Sage Advice

The problem with sporting a beard is that it not only affects the appearance it also affects perceptions. In some people (like me) a beard lends an undeserving gravity to the face making one look like someone one really isn’t. I know it from experience. People have told me that they thought I was a scientist or even a professor judging from my appearance. I am routinely mistaken for someone of the thinking class who spend more time thinking than doing anything concrete. To the world most of the bearded ones appear like they know the solutions to a lot of problems. That must have been what someone in Suryapet recently thought about me when he approached me for advice.

The hotel where I eat regularly is a rented one and one day the hotel owner introduced me to the landlord who happened to work in the municipality. Whenever we meet he greets me with a great deal of respect that I feel I do not deserve. The other day I noticed him waiting for me to finish dinner. I felt he had some work with me. I am in a post where I am not in a position to help anybody in anyway. However after I finished my dinner he approached me in that manner subordinates in government service do when meeting officers. He said he wanted some advice, which was something I give a great deal to farmers whether they need it or not. It is my job. So I thought he wanted to know which crop he should sow or something of that sort. Or maybe he wanted to know about some government rule. But I was completely taken aback at his question.

The landlord wanted to know if it was advisable to have a cell tower atop his building. He asked if the cell tower had any effect on people’s health. Since my knowledge of anything connected with cell phones, computers and the like is rather limited I wondered what to tell him. I had read somewhere that the radiation from cell phone towers is dangerous to one’s health. Only the other day I had watched a breathless anchor on a national news channel go around with some kind of a measuring device in her hand and shriek how dangerously high the radiation levels were in places near cell phone towers. The next day one of the local Telugu channels did an exactly similar program which is what our Telugu channels are rather good at. They don’t have a single original program and always copy ideas from the national channels. Anyway, all that watching of television came in handy when it was time to open my mouth and dispense advice to the waiting landlord.

I told him the same thing- that the radiation from cell phone towers is dangerous. He pondered for a while and thanked me. I was relieved he did not ask me further questions about how dangerous it was and which part of the body the radiation affected. I had the answer ready though and was ready to tell him it was the brain that got affected. The next morning he appeared while I was having breakfast. I thought he would tell me that I was wrong. But he told me following my advice he had refused a mobile phone company’s offer to set up a tower on the terrace of his building. He told me they had offered to pay him a rent of five thousand rupees per month. But he was willing to forego the rent rather than face the dangers.

I felt he was suitably impressed by my advice because he thanked me profusely like I had saved his family’s life. I had not expected him to take it so seriously considering five thousand rupees is a lot of money in these areas. It was one of the few instances when someone had taken my advice very seriously maybe because of the beard.