Chapter 20

"Naman, hey Naman, get up. There is a letter for you" said Mr. Naman's mother opening the windows of his dark room. It was 10 am on a hot sunny day in Ugar. Mr. Naman opened his eyes and looked at the rotating fan on the ceiling. Watching that celing fan rotate was the first thing he used to do every morning and somehow it brought smile to his face. The cool air circulation, the perpetual motion, and the circular movement, Mr. Naman loved all these abstract aspects of life.

"Whose letter is it, Ma?" asked Mr. Naman. Most of his newspaper article feedback used to come at his office address. He didnt had any pen friend who write to him. Actually Mr. Naman wanted to make one friend while he was young but he didn't like the term pen friend. Why would you name a friend based on the tool of communication, asked Mr. Naman. Surely one does not call your friendly neighbor as wall-friend just because your houses share a common wall. The use of proper words to describe a notion is critical in the world of Mr. Naman.

"How would i know, i have not opened it" responded Mr. Naman's mother. Mr. Naman opened the letter and was surprised to see a fan mail at his home address. The letter writer was a 16 year old kid who was a big fan of Mr. Naman and aspired to be like him. He wanted to learn from Mr. Naman about the requirements to choose writing as his career. How should he shape is future to grab a job in the daily newspaper. He had kept his name anonymous and had asked Mr. Naman to respond in his newspaper column. The letter writer had said that he had found Mr. Naman's home address by stalking him one day.

"Wow!" thought Mr. Naman, "somebody stalked me". Internally he was feeling exuberated on his mini-celebrity status. He wondered how many people like the letter writer would be out there? He thought of immediately write a response to this letter. Mr. Naman was always amazed by people who used to read those self-help books with titles such as - How to say No? or Seven things to be a happy person. The only person who was getting happy in all these books was the book writer because he was making money. The book writers rarely followed what they wrote themselves. Mr. Naman thought that he would respond to this stalker in a similar fashion.

How to build a career in column-writing: The five things to know to be a successful column writer.
By Mr. Naman Ugarwadi.

1. Concentration - One needs to have an excellent power to concentrate on what he is writing. Often, one gets lost in his flow of ideas, a good concentration helps writers to focus on one idea at a time. In order to develop concentration, i suggest learning to peel apple skin in a continuous manner - aka the whole skin should come out as one long piece.

2. Attention to detail - If there is one thing common in all great writers, it has to be their attention to detail. It takes years to get this ability. I suggest you to make a chapati (roti) and ensure that it is a perfect square. You are not allowed to use any external instruments such as rulers in this process.

3. Retention power - Ideas can come anytime. The key is to remember them when you get them to write. Remember what you dreamt last night and write it down the next day, everyday. If you have to, stay awake to capture your dreams although dreams come only when you are asleep.

4. Regularity - You have to write it everyday, a break of mere 2 days and you will find yourself experiencing writer's block. I suggest you to write something everyday, even though it may mean writing the same thing all over again. Your handwriting will be differentiator and if your article/book becomes a hit you will have more than one hand written copies that you can sell.

5. Reading to friends - No matter how good or bad you have written, it is very important that you read that to your friends. They may not like it, go back to your house, or may break your friendship but you must persist. It is only friends feedback that will help you grow. This may even mean that you will have to tie your friends to a chair and read to them, this is indeed very important. Even if you can't do the other four things, you must do this one.

-Mr. Naman.



Feeling quite satisfied by himself that he has mentioned valuable points, Mr. Naman goes to drink some coffee. Somewhere, sometime later a kid will realize the price to stalk someone.