When we talk about physical appearances, we have 3 parameters by which we judge every male – Tall, Dark and Handsome. I know every girl looks for these three traits in her companion. I never understood what all the fuss is about being tall. Is it that you need a guy who can clean all the fans without using any chair to stand on, or is it that you constantly feel the urge to replace the CFL with ease?
I was never “tall”…… never. From the time I remember I have always heard my parents say, “He is not as tall as his elder brother, he is just average.” I have always wondered is it really important to be tall? Right from my childhood I have been accused of not doing things which can make me tall – as if I had an allergy to being tall. The most common suggestions which I received for increasing my height were:
Drink Complan – This Company should be heavily penalized! They just show all sorts of fancy advertisements with all the 3-D graphs, random nutrients which their health drink has ( IDA, PDA, DDA, YMCA, Chemical X or just any other random combination of alphabets) and showing false videos where tall boys are extremely happy and shorter ones really sad as if taller ones stole their mojo! I’ve drank every health drink that was available in the market in my childhood – Complan, Bournvita, Milo, Boost. You name it chances are high that I’ve already tasted it. But nothing happened.
Playing Basketball and do Stretching Exercise – People think that playing basketball and stretching helps. Oh really! If jumping and stretching ourselves helped then just tell me why monkeys are so short, they have been doing these exercises for ages but I’ve never seen any 6 ft tall monkey.
Take those Magic Height Increasing Pills: I never wanted to be victim of those telemarketing ads wherein people say that they gained more than a foot in 3 months.
While others think that I am short I believe that I am of medium height. Yes this was inspired by half full half empty analogy. Being 168 cm tall in India is not that bad. (I intentionally wrote it in cm so that it appears big!)
The biggest problem which a ‘medium height’ guy can face is with girls. I guess the following chart explains it clearly.
(Note: The red part is fictional in the above chart)
You must be thinking why I included the height of Heels while considering height of girls. Let me get this straight: Girls have a unique way of calculating their heights by adding on an average 3-4 inches in their actual height (I learnt this fact lately!), so to present more accurate data I had to consider this.
One more incident which proves the above hypothesis about how girls estimate their heights happened at my school’s farewell. Two years back when I was in twelfth standard my school threw a farewell party for us. We all were having fun and suddenly one of my friends comes to me and says,” Hey this is our last day in our school why don’t we get ourselves clicked with every possible girl out here.” Well this was the obvious thing to do but considering my sudden change in personality from being perfectly normal to behaving like a pumpkin in front of beautiful girls this was indeed a Herculean task. But since it was the last day I decided to execute this plan what so ever.
So the first girl I went to was the most beautiful girl I considered (see my guts!). This girl was of same height as mine (I am not kidding) .Before approaching her I prepared myself a short introductory speech which would help me in my plan. So I thought in my mind – “Hi! XYZ, do you remember me? I am Abhishek from E section. We have met before. I must say you are looking absolutely stunning today (which she was!) Do you mind if I take a picture of ours?” to me these 2-3 lines were so important at that time as if I was about to propose to her. So I went near her when she was alone and God she looked gorgeous. The moment I saw her I could feel the pumpkin version of mine replacing the normal guy inside me. And it did happen. When she turned towards me all I could hear myself saying was, “Can I have a photograph?” Upon hearing this, guy behind me who was to take our photograph handed me the camera and went away. Now I was left with a camera and the girl who was about to make a face and go away. But she was kind enough to let me have the photograph. Yaay me!
You might be thinking how my story can have a good ending. You are right it didn’t end well. Remember she was of the same height as me. Yes she was but not on that day, she had worn 3 inch heels that day just to enhance her appearance.
The following meme will give you the hint how that picture was:
In short it was awkward.
So just because of my average height I had to face the following things:
- Whenever someone asked me in which class I studied, to every answer of mine I had to hear “You don’t look like you are in such and such class.”
- Whenever cricket selections were made the taller ones were given more preference as if talent increased with height.
- Whenever I was asked to read the news or any other article in the school assembly the first thing I did when I went upstage was to adjust the mic which would otherwise be above my head.
- I always stood in the beginning of the line during the assembly/ sat in the starting rows as we were asked to stand/sit according to our heights.
- Whenever not so tall people have a fight, most students and especially girls think it is cute! How the hell is fighting cute? Answer: because you are not so tall
- I was always denied the permission to take a two wheeler to school other than bicycle just because my parents thought I won’t be able to handle that.
This is a non-exhaustive list. But apart from that there are various perks too. It is all just the matter of perception i.e. how you take it. Now I have accepted the fact that the probability of meeting a girl shorter than me is not so good (again considering the heel factor), the compliment I’ll be getting the most will be – Cute. Not sexy, handsome, hot or any other adjective given to men but just plain, short cute! And the fact that no matter wherever I go I’ll have to bear all the jokes on my not-so-tall-height (Except when I go to Japan or China #peace)
Abhishek Singh 
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