That evening I left home telling my parents I was gonna play soccer, and headed over to the train station, half a kilometre from my house. From there I exited the west side, and found a poster for the 'Muscle House', gym, with sector 3 written on the poster to mark its location.
I asked an auto driver to get me to that gym with my pocket change, but he turned me down saying that the gym was right at the end of the street, and I walked the way over there.
Through the glass wall I could see in there, weights and various pieces of equipment, treadmills and this weird standing cycle machine, some plates were stacked, some scattered, I could see several people. Most were ordinary, but in the corner of the gym I saw this incredibly muscled man lifting mystically large weights, he was no joke lifting half of all the weights in the gym all by himself, repeatedly with a look of huge strain on his face. I hadn't seen such a sight before, and stood there for 5 whole minutes watching the real-life superhero repeatedly hoist the huge barbell to his chest.
Soon enough the man left and opened the door for me, I was now sure I was mistaken when I previously thought that the gym had to be expensive to get you muscles.
The whole gym was rather small, a large room slightly bigger than 2 bedrooms put together. It seemed very serious. Posters on the wall saying 'Today I do what other wont so tomorrow I do what others can't, and 'Pain is Gain', the whole left side and everchanging mural of people flexing in the mirror. It had a strange permanent musk of sweat despite obviously having the ceiling fans and AC running. I went over to the desk, which didn't have a separate room, and spoke with the trainer. A medium height thickly built man with dark skin and muscles that looked hard and tough like well-used anchor ropes under his skin. With a serious face and rough black hair.
"So this gym will work, right?", I asked him.
"This place has all the equipment you need to look like me", he explained, flexing his thick python like biceps.
"Ok is this place really only 500 rupees a month, even I can pay for that", I asked him.
"Yeah, it's the least expensive gym in the whole area, do you want a discount or something", he asked. "What year of school are you in?", he asked.
"I am in 8th standard", I answered.
"You look pretty small", he said, "I used to look like you at your age".
At that time I was 5'4 and 39kgs. I had grown 4 inches in the last 6 months with no gain in weight at all. People would say I looked like a twig, and the fat fool Harsh wasn't the only one who would pick on me.
"This gym only as payment by the month", he said. "Unlike the other gyms there is no discount for joining 6 months or a year at a time, we don't need that here", he explained. It didn't matter, even I could afford this place without a discount.
"OK how do I get big", I asked him.
He pointed to the pullup bar propped on the wall, "see that, big back, right there", he explained.
Then to the squat rack and leg press, "big legs".
Then to the bench press, that lying down lift that looked scary to do, "big chest, over there"
Then to the dumbbell rack, as I looked at the dumbbells labelled from 2kg to 30kg, "big arms", he explained.
"What more big do you need?", he asked me.
"Uh nothing", I answered, I felt foolish for thinking I could only gain muscle if the gym was expensive, which of my other ideas were dumb.
"That was oversimplified", explained the trainer, "come back with 1 months fees and I will tell you what you really need to do.
It took me about 10 days to save up or collect the money, I would say I was out to get myself streetsnacks and then not buy anything, instead hoarding it up. 10 days was still faster than I had thought and I walked over to the gym with the money.
The trainer accepted with a smile, and told me he will say exactly what I need to do.
"You look smaller than my dumbbells", he said. "Show me how many push-ups you can do".
He told me how to do them properly, then asked me to do the same.
I followed along, getting to 7 reps, then 2 more grinding through just as the poster told me. I tried a 10th, but my arms gave out under me.
"Not too bad, a lot of people can't even do that these days", he commented. "The last 3 reps were shallow.
"Now show me 10 squats", he told.
I did one before the trainer corrected me. "Your feet are to be flat on the ground at all times", he said. "And keep your back straight till you lower yourself below parallel"
He meant till legs were parallel with the ground. I tried to do it the way he said it, the balance was awkward,
"keep on going", he told me as I passed 10, my ass was feeling it after the 15th rep.
The trainer told me to stop and asked me to fetch the 10kg dumbbell, showed me how to hold it up to my chest and do squats at the same time.
It was much harder, but I cranked out 10 reps as my legs felt heavier each rep, I felt like stopping, but sir shook his head, "till you can no longer do a rep properly", he ordered, "it wont work if it is not hard".
I kept going as he said. Got to 15 before my legs refused to move.
"So your not that strong, but don't worry, that's why you came here", he explained.
"It will take a while to get strong, but you wont regret it I assure you", he smiled. "Just keep doing as I say".
The next exercise was the pull-up bar, years ago I tried to do them in a PE fitness test in school, and couldn't get a single one.
This time I hung on the bar, and pulled with all my might, the trainer looked at me, and gave me a bit of extra force to ensure it was sufficient to get my head over the bar.
"Do another one, one more, one more", he kept going till I had 6 reps in total, more than I thought I would get considering that I hadn't ever succeeded in a single rep unhelped, that I say was a huge confidence booster.
"Whatever you do here, try to get better at these 3 exercises and the overhead presses I am about to show you", he said. "They are the most effective at helping you get big like you want if you become very good at them.
Overhead presses were next, with the bar, the trainer told me I could do it with the dumbbells if the bar wasn't available. I could barely do 5 with the empty bar, which was 10kgs, it felt awkward and heavy and I was reminded I wasn't used to moving this way. It made Dheeraj's feat of lifting the struggling 75kg harsh over his head in the same way all the more impressive.
The trainer smiled, "I'll tell you what that was better then I expected", he remarked. "You leaned back somewhat, and that is not correct form, but still better then I expected". "If you follow my advice you can get very strong", he said.
"You mean as strong as that guy!", I pointed at the beast of a man resting between sets of what I now know are 400 pound power cleans.
"You know what, maybe", he answered, with a chuckle. I was gullible and sort of believed him.
"The most important thing is to come here is to keep on improving, and keep making small increases in weight and reps for a long long time, it took that man at least 15 years to get as strong as he is", he explained. "He was younger then you when he started."
I felt in awe, imagining the weight I could lift going up step by step multiplied over so many years. I would practically be a superhero, strong enough to vanquish any bully I ever come up against. I was sure I would be as strong as Dheeraj by 12th standard.
The trainer led me to his desk, and took out a sheet of paper. "Now listen here", he commanded. "I am about to tell you some very important stuff that if you don't follow, you will never be able to get strong". "It's about what you need to eat".
I know so many panic on diet plans, but I was then in a trance to listen to anything that would help my gradual transformation into a superhero.
"What did you eat yesterday?", he asked.
I thought for a moment, "Rice, roti, dal, I had leftover fish with the dal", I answered.