Shave Puri

Source: The NY Times

The scene starts with camera focus on the floor. A man comes walking on the plush granite flooring. The focus is still on the floor. Black leather shoes polished perfectly to shine just as much needed. As the camera moves upwards we could see the trousers that are plain, elegant and pressed to roll out even the smallest crease on the fabric. The left hand is in his trouser pocket and the right hand is still not visible in the frame. Shirt neatly tucked in, full sleeves, straight collar and matched the trousers. An outfit that will make the women turn their heads; that will make even a man envious. As the camera moves further up, the excitement amongst the audience increases. As the camera finally reaches his face the audience is disappointed or perhaps disgusted.

After such a brilliantly groomed entry, the audience least expected a man with his hand on his cheek, scratching his shabby beard. The man is Amit Puri and the audience are my classmates from my engineering school. The above sequence is not a movie scene; it is the day of our placements. Amit had a great sense of style but when it came to his beard, he was as good as an illiterate. He feared that a clean shave would make him look like a kid so he never tried to bother the beard. The irregular growth made both the beard and Amit look shabby. Amit is in his early twenties and looked lazy though he wasn’t. The impression of such faces is often made in a wrong way. If not for others, do it for yourself; groom your beard well. Trim it if you do not like a clean shave. Your beard is a part of you so you have to take good care of it otherwise it will be unhygienic and untidy for you and others around you too.

Despite being a top contender to be placed that day, Amit was not selected. Probably Amit looked too lazy to them.  Probably, he was a little too unconfident and dull. Amit’s happy go lucky character might have prompted them to reject his candidature.  Amit missed his chance because he had taken good care of himself.

The next day we decided to get Mr. Amit Puri groom his beard. We launched a WhatsApp campaign called #ShavePuri. All the messages that we type must end with the tag #ShavePuri on our WhatsApp group. In addition to this we also started talking to him that way. After bearing the torture for the entire day, he finally said that he will try. The next day we saw an Amit that no one had seen before. He sported the below beard and completed himself in a way.

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