Bycycle tales

Most often than not there are people who drive fancy cars (and sometimes the not so fancy ones either) who rave and rant about the madness of the average bicycle rider on our city roads.The grouse is that they have no road sense,can turn at will with no indication that they had planed to do so and can enter ones field of vision when there is just about time to jam the breaks hard inorder to prevent oneself being hauled up for murder.On our roads the guy with the smaller vehicle is king.I must admit I am one of those people...but the one in the not so fancy car but nevertheless I must admit to knocking a couple of them off their bikes.Now having joined the ranks of the average bicylcle rider,I am beginning to look at thing from their or rather now "our"perspective.

Lets get some facts right,since no one takes much notice of this lowly rider,the bicycle comes with no fancy or even basic headlights or rear view mirrors.Now the chances are that none of us has eyes behind out heads so we ride at random.I would begin to think that everyone else ought to be looking out for us little people with no amenities and giving us right of way.Having been on the neighbouring roads for the last two weeks I can vouch for the dangers that city roads present.Traffic even in the by lanes has increased and most people get this cheap trill by pushing us off the road(i must admit that there must be something very tempting about a woman in levi jeans and nike shoes that makes people want to push me off.....so much for wanting to reduce carbon footprint)I have no started appreciating the travails of the average bicycle rider and when I need to drive the car I have begun to look out for them much to the displeasure of certain family members who still harbour hopes of killing a few sometime in life.

such is life

The heat can really get one.Mad as a hatter was never truer.With temps getting into the wrong side of 30s its small wonder that everyone is blowing up The maddest thing to do during this heat is to do things that one doesn't normally do.Take for instance this new way of observing lent(old way but new for me,never done it before).To go off non veg food for forty days is hard at the best of times,and to do so in summer with the heat already getting to one,is the worst kind of decision.But when the whole world dares you to try,and when one considers the so called benefits (loosing weight....because i shall eat a lot less,getting innovative on cooking)it kind of seemed worth it.But to not be gracious about it is a definite no no so here I am caught in this dilemma of to do or not to do and that really is the question.

All the friends have left so the visitor brigade is over for a while,the serious business of making money,keeping oneself busy and managing to stay calm amidst waves of negativism from people around,the need to be patient(when what one really wants to do is to be irresponsible) and to take on the mantle of responsibility is all getting on my already frayed nerves.Sometimes its healthy to throw all caution to the winds,to live for only oneself and to be selfish,irresponsible and irreverent.I wait for the day I can do all that but perhaps when the time comes,I may not want to be any of those,for such is life

The joys of cycling

First there was the cycle.Its started with a few faltering steps taken in Bangalore to get me seriously hooked.Of course nothing compares to real cycling as opposed to the many cycles in the gym.Perhaps all that gym activity made the real bike seem less alien.Thanks to having friends with grown up children(read children who have outgrown their cycles) I got myself a second hand cycle.The next challenge is to get it into working condition(the child in question had outgrown it by at least a year)Nothing in our house happens without the tacit understanding and help of our domestic help,the ironing man,the watchman and the local hangers on.Of course all their sympathies lie with the man of the house(the untold reaction being that women above a certain age must behave so and not indulge in childhood pursuits).After two days of constant reminders,(and after the husband had told all his sympathisers that if the cycle wasn't in running condition in the next day or two,he was in danger of being starved)the ironing man(chap who irons our clothes and is the local fixer)took the cycle today and got it all spruced up and ready.Of course considering I am a novice it would be prudent to keep cycle testing for a time when the road is clear of all human kind and the automobile kind (there are enough people waiting to see the fun).Our road has some four and a half kids who play on the road between four thirty to six in the evenings.Unfortunately they are all at an age when they are too young to appreciate that learning anything new after forty is an uphill task and requires bravery.Since they don't understand,they tend to hang around and gape.So I wait patiently to see them go back to their homes but as usual the gods conspire against me and,instead of the usual kids,there i was seeing some ten little boys pour out of one house which till date didn't have a child to its credit.The clock ticks and I wait patiently till the last of the brats disappears and then the fun begins.First step is to unchain the bike(the paranoid husband has locked it to a post to prevent it being stolen,though i can still find ways to steal it)The next challenge is to unlock the bike.Being blind as a bat,this takes some doing,but by now I am pretty good at braille so the next step is crossed.Then comes the actual riding.Now we are talking of an empty road and a woman who under normal circumstances is considered old to be learning to ride.But for the average roadside romeo a woman of any age is a woman,so while I struggle to get my grip,there was this young blade who got some cheap trill of cycling by too close.Of course this is lost on me for the moment(everything dawns on me much later to the frustration of such young blades who don't always get their trills as there is no reaction from me).Once i get the hang of it its that wonderful feeling again.This place of course has seen me learn to ride a scooter and a car on these very same roads so its with a sense of deja vu that i set off to ride and enjoy myself.If this is exercise then I am all for it.After the initial fits and starts,I am off crossing the road to my old street and back.Some forty five minutes later feeling rather good about myself I get back home and announce to the mother that I have been out cycling.Her reaction is enough to deflate even the most optimistic(is the bike still in working condition she asks in all earnestness....well looking at the cycle in question,it doesn't look like it can bear the weight of a seventy kilos)but as I have lived with her all my life,I let it wash over me without turning a hair and I am going to be back to cycling and the joys of learning new skills tomorrow

paper tigers

one believes that all paperwork must end the moment one retires,or rather I believed thus.Today my happy existence was shattered by the piles of paper work I discovered I needed to do.Its starts with having to pay taxes.Now that really takes the cake.Why would one unemployed woman be expected to pay taxes,is beyond my comprehension.But truth be told that's exactly what the government expects one to do.It seems that to get all this tax business done,one needs to get all the paperwork in order.Now I have been one of those lucky ones who always had a man Friday to do my accounting and filing.I miss the one boy in my life who made it all seem so easy but he has since exited my life so here I am doomed to handle all this myself.The first thing one needs to know(or so the husband informs me) is to file by date.I spent the entire afternoon putting piles of paper into monthly piles to be filed in that order.Its no fun when the mother comments that I remind her of her grandfather who did this on a regular basis.It seems to run in the family all this last minute work and if its genetic then there is no way I can escape.Why I wonder cant i be the simple housewife that I have become(no one believes that I can be a simple housewife though why it beats me) who is dependent on her husband to take care of all this.Well it seems that the is no rest for the wicked especially when the wicked have a history of having managed all their affairs for the last twenty years with no help from the husband.Oh well its time to tackle more files so to work to work I go.....

childhood in parumala

Ive been reading a lot about kerala and it occurs to me that many experiences are similar.For instance every vacation saw us board the kerala mail(that's what it was called) and we got off at tiruvella(i think its spelt that way).From the station we took a taxi to the backwaters and waited till a valam(long snake boat) came along .We had to be very careful how we got in,taking care to balance right or fall into the river.My mother went into depression as soon as she got into the train and by the time we reached the boat her depression was well established.My sisters cribbed about leaving the city and having to spend the best part of their lives in a god forsaken island.My father tried hard to balance all this but as we neared home he didn't bother with any of us.The boatman carried a long bamboo pole which he used as an oar and when we reached the opposite bank he would jump off the boat and drag it,people and all up the bank,and we all jumped off and landed into soft river mud which promptly came up to the ankles.I loved it and the rest of the family hated it.Our house was set a little off the river bank so that meant a bit of a trudge up the drive with muddy feet.The house itself was a rectangle,with a veranda running all around.The veranda was at least two feet high and there was always a Kindi(a small jar with a spout ) full of water.We were expected to wash out feet before entering the house.The house itself was on many levels.In the centre of the house was a huge room that served as a store room or a modern cellar.Right in the middle of that room was another room on a higher level which had this huge wooden door and wooden steps leading up to it.This was where the more interesting things were stored,the ripe jack fruit,the juicy mangoes,the fresh farm eggs and goodies that were out of reach of us kids.God forbid we dared venture there,but the trick was to hang around until some adult got there and then if one sweetly offered to help,they tended to overlook the fact that I was a child and there i was being given a peep into that world of good food.Foodie that I am,it was the first thing i looked out for in the house.In the early morning the milk was churned and the butter always stored in earthen pots hung from the rafters.It was out of reach of children but was tantalisingly attractive.Not that I cared too much for butter.

At night this lovely house took on a different personality.Thanks to the absence of electricity,there were a million lamps lit with oil.If one wanted to go outside the torch was always a bunch of palm leaves that were lit and used as flares.The shadows of a million lamps cast long shadows on the walls.If one is a child this can be really scary.When night fell the silence was deafening and the only sound were those of crickets and mice.Tiny scurrying feet could be heard all night.Mysterious laughter came from my grandmothers room(she had died a few years after I was born).Considering she wasn't around,the adults exchanged glances and continued to do what ever they did,but she was having the last laugh.Her spirit never left that house,she wandered the nights there especially in the store room and if one coconut was missing then the house would shudder and mourn with her anger.The floorboards creaked every time we walked and the sound can conjure up a variety of fears.On Sundays the church service fuelled my imagination.Priest in black wandered up and down the aisle of the parumala church which housed the remains of a well known bishop who was supposed to grant all wishes.Today when I think back it all seems so foolish but to a child dwarfed by those many priest swinging their incense cradles and chanting in mournfully voices,it was really the fear of god as i saw it.Today that house is just a memory.Modern day progress has rendered the boatman and his wears and transport a thing of the past and to me there are no more visits there,these are childhood memories.

Bumblimas and us

One large bumblimas (I am not sure why its called thus) has been around in the kitchen for a few days now.The size of a football or perhaps a little smaller,its a lemon green and belongs to the lemon family.My nephew took the trouble of climbing the tree,risking being bitten by red ants and bruised by thorns and brought it all the way from one grandmothers house to the other ones home.Not knowing what to do with it my mother left it in the kitchen until hunger and curiosity got the better of me.Having invested in a juicer,my current obsession is to turn everything into a juice and this poor fruit was about to get some much needed attention.At touch it was a bit soft and i was convinced it has gone bad but nevertheless I cut it into two.The insides of the fruit set me thinking.The fruit itself was firm and ripe but all around it was a thick layer of soft mushy or rather spongy white stuff almost like protection for the core.So really the fruit had a thick hide,soft protection and in the center was the fruit intact and good enough to eat.So like humans really when one thinks of it.Some of us have this thick shell that looks like its hard to break but actually inside some of us are so vulnerable and soft that until one is pushed to the limits,the core really doesn't come through.The core reminded me of who we really are.Our personalities,our strengths and weaknesses are all tightly coiled into our core and the rest of it like the fruit is really not good for much,easy to get rid of,layers we develop over time and experience that cover us until at times we are judged by that layer.Some people refuse to see beyond that and like the fruit that sat at the kitchen table without a second glance,some of us get ignored or not noticed because no one bothers to see the core.I juiced the core of the fruit,the real fruit and it had flavours that burst in the mouth,the taste of sweet smelling flowers,lime,a certain tartness mingles with just enough sweet,not the cloying sticky sweet that makes you sick.Everything in balance.As i sipped and relished my fruit juice I couldn't but imagine how all of us have many flavours,all in balance,some more potent than the rest but in the end its all there.Do we need a juicer to get us out of our shell,perhaps not but we certainly need to look into our core more often.There is the secret of who we are and what we choose to become.

learning to ride

It been a desire for every since I can remember.Cycling was what i wanted to learn.As i watched other kids ride their bikes I wondered how it would feel to be free,to balance on so thin a frame and to ride against the wind.But it was not to be.Overprotected and worried about everything we were forbidden to ride.Many years later as an act of rebellion I bought a scooter thanks to becoming an earning member of the family.I didn't know the first thing about balance and crashed many times to emerge stronger and more determined.Years later I graduated to a car,learning to drive at what most folks would imagine is a ripe old age(at least for learning motor skills).But the need to ride a cycle never left me.Lat week I sported a bike,small enough for my short feet to touch the ground and the determination came back.Much struggle later I was balanced and riding,the wind against my hair just as I had imagined it.The trill was everything,I had mastered it and the faces of the children on the road registered the shock that someone so old could be learning to do what they took so for granted.They watched me with great interest and then encouraged me along the road.Obviously they will never know what it feels like to want something so much and the great sense of achievement that comes from mastery.

Memories

There is much to write but the fingers on the key board refuse to move and the thoughts are trapped in the mind,probably because its not willing to be recorded.But it must at some point,that is the therapy.One full year to the day,the day I quit,the day a parent died and the day life changed in many ways.It brings the family together all three daughters,each meeting together for the first time in many years.Its a somber morning,we don't talk,we ponder,each captive in their own worlds,thoughts and memories.Each a different one,each in a different time frame.We meet again at the cemetery after a year.Ten roses of different hues adorn the grave but my father wasn't a lover of flowers so much.Perhaps if convention didn't exist,we may have left a good fresh fish and a bottle of black label.Would that have been more appropriate.I am not sure.We mourn out dead.My mother breaks her silence after a year and sobs,my eldest sister takes charge as always.I stand alone not physically but very much in my thoughts.I don't want to think,I don't want to remember,some memories are too painful,best to be wiped out but the human mind will not allow that and so we relive our most painful moments,every memory of that day by the hour etched firmly in my memory and this is the only way to deal with it,to remember.

God men and they tribe

Organised religion and me were never friends.I need to be inspired by the words and deeds of people who are so called representatives of a religion and unfortunately there are few who do so.In fact the ones who don't number more.I belong to an orthodox order which means that there are traditions and rituals that have very little to do with the actual essence of my religion,unfortunately these take precedence over all else.
Imagine my shock when a priest today told me that I am living in sin because the church doesn't recognise my marriage,then he went on to harp on the fact that i couldn't be a member because I had not married in church.By this time I was ready to walk out,except that I needed a memorial service in memory of my father who lucky man has a priest at that time who was young,liberal and a good man at that.Unfortunately for me I had to deal with an absolute bigot who had my bile churning and my blood pressure rising.If it hadn't been for a very patient(non christian) husband the priest may have got mouthful from me on the virtues of his profession.Unfortunately these are men who are seen by the larger public,these are men who in the name of god,tarnish the very image of a god of justice and peace and love to all mankind.These are the men who in the name of god make money well beyond their means for who the outward trappings are what define the person.God forbid I would need to ever go to such a man for an religious service.He by his actions and words has made me want to change my mothers membership to a different church(simply because we know more people there).He by his actions has prompted me to write my own funeral,where I am leaving specific instructions on what has to be done and what bible verse must be read and what hymn should be sung and when all is done,since the church will not bury me(despite me being a practising christian)then i can be cremated and the ashes added to the soil of my favourite plants so that my spirit may live on in the flowers that bloom.Over my dead body will men such as the priest of today,say a prayer because for me it will be an empty chant from a man who doesn't represent any God that I have ever known.

Fashion and me

Fashion victim I am not,nor am I fashionable but i do believe I have a style of my own and if this means walking into a snooty fashion launch with a bright yellow plastic bag filled with books,then so be it.So this was one event that had the beautiful people of Chennai(beautiful with loads of help from the best cosmetic companies I must add) falling over themselves to kiss air,show a lot of skin,drink copious amounts of free wine and champagne and gorge on equal amounts of finger foods and gawk at some of the most shocking clothes(for their lack of style despite being palmed off as the high end of luxury) and some of the accessories that yours truly could well get off the pavements at a price that doesn't burn a hole in ones pocket.
But all opinions aside,the event itself is an eye opener of sorts.Of course the mandatory celebrity guest of honour was there,so what if she is a fading diva who despite all the makeup and surgery still looked like she had been made.Then the usual page 3 people of Chennai who are there with so much make up that its a wonder they can smile (people here haven't heard of subtlety)But then again when the cameras are clicking all around its understandable,after all chances are the the newspapers the next day will carry your picture.There are also the others in the mutton dressed as lamb category but I take my hats off to them for sheer genius in reinventing themselves.I of course had to be different simply because my wardrobe demands that it be that way,so there I was.Now I still cant understand why one would pay some twenty odd thousand for a skirt which weighs a ton and would feel more like a straight jacket than a skirt,or for that matter why pay ten grand for a sweater that looks like it was pulled out of shape in the washing machine and then the slippers.Considering that there are times when I tend to go a bit mad at shoes(meaning I spend a bit) the footwear in that shop was garish and not stylish and the woman actually oohed and ahhed about it.Was i out of touch or what.I love going for these event just to watch the fun,the people and the madness that is called glamour,and luckily for me I can stand on the sidelines and enjoy the show knowing I will never need to buy anything for shops such as these.Designer wear for me is about style,elegance and class and for that if I had the money i would be spending it on Armani or channel or Dior.I have stoped dead in my tracks just to gape at some of the best cut and most elegant clothes that these fashion houses produce and for that an arm and a leg wouldn't be too bad

The fridge

I am not in the habit of raiding refrigerators in other peoples homes,but I am not the kind to pass up an opportunity if it comes my way either.The fact is that it says a lot about the people it belongs too.Hadn't given it much thought until recently but the way its used is rather interesting.A lot of countries still use their cellars to store stuff but for lesser mortals like us the fridge is a necessity.Let see now,the things that will really perish are meat and fish and maybe veggies but if one is a vegetrain then what can a fridge be used for.
I have a huge fridge which was bought recently simply because i am in the habit of getting all the measurements so wrong that instead of making food for a one or two man army,I sometimes make food for the U S army so to speak,so the fridge is always full,and on the next day when i could eat leftovers,there will be the odd grumble from one member of the family who will want fresh food so there goes.It piles up in no time and before you know it there is so much food in the fridge that I can now write a book on recycling food and the many new recipes that leftovers have to offer.As for some of us who live in remote areas the fridge is one place to store for the month,but actually its the freezer.Sometimes when the ice cubes taste like fish sauce and the chocolates in the freezer take on Chinese flavours one knows that its time to get a new fridge with a large freezer.
For some its a style statement or just one of those gadgets that are a must have.I raided a fridge recently and was amazed at the variety of stuff available.Every kind of dhal in full form and in powders was there for the asking,curd in such large quantities that would make even the god Krishna would go off the stuff(legend has it that he was a great one for the butter from the curd).Then there were flowers.Yes flowers in little boxes all ready for a full week of puja and veggies like all of us.The freezer looked more like my store cupboard and there I was getting a new look at the most unconventional uses of the freezer.I remember the freezer in my moms home that was packed to the gills with everything that once walked the earth and we always found something to eat there.The extra large freezer in our home has a little more variety,chocolates,ice creams(we now buy them because of extra space and its translating into extra bit of fat around our respective stomachs).Its a fusion of my mothers habits,the mother in laws ideas and a little bit of our own.So here I am with a fridge full of greed,my moms fridge spoke of thrift,(she wouldn't dream of throwing anything away),my sisters house had a freezer and a fridge all a big store house because she was always worried about running out of food,another relative just stuffed anything that looked like it needed cold storage but when it comes to unconventional uses there are no marks for guessing....the mother in law takes the cake.I have decided to raid a few more and my next research project will be on personality and the fridge with a few variables like culture,religion,sex etc thrown in....seems like a plan

Best wishes and forwards

Its almost a month since i put finger to keyboard and so much has happened.A year ended,a new years day came and went,the house was full of visitors and is now silent,and the sms messages are over for a while,which really brings me to what this is all bout.
From the 24th of December to around after boxing day,the sms messages come fast and furious as they do from the 31st of December to the 1st of January.I am not into this sending of mindless messages but politeness and good manners ensures that I thank one and all for kind wishes and so one.I used to send Christmas and new year cards all bought from UNICEF until I caught the email bug.The mobile phone however has not taken over my psyche.Let see now,most of the people who wish me on these days are ones I have no contact with at any other time of the year,in other words they are neither old friends or family,secondly,most of the messages are mindless forwards which have no meaning.Nothing is personalised.I remember writing our my friends names and signing personally with a fountain pen and it meant so much,but forwards are just that,very much like a carbon copy or a chain mail,does it mean anything?.Frankly no.But just once in a little while there does come a message that means something.To be sure the message was personalised and could not have been forwarded as it wasn't meant for anyone else.From the many messages that I received,this one stood out,it made an impact and it touched a cord.Isn't that what wishing is all about,isn't it about telling someone how much they mean to your or that you share their joy or their sorrow.I wrote back to this friend and she was clear the message came from the heart.Yes I agreed,almost all the others came from the keyboard and meant nothing,this one from the heart I will cherish and the sender is not even someone I know all that well,it says a lot about people don't you think?

out of control

Abnormal psychology was a subject we looked forward to.Reading our prescribed text most of the class assumed that we had one or more of the illnesses mentioned there.The lecturer herself was a difficult woman,but a brilliant teacher.We went through the whole semester studying mental illness its treatment and what or how to cope.The principle was clear,neurosis was a function of how fragile a persons mind was.Its a tipping point.It can easily happen to any of us and its scary.Then I went to counselling courses and sessions and the practise of the subject made me realise that the mind besides being complicated,can be made to surrender for better or for worse.Its not surprising that human behaviour is decided by our environment and our upbringing.The fact that a child's personality is formed in the first six years of its life is what is scary.

Today I watch a friend go to pieces,I see the symptoms and I feel for the person but what interests me more is how we behave in situations when someone is loosing his or her grip on the world and on their lives.We may seem like fair weather friends but is it because we cant cope,we don't know how to handle the situation or does it reflect on ourselves and who we are.We avoid situations that involve the person,we fail to make the phone calls that we made so often in better times and we fail to visit as often as we need to,but then again help cannot be extended unless the concerned person wants help or is willing to talk about it.It can only work when the concerned person decides to change and is willing to admit to the problem but all of us are in denial,we are caught up with our little follies,we want to be popular,liked by our friends and to be normal and the danger lies there.Today I see my friends,the one who sought help and had the courage to change,have pulled themselves out of danger,but the ones who refuse to accept that there is a problem continue to spiral out of control while we watch helplessly and hope to god that there may not be a situation we will have cause to regret.

loss and learning

Life is so complicated.One day is a fun evening with girl friends,the next day the same people get on ones nerves.Then the next day someone you love but never bothered to acknowledge dies and suddenly one wonders if one did say all the things that needed to be said.

There is something final about death but our customs can get in the way.Christians bury the dead and for us that alone ensures that the end is never really so final.The Hindus burn their dead and all that left is ashes thrown into some sacred river and gone forever.I always thought that was a crazy practise.I couldn't imagine setting fire to someone ones loves but today after visiting the cemetery(something I avoid doing) I realised that burying the dead makes it a lot more difficult to forget.For us a visit to the grave is like a visit to that person.On festivals we leave flowers,on holidays we go to talk to a stone because in our hearts and minds the person is there.Its never really over.For me my father is still very much in the neighbourhood and I cannot let go.Every visit is a reminder of the many memories some good some bad but most of all a deep sadness,an emotion that one doesn't need,but cannot rid oneself of.Was cremation a better option.I am not sure,would I regret that there is nothing lasting to go to.Would I feel better?.I think not because at the end of the day,a loss is still a loss and we are all victims of our faith and our upbringing so we cling to the little things in life and go back to the past and relive times and we will never forget.The fact of the matter is that parents are not people we forget or stop missing.Every act is a memory of things learnt of things we hated doing but were forced to and for which we are grateful because in their wisdom they taught us many things and now we realise the depth of what was taught.Maybe it wasn't something one learnt to appreciate at the time but it takes loss to understand somethings but I wish there was a better way

Discrimination

Ever come up against prejudice or discrimination.I have but it seems so trivial that I never really give it much thought but really the underlying principals are the same.How does one lifestyle become less acceptable than another,and why does one always have to compromise for the other.
Lets see now,the biggest discriminators in life are probably food,religion and gender and not necessarily in that order.
Lets start with food.The broad category of lifestyles would be the vegetarian vs the non vegetarian,the others are usually folks who wont eat pork like the Jews and Muslims or the so called vegetarians who eat fish for some reason.But take any hard core vegetarian and one will find that they are quiet intolerant of the non vegetarians.From turning up their noses at the so called smells (please some of us are sick at the smell of rajma or dhal too)to their inability to eat at the same table and the curious lengths they take to avoid contamination,one would begin to think that all meat eaters are walking weapons of mass destruction.I am yet to fathom why its always this group whose sensibility's have to be considered.Wait a second,I don't like being made to feel like an untouchable just because I have a refined and adventurous appetite for food.After all one mans food maybe another ones poison but why cant we just learn to live with our differences.
Religion,again the great divider.Unfortunately most often than not our value systems are based on our religion,our food preferences stem from our religion so whether its kosher or halal,or no garlic onions or anything that once walked or flew the earth,it all comes from our religion.Then there is the big difference of one god verses many gods.For some of us there is only one point of contact in heaven but for others very much like our political system there are gods with different portfolios.I sometimes think this is a good situation because there is safety in numbers and chances are that very much like humans the gods may have their own power struggles and therein lies the divide and rule situation(chances are that the more one panders to one god then the others may also do one favours,good system all around)Unfortunately despite my simple explanation of the situation both of the above can lead to fear,hatred,intolerance and violence which really defeats the purpose of why they exist in the first place.
Gender,and I have plenty to say on this count being a victim of the gender bias many times over.First lesson to learn as a woman,play dumb and act stupid,chances are that one will get ahead.Learn to work within set standards,which really means smile and do things around the house even if you detest it.Of course some like me refuse to do so and have had to bear the consequences of such acts but better to live a life on ones terms then to simply exist at the pleasure of others.I find the gender bias very much in existence in the home environment.There is I discovered different laws for the daughter in law as opposed to the son in law.The sils as we call them are a privileged lot.They can get away with most things.The dil on the other hand has to be of a certain kind,she needs to get along with everyone or she is termed a not nice girl,she needs to hang around the kitchen asking if she can help.God forbid she does no such thing,the whole world and his uncle will condemn her.I see this happening ever so often and the strange thing is that we don't question it.Years of socialization had immunised us to this abuse and we let it pass.Unfortunately it happens even in this current generation and I wonder how or when we will see the tide change.
Discrimination in its most subtle form is hard to pin down,it just leaves you with this uncomfortable feeling that all is not well.Any debate on the subject will turn into emotional drama so the best course of action is really inaction or as I discovered non violent non co operation.
I watch everyday and I learn many things over the course of my life.I have seen lives destroyed and people compromised in the name of honour and dignity but remember discrimination is never about honour or dignity it undermines the very fabric of ones being and the best way to win is to fight and the fight is not easy nor is the end clear but one must go on

December

December is here and for me its a winding down of the year.A year that has been both traumatic as well as blessed.It was a year that was to be a turning point of my life.It changed many things on many fronts but looking back on Dec last,it brings back memories of Decembers of many years.For me December is a month of Christmas carols and Christmas trees,of holidays and friends of parties and happiness.In all the stress's of life I made December special,despite the anxiety that lurked at the back of my mind.Last year I knew that my father was ill but I went ahead with my annual Christmas party which I have made a tradition in my home.My Christmas tree went up on a song and a prayer.My visit to my parents on Christmas day was special because for me it was a time for family,a family that I knew would soon have to diminish but to be enjoyed for whatever time it existed.
Today the second of the month I pulled out the Christmas carol CD and it plays in the background as I write.There is no celebration this year because I don't have the spirit to indulge in a party in the backdrop of so much tragedy,personal and in the world.But the spirit of Christmas is of forgiveness,of thanksgiving to a god who has protected us and guided us in the past year and for me it will be a time of quiet reflection,of prayer and dedication to a life which I hope has been well lived so far and which I again hope had added some value to lives other than mine.Its a year of looking back on a change that brought about a new beginning for me,a new career choice which I am enjoying and which could have only happened when one door or chapter in life closes and another begins.For me December will always be a month of joy amidst sadness,an ending of one year with a hope of a new one and in the meanwhile I sing my favourite carols and revel in the legends and stories of Christmas very much like little Tim or Scrooge in The Christmas carol.

terror and sub culture

I am uneasy,I am unhappy,its all the aftermath of whats happened in Bombay.Its happened many times before in many countries and in our own,and there is outrage and there is anger but then life goes on.We believe it wont happen to us and we couldn't care too much,after all its always a crowded market or a minority group that's being killed or raped or terrorised and we don't care and neither does the government.
Cut to Bombay and the taj and the oberoi under attack.The Victoria terminus was also under attack but strangely that took a back seat,after all do the crowds on the suburban trains make for good sound bytes.Look at the two big hotels,the rich and famous come there,its the swish set that hob nobs there.They don't vote but they critise the government,we don't care for them but we love to know what they are up to.Its the difference between wall street and main street.So when wall street screws up,they are bailed out but when the main street suffers,well....the less said the better.We have never had as many heads rolling or as many resignations as when the tragedy happened in Bombay.Its happened so many times before but didn't anyone take moral responsibility,why does this happen only when the rich and famous are affected?.Don't the other lives matter.Lets face it we don't have a system in place but then again who does.Terrorism by its very definition is all about planning,its plain cold blooded murder and we are dealing with desperate and misguided people,but that does not mean we react only when one section of the public is affected.That is not acceptable.I feel sorry for the staff at those hotels,their training does not equip them for such situations and they job demands that they look after the guests first before themselves so they do just that and get killed in the bargain.
I wish the government had asked for international help when we got the first signs of terrorism in out country,its just not fair to wait for the taj and the oberoi to be bombed for them to rush in to action.But them again I would rather have a Manmohan singh at the top than an advani who is almost as bad as the terrorist themselves.Maybe as a token of what they feel,some of the dadas should give up their security for people like us,after all a few less politicians can only make the world a better place.

Family bathrooms

Isn't it surprising that a bathroom can become a bone of contention among people?.Bathroom habits really define a person.My mornings start with a good brushing of teeth and washing of face and then a cup of tea,but to a large part of my family its the other way around.A cup of tea to wake them up fully and then brushing teeth and washing face.I cant deal with it but I learn to ignore it and stay far away from them in the mornings.Some members of the family walk around with the toothbrush and foam in their mouth with newspaper in hand.It makes me want to puke so I stay in bed with eyes shut tight.There are still others who even have a theory about all this.Something to go with morning breadth having good bacteria.Oh give me a break or better still give me the toothbrush.But funnily enough with all the fuss about having to brush teeth first thing in the morning,the toothbrush is the one thing i always forget when packing to go any place.Then in the morning I beg,borrow or steal(the option of buying one doesn't arise as shops don't always open early in the morning) and if nothing works,I keep my mouth shut all day (big deal for someone like me).The other thing about bathrooms is the amount of time my family members spend in there.My mother takes a good 45 minutes to have a bath and I have to constantly check if she is alive(old people tend to fall in bathrooms,hence the panic).The husband will combine lots of things with a bath....read newspaper,use potty,shave,shampoo hair and whatever else,so another 30 minutes gone.My nephews used the bathroom as an escape hatch from mothers or older relatives who were always finding jobs for them to do.Nowadays if my nephew promises to arrive at my house but decides to have a bath before he does,I can safely assume that the boy will not surface for at least an hour or two.The younger of the nephews can live in the bathroom all day.We have three bathrooms at home(we insisted on this when looking for a flat) and god forbid a day arrives when all are in use by mother,husband and nephew and poor me should need to use one....I may as well go to the neighbours house or learn extreme bladder control.....but I hope the day never comes

freedom

Freedom...it means so many things to different people but from the time i can remember freedom meant a great deal to me.When i was a baby it meant the freedom to cry despite my fathers wrath,as a teenager it was the freedom to dress the way I wanted and to do the things i wanted to do.As a young adult I rebelled at the thought of being just someones wife or mother.For me life was all about living on ones terms so I waited till I was ready to settle down with someone who appreciated what freedom meant to me.Its not always easy to be free,life is all about compromises but freedom is not so simple either.With freedom comes responsibility,with it comes maturity.Freedom takes into consideration other people,the environment and many other things,but the essential to freedom is to understand its complexity and to appreciate its greatness.All my working life I reveled in freedom,I demanded it and its not easy so at one point when freedom can harm ones objectives(somepeople are insecure and free people are difficult to deal with) one needs to decide how important freedom is.It can be a simple thing like having free time for life outside the office,it is freedom to explore the many facets of ones personality and when one wants this more than anything else one takes decisions,hard decisions,decisions that most people don't understand,decisions that one clutches to ones heart with the same happiness as one did when freedom became important.Today I appreciate that freedom has made me a better person,more balanced and content with what i do with my time.Freedom has given me the courage to follow my dreams and live life on my terms.Freedom has taught me the difference between having to do something and needing to do it.It has taught me that life is full of ups and downs but freedom gets you to your goal a little bruised but not broken.

blogging or facebook

Time was when blogging was the latest kid on the block among my friends so the excitement of writing everyday was a big boost to our day.Two years on sometime in the middle,face book took over our lives.Suddenly everyone was there doing some of the most inane quizzes which didn't add an ounce to our lives,just mindless stuff we did because everyone else seemed to be doing it.Then face book took on a new dimension.We used it as a tool to be in touch,and it is a good tool,today I am in touch with so many friends of years gone by which wouldn't have been possible if we hadn't all had one common meeting ground.Then they introduced chat and for a chatterbox like me that was the best thing that happened.
well what does all this say about some of us.Do we need constant excitement and stimulation or is it just that our attention spans are keeping pace with that of the now generation.Today some 20 somethings are amazed that the 40 somethings are discussing face book,which they always imagined was a property of their generation(not surprising considering that the founder is probably old enough to be our grandson or something to that effect).And now I go back to my pet blogs to find that a lot of us have simply stoped writing.I know what my excuse is...well I am using my writing skills to earn a living which doesn't leave much time for blogging but perhaps the economic downturn has left all of us insecure of our jobs and insecurity is hardly the breeding ground for creativity.Well the long and short of it is that I have decided to make a conscious effort to write and be inspired on a daily basis and I hope to keep that promise to myself.

Rain and the city

The monsoons have set in long before it was anticipated and after years we don't have to worry about water.Some years ago all we did was obsess about water and when out next bath could be taken.Thankfully the rain gods have been kind to our city.
Two years ago my car drowned in the downpour.I watched helplessly as the water rose and the car went under.Stranded on the first floor I prayed hard that the rain should stop.My anxiety heightened by two old parents not in the best of health and a water logged locality our of which there was no escape route.I ran through many situations in my head,my blood pressure rising at the same rate as the water.Thankfully the good lord above answered my prayers and the parents didn't have an emergency and the car was insured and everything fell in place but the anxiety haunts me till date.
Today two years later the rain lashes down on my road,the same car stands on the road and i look out at regular intervals to ensure that its safe.This time around the heightened anxiety is missing as one parent is no more and the other is under my nose and my road doesn't get as water logged as before.But we are all human and worry and anxiety are part of our lives.I tried to enjoy the rain and the darkness.I took the car out ,drove through blinding rain until i was stop ed by a large tree that had fallen across the road and sent me back.It reminded me of all my roots.The tree has been around from my days at college,giving us shade while waiting for a bus,giving us beauty on an otherwise stark road.The tree had stood the test of time but not this time and one more memory of a city of yesteryear's is ripped out of my memories.I did enjoy the rain a little,I did enjoy the drive and the the dark skies but somewhere the anxiety lingers,of times gone by of times to come and I wonder....will I ever rest peacefully....perhaps that happens only six feet under.

The one man at the gym

Whats it like to be the only man in an all woman's gym?.Tricky to say the least especially when there are woman of all ages and sizes not to mention the fully covered ultra conservative ones.Even the slightest sign of inappropriate behavior can be the mans downfall.But that's what is so amazing about this chap.Young,presentable with a well toned body he doesn't let you feel hes around.But he is and the one chap who will correct you and make the exercise chart.He knows all our measurements but doesn't make one feel uncomfortable.In fact he is so popular that when he went missing for two months(to set up another gym) we all missed him.He came back a few days ago and was greeted with great affection.We rib his about his girlfriends,we chat with him about the machines and we wish him well when he has good assignments.
I know he a rare type.Most young men in his position would have been strutting their stuff around the young woman at least but this chap deals with everyone on an even keel and everyday I marvel at his attitude because its rare.All his staff look happier when hes around but there is no let up in displine Yesterday when a client wanted someone to help her with the exercises,a trainee was assigned and the man stood close by to watch and correct her if necessary.He didn't jump in and do it himself.Obviously leadership skills are part of what makes him who he is.Not that hes perfect,sometime he makes the odd interpersonal faux pas but like all human beings he does have his ups and downs
I am not sure we notice him as the only man around,over the months we have all gotten so comfortable with him that we talk to him like one of the girls.Well hats of to a decent chap who knows how to conduct himself in such an environment.

when i wast around

Sometime the mind goes back to many years ago and people and places crop up suddenly.It happened by chance.My mother and I were in a discussion about visiting some friends and family.Me proposing the idea and my mother resisting with all her might(she hates going out).
It got me thinking and throwing my mind back a few years(a good number of years actually).I remember a line of friends who lived on spur tank road and Harrington road.I remember visiting friends with my mother in Kilpauk.Most of my memories are of holding my mothers hand and tagging alone by bus or walking around to visit.It was a regular occurrence and not something she disliked.With my father away at work and the two older kids in school,my mother and I started our visits.I think there was a timetable to the visits.In most houses there were no children my age so I was always well fed by the friends(that was the highlight of my visits)and allowed to sit and listen to them chatter away.I never understood half of what they said but they all lived in quaint houses with some garden or trees so i was allowed to climb trees or play by myself for hours until it was time to go back home.I remember on house where I was always served tea if in bright yellow cup and saucer.I felt very grown up and smart drinking from that cup.Now i remember that the only reason she allowed me to drink from it was that it was plastic and my baby hands couldn't do much harm.
I remember the great lunches at my aunts place and the other friend who was a great source of amusement for my mother and her other friends because she gave her kids bread for breakfast.I can figure out why this was such a source of mirth but in those days I believe serving bread was a sign of a lazy mother.
Why did a woman who did so much visiting now dislike the idea of stepping out of the house.I tried to put a fix on it and it probably started around the time that my father retired.Suddenly he was always there and there was no time to visit.Funnily enough all the men of those household retired around the same time and suddenly the woman were not visiting.That was it,no more visits and then we all lost touch.Yesterday when I reminded my mother about these people I discovered that they had all been neighbours at some time or the other when my parents first came to madras and then they became friends.I realised that I my memories started only from the time I was born and that some ten or twelve years before that my parents had a life I know nothing about.They stayed in all kinds of places around the city and sometimes the suburbs,my sisters went to different schools until they joined the one I went to.There was a life I want to discover but no one wants to talk about it.Not my sisters nor my mother so I guess I will have to keep asking questions.Will I also stop visiting,will I also become the hermit that my mother has become.Scary thought but perhaps in the fullness of time I shall go the way of my mother....I wonder.

Lazy and happy

Once again the same question..."don't you get bored being at home after working so long".I am not sure why i am asked this question time and again.Considering i took the decision of sound body and mind and after having been in the rat race for 20 odd years I wonder why everyone who knows me is so surprised at my answer.I am enjoying myself in years.The last time i felt so relaxed was when i left school and had 6 months to myself before college started.Nowadays kids would have used that time to learn a new course,get a prat time job,rush around from one activity to another.But we lived in a time when i could do nothing and get away with it.I read,ate,played(as in playing on the road...at 16 in those days that was quiet acceptable) and had a good relaxed time.I think I deserve to rediscover that time and if its suits me fine why does everyone look so shocked.
Let see now,do I really enjoy myself.Yes and no.Sometimes i am overcome with guilt for not earning my living anymore,guilty for having to ask the husband for money all the time(what i made i invested and have no intention of touching for the moment).Sometimes I feel unproductive in the corporate sense of the word.But most of the time I am happy to be doing the odd jobs at home to catch up on reading,to go to the gym to not have to drive in maddening traffic and still keep appointments in time.I am happy to have been there done that and I am happy to know that I can split my life into eras.I enjoyed every segment thus far and have made my own decisions so its easier to leave life behind and live forward.
I have to keep coming back to this topic as the questions come up very often .Probably the only thing I miss is that stories and things don't crop up with the same regularity as they did before because my outings are few and far between but for the moment I am not complaining

Mummys day out

My mother and many woman of her time,lived lives that were totally dependent on first their parents,then their husbands and finally their children.The were provided for by and large and should a husband not provide,then they had made a bad marriage and the parents or their fate was the cause,if it were a good marriage and good fate then the husband would have provided all.
All their lives were spent that way,they are great mothers,perfect wives but where they happy or did they waste the one life they had in the services of duty and family.I am never sure how to answer that question especially when marriages lasted 60 and more years.They had to be doing something right.
Now my mother for instance will always lament her fate at being married to a man who was not quiet what she imagined a husband to be(some truth no doubt).The fact however remains that my father took on all the financial responsibilities and my mother took care of running the house and bringing up children.Some time later when she was in her 50s,my mother like most women of her generation she decided to give up going out of the house for anything.She got used to being house bound and watching tv and yelling at my father for getting under her feet all the time and interfering(that's what men do when they retire and have no office to go to and no people to yell at)Over the years getting my mother to step out of the front door was a task that would put every skill of strategist to good use.If anyone managed to get her out of the house,even to visit her daughters,it was considered a big victory and the person concerned would well qualify for a noble price in blackmail.Which is precisely what works with her.
Now being left in the charge of a 76 year old mother (who under all that dependence can be as stubborn as a mule)I have become adept in the art of emotional blackmail.So today after having thought through the night on a game plan,I decided to go ahead.Of course no surprised are allowed so she was told that the bank needed to see her in person(no such requirement exists).She was warned of dire consequences(I did tell her her bank account would be frozen and all her money given away...which she believed)I was ready to take the plunge.Now anyone reading this might think that i am a nasty daughter who is harassing a senior citizen.Far from it.
Imagine my despair when the papers reported that bank employees were on strike.Well having hidden the papers from her I proceeded to get ready and finally after much wasting of time and constant grumbling,she was out of the front door and to the bank.Well you can imagine,not a soul stir ed in the bank and me,I was most surprised."Oh it looks like a strike doesn't it" I said with the innocence of a 5 year old(assuming they are innocent nowadays).Well "we just have to go back I guess" says she.Was I going to allow that?.Of course not.Opportunities come only once and now that the mother was out in the open I was going to cash in big time."we shall visit some family friends" I say.Huge protest (which are promptly ignored) and long face and sulk sulk.Well there are some advantages of being the driver so i drive to the friends house (all the time telling her that its bad manners to talk to people only when you need them....she refuses to accept that she does any such thing)and escape on the pretext of having to run errands.Half an hour later I am back to fetch her and she seems happy enough to have gossiped and had a good cup of tea(Oh they managed to make good tea says she....huge compliment coming from her and to be taken as...oh the outing wasn't too bad).So we manage to be back home in time for her tv serial (where everyone cries because they have bad marriages and bad fate),she get back into her glad rags and yours truly is tired by the sheer enormity of what she has accomplished.Friday being another day,we shall get her out again because the bank work is not over,but the sly mother has figured out that her equally sly daughter may not have been speaking the whole truth when she swore blind that the bank wanted her there in person.So for now she has promised to sigh cheque and reduce me back to my status of errand boy to a very lovable by adamant mother.

Oh Monday

Mondays,it seems commonplace to hate this particular day of the week.For most people the beginning of the week spells another six days of having to run and rush through the day in a desperate attempt to reach targets,meet deadlines and meet the weekend(which unfortunately cannot be rushed).I was one of the breed though for many years I looked forward to Mondays because i enjoyed what i did.Many years on when I choose to give up a full time job (around the time that Mondays became less and less a day to look forward to)I basked in the joy of being able to forget the days of the week.One didn't need to know because there are no deadlines to keep and one can do what one wants irrespective of the day of the week.
But all of a sudden,I woke up one morning,earlier than usual because this "oh its a Monday" feeling hit me.Why I wonder,what made it happen.I am still trying to figure it out but haven't found out as yet.Is it because my brain started sending me messages that its time to get to some paying work.Is my unconscious mind dying of guilt because I am not bothering about finances or is it just that the amount in the bank balance looks so small( even my mother who has never held a job has more money than me) or was it the sudden and.....guess what,i cant even remember the reason but all it takes it a friends shoulder to cry on and I am feeling better already.Finally it all boils down to getting a grip on ones self and making an effort.Getting hold of a project to work on and that's the key

Unrecognizable thats who i am....

You could have known me for twenty years of your life but if you haven't seen me in six months,chances are that you will walk right past and not acknowledge my presence.That's because you wont have recognised me.Now lets get this right,its nothing to do with height weight and all that other stuff.Its just that over the years for some strange reason I look different almost everyday.I wasn't aware of it until a professor insisted that I sit in the same place in class ever day.He swore that he had to search for me as the look changed every day.Not surprising then that I am constantly walking up to old schoolmates and college mates and having to introduce myself and hear them gasp in surprise at the change.I am convinced that its all about the rest of the world having bad recognition skills.
Imagine my surprise then this morning as I stood waiting for the butcher to cut the chicken for me.A couple walked into the shop and I knew instantly that the woman had been with me in school or had she worked with me.A quick scramble through my brain files and i knew that she was a classmates sister from school.Should I confirm it?.Or should I just go by after all she had known me for sixteen odd years(years when we moved from being children to teenagers to young adults...where the most change happened).I decided to let it pass and was just about to leave when she smiled and we both started to say something....well wonders never cease.She remembered me and we exchanged notes of fellow school friends.It left me convinced that this was all about recognition skills or that the brains ability for long term memory is far greater than short term ones.Shared experiences,time spent it all matters.Of course even in the case of girls who didn't recognise me,the fact remained that when we did get over the initial shock,life was back to normal.So here I am all ready to go out again this evening and chances are that there will be people who know me but wont recognise me.One things for sure,I am safe from being identified from any police line up and that's for sure....like they say there is always a silver lining.

The possibilities

Sometimes its just about making the effort.It has been days of thinking of doing things but not getting down to it,especially the jobs one doesn't want to do,like dealing with the government and such.
So this week,having put things off long enough I went ahead and attacked.First stop was to get the ration card done,surprise surprise....the crowds were less and the work got done in under half hour,next stop,nationalised bank....no progress but at lest some follow up done and to discover that the financial situation is not as bad as I imagined it to be.Reassured,I attack spending.Now why does one need to spend tons of money in supermarkets buying basic necessities when its all available at the public distribution system.Again the crowds are non existent(lesson to be learnt,go in the middle of the month) and I get dhal,wheat,sugar and tea,what more can i ask for.The bill is under a hundred bucks and if that's not fair price then I wonder what it is.Eco friendly too,I have to take my own bags so all the cloth bags are out and my months expenditure on food has been cut down real fast and with no compromise on quality.
Meat and fish is also getting better,avoiding the super markets is such a good idea.The quality of food is better,our cooking methods have bettered (thanks to the mother officially taking over the kitchen) and we are feeling a lot better health wise.The rains have added another positive.The car doesn't have to be taken out so much,its beautiful to walk on the roads and get the much needed exercise,to chat with the shopkeepers,to check out the gardens and to watch all my plants bask in the lovely rain....oh its so good to be able to stop and smell the roses.

My days are numbered

The aversion to numbers or anything faintly numerical,started when I was around six.My father who had a pretty decent grip on numbers,had to deal first with the disappointment of having to deal with three daughters(the common belief being that boys were more numerically inclined)and to add to that he discovers that the first two could barely count and were nowhere close to being numbers driven.In one last ditch attempt he decided to start me young and math classes began the moment I entered school.He tried when I started to talk but didn't succeed.Well being my fathers and mothers daughter,I was a combination of stubborn determination and dormant rebellion so if he thought he was going to teach me maths,it had better be my way(one plus one equals two would mean putting two chocolates to do the addition or nothing else).Well every time he sat down to teach,the battle started.He was a man of little patience who simply couldn't understand how any child with even the basic brain could be so difficult when it came to simple arithmetic.Well the long and short of it is that I developed an eternal hatred towards anything numerical.
Imagine my surprise and my parents shock when I ended up with a distinction in statistics in college.My mother was convinced that the examiner was drunk when he corrected my papers and my father secretly had that "I told you she had some brains" look on his face.As I started working and generally getting some experience of life the truth dawned that perhaps I should have fallen in line early in life and realised that everything finally comes down to numbers.So from sales targets,to income tax,to simple everyday accounts,there was no getting away from it.The tragedy was that even something I love like drawing,painting and cooking needed some quantitative ability to get places.So I stopped dreaming of being a painter and instead decided to cook everything that didn't need precision measurements.So baking was simply out of the question.
Years later and now that I have time on my hands,I have decided to bury the ghost of my numerical aversion so the baking is first on my list.It started with chocolate fudge...all measurements in place and the dish is an instant hit with all my friends.Well well,the first hurdle has been overcome.So my next step was chocolate brownie.This required the next level of measurements so I made my attempt.Except that the oven was a bit too hot,the brownies came out a nice sticky brown exactly the way they are meant to be.So my confidence sufficiently boosted I am well on my way to the next level of testing.Its going to be bread next and if I get that right well perhaps my father can be proved right.....there is a bit if brains just waiting to be used.I may have tackled the office accounts and targets and other mundane ever day corporate stuff(that's only meant to survive and impress the boss) but to be able to master a passion long lying dormant because I believed I couldn't master numbers.....well that's a new high and now its all coming together,the ingredients are all ready and I am ready to arrive hot off the oven.

old order changes

We started school learning to write.I remember many note books with pink lines as borders with three blue lines in between and we had to write in a way that all the starting letters touched the pink lines and the others stayed within the blue lines.End result....lovely handwriting.This was also repeated for Tamil class as well so much so that my Tamil handwriting is picture perfect.
When it came to reading,we had regular reading classes both in English and Tamil.While English was a good class,Tamil was sheer humiliation(worse when one has an elder sister in the same school who is fluent in any language taught and is constantly being held up as an example).The sheer anxiety of those Tamil reading class makes me wonder how I survived all those school years staying sane.Unfortunately Tamil turned to french in college and if one didn't have the advantage of the Alliance francais then well,it couldn't have gotten much worse.
The point of all this is that years later when the ink pen gave way to the ball point,to the felt tip to the key board....well hand writings went for a toss.Imagine my surprise when the bank manager claims that my signatures don't match the original(signed some twenty years ago).Its shameful because my dad was 87 when the manager claimed his signature didnt match the original.To be in the same position some 40 years earlier is cause for concern.Now as to reading,well that's gone by the wayside to.When was the last time I read aloud....cant remember.Not allowed to sing aloud even in the car when travelling with husband as the man objects loudly(one would think that if any support was forthcoming it should be from family,whatever happened to the better of for worse promise?).
So I am wondering if i should start to write letters to friends and family(used to do this earlier only to realise that most of them never got posted coz lazy me couldn't dream of walking up to the Post office)but then again why when i can call.So this is probably an obituary to the written word and to public speaking.....sigh....once again I am faced with the fact that my world has changed forever.....on the bright side....I am still standing

Goodbye sunshine hello thunder

Funny how when one is nice to people,one gets taken for a ride or at best ignored.Get nasty and they take notice,end result however is that if one is dealing with inefficient people then the matter stays unresolved.
For starters I worked for a company that had no clue to accounting so they generally dumped money into my account and expected me to run an office....so poor me looks rather rich on paper(the truth being far different).Now if one is rich and middle class and salaried(difficult to be all the same at once as they are all different states of being but yours truly always manages to do the impossible) and cant manage to explain to nosy auditors how I came about being allegedly rich.One then goes to ones bank.Now here is a bank that spends millions on advertising to say how great they are etc etc so poor me despite having been in advertising so long(helps you come to terms with the fact that all advertising is rubbish and untrue)actually went to them for help.Being polite by nature I asked them for information and waited patiently since i was told that the data will be available in two days.When two days became four,I asked them firmly why the data wasn't available.Went four days became ten,I blew a fuse.Strange,it fell of deaf ears,they continued to mouth the same excuses and despite my rants,they are unable to give me the information.This bank is famous for this and while I find that being polite and nasty gets the same results....well I may as well feel good and let of steam at them.This is a bank,but I find that nasty behaviour works in most places.Talk of a crying child getting more attention.My new motto in life is to shout,rant,be nasty and say goodbye to my nice self.It was nice being you but the world has changed and I am adapting to a changing world.

under attack

To be part of a minority is not a very happy state but not one that is top of mind either.Personal attack on the other hand is something else.It makes one feel vulnerable and introspective.Was it me,was it something I said and one tends to keep thinking back.Its funny that as human beings we focus more on the negatives(unless one is an out and out positive person).
Recently some of us commented on a story that was doing the rounds.Sordid as it was,we decided to look at the funny side.It didn't work....suddenly the mail box was full of self righteous,sanctimonious remarks from women who live far away and who in my opinion had lost their sense of humour (assuming they had one in the first place).The outcome was that I ended up feeling vulnerable and sad.It took two other women to come up with something funny to put my mind at rest but the outcome was strange.Most of the group thought that the funny side was misplaced.Did they expect us to be sad for the whole world?.But then again have we become so immune to disaster and sordid details that we no longer care?....I am still not sure.

poof...zap the little devils

Hmm...let see,I don't like the little men and women who dot the income tax office.Frankly I don't like auditors either though mine is a nice smart tam bram who knows his stuff but the point being that they make my otherwise peaceful life a bit of a mess.I mean I like making money,I slogged for the better part of my life and ended up making some serious money close to retirement when the rest of the 20 something are raking it in at the beginnings of their work life.So why cant they just let me enjoy it,let me indulge a bit and well just let me save for a rainy day.No but you see that's the tragedy,now to begin with I hate keeping records.There was this lovely boy in office who was so pucca he kept tabs on all my finances and I was fine but don't you know how difficult it is to hang on to chaps like that.
Tell me why would someone be interested in my financial history?After all I am a poor church mouse who was paid a bit and like a good middle woman decided that the little money saved was fine ....but no they actually want to know why i paid who and what....give me a break ...am i supposed to remember all that...the tragedy is that they think its income when its all been expenditure....how many salaried people get extra income.Honestly how does one make them understand.So now I am actually expected to keep track of all the money I spend and account for it at a time when i am sponging off the husband.They even take the pleasure out of sponging...I need something strong to zap these little devils out of the system and in the mean while I ve decided I don't like money at all,It gives me a headache .The only solution then is to turn dumb and become a helpless housewife who has to run to the husband for every decision.Maybe i shall try it,why not ....talk of recreating oneself.Ha sounds like a plan....hmm I am liking it.

Boys,men and mallu men

This week the focus is on my community(i have had an overdose of them hence)By and large I don't like mallu men(the few exceptions are my small group of mallu men who remain friends and whose friendships I cherish,but all of them without exception have been living out of Kerala all their lives).What bugs me most about them is their condescending attitude to woman(cant really blame them as the average woman in Kerala is a doormat).Its probably their upbringing and the constant reinforcement of societal values that gives them an upper hand.Unfortunately its the middle aged ones that are the most dangerous.For starters they leer,pass uncalled for comments and can get intrusive in a way that one wants to break those ever present coconuts over their heads in the hope that whatever sense may be hidden in the recesses of their otherwise dead brains,can be brought out.Sadly its also the woman in kerala who are part to blame for these men.Boys are a grand obsession in this state(maybe so in other places as well).Girls are taught very often that despite being educated and articulate and working,their primary responsibility in life to be be someones wife or mother.Its a tragedy that if one dares to do otherwise there is instant talk of the girls loose morals,bad parenting or just economy and the click click of many tongues can make one feel that this is the worst possible situation to be in.Small wonder then that the men quiet literally believe that they are gods gift to womankind.Strangely this gives them license to behave as they please,to treat woman as sex objects and to ridicule and turn violent should a brave woman stand up to their advances.God forbid one is in an unfortunate situation of being saddled with all men in a train compartment.After having striped one naked with their eyes(rest assured its as bad as being physically assaulted)they will them continue to make snide remarks and if all this fails,then they will inch their way into your personal space.If they are are down by a few drinks(often the case as they always drink bottoms up) then be sure to have pepper spray handy or a good sharp heeled shoe or even the ever present umbrella.
Once again it comes back to socialization,if men of the same community can be nice and generous and respecting of women when they have nothing to do with their native land,one cant but imagine that it has a lot to do with Kerala society in general.When will these mothers make sure their kids learn to cook and clear up after a meal.Would it be so difficult for them to learn that sisters are equals in life and not inferior beings(then they tend to treat their wives and other women differently)well that will be the day....in the meanwhile the women continue to believe that their lot in life is to wait for crumbs off the mans table....Unfortunately while writing this I realised that i also know a lot of mallu men (who despite cross cultural exposure) continue to remain chauvinistic and macho and can be a pain in the wrong place.My advice....please steer clear of this breed(i have managed to do so).So I end with a prayer that the good Lord give the mallu man a shock to his system very soon and in the course of evolution,please god can you re engineer their brains and that of their mothers also so that the next generation will be better....?

Disclaimer:To all the nice mallu men(and I mean the ones that are my friends) who read this...my apologies,sometimes guys you are the minority sadly

Gods own country and the Devils own people

Last week I took a long 15 hour train trip to Kerala.Someone called it gods own country and the devils own people but we shall come to that later.
After passing brown arid dry terrain of Tamil Nadu,it comes as a shock to enter Kerala.One can almost see an invisible hand with a piece of good green crayon draw a deep line between the two
states.
Kerala is lush and green with beautiful waterfalls and the smell of damp earth which is so refreshing after the heat and dust of the neighbouring places.The rain falls in torrents or a slight drizzle and the sound is a soothing plonk plonk on the sand outside.Almost all the countryside is dotted with houses with typical conical roofs strong enough to allow torrential rain fall off like water off a ducks back.Each of the houses( however rich or poor the occupants may be)will have a small garden and some plantain trees,papaya a jack fruit or a mango tree and sometimes the tapioca trees.Now that the build up to onam(the harvest festival) is on,the gardens are dotted with yam plants in all their glory and one can be sure that a tender yam is just waiting to be dug out and melt in ones mouth(its hardly needs much cooking time).Flowers abound and again they are fairly typical,the hibiscus,the yellow trumpet flower and the theti (a red round bushy flower).The gardens are lovingly tended to on a daily basis and is often inhabited with a couple of chickens,hens and the odd duck.I love the duck.Its a bird that is pretty common in Kerala and can be found in ponds and rivers.Not very tasty contrary to popular taste but there is something to be said about the duck and the way they always swim in formation and do those upside down jumps in the water.
In between all this green expanse there are breaks and they come up on you rather suddenly.The lakes and backwaters beckon with their lovely long snake boats with fisherman throwing the nets for the catch of the day(rest assured that fresh fish is always on the menu of all homes).The waters are clean and silvery and the black boats almost inspire the most dull person into wanting to paint.The waterways are long and wide and can be seen interspersed with large coconut groves and small coves to anchor the boats.
Kerala besides being beautiful,is also clean.The mallu obsession with washing(its all that water around them) doesn't stop with just washing themselves,even the animals,roads and gardens are clean.Its a joy to just see so much cleanliness around.The garbage is most houses is burned and turned back into the soil.This is not some countryside story.Trivandrum the capital city is exactly like this.Hardly any high rise,just the odd ones that mar the landscape but by an large its all houses with gardens small,large and medium.Walk into any ones house and someone like me will come back richer with small fiery chillies,lovely pink chambaka ,and a thousand other fresh home grown produce.
For all this beauty that is Kerala,the people (despite being some of the most educated and the most literate state) are small minded,lazy,opposed to progress and intolerably arrogant and its the tragedy of the state that all the beauty of the environment is wasted on the people who in my limited experience,haven't changed a bit in all the years that I have seen and interacted with them.Fottunately the ones who do leave the state do turn out to be pretty nice(with the usual exceptions) so one can only conclude that too much homogeneity is not very healthy.

The quack in me

Being a quack is not something most people would be proud of but i am and with reason.For 30 years I have had practical lessons on diabetes and can with a great deal of confidence decide what to do in an emergency or even change the dosage of insulin with out too many problems(I always consult a doctor to confirm my decisions).I discovered quiet by surprise that I am a pretty good quack so I have over the past few months been sharpening my quacking skills.Its paid off.A few months ago when a friend was agonising over her daughters fever(this friend imagines that even the smallest of illness can be something of mind boggling urgency so...)I sat and watched.On a closer look at the daughter it occurred to me that she was a lot more yellow than the average Chinese and that can only mean one thing....jaundice.When i pronounced my diagnosis of the case I was met with silence,then the "oh my god,I hope your not right".Well good quack that i am,I am most often right so when the doc confirmed my diagnosis I was rather elated(poor girl had to live through horrible diet restrictions)my next case of that of the husband and his tail bone problem.While he went on and on about the pain,I did my research rather well and confirmed that a good dose of physiotherapy would do the trick.I even gave him the options available...so much for Internet research.It amused me no end when the doc repeated all my alternatives and was rather miffed that i seem to know all the answers.The junior doc who was pretty bugged with well informed patients,suggested that since i knew so much I didn't have to bother about the hospital visit...Sour grapes if you ever heard one.
Today I have diagnosed that I have tennis elbow (without knowing a thing about the game mind you)and know what course of treatment needs to be done ,...not for me the steroids so after having decided I went to the doc who told me what I need to do...rather easy this whole ortho business....there are no cures for any damage to body parts,unless broken in which case there is surgery,but should you make the mistake of breaking a rib there is very little to do besides rest and relaxation so the docs jobs is rather easy.Like the good doc says there are no emergencies in ortho.Today I asked some hundred questions during my 10 minute therapy and have decided that after diabetics my next quack specialization is going to be orthopedics....ha talk of home remedies...long live the Internet.

Of death and life

There is something to be said about stages in life.There was a time when almost all my time was taken up attending weddings,then it was visiting friends with babies,and now its attending funerals.As a policy i never went for funerals as longs as the parents were around,but with the death of the father it looks like it set off a trend.Many a close friend or family seems to be going underground literally.At the cemetery I seem to know more people six feet under than above and the tears I've cried could fill an ocean.Most of them are deaths that have occurred at a time when most people have lived their lives to the full and therefore one is happy for them and we can reflect on a good life.There are others that have gone in the blink of an eye when one was least expecting them to and those are the tragedies.
Recently at the funeral of my uncle,I had the opportunity to revisit the land of my parents and to reconnect with family after twenty years.There is something terribly overwhelming about meeting family after so many years.To begin with one have never imagined that ones family is so large,and all under one roof.Secondly it brings back fond memories of happy childhood days of play and happiness and one wonders why we never kept in touch.There was this cousin who spent her holidays with us and with whom i had a great friendship.My holidays were spent in their house and i still remember giggling in church in orthodox kerala because we had to kiss the priest hand and he unfortunately was a young man who couldn't handle the attention we gave him just to see him rattle while my aunt who was a stalwart of the church,glared at us which surely meant that punishment was around the corner.
To reconnect i decided to visit all my cousins only to realise that there were the next and the next generation there to greet me.The nephews and nieces looked curiously at this aunt who turned up in jeans and who was striping their garden of all fruit.The younger children wanted to know where i had been all these years and my cousins and i spent a good day catching up on family politics.Suddenly it was good to be back with family and we had all grown into different individuals but the bonds remain the same.Surprisingly one cousin complemented me on my command over the malayalam language which left me shocked,She was known to be stingy with her compliments but i considered that age and experience had mellowed her.
It was time to leave and we have all promised to exchange notes on a regular basis but I sometimes wonder if in all this tragedy there is some hope,some silver lining to it all ....

the tail of two dogs

Loyalty....it was considered a virtue some years ago,A number of my contemporaries worked for companies because they had been treated well,their efforts recognised and so on.We rated loyalty very high on our agenda.Then the times changed and a new breed entered the work force.While job hopping was looked down upon in our time...rolling stones gathering no moss and all that...the new breed didn't know what moss was(not surprising as they grew up in concrete jungles) and for them job hopping was a reaffirmation of their abilities and the fact that they were needed all the time.Somewhere along the line companies also bought into the idea and that when loyalty became a liability.If we stayed on too long it was because we were not getting other jobs and that kind of questioned our skill sets and that's when some of us had to throw loyalty out of the window.
Did this virtue go out of only the corporate sector?.Far from it.Yesterday it was brought home to me so clearly how little loyalty pays.
There are two dogs on our street.They are both strays but there ends the difference.One is the extrovert.She has very sharp survival skills so she wanders among different houses,spending a day or two in each.She will greet you with swishy tail and prance around like she hasn't seen us in years.This is the treatment that anyone in the building she stays in gets.You don't have to feed her,pet her or do anything but she does her bit.End result is that most of us let her use our terrace or our car parks as temporary home,we feed her left overs and one person actually took her home to three streets away when they moved,so she now spends the week with them and is back for the weekend ruling the roost in our street.She is well fed and clean and this is a direct result of ditching loyalty to any one house and instead keeping all her eggs in different baskets.
The other dog,is the exact opposite.He also wandered into our street a few years ago and then decided on the house he wanted as home.He started by hanging around outside the gate,slowly moving into the garden and then making himself at home on the door step.His loyalties were very clearly to one house and one family alone.They fed him and played with him so all was well until one fateful day when the woman of the house died and the house was sold and everyone moved away.They didn't take the dog with them and the gates of the house was locked,so there he is an abandoned dog.Imagine my surprise when I tried feeding him last night.He didn't know how to get out of the gate and because he had not kept his options open,(preferring to safeguard the house and in the process bite a few people)there the food was on the road and the dog just stayed close and watched but couldn't eat and I was too scared to venture closer.The long and short of the whole exercise was that our extrovert dog came over and gobbled up all the food while the other one just looked on helplessly.Did his loyalty really pay or like so many of us who threw it away,would he have been better off doing his own thing.I believe he would.In the meanwhile I am still trying to get him to eat a bit.

grass roots

I have been having a lot to do with ration cards lately.The card entitles some people to all kinds of commodities like rice sugar dhal etc and if its not used for two months then the card is cancelled.Considering how difficult it is to get a new one,we normally allowed someone else to use our card to buy stuff as we didn't need so much
Now that my mother lives with me the responsibility of keeping the card active is mine(my dad took care of that and being an old person he got away with a lot).To begin with,ration shops are dark,crumbling places piled high with sacks of everything.Its mostly full of people who either walk there or live close by.Very few people arrive in cars the way I do and that's not a nice thing.It almost makes one feel that one is cheating the lesser mortals of their access to food(never mind that I am entitled to it).With all that guilt(really that's my problem) i park the car a good distance away and walk to the place and stand in line.I start by getting stared at,then they chat me up(convinced that i don't understand the language)and are taken aback when i reply in fluent tamil and continue the conversation.The trick is to identify with the masses so i discuss food prices and crib about how hard it is to make ends meet and so on.I even chat and enquire about the little tykes that accompany the mothers and shuffle my way to the counter where after a few visits I plucked up the courage to ask for all the commodities listed there.
I take care to dress in drab clothes and rubber chappals and look as much at home as my housemaid(and manage it very well).Having gotten over their initial shock,they get curious and soon the chap measuring out the stuff is commenting about my cloth bag which I bring along and encouraging me to buy more stuff and with promises to keep things for me.I am now welcomed with a big smile by counter staff and have become an oddity in the place but have been accepted. Its still not easy standing in long lines in the hot sun but sometimes it needs just such an experience to remind one of the problems and trials of the less fortunate and appreciate what one had,so its time again to go back to the ration shop but i shall wait till the second week when the rush is a little less and once again I will get all the news on what keeps people going on a different plane

The family and the ration card

When one runs up against the bureaucracy,there is only one choice...fall in line.Which is why this morning saw us land up at the family ration card office to apply for one which would in no uncertain terms,establish the fact that we live in this country and in this city so let no one dispute it.Never mind that we also have a passport and a voter id which are all issued by the government.
Having decided to get one we find ourselves faced with three ques of people(no one is sure why they are in a a particular one)and since all of the instructions are in tamil,i decide to be translator so i recall those horrible tamil lessons i endured as a child and begin reading the instructions,by which time the impatient husband has managed to reach some clark and given in his papers.
Now we have no idea what the definition of family is really and as we have decided that the husband will apply in his name and i will not be mentioned,it seems that he is a single man for the purpose of the family ration card.,and there begin our first brush with how difficult it is to be single in this country.They don't issue cards to single people,because by the governments logic you need to be part of a family(as in father mother,children dog etc).So we appeal to the higher authority.I choose to stay behind (trying to look like the other woman may seem hep in some circles but not here and as i cant be identified as wife the best thing to do is to remain invisible).So the conversation goes like this.
senior clark...."why are you single"
husband....smile in resigned fashion
senior clark....ok we don't issue cards to single people....you have to have family...why do you need card?
husband...the gas agency wants proof of my existence.
senior clark(a little foxed by this new development)...do you cook?
husband....(with straight face)I have a cook
senior clark....(having never had such a situation before)...hmm...ok you go and submit papers.
(we heave a collective sigh of relief and move to Que)
after sweating a bit and beginning to smell as bad as the rest of the crowd,we submit papers and get a chit in return,not even a printed receipt.

well now we wait for verification and in the meanwhile we are still trying to figure out how the husband and i are related for the purposes of governance...and as for me,i am still not sure if i should be my mothers daughter or my husbands wife....hey what ever happened to me and my identity....well remember we may be a growing economy,affluence all around,educated independent woman but the reality at the grassroots is still the logic and reasoning of the dark ages....so i wait to be recognised

babies all

Baby,the word is usually used to describe a real young person or could be a term of endearment but to be named "baby" is something else.Among malayalees this is so common that its translations are a dime a dozen and any given family can have more than two babies(as in names) so there is a Kunju(baby in mallu land) and then a Kunjukunju and a baby john or just a baby.Its an unisex name so one is never sure if the baby in question is a man or woman.Imagine our dilemma as kids when every uncle around was a baby of some kind.So we got our own system in place.We prefixed the name of the place the uncle worked in so we ended up with a "coimbatore uncle" a "trivandrum uncle and so on.
The baby obsession doesn't end there,it also extends to the aunts so we have kochamma (small aunt i think) which in modern times has become a "koch" so we have stylist sounding names like valsa koch,susi koch and so on(the baby theme still holds)
The worst experience was when a client told us his name was baby john and for the life of us all we could think of was baby corn(food being an obsession as much as the baby type) so while we thought of the many ways to eat or cook baby corn,the man himself was by no stretch of imagination even half as appetising.So every time we rang his number we repeated the name many times just to wipe out visions of baby corn.
Strangely non of the babies are every referred to as babies...i sure must get to then bottom of this.I wonder if this was a way to ensure that the so called babies never grew up?I am going to ask one of those geographical uncles to explain this once and for all.So much for the saying...whats in a name....every thing i should imagine.

retail therapy

At the best of times I am a bad shopper and if shopping has anything to do with buying clothes or household things then I am hopeless at it.It begins with having to look respectable(shop assistants are a snobbish lot and will ignore you if they think you cant afford what they have to sell and that's judged by the way you dress) and most often than not the nightmare begins the moment one enters the shop.
The big retailers all have perfume counters at the entrance so the moment the doors open one is swamped by eager young men (not for a moment must one believe they are attracted to you...they are not) trying to sell the so called latest perfume from some fashion house or the other.brushing them off is rather difficult and no amount of arguing with them that the so called latest is last years range(remember some of us read the foreign fashion magazines)will brush them away.If all else fails prepare to be sprayed on by a dozen different fragrances and come out smelling like a flower shop or worse a tart.
When the successful escape has been engineered then the girls get at you.What erks me the most is that the girls have a nasty habit of peddling the anti wrinkle creams the moment they see me(yes i am on the wrong side of 40 but there is no need to rub it in literally).If i refuse they will go on to anti pigmentation creams,fairness creams etc.All I ever want is mascara or lipstick but they don't seem to think that someone my age may,just may want to bad an eyelash at some drop dead gorgeous hulk but well considering most women may be in denial about wrinkles,the girls do have a tough job ahead and chances are that the commissions on these products are the highest.
As one climbs the floors to the women's ware lot the experience can get more depressing.To begin with most shops today stock only the smallest of sizes,then of course the latest trend seems to be the balloon dress or the strapy number both of which can make the likes of me look like mutton dressed as lamb.So while the shop assistant will swear that the clothes look good on you the trick is to put it right back.Has anyone ever come across a shop assistant who actually tells you that something doesn't look good?.lets face it the poor girl will have an unhappy client on hand(no one wants to know the truth...that's the whole point of retail therapy) so in her own interests she had rather lie..
All in all retail therapy is no longer retail therapy so when depression or just sheer boredom overtakes,i head for the supermarket.The happy shelves of food can lift a sagging spirit and add to a sagging body too but the hours spent on food shopping is real retail therapy as far as i am concerned.