Even I would never have believed had Arjun Rampal not told me the story. Well I’m talking of Arjun and Rampal, two of my best friends who love walking up and down the ramp in every major fashion show all over the country. In our circle of friends we call them Arjun Rampal as it makes them feel far more elevated than they are.

‘Well, we’ll be modelling for an international brand in Venice too later this year,’ said Arjun, beaming with confidence. Yes, these two friends are the two handsome Greek Gods in our circle of friends… they are tall, well built, and have a great sense of humour too. They have faces with the greatest angular cuts making them so alike the sculpted Gods in the museums. Yes, they are clean shaven too… and, as a matter of fact, they shave their body hair too. The girls in our group love to act out elaborate swoons when they take off their shirts and show us some of their professional moves. 

It was during one such get-together that I asked, ‘I remember you guys sported squiggly beards in college and loved being called the mad scientist duo. What happened to that image that you were so carefully nurturing?’

‘We had an encounter with God himself,’ said Rampal.

‘You never told us about this before,’ said Kanika, and then asked everyone else to sit closer and listen to this new story that seemed quite interesting.

Rampal said, ‘You remember we had applied for the Mister University contest and our applications were weeded out in the initial round.’ He then told us that one of the administrators had told them that bearded fellows stood no chance to move ahead as a clean shave was one of the essentials and that this was an unwritten law. ‘We had no intention of doing away with our ‘mad scientist’ image then,’ added Arjun, ‘and so we were walking back that night when at a deserted spot we saw this man sitting on a large boulder. He was a white piece of cloth draped around his waist and one shoulder and had an hypnotising smile on his face.’

The story was getting intriguing, so we snuggled closer to them. Well, they were called by this man on the boulder and he told them a story.

Thousands of years ago it were the Gods who inhabited the earth and this place was their paradise. Then demons from the underworld wanted to emerge out of their dark abode and stay in this bright place. 

It was a difficult war. I say difficult because it was not easy to differentiate between the Gods and the demons. Both had the same features, same skin tone and both had hair on their bodies and sported beards. 

Yes, those were times when shaving was unheard of and so the confusion was so great at times that a demon would kill a demon and Gods would kill Gods. This was getting serious and the King of Gods then went into a deep trance for many years to find a solution. Meanwhile the warring Gods and demons kept fighting their battles and remained confused. 

Then one day the King of Gods opened his eyes and announced, ‘The almighty creator of the Gods has finally given me the answer to our problems.’ He then said in a low voice that all Gods needed to somehow get rid of the hair on the body and elsewhere.’ 

No one knew what would happen if this was done, so one of the Gods offered himself as the volunteer and was shaven with rather primitive tools that the Gods could think of. As he stood there in the massive court of the King, shorn of all his hair, there was silence. It appeared that most of the Gods were holding themselves back, but then the King laughed out loud… and the entire court rocked with laughter. 

‘This is too funny,’ said the general of the Gods, ‘we will not be able to defeat the demons like this unless they die laughing.’ 

The King, who was known to solve problems, then said, ‘I command the next volunteer to be shaved everywhere except the head. And the next volunteer will be the general himself.’ 

Well, nobody could possibly protest, not even the general, and so the order was carried out. And there stood the general, looking more majestic than ever, and the King smiled and applauded. It was then decided that the Gods would shave off every bit of hair from their body leaving the head… and this would make them different and then Gods could focus on fighting the demons. 

The gods won the war finally… and the best thing is that even the Goddesses were rather enamoured by their new look and made sure that the Gods never reverted back to their hairy form.

‘Well,’ said Rampal, ‘this man was one of the Gods who had heard of this story from his Grandfather and on seeing us so dejected, had decided to come down to give us this secret.’

Arjun then added, ‘But I had initially protested and told him that our look was nurtured and had an aim. That God on the boulder told me calmly that the Gods above would bless them thousands of miles on the ramp as we were the two chosen ones, and that this would all be possible only if we did what he had asked us to do.’

The duo then announced that it was that night that they went out and bought the best razors in the market and determinedly shaved off every inch of hair on them. ‘Except the lovely dark curls on our head,’ said Arjun with a smile.

Well, to be frank, I too sat there with a stubble on my face… and was trying to hide it by cupping my hands on my chin. But the decision was made for me. A shave would get me closer to the Gods, and maybe not for a walk on the ramp, but may be for a great time as a blogger.

So yes, I did what the Gods ordered.

.

.

Gods recommend shaving

Gods recommend shaving

.

‘This post is a part of #WillYouShave activity at BlogAdda in association with Gillette‘.

.

Requesting the following bloggers to also write on the #WillYouShave activity:
1. Roshan Radhakrishnan. Blog: GodYears
2. Rahul Prabhakar. Blog: RahulPrabhakar
3. Shetty Anirudh. Blog: ShettyAnirudh

In the post that you write, you will need to mention that you were referred by me.
Suggested topics for males:
Missed chances: Stories or instances where you missed out on an opportunity because of a non-shaven face.
Luck or Confidence?: Will you leave your fate in the hands of destiny or will you step up and say yes to a well-groomed face to be at your best everyday?

#WillYouShave

Suggested topics for females:
An instance when a stubble came in the way of a man’s chance to make a good impression.
An instance when a well groomed look ensured that they struck gold on an opportunity given to them.

.

‘This post is a part of #WillYouShave activity at BlogAdda in association with Gillette‘.

.

.

.

Arvind Passey
30 November 2014