Pattikonda Nageswarrao Chandrasekhara Shambhu was his full name. It required an extra line in his passport. It was similar to other names from where he hailed. At his school, university and work, he was called PNC Shambhu.
Amongst his friends and in social circles, he earned the honorific and he came to be known as Politically-Not-Correct Shambhu. When he went abroad to work, he came to be known affectionately as 'Politically-Not-Correct Shambles' or just as 'Shambles'. It was quite apt as it turned out. You see, Shambhu was his given name. It means 'source of joy'. It is one of the names of Lord Shiva, the Destroyer - one among the Divine Trinity of Hindu mythology.
It must have been some kind of divine warning for the world at large for Shambhu was both a source of joy and a destroyer. He was of a happy disposition and merrily destroyed a lot of egos, myths and widely held beliefs in those around him, while being mostly unaware of it like a bull in a China shop. There was a childish innocence in him, also a trademark of the deity he was named after. It often seemed that only divine intervention had saved him and those around him from imminent catastrophe and somehow propelled them all into a new, better order while destroying the old one - which is what Lord Shiva represents.
Come, let me take you on a journey, slowly following the trail of 'Shambles', at a leisurely pace in future posts.
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