Whatsapp gunya...

Like Chikungunya fever, "Whatsapp-gunya" is on the air now. Initially I was wondering how whatsapp can be better than fb.  Then my friend told me that I can make free calls and send free messages in Whatsapp. Like a true Indian, I was mesmerised and flattered by that lovely word "FREE".  

Whatsapp should have been named as ‘Gossipp’ in India.  Because here it is our birth right to talk about others. Facebook owner was charged for collecting others’ information recently. Silly people!  In India, our primary job is to collect information about other people only.

In those days, men gathered at the tea shops and women at the street water tapes to gossip. Now whatsapp offers that platform. So wherever and whenever we are idle, we open whatsapp. If People don't see whatsapp for one hour, they get shivering, aloofness and kidney stones.  Some people type in the mobile so fast like shatabadi express without even seeing the screen. But when I type, I always press four letters at the same time. Whatsapp has become the new better-half for many.

Video chats enable our dear ones to scold us face to face. New Murphy’s law has to be ‘When you check whatsapp while sitting in the restroom, you will get whatapp video call!’

Everyday a new group springs up with different names. I am invariably added in all groups whether it is named "All Guys" or "All Gays".  I have 190 contacts in my phone but figure in 191 groups.

Some of my groups are :

Dance Divas :  I am a man with two right legs. Why am I here?  Further I have danced only to my wife’s tunes till now.

Kitchen Hulks : I have never cooked anything apart from stories.

VOCH - Voice of Chennai Husbands: I thought someone had added me mistakenly, a deaf and mute husband. I told them to change the name. They changed to “Fearless Husbands”. I ran away from the group before my wife found it!

If remembering the group names is stressful, posting according to the group is perilous.  Once I posted Nayanthara photo in Sai baba group!  I already have memory like ‘Gajini’. These  admins change group names often and cause havoc. Some admins misspell the group names too like ‘Friends dairy’, ‘Early Ricers’ and ‘aunty-corruption’.

Every day I get 500 to 600 messages. 80% will be good morning. If I open all, my good morning will become bad morning. If I reply to all, it will become good night.  Most of the messages are forwards. If a goat drinks pepsi from bottle, it will drink in all my groups with various captions like ‘Only goats drink Pepsi’, ‘No water from Karnataka, no water for cattle also’.

There is no dearth for rumours. Every month our National Anthem is selected as the best one by UNESCO and some patriots will always forward. Next UNESCO may also select best Indian curry and best Indian husband.

Our Government brings out new laws frequently. They told that group admins will be arrested for any wrong post. I immediately relinquished my admin post from family group and made my wife as admin. Then Court added that you would be held responsible for your posts. I took my brother in law’s phone and forwarded two anti-indian posts. Waiting for results now!

Modi ji must bring a new law to save people from antisocial elements who regularly...

(i)          Send good morning, good midnight and happy valentine day (!) posts. 

(ii)        Send their selfies and negatives in sideways, centre ways and threaten the general public.

(iii)      Posting status while "In Mangudi,  Mannarkudi" or “Malaysia” thus causing heartburn to us who haven’t crossed Koyambedu till now. I was really happy when Trump was not giving visas to Indians!!

(iv)       Posting status like "Feeling confused, ‘Feeling no feeling’ or Feeling dysentery.

But my office whatsapp group called 'Voice of Chennai Customs' (VOCC) is the best one.  It serves as not only whatsapp but also Office notice board, FM, newspaper, TV and serves Memo also !

In any group, some members sleep in the group 24x7 like in koyambedu bus stand and some visit once a year like to their in-law's house. Some even stay for a week like MLAs in ECR resort. But our group is fully functional during office hours!

VOCC is full of connoisseurs.    We got our own music RJ, HOD Cartoon and Vikramaditya’s Vetala for riddles. Our birthdays, anniversaries are broadcasted loudly and parties are extracted. My friend has got two marriage anniversaries as well !

We have our own jokes, Current news  and live TV news sharers. When DA increase comes on TV, we will know it immediately.  

Our members have specific traits in answering too. 

If I post "Indian women sent to moon by ISRO",

Comments will be like...

A :   "There also? Real lunar eclipse starts! "

B  :  "Girl power’ 

C  :  "Good news" 

D  :  "Please send all women there!!

E   :  "Chalo, Let's celebrate 

If I post “ISRO’s all women satellite crashed in moon”, Same people will comment like...

A  :  "Moon escapes "

B  :  "Even Moon is afraid of us’‍

C  :  "Very sad news" 

D  :  "How is Moon !!

E  :   "Chalo, Let's celebrate 

These kind of multi personalities (!) make the group vibrant and  keep the spirit flying high and make us to sacrifice office work for the cause of greater good i.e Chatting.  As long as they remain, happy Whatsapp days. 

Airport Job...

 Rapid-text :  An In-comprehensive guide to officers who join airport. Learn airport customs work in 30 minutes.

Working in airport is a dream job or at least would seem so as you are always sleepy whether you are on or off the duty.  If you are posted there, don’t delay in joining. 62 times airport glass panels have fallen. Unless it falls and kills someone, our govt won’t change anything. So Please join and bring a change !

ABCD of the job is Airport, Baggage, Check and Detain. That’s all. If you are good, you will be blamed by people in CP grams! If you are very good, your name will feature in TV also!! 

Purchase white uniform (Stitch pants with elastic at the hips), marker (for marking bags) and a knife (for checking luggage). Learn how to scan the bags thoroughly. I was told to mark all black images and I had been marking all black bags for one month till my BS questioned ‘why this racism’ ! If you are posted at Hand Baggage Scan, you will get opportunity to see a lot of beautiful passengers. But stick to your scanner image till you become senior. Seniors can watch two sceneries at the same time by rotating both eyes separately!

Nowadays passengers are returning to mother India with murderous rage due to demonetisation, flight delay and TV duty. They will wait for days in the immigration on foreign soil and not a minute in Indian mud. If you stop them, they will turn into Hulk!  So learn verbal karate, verbal kung fu and all bad words. I can scold you nonstop in Chinese, Korean as well as Japanese. When you can’t fight, call Customs Sepoys. Indian blood is afraid of Khaki Uniforms from pre-independence period.  I have seen many bahubalis melt in front of our khaki-clad sepoys.

Collecting duty for TV is the biggest challenge in airport. Bargaining will be going on in all TV counters like village cattle market. No one wants to pay duty to the Government. Their stand is that why should they pay duty to a country which is still developing 71 years after independence. Even an ape would have evolved into a man by this time. But they didn’t know that every week we are sending a businessman with 1000 crores to London and we plan to purchase England sometime!

If you are an atheist while joining the airport, trust me. You will become an ardent devotee while quitting the airport as you are certain to face cascade of problems. I became devotee of Lord Rama, Vishnu, Allah, Jesus, Raghavendra and Dharmendra. Name hardly matters. If a stone with flowers is found, I pray ! After my shift duties, I used to reside at temples.  

You will find new positions in sleeping. If you are found hanging upside down and sleeping like owl, tell your family not to bother. Tell them its new “Pathanjali Yoga”.

You can meet all VIPs and Cine stars who will be cordial. Once I asked actor Kattappa why he killed Bahubali. He replied that Bahubali was also asking unnecessary questions !

I worked as PRO as well which was like chicken in briyani! (icing on the cake). Working as PRO is one and half times tougher than working as officer. PROs used to command earlier. Now they take care of demands from passengers as PRO has become Public Restraining Officer.

PROs walk a lot. I was 7 feet when I joined airport and now only 5 ½ feet. I discovered that missing feet in my stomach. The PRO who replaced me is already 3 ft. I wonder what will happen to him?   My friend who joined airport, resembled a baby elephant then.  Now he already looks like a pregnant elephant.    

PROs will face a few problems too..

Someone would invariably call us at the ungodly hours during our sleep. Once someone called me at 02.30 am and asked who is in charge there? I blinked and told ‘My Wife’. He told ‘No Yaar’, “Which AC is working?”  I told “Samsung AC”.  He hung up. Another day I was woken up by siren sound at 0100 am (my  Whatsapp sound).  Someone sent me a video showing a wife killing her sleeping husband by throwing a big stone on his head. I couldn’t sleep after that.   From that day I put my phone in ‘Husband’ (quiet) mode during night time.

Once a VIP in full booze was to be seen off by a PRO friend.  The facility was so impressed by my friend’s calibre, he kissed the PRO on his longest forehead (?) and took off. The PRO returned spitting all the way.

Another time, a person had requested a PRO for domestic entry. The PRO went to Chennai domestic terminal and searched. Both were at domestic but couldn’t spot each other. After playing hide and seek for half an hour, my PRO found that the other guy was in Trichy airport and had requested for facility there! My friend returned and was seen shouting  @*$%#

 Keep working in airport till you start getting hallucinations. I started to stare at the woman’s necks for 24 ct gold chains even at my family functions.  Once I thought of taking a guest who came to my house for physical checking. Then it worsened.  I started to look at the crotches of the men on the road for hidden gold. If this happens to you, then its high time to take transfer.

Till then happy Checking.  

Ek, do, teen.... Kalash !

It was the initial stages of my Air Force Career in saving the nation.   Like Herculus, I was lifting the whole nation on my tender shoulders. Like a true ISO, Agmark tamilian, I didn’t know Hindi. The only hindi word I knew was “Jai Hind” and only hindi song I knew was “Jana, gana, mana...”.  Later I came to know that even that was not hindi.  My thirst for Hindi was born by Tezaab movie.  I learnt one, two, three in hindi from Madhuri’s ek, do, teen... song only.  When I saw her dance, I immediately understood that Hindi was the best language !  How I craved Madhuri to be my teacher! As Madhuri gave one hit movie after other, my love for Hindi also grew !

Before Tezaab happened, I had never seen a hindi film in my life apart from those black and white news reels played in the cinema halls.  Screening them was compulsory in those days.   Mostly Gandhi ji used to walk in fast mode in those reels and it would be whirring and blurring. Then some alien voice would recite some mantras in hindi.  Then 5,4,3,2 and 1 will come in circles and then the movie would start. I thought they were the warning for the late comers.

When I told my friends that I would also go to Tezaab movie alongwith them, they suspected my mental health at first.   Mostly I went to see Madhuri after seeing her in Chitrahaar.  It was like watching Chinese movie in china. I understood nothing. To see her face, I had to bear the hairy face of Anil kapoor and hairless face of Anupam kher. Then came the much awaited ek, do, teen... song.  What a song and dance! My body, heart and soul swayed alongwith Madhuri’s movements especially those scintillating back steps shaking her hip as if it was another body. People went delirious and berserk. If Gandhiji had seen that mob, he would have walked backwards and returned the independence.  The euphoria lasted 7 minutes. When the song was over, the crowd left the theatre. Madhuri carried the movie successfully at the box office on her hips.  It was the beginning of a new era. Indians changed their heart’s wallpaper from Sridevi to Madhuri.  When Beta was released, Indians heartbeat also changed from ‘tick’ ‘tick’ to ‘dhak’ ‘dhak’.  It continued till Nene, Madhuri’s husband came and stopped our heartbeat.

If Madhuri had come to the intellectual state “Tamil Nadu”, we would have built a temple and named her as “Madhuri Amman.”  After her retirement, we would have made her Chief Minister and fallen flat on her feet !

Yesterday I heard the song again with minuscule difference. First I thought Madhuri had come up with another dance to teach hindi to my grandchildren. Still I found something was amiss. After all it was like my family song.  I searched in Youtube and found the new ek, do, teen in baaghi 2 film. Much to my horror, my nuptial bond with that song got severed with a bang.  When ek, do, teen was sung, the dancer started to run as in 100m race and I ran for my life.  Her dance movements resembled belly fat reduction exercises.  She was rotating her stomach like yogi Ramdev.  Her gyrations lacked elegance and Madhuri’ innocent face with a killing look was missing.

It is always better to leave out the classics. Nowadays our musician hulks take an old song, add 2 tsp rap music, 3 tsp rock music and 1 tsp gasoline and burn them.  After hearing their song, you won’t like to hear the original as well.   Indian Mozarts and hazards must realise that the old magic can never be recreated.  These songs are interwoven in our lives and part of us. Remember! If this trend continues, we ‘not so much’ youngsters have no choice but to go to marina beach again.