BEING A FAT BOY

I had just finished publishing two blogs while roaming the US when readers started emailing me: “Write more about your childhood!” Apparently, my misadventures are more addictive than pumpkin spice lattes.

Today (11/01/2022), I stumbled upon a Daily Mail article claiming obesity is basically hardwired into our genes. According to some clever scientists at King’s College Hospital, London, dozens of DNA strands conspire to keep us, well plump. But I remain a stubborn believer that poor diet and lack of exercise are the real culprits—genes be damned.

Back in the 1950s and 60s, I was the “odd one” in my family. I come from a brood of nine siblings—five sisters, four brothers. Two elder sisters, everyone else younger, and guess who was the only one carrying extra weight? That’s right: yours truly. No “obese” label back those days, just a generous, chubby child wandering around Cochin and Thrissur.

In Kochy, nobody called me fat. But in 1955, after moving to Thrissur, it became obvious I was “different.” I couldn’t play shirtless like the other kids without inviting nicknames and ridicule. Older kids asked, “Where do you buy your rice?”—a stingingly personal insult in the currency of childhood teasing. I held my tongue, resisting the urge to launch the classic “from your mother-in-law!” retort.

High school brought drill master Antony Cheenikka, who ran a nearby gym and decided my pot belly needed urgent attention. I did not like his attitude, I refused to join. In retaliation, he singled me out for the tiniest marching mistakes, punishing me by making me hold 1kg dumbbells in each hand until the march ended. Medieval torture, with a side of humiliation.

Ironically, being fat was considered healthy. Visiting relatives would fuss over my siblings, exclaiming over their “deplorable state” and accusing me of stealing their food. My mother, of course, never played favorites.

In an Ayurvedic experiment, my mother tried fattening up my lean siblings with black monkey broth for six months. With the help of a gamekeeper Raghavan, she procured the carcass, and our house reeked of cumin, cardamom, turmeric, dried ginger, cloves, star anise, and fenugreek. Everyone except me drank daily two ounces of broth,but the broth had zero effect. My siblings stayed as lean as before, and I remained the family anomaly.

Being fat also meant more chores for me. I looked after goats, cattle, and poultry, ground rice and black gram for breakfast, shopped for groceries, and ran errands for Ayurvedic medicine. When my father was away, I represented him at weddings and funerals. Fatness comes with responsibility.

In the 1960s, parents obsessed over lean children. Jeeventone, a thick brown paste promising weight gain, was everywhere. One of my auntd joked I could model for Jeevantone like fatteming medicine advertisements. On that comment, my cousin,Innocent measured my biceps and calves, nodding solemnly in agreement—family validation, if unusual, was achieved.

As a teen, I finally decided to tame my unwieldy body at Ayer’s Gymnasium in Thrissur. Mr. Ayer, a spry septuagenarian, taught me ground exercises, padmasanam, and parallel bars. I ran a mile to the gym every morning and stayed disciplined until leaving for medical school. Post-gym life, jeering stopped, though my subconscious disdain for overly plump people lingered.

Weight science has changed over decades: exercise in the 70s–80s, cardio and dieting in the 90s, blame carbs in 2010. Looking back, my real culprit was always simple: I ate too much.

In the US and England, fat kids blend in. In 1950s–60s India, I was a spectacle. Genes aside, my view is simple: overindulgence and lack of exercise make a child fat. Science may argue—but nine siblings and a lifetime of anecdotes tell me otherwise.