Private tuitions are a big thing in Bangalore. Especially if you're in the 9th and 10th grades and have board exams approaching.
The school was never good enough, the student never passed exams enough, and the music was never good enough. Until something changed, and In The End, it really did matter.
There was a gap of an hour between getting home from school and having to go to Mrs. Grover's for Hindi tuitions. I'd just been gifted my first Walkman and had saved up six weeks of my weekly allowance, reaching a sum total of 300 rupees. Well, I lied, because I spent all of it on an audio cassette.
The artwork on the top was of the cassette was of a red man holding up a pole with fairy wings on him, to an off-white and brown background.
The music had nothing to do with the cover, but it let me feel absolutely Numb for an hour with an old pair of Philips over-the-ears on. Thank you Akka, you took me everywhere whenst I was little, but you also took me somewhere all my classmates loved pranking auto drivers to go to, before running away. You took me to Linkin Park.
Any which way, the hour between school and tuitions saw me develop the habit of pacing from the coconut tree to the main gate for an half an hour until one side of the cassette was over. During these little listening sessions, I would daydream further back in time to a much younger Adhira and I where we would headbang our little heads, I had straight hair and she has the loveliest black locks. What led to this little baby mosh was her brother Adesh driving into our compound (we used to live in twin houses, I still do but I used to too) and blaring a legendary piano introduction. We know this song as In The End.
Returning to me a few years later pacing up and down the compound, I discovered how well Japanese flutes go with a distorted guitar and learned the importance of Breaking the Habit. The only habits I had back then was of course being addicted to Pokémon cards and pretty pubescent prowling girls.
By the way, Adhira and I also discovered that Cartoon Network played the amazing video of Points of Authority late on Saturday nights waiting for Dragon Ball Z to air a new episode, two days before all our friends saw the episode. Linkin Park had a role in making us little gods of the playground.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that Chester Bennington and Mike Shinoda have been my heroes ever since I was 10 years old. They didn’t and don’t know this, but we do. They didn’t and don’t know exactly how they touched so many lives unil they went and made that silly album Minutes to Midnight. At least it played during Transformers though. We saw that one with 20 classmates, an old flame and a friend of hers. I remember being Numb to the point of my hairs standing on my hands when Starscream flew across the screen to the chorus of What I’ve Done.
I hate you Mr. Bennington. I hate your bands new music and I love you all from the bottom of my childhood's heart. In the end sir, you do matter, and if there's Somewhere you Belong, it's in all our hearts.
Today, yesterday and tomorrow. Thank you for the greatest childhood we could have all asked for. And we sincerely hope that wherever you are, your flaming tattoos and tinted glasses take you One Step Closer to where you want to be. You’ve left us all a Papercut in our minds and Crawling on the floor. We’ll never turn our backs on you and you won’t be ignored. We’re always With You.
Rest in peace.
Inspired by Shariq Rafeek