The Chronicles of S: 2.0

moving, moving...gone

2009-12-17T16:42:00.003+05:30

My last post here; the chronicles have shifted to wordpress, which is why I've not bothered to change the rather bizarre colour combo on this template :)

So à bientôt and see you at

http://pronounciate.wordpress.com

Rocky part deux

2009-12-14T16:50:00.003+05:30

And no I don't mean that terrible series of movies starring you know who! The ones that for some bizarre reason have reached a cult status. This about our local Rocky - the Rocky of the gym.

Since my usual swim was not an option in this Delhi winter, I signed up for the gym. And with great difficultly I've been dragging my ass out of bed everyday at 5.30 to cycle down to the gym. But Rocky (the second) makes it all worthwhile.

My third day at the gym, this guy who sort of helps out (especially the pathetic women who obviously don't know what a treadmill looks like) came upto me and started demo'ing how to use the dumb bells. Then he goes (in Hindi of course! and with my terrible Madrasi hindi replies) :

Rocky: You working or studying?

Self: I'm a journo. Work in a magazine.

Rocky: Ah! So you could write about me?

Self: (grinning at the thought of my 'green' mag writing about this guy. Green gymming perhaps?) Uhhh what could I write about you?

Rocky: You don't know who I am. (sounds a little put out but gamely continues) He pulls off his baseball cap and shakes out this shoulder-length hair.

See this hair? I've pulled ten cars in one go with this hair.

Self: (trying not to laugh) Ah!! Sorry, we are a 'green' mag so not quite our interest area.

Rocky: Oh. Never mind. But I am now practising to pull an aircraft.

And thats when I picked up the dumb bells and assiduously flexed my wimpy biceps.

P.S. For info on Rocky I go to earlier post: http://pronounciate.blogspot.com/2007/10/rocky-love-fest-and-actual-punjabis.html

2009-11-26T17:26:00.001+05:30

Another addition to my signboard collection. This one courtesy the Tuticorin municipality.

Idiot love

2009-11-09T17:23:00.004+05:30

Last month, I was whizzing through forests in Nilgiris in a taxi. I was heading to Masinagudi to discuss elephant corridors. But lets not get side tracked here. The ride was punctuated by informative boards put up by the forest department. Do not feed wildlife. Do not get out of your vehicle.

I don't know about the first, but certainly saw people not obeying the second. But the most entertaining part of the taxi ride was in the car with me - the sole CD the driver had. Filled with Tamil movie songs no doubt from movies that got canned. My favourite starts off with a woman yelling:

I love this idiot. YES I LOVE THIS LOVABLE IDIOT!

what's your G?

2009-09-29T17:37:00.002+05:30

This post will be super short cos I just wanted to give the url of another blog where I co-authored a post.... check it out...

http://ithinkigetthepoint.blogspot.com/2009/09/gujambals.html

The count climbeth...

2009-07-29T18:00:00.002+05:30

My naked guy count has gone up by one. Damn! What is it with this city and its naked men? This one was lying on the road divider at Ambedkar Nagar junction enjoying the sunday morning sun.

Is there anything more to say?

I think not.

The TA path to oral, anal and phallic...

2009-06-30T13:48:00.008+05:30

It all happened at a talk on FTAs (free trade agreements). I was invited to the building next to my office to hear a Costa Rican talk on how they fought a FTA with the US which would have been anti-farmer, anti-this and anti-that and would help the big bad wolf devour Costa Rica's market. But before the Costa Rican got started, mine host held forth -

"Hi! Its so nice to see young faces here. And some of you may not know but P and I go way back. We are both from TA families. We've known each other some 35 years. Those days there was no A/C in trains or mobile phones but we had the energy...."

You know the drivel that such folks spout. Then she went on, "In fact P's family are also into TA. Her husband is a wonderful person. Some day you should get her to talk about their love story. Anyway their children have been married in the TA tradition. Oh, perhaps some of you don't know what TA is. I should explain. Ah, S do you remember when we went...?"

And that was the end any TA talk. After the Costa Rican finished on FTAs, mine host invited this really old, frail man - a priest to talk. "I want to take a good look around," He literally did so, slowly turning in a circle and staring at all of us. "And I see all this young bright faces. I would like to ask to think about what you heard today. Are you going home after this and watching the TV or are you going to work for something worthwhile, dedicate yourself to the service of society and forget about making money and having a comfortable life. Close your eyes for a minute and think deeply about this,".

At which point everyone obediently closed their eyes except me and this Columbian woman who were trying hard not to snigger. The old fart was so full of it! So patronising. Grrr. As if we are all shallow creature flitting aimlessly from one transient pleasure to another. And even if we were, that's our life and our problem. Stop being holier than thou.

I haven't forgotten about TA.

According to Wiki, TA stands for Transactional Analysis. I quote, "....is an integrative approach to the theory of psychology and psychotherapy. Integrative because it has elements of psychoanalytic, humanist and cognitive approaches. It was developed by Canadian-born US psychiatrist Eric Berne during the late 1950s". And, "TA is a theory of personality and a systematic psychotherapy for personal growth and personal change. It offers a theory for child development, where it ties in very neatly with the Freudian developmental stages -oral, anal, phallic,".

Very deep and socially uplifting, I'm sure.

Reaching zombie-dom...

2009-06-06T17:03:00.002+05:30

My brain, or whatever passed for one, has been sucked out. My head is now a vacuum, a nothingness. Ah, what bliss! Zombie-dom has been achieved courtesy the B. Obviously. I should make a zombie movie out of this. Instead of ancient curses and mutated animals, the B would take on the non-zombies - single-handed. A la Rajni.

Except the B's weapon would be verbosity.

La famille B...

2009-06-02T09:08:00.002+05:30

It's bad enough we have THE B to deal with, now we have inferior clones as well. Junior sits next to S and drives her crazy everyday. She's going to have a breakdown soon. What does he do that's so irritating, you may ask. Well, he breaks into song every now and again, especially popular Hindi numbers. Or shows off his Punjabi roots and then dabbles in the little Bengali he knows. The worst though is when he comes and waves his hands in front of your face and asks random questions, and sagely advises all to 'chill dude cos nothing is worth it'. Thanks, O Maharishi! That's the unasked for advice I need just after the B has been harassing me and spouting gyan at me.

Then there is the female junior b. Again encouraged by B, she asks inane questions and insists that if she as a layperson doesn't get our story then its a stupid story and we must drop all our work and answer all questions she has right away. And of course she tells us fascinating biological theory such as viruses evolved, reached the pinnacle and found it not so good, and so un-evolved themselves (see my earlier post on this amazing theory that Darwin and Wallace would have killed to come up with).

La famille B: B, et b et b.

The flock flocketh...

2009-05-30T17:39:00.004+05:30

I should invest in an global positioning satellite system. And tag everyone remotely associated with my office. Everyday I get asked questions - "Where is A? Is she coming to office today? Where is P? Where are the bosses? Are they coming to office? Where is...."

I cannot for the life of me fathom why I should know the answers to these endless queries. I tried telling folks politely that I don't have a GPS tracking device attached to my colleagues and bosses, neither can I read their minds, nor do they keep me informed of their whereabouts on a minute by minute basis.

But still people flock towards me. Even when the office is choc-a-block with people, these souls will unerring head towards me. And when I wear headphones to drown the incessant chatter, they will still come and ask me all these questions which I can't hear. So I'm forced to remove said headphones and go "What?". And of course, thick and fast come the standard queries that make me grind my teeth and bare them in a facsimile of a smile.

What to do? I put up a sign on the noticeboard next to me, "I am not my brother's keeper. I do not know where people are."

And still they flock-eth away. I need to move to the outer Mongolia...but I'm sure they will still find me.

We are second only...

2009-05-18T09:09:00.002+05:30

My mother was taking a break from work in Pudukottai and decided to visit the local museum. Its apparently badly curated, filled with a lot of random junk from stuffed animals to Mughal miniature paintings (probably fake ones). The stuffed animals will thrilling rare creatures like mynahs and crows. And of course the labels accompanying the animals was full of information - CROWS, MYNAHS.

Same went for the armoury - random cannons (marked CANNONS), and spears. The highlight was the guy in charge proudly told mother mine that the museum was second only to the one in Egmore, Chennai. Second in what? Second only madam. Egmore is first.

Make what you will of that! And then there was the brilliant Mughal miniature of some female and a musical instrument aptly titled, "Mughal miniature showing musical instrument with lady".

The world is my brother...

2009-05-16T18:17:00.004+05:30

I had just climbed a mountain in Himachal with a couple of friends and friend's friends. After a tiring hike up and down the mountain, we were recovering over cups of hot tea and maggi, when the talk veered to tiger conservation. And one of the friend's friends, a guy named P was talking about his office - a wildlife NGO in Delhi. I remembered my aunt mentioning some cousin who worked in the same place. She had in fact told me to get in touch with said cousin. Not that I had, obviously. So I asked P if he knew this chap, A. And P does a double take and says, thats me! I'm A.

Rather confused, I said but you're P! It turns out he is A P Z! So I asked him if his mom was called, L and he had aunts, R and J and an grandmother called R... It was P's turn to be confused. Finally it turns out we are third cousins! What are the odds? Looks like I'm related to half the world. Wherever I go I bump into family. As a friend insists, this could only happen to me!!!

B(f)ereted out?

2009-04-27T15:23:00.002+05:30

If I'm out of a job this month, it will be because the B has discovered my secret... this blog. The blog that has several posts about the B. And what made me think he knows about the blog? In the meeting today, he asked someone to 'pronounciate'. What are the odds that it was an innocent comment?

If its innocent, then I should object to copyright infringement. I feel rather possessive of the word, having stolen it from a dumb American.

Brevity...

2009-04-21T11:05:00.003+05:30

Brief, concise, terse, curt, pithy....
These are words alien to my office. Our meetings are at least three hours long, our conversations are more like speeches - especially when the B is involved. The motto is, never use one word when you can say it in 20. The pinnacle of such piffling, waffling, beating about the bush, extraneous conversation is the lady of nasal talk. She who presides over the second floor. The nasal bong. Every time she opens her mouth to waffle on, the urge to whack her over the head is overwhelming. First there is that irritating, juvenile, trying to be cutesy 16 year-old nasal accent. And then there is the endless spouting of bull. "You know, I saw that and I wondered whether it was right. But we were pressed for time and I wasn't sure so I didn't bother. (Humming sounds). And I think it is a bit of arrogance on our part. We, XXXX, are so sure of ourselves sometimes we just don't think we can do wrong.....,". And it continues in that vein endlessly.

I was trying to waffle too and be un-curt, un-concise, un-brief, un-terse, un-pithy. But I am afraid my attempt pales in comparison to the masters of the art. I am that unhappy soul who is neither terse nor waffly. What to do? We are like that only.

Chilli country girl...

2009-04-16T10:18:00.002+05:30

Its midnight and the city is asleep. Well, almost asleep. There are at least 4 people who are awake, crowded into a cosy room, enjoying the last of a series of hallucinogenic plant material. In the middle lies a plate filled with sausages and a dab of pickle - Indian style pickle not those insipid vinegary American pickles. (And this was pickle from the North East. That says it all, doesn't it?)

Everyone respectfully waves the sausage in the vicinity of the pickle and eats. All except one- there is always that one person who has do things differently. And this young person digs into the pickle with gusto, unheeding of the warnings that it is one helluva spicy pickle. Her retort - I am from the land of pickles. I was born in Guntur, home of the largest chilli market in India. We have chilli in our veins....You get the picture.

That was the last piece of conversation from her for half an hour - she was too busy gulping cold beer and water.

Revolutionalising evolution...

2009-04-15T10:40:00.003+05:30

I am deeply ashamed. I cannot call myself a student of science any longer. How could I be so unaware? So lost? So caught up in the mundane details of living that I failed to learn that viruses are capable of ratiocination? Reliable sources tell me that viruses have reached the pinnacle of evolution and decided that they had enough of this Darwinian concept (presumably they reached the pinnacle and saw that it was not so good). Therefore, they took the next step of de-evolving. Hmmm.

I am eternally amazed at the fount of knowledge that abides within my workplace.

With love from Almora...

2009-04-15T10:34:00.002+05:30

Here are more entries to the signboard database.

Tamil-o-meter...

2009-02-23T16:43:00.005+05:30

Furthering the Tamil cause - whatever that may be- babies that are given Tamil names will get a gold ring. But they have to be born in government hospitals.

Wonder who will decide the Tamilness of their names? Next thing is to budget money to draw up a list of 'Tamil' names and then some idiot can get their 15 minutes of fame by objecting to the non inclusion or inclusion of some name. We could even make Tamil named babies a special status group like SC/ST. And all of us Tambrams with Sanskritised names should consider heading to the gazette office and changing our names. Maybe they can give us silver rings for at least having 'Indian' names.

I dub thee...

2009-02-18T13:56:00.002+05:30

The cse leddies have a new name, an alias - it is decreed that they shall henceforth be called

Our Ladies of the Phone

You know, like Our Lady of Velankanni or for a more international example - Our Lady of Guadeloupe.

And so they shall be known while they continue their illuminating conversations:

Hello? Hello? HELLO! Poonam talking here. POONAM. HELLO? Can you hear me? HELLO. Who is this? POONAM talking here.

And so on....

Pure Tamil...

2009-01-31T16:59:00.002+05:30

Our gracious minister for local administration (talk about inventing a position), M.K. Stalin recently called on all Tamils to name their children in pure Tamil. Right. This from a person who is got such a pure Tamil name!

Anyway what on earth is a pure Tamil name? Would Christian names be pure Tamil? How far back in history do we go for pure names? Since a lot of Tambrams have sanskritised names, I guess we aren't pure enough for Stalin.

more signboards...

2009-01-31T16:52:00.004+05:30

In Fatehpur Sikri, ASI's board kindly informs you:

More lovely offerings in our Agra hotel:

Back in Delhi, this is the Tibetan market near ISBT:

And again in Delhi, on one of those small water tankers.

Raj Kumar WATAR SAPLAYRS

And as soon as you enter Jahapanah forest in Delhi, MCD exhorts you to "Say No To Plstic Bags"

I wish someone would invent a camera that can be attached to a bike helmet. I miss out on all these brilliant photo-ops when driving.

Signboard watchers rejoice...

2009-01-28T17:46:00.003+05:30

Some people bird watch, others watch sign boards. Agra, I found, was signboard watcher paradise. Here is a sample. Unfortunately, photos are available for just a couple of them.

Saw this from a bus. We were passing a cantonment-ish area - all neat and clean in grids. There was this lovely little sign board on a building: WET Canteen

Need I say more?

And this was on offer in our hotel menu card. A gem lost to the universe!

And another that we saw from the bus. I don't think Gates would like this one.

The last two are not actually from Agra but nevertheless. This one was on the way to Agra, somewhere in Haryana. A rather fancy looking dhaba welcoming you to Dabchick Hodal.

And this in Delhi on the back of a Maruti omni: School Cap

Name the CM contest...

2009-01-27T17:23:00.006+05:30

Went to Agra this weekend - FINALLY! And as I walked into the Agra fort the security guy checks my ticket and asks in a rather suspicious manner, " where are you from?" After gaping at him for a bit and wondering why that mattered, I said Delhi. And he goes, "So who is the chief minister of Delhi?"

Ooooh! such a tough question. One that no terrorist would know the answer to. Not sure the security guy knew the answer either. He nodded when I said SD and let me through. I should have told him that my boss breakfasts with her and lunches with the PM, so there.

Before my encounter with the security forces

The cse leddies...

2009-01-16T18:10:00.004+05:30

"I was advising him to do....but if he doesn't listen, what can I do". This is the kind of fascinating one sided conversation I am forced to listen to in office. These leddies sit in the middle of our floor (we have a horrible open plan floor so sound carrieeeeeeeeeeeees) and murmur endlessly into the phone giving solace to the numerous sundered hearts of their acquaintance. This goes on for on average 4-5 hours a day! Some days I have to keep me iPod playing on max volume to drown out that persistent murmur.

To add to our problems, the leddies occupy the seat next to the only phone from which long distance phone calls can be made. So we have to displace them and they hover while we make our phone calls......

Isn't it bad enough we have to suffer the B?

multi tasking mama...

2008-11-19T11:18:00.003+05:30

Went for an early morning - it was cold and foggy - bird watching trip to Lodhi gardens. And I mean bird watching in the most innocent sense - looking for members of the phylum Aves. The bird count was quite sad but the human count was terribly high. The place was packed with enthu ungles and anties taking their morning constitutional.

On my way out, I passed this mama wearing the de rigeur long shorts, collared tee, and socks upto his knees. The mama was briskly walking down the path when I heard him go "shuklam baradharam vishnu sashivarnam sathurbujam".

Talk about multi tasking! (For the non-Iyengars, this is the thousand names of Vishnu that the mama was reciting.)

Men and their...

2008-11-17T10:53:00.004+05:30

I think I'm jinxed. Or Delhi is just crawling with men who either wander naked or....I was on my way to office, and there right outside Batra, this mama was busy. Doing what? Scratching. The where I leave to your imagination. Let me just say his hand was not visible.

There could be other explanations for his behaviour...but...

And oh yeah, our original naked guy makes a cameo appearance on the Chronicles. My aunt was driving by his usual hang out when he walked out into the middle of the road. And this cow which was passing the time of day, took a look at him and went mad, running helter skelter.

Invasion addendum...

2008-11-04T14:13:00.002+05:30

And yes, I always found the Bongs in monkey caps. Thanks Dr. R for the reminder!! In fact there was this old man who was wearing just a cotton kurta and dhoti, and slip ons and to literally top it off - a MONKEY CAP!

Conservation is our concern...

2008-11-03T18:43:00.002+05:30

Another good one - in Chopta, courtesy Uttarakhand forest department

Hitting the road...

2008-11-03T18:26:00.002+05:30

The UP state transport drivers love that song Hit the road Jack. In fact they think it's written for them, their style of driving - hit the road, oh yeah! And hit every pothole on the way. Which considering that UP road = pothole....

After some 7 - 8 hours of non stop bus travel off the mountains, we reached Rishikesh at 6 in the evening and found a bus about to leave for Delhi. And though we knew that it would be a hair raising journey (the bus was in worse shape than any Pallavan bus I've seen) but we got in nevertheless. At this point we didn't care as long as we got back to Delhi. It was as sane as a UP state transport bus could be, till we hit Roorkee. Somewhere along the road, the driver and conductor switched places...and the fun began.

The conductor (now the driver) kept stalling and moving forward in fits. At one point he found that the dhaba he wanted to go to for dinner was on the wrong side of the road divided. So when the divider ended, he took a sharp right turn and then somehow managed to back into the dhaba. No sweat, except for being on a national highway in the dark with other traffic zipping up and down. We continued to Meerut where they switched places again. Thank god!, thought I. I bet all the passengers heaved sighs of relief.

The driver (the original one) promptly got us lost inside a mohalla, almost ran down an old man and merrily waved away suggestions that it was not the best route and kept going through narrow roads, almost scraping lampposts and shop fronts.

Finally we managed to get back onto the highway.

Inside the bus from Rudraprayag to Rishikesh.

Invasion of the bongs...

2008-10-29T15:56:00.003+05:30

GRRRRRRRRRRR! Off with the Bengalis is my refrain. They are so irritating! Deepavali weekend I went trekking in Uttarakhand. Climbed up to Chandrashila. The view was awesome - and it was mostly in my imagination thanks to the mist that played spoilsport.

But back to the Bongs. My friend and I hit Chopta to find that all the tourists there are Bongs. The family next door in the dhaba were Bongs. It was so bad that the dhaba guys kept calling my friend dada though he does not look remotely dada-ish. And the Bong family next door would keep talking. So we were subjected to intermittent chatter in osh kosh bigosh. Terrible. I have discovered an Universal Truth - life is so full of Bengalis. My office is overrun by them, I live in an area a stone's throw from the Bong heartland in Delhi and everytime I leave the city on a holiday I bump into more of them.

Ah well at least it was a lovely (though killer on the legs) climb. And an even better journey back. To be continued...

My 007 mission...

2008-10-13T18:37:00.006+05:30

Right. I've been getting comments on my disappearance from the world of the Internet. Actually it was only one enquiry but lets not be pedantic. I've been MIA because of this secret mission entrusted to me. Or rather prosaically, since my computer crashed - the techie guy says mother board needs to be replaced. And for various reasons this is not such a clever idea and therefore I need to get a new laptop. In the meantime I've been stuck with a dinosaur of a laptop courtesy my office that informed (or not so informed) sources tell me once belonged to our late founder. So I should behave with respect to the laptop; it having felt the touch of his fingers.

That's beside the point. The dinosaur doesn't like too many tabs opened on ze internet so I've been parsimonious with the windows. And the last week I was in the jungles of Madhya Pradesh (literally), having gone to Kanha National Park. I was chasing forest guards there. Tramping around in the forests. And oh yes, I saw a Panthera tigris. Tiger for the zoologically challenged. See me facebook for pictures.

So that be the 7 O'clock news.

That's all folks.

p.s. I have no theory on why I have escaped the attentions of the Beret but now that I have my Kanha story to do, things are already changing on that front.

The King of all that he surveys...

2008-09-25T17:25:00.003+05:30

I went to meet a certain bigshot lawyer for a story. His lackey shows me into the hallowed office at the end of which was a large desk and behind it - the man himself. And after the initial pleasanteries in his upper class 'i say' accent, he suggests that we talk on the phone since he has clients waiting and doesn't want to waste my time hanging around. All the while I had a hard time suppressing my laughter for he kept taking mini breaks to puff on his fancy hookah. Between the accent and fancy room and the hookah...

Btw, the Beret has returned and has been blading all and sundry..except, for some inexplicable reason, ME! I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the status quo continues.

The Return of the Beret...

2008-09-06T17:04:00.000+05:30

The bad news is that the Beret is coming back soon. Way too soon. Worse, he’s on my GTalk list, so I cant put up my tracker Beret statuses (statii? What is the plural of status?). and he got there cos he had this clever plan of having a writing workshop for the poor sods in office (including us hapless folks who report to him and so have no choice in workshop participation). He decided to send a proxy email asking about who’d be interested in said workshop. And guess who was the unwitting patsy for sending the email?

Escapades at the SC…

2008-08-30T15:50:00.002+05:30

I’ve been haunting the corridors of the Supreme Court of India these last couple of months. Thanks to biggie environment cases that were coming to an end. The main ones were about mining in Orissa.

The first time I get into the court, it was a hot, sticky July afternoon and I’ve been plagued by a killer cough. So I get into the press corner which is packed and yet I freeze cos the court has it’s a/c on so high, they are contributing to global warming all by themselves. I guess they need it otherwise the lawyers in those layers of black will die of overheating. And I have keep holding the cough in which only makes it worse. At some point it get so bad that I have to cough and it sounds much louder - a terrible racking kind of cough.

Once everyone settles down, I started the game of trying to actually hear the proceedings. Except for this bigshot lawyer, dr. d, everyone else was mumbling to themselves- even the judges. It was impossible to hear anything. Added to which there was a chap from Reuters who was clueless about the case and kept asking me to explain everything. You’d think you’d do your homework before covering a case!

The last time I went to the court, I couldn’t get in even with a press card so had to enter by the side entrance where this lawyer was waiting for me. And his clerk just walked me through, straight past the gun-toting security. I must say they really protect the court from attacks don’t they? Splendid job, I say.

N. men everywhere…

2008-08-19T18:14:00.001+05:30

Going to my aunt’s place is now fraught with dangers. Normally I park my bike in her old apartment complex in Alaknanda and hitch a ride with her to the baarder. But now I think I will brave the maniacs who zip up and down the jungle road with their headlights on high beam.

All this because of the life altering, psyche scarring encounter the last time I picked up my bike from Alaknanda. It was twilight and I was going through my usual routine of fighting with my bike. I always have to kick start it some five times before the engine fires. So anyhow, there I was swearing at the bike when I noticed some chap at the end of the passage walking by. No big deal. Then a few minutes later (I’m still kick starting) he walks back and towards me and serenely strolls past me. And at that single instant I realized what was so odd – his clothes. He was wearing a T shirt. Just a T shirt. And shall we say that he was…ahem… at attention?

Needless to say I renewed my efforts at starting the bike with increasing fervour and sped out of there. I did do my civic duty by telling the security guy about it. Strangely he was rather indifferent. Perhaps he was wondering what the fuss was about. Maybe the chap is resident kook, known to all as that weird wandering naked guy.

Where have all the dead fish gone?

2008-08-13T14:23:00.001+05:30

The next day (after recovering from the train ordeal by eating, shivering in bed and watching Namaste London) I went off to Harike, hung with the local forest department range officer, spoke to some locals about the dead fish. Unfortunately for me, there were no dead fish by the time I reached. All that remained was a lingering sewage smell. Where had all the dead fish gone? Eaten every one.

The local populace had either eaten them (yipppeee…free fish! Easy pickings, never the mind the funny gabbu) or they had sold them. Fishing rights are also auctioned on sections of the canals and local fishermen then sell to the concerned contractor who sits in Harike or Faridkot, playing cards. I met a few of them and found that the fishermen had sold them the fish and these fish made their way to the local fish market. Needless to say I was planning to stay strictly veggie on this trip! Some Bihari migrant workers had also eaten the fish and some had fallen ill too.

I also talked to folks in Faridkot and found that the town’s purifies its canal drinking water with due diligence. The operation is outsourced to private companies. The guy there took us around (me and Balle’s alter ego- the Faridkot TOI reporter) the facility. Basically the important machinery were non functional (and this was for at least the past 15 days. Before that the chap didn’t know cos that’s when the contractors were changed) and all they did was to pump it from one tank to another while adding bleach and some other chemicals to it.

Jab we met (my version)…

2008-08-09T15:37:00.002+05:30

I ran from the ticket reservation counter at Nizamuddin towards the train shoving people aside and yelling, “hato. Train chhut jayega”. This dramatic Jab We Met scenario was because I had exactly 3 minutes to catch my train to Punjab. And why was I off to the Poonjab?

To look for dead fish. Dead fish in sewage to be precise. My first trip to the Poonjab was all about dead fish that had popped up dead (obviously) in the canals taking water from the Sutlej river. The canals are a source of drinking water for a bunch of villages and towns in two states. So at the confluence of the Beas and Sutlej the river is dammed and water siphoned off into 2 canals. The confluence is also an important wetland and is a wildlife sanctuary (one of the few in the state of no forests). The wetland is called Harike, marked on the map by a hamlet of dhabas.

Now that you have the geography clear (if you are anal about it, you could google), I was off to Amritsar and Harike because this Times of India guy had reported the dead fish from nearby Faridkot town (which drinks the canal water). So off I went to check this out. Since it was all last minute I left early one morning at 5 in the morning for the railway station, reached there with 45 minutes to spare, hoping to get a general ticket, only to find two very long queues. With no prospect of getting a ticket in time, I contemplated just jumping into the train and paying the extra fine for traveling without a ticket. Then I found out that the fine was 10 times the ticket cost. I didn’t think my office would appreciate reimbursing that – certainly the accounts guy would not find dead fish worth it. So instead I tried that age old Indian trick of jumping the line with the added twist of looking like a lost female. That didn’t work either. Then my luck changed…this guy in front of me created a third queue and then suddenly barged into the first queue and got tickets. He had promised to get my ticket too – he was trying for the same train as me. So the next thing I know, he’s turning around and saying run, I’ve got them. And so that started my ‘Jab we met’ moment.

The train journey to Amritsar ranks as one of the worst ones ever. It was blazing hot and the coach was packed and I didn’t eat anything so I was little crazy with the heat and lack of food. Not to mention the fat Punju lady who kindly made space for me on her reserved seat, but insisted on talking to me in Punjabi which I only half understood (the Punjus in the family can take a bow, obviously the proximity has had effect). The journey was so bad that I couldn’t muster the energy to check out the Golden Temple or anything else in the city for that matter. It was all I could do to drag myself to the PCO and call all my contacts.

Dasavatharam…

2008-07-17T17:34:00.001+05:30

Saw Dasavatharam recently. UGH!!!!!! And I went all the way to Noida to watch it too- thanks to B and R who were ensconced in that place and so I had to make perilous trip across the Yamuna, across state borders to see Kamal buried under loads of prosthetic makeup. It was so much makeup that he could hardly move his facial muscles (= couldn’t act). I don’t know why I go with such high expectations – Kamal has degenerated into making these self aggrandizing movies. Should just stick to good old Rajni –at least you know what you are getting. No pretensions of high brow-ness. Silly masalas with great Rajni one-liners.

The perilous trip to Noida was more fun than the movie itself. I took a bus to 12/22…yes that’s what its called. And imagine the bus guy yelling it in hindi…in that inimitable Indian hawker way. Apparently it refers to sectors 12 and 22 which are on either side of this main road hence the innovative name.

It’s almost as bad as being told to take the Valad bus and get off at 36 and walk down to Boyfpown – this happened in Wayanad.

The anti aloo man…

2008-07-04T18:27:00.005+05:30

Way back in February, I met this Tamil guy in Barmer, Rajasthan which is not far from the Indo-Pak border and hence the very visible BSF presence. And now that I've got the historical details down...He was an accountant with the BSF. So while waiting to get our tickets at the Barmer railway station- the one with the gorgeous plastic yellow and green palm tree - we indulged in a pleasant anti-Bihari (read North Indian) rant (in Tamil of course!). His main complaint was the Bihari penchant for aloo. Aloo-gobi, aloo-peas, aloo-beans…the list is endless. Our canteen (i.e. mein office) actually serves aloo-karela!

My family aka the CIA...

2008-05-26T14:03:00.004+05:30

Why do I have to report everything in life to family - from brushing my teeth to going rafting? I went rafting a week ago and had people phone me indignantly. Apparently I was required to inform them! My cousin (the idiot whose wedding I went to) calls and says you went rafting with my friends, why didn't you tell me? I had to heard about it from my friend.

Didn't know I had to broadcast this info. Then my uncle got psyched out because my cousin showed him an ad on tv where these people are rafting and they go into the water. She told him, thats what S has gone for. And he started off about what is the child doing? Is she safe? Call and find out! She never said that it would be like that!

Family I tell you...

(Am certainly not telling him about the spill I took from my bike!)

Sperm mail...

2008-05-14T18:41:00.003+05:30

On a lighter note...I got this email from some guy inviting me to personalise my google search page. This was sent to one of the egroups I subscribe to. And a bunch of others emailed to the group suggesting it might a virus laden email which the person didn't actually send. A couple of days later we got confirmation that our surmise was correct.

The chap wrote saying,"I am sorry about the sperm mail".

The THING lurking upstairs...

2008-05-14T10:58:00.008+05:30

I had the utter joy (read sarcasm) of writing the cover this time (May 31st issue). And after a week of chatting up total strangers in the hot sun, the story was written and turned over to the copy desk who love to kill us because we write such bad copy. Anyhow, I was sitting with one of the desk folks going through the story and plugging the holes in it when this person - no that would be insulting humanity - this THING popped up and asked me if I was SS who was writing the cover. I said yes I was writing the cover and IT started berating me for turning in the story after the issue closed. This was a load of hogwash because I'd turned it in before and anyhow it must have been the quickest first cover ever, having been finished in a week. According to IT, I was in distinguished company in turning in the cover late, along with the famous N.S who is now with the TOI. What was the THING'S problem? I have 3 bosses and a half (the half is in the Wash Post) who didn't demur a bit about my deadline.

And then after a while the THING reappeared and started ranting about b*chod reporters who couldn't write and generally casting aspersions on our education level, reading skills, English knowledge and so on (I will spare you the graphic terminology). And IT kept directing this at me though IT has never edited anything I've written. So finally IT came to me again and said, " so S.S....rant...rant". I replied that wasn't my name and IT started yelling about giving IT attitude. IT then wandered away since I wasn't giving IT any fuel.

The worst part is that it is apparently acceptable for a THING to chew out people in front of colleagues when it was most unwarranted. All I got later was sympathy from everyone. Big help. No one had the balls to tell the scumbag to F* off. There should be rules on behaviour in public spaces. One cannot use words like b*chod at a colleague (or anyone else for that matter). It is so easy to yell at people junior to you, after all they can hardly swear at you. It is beyond the pale to chew people out in public even if they deserve to be chewed out(and in this case I didn't). And the THING comes after an hour and says it wasn't personal. This was said in private when I left the room on some work. If you can abuse in public then have the guts to apologise equally loudly in front of everyone. And anyway just saying it is not personal doesn't make it okay.

Can I scream and hurl the choicest of abuses and then after ten minutes say it wasn't personal? Why don't we all do that then. The THING is now beyond even acknowledgment. I sail past IT as if IT does not pollute my office space. Unfortunately that is all I can afford to do.

And we pride ourselves on our ancient society and culture?

what is it with weddings and coots?

2008-05-08T19:01:00.003+05:30

The coots were out in full force. Silly bro got married and so I am next in line to get hassled. Every couple of minutes another old methane filled coot would stop next to me and say you're next; when are you getting married; why don't you get married and many such variations of the same theme.

I almost grabbed one of the lifesavers (the groom's friends who kept bailing me and M out of fraught situations with the coots)and paraded him in front of the coots. Actually M and I were going to pass him off as common property, a shared resource. But then we decided we didn't want the deaths of the coots on our hands.

Packets of every kind…

2008-05-02T19:50:00.001+05:30

I made the ultimate sacrifice recently (and brother mine better appreciate it) by going for my bro’s wedding. It was a sacrifice because the old coots were being their usual cootish selves –more on that later.

But first enroute to the mehendi session M (aka P) were discussing sourcing of a certain plant material in Delhi. And I mentioned that A had got ‘a packet’ from Paharganj. When an aunt accompanying us asked innocently, "What was in the packet?" Ha, like we're going to tell you! We then got to discussing what to get the bridegroom and I suggested “a packet” of another kind – the Durex kind. At this point, another aunt sitting with us added, “The priests also give these packets out don’t they?” I will leave you with the image of a pot-bellied vadiyar with his kudumi handing out “packets”...

Loove marriage…

2008-04-07T18:53:00.002+05:30

One weekend recently, I asked my uncle (the Punjabi one) to pick me up from my new place on his way home to the baarder. When he came by, my landlord was loitering near the gate so I introduced them to each other and they a pleasant chat in Punjabi reassuring each other about the safety of the little girl (me). A couple of days, my landlord asks me, “Your uncle, he’s Punjabi. But you…..?” For I obviously don’t sound or look remotely Punjabi. I confirmed my madrasi origins while saying the uncle was an uncle by marriage. That zapped them further and he said, “We don’t marry our children outside the community”. So I said it wasn’t my grandparents choice, my aunt decided herself. And the mystery unmystified itself in their eyes.

“Ah! Love marriage!”

The simian habit…

2008-04-07T18:34:00.001+05:30

The monkey menace in Delhi is a favourite space filler with the media. There were all these reports of monkeys going crazy some months ago. Including one about this monkey which attacked a municipal corporation guy causing him to fall off the building and die. This monkey was hunted down and caught – maybe it owned up to the crime – and relocated out of the urban area to Asola Wildlife Sanctuary. Asola is this scrubby jungle with no wildlife really, on the Delhi-Haryana border. It also happened to be our very own baarder so you can imagine we weren’t too thrilled about this MCD personnel killer monkey in our neighbourhood! Wonder if the monkey which slapped our dog was the same one?

Talking of monkeys, was on my way to Jantar Mantar to meet some protesters (as always) when I noticed these two dudes on a scooter in front of me at the traffic lights. The pillion rider was carefully searching through his friend’s hair. Apparently our simian instincts haven’t left us completely.

Btw, nothing to do with monkeys...its been a month sans beret! How time flies!

War against global warming...

2008-04-02T12:57:00.002+05:30

Cities around the world observed Earth Hour this weekend by switching off all electrical appliances for the appointed hour. Me and the denizens of Utsav, Kant Enclave, The Baarder also observed Earth Hour - for 12 hours.

Obit: Lichen Tee

2008-03-19T19:31:00.002+05:30

My lichen t-shirt is no more. The monkeys in the balcony got to it. They came, upturned the garbage, tore up my shirt and absconded with my trousers. Guess its time for a wardrobe makeover anyway.

This was in my new place. Yes, I finally moved out of the family homestead; out of the baarder and into the city; back into cellphone range; out of the jungle, just not away from the monkeys.

The Beret goeth...

2008-03-05T19:20:00.005+05:30

Well The Beret has left us bere(f)t. What will I blog about? Who will we bitch about?

He left on the 1st of March for six months during which time he will be driving people in The Washington Post mad. But not before he inflicted two of his famous sessions on us. The second one was actually fun because we collectively gathered the guts to challenge his ideas and it almost erupted into a full fledged yelling match. But even ten of us together were outyelled by him - he just stood up and loudly, emphatically stated his point of view. And that was that.

Well, life goes sans Beret though not post Beret.

Re the parallel universe me...

2008-02-26T12:03:00.003+05:30

Got a rather prosaic explanation for why I received a call from myself. There goes my beautiful parallel universe theory.

Apparently it might be just a glitch in Nokia handsets. Dang! Too prosaic and possible. I will stay with my parallel universe...

the sessions cometh and cometh...

2008-02-08T18:45:00.000+05:30

The Beret has been in top form.

Certain mind exercises to better our journalistic talents have been designed. I do believe these will help...but as always it is beret's approach which makes us all shudder and cross ourselves and drop down on our knees. We had the first session this week for over 3 hours starting late evening. We were all looking rather worse for the wear by the end.

And now, we have a new definition of Monday morning blues...our next session is scheduled first thing on Monday. Such joy and happiness!

all sound and light...

2008-01-19T18:38:00.000+05:30

The mind numbing cold of December makes one do rather silly things, especially the 'improving one's mind' kind of activities. Our family went, en masse, for the son et lumiere show at the Red Fort. The good folks at the fort take their work literally - only sound and light, no shadows or anything to add dimension. At least we had different colour lights. Anyhow, it rambled on about the fort was built by Jahangir (I think) and how the women of the fort were in charge of the place once a week.....

Then after Aurangazeb the place went to the dogs for the following Mughals were weak, insipid, alcoholic louts. Like the one who kept drinking (we heard him) inspite of news that some invaders or the other were descending on Delhi. All he would say amid his drunken orgy was that Delhi was still far away. Our favourite lout was this unnamed guy who, according to the Voice, fell in love with a common Slut. At this point the sound system's delicate sensibilities were overcome and it shut down for a while. After smelling salts were administered, the system recovered but started all over from the beginning. We half expected it get horrified by the S word again, but it overcame its embarrassment most manfully and continued without a glitch.

I also went for a play about Pushkin written by some Indian woman and dramatized by somebody else. It was called Pushkin's last poem (or was it letter?). With some sad acting and even worse directing, it was one of the most pathetic plays I've seen. They had this narrator who would smirk and explain the scene, and then the actors would enact whatever she said! So silly. And the play certainly did not increase my knowledge of Pushkin or his work except in that he seemed to conform to The Artist Rule, ie., all great artists should love a woman but not be with her, instead they should be womanizing drunks who no one understands and everyone persecutes. And their genius gets recognised posthumously.

The wiggle mama...and others

2008-01-12T12:42:00.000+05:30

People do the oddest things while driving...perhaps they think they are invisible. This portly mama in front of me, on his vespa/chetak was chugging along at 40 kmph when he suddenly did an excellent butt wiggle. So out of the blue was it that for a second my cousin, S and I weren't sure if we had actually seen the wiggle. A glance at each other told us we hadn't hallucinated. (UGH! Imagine, hallucinating about plump mamas doing a butt wiggle).

I do meet some interesting mamas don't I? Ohhhhhhh! An absolute gem of the mama breed was the one I met in Toronto....classic mama, he was.

This was way back in the good old days...2007. I was visiting Buffalo and Toronto in the height of tourist season - January. I was staying with family (as always). [An aside: whoever came up with that line about mallus in every corner of the world got it wrong. The original usage had to be extended R.S. Mani clan. This was for the those in the family or as they say in TN, "those in the family way"].

Anyhow, I was staying with family, having a great time freezing while exploring downtown Toronto and getting very familiar with every Starbucks in the area. One day, my aunt said we had to go for a seemandam- 'the loading of bangles and eating pure carbs' ritual for expectant mothers. So we dutifully went to some TamBram (Iyengar specifically) house nearby. And there I was introduced to a mama (more a thatha really) who had been dying to meet me. His family was from the same village as my dad and his dad knew my granddad....and so on. So he sat me down and went into an explanation (for the benefit of others seated nearby) of how we hail from the same village and how my granddad had 9 kids and one was a doctor.....and then he says, one of her (ie me) uncles scandalously got married to an....IYER! Gasp, the horror of it! I kept trying to interrupt and say, ahem..actually it wasn't my uncle, but my dad.

Gotta love the mamas. Just gotta.

No Irish lakes for me...

2008-01-10T18:10:00.000+05:30

Went for a talk in IHC (India Habitat Centre for the non Delhites). It had the intriguing title, Early Irish Mythology and India. Since I wasn't aware of any Indian connections with ancient Ireland, here was an opportunity to learn. Reached the place a bit late but found nothing going on. Some Indians and presumably Irish folks were wandering around in their evening best. The talk started over an hour late. Apparently the Irish believe in IST too - Irish Standard Time.

Anyhow, sat through some random intro speeches including this really hilarious guy called Dr.K. He was to introduce the main speaker. It was so funny I actually noted stuff down. His gems,

.....rebuilding the mammaries of the existence of ancient peoples. [That was memories if you haven't got it yet.]

Then he went on about the main speaker's interest in antiquities,

"As an Indian, I can appreciate his interest in antiquities". [As if Indians have a patent on appreciating antiquities.]

After we (colleagues and I) derived much enjoyment from these words of wisdom, the main guy with an unpronounceable Irish name (and they say South Indian names are complicated!) started talking. Apparently the names of the father and mother gods in Irish and Indian mythology is very similar. Unfortunately I didn't catch the names due to his lovely accent. After that there was no Indian connection. He just rambled on about the Celts who had some bizarre myths. No Indian angle at all. So we got bored (no visuals for us lesser non anthropology creatures) and left rudely half way through the talk. I did hear a lovely myth which I just have to share:

This is straight out of Indian movies (ah that is the connection!) with a couple on the run from the guy's father who is a god of something or the other. The pair are in spot of trouble so the girl's father gives them this wondrous magical horse. The only catch (of course there is one!) is that the hero can't let the horse stop or urinate. If either of this happened all would be lost. Imagine the fate of these star crossed lovers being dependent on a horse not peeing.

Of course, the horse stopped AND peed. And this formed a spring from which arose a lake. This is the origin story for Ireland's largest lake apparently. As for the lovers, all was not lost. The girl's dad gave them another horse. Didn't find out if this is a loop story with endlessly repeating elements. Hopefully not for I wouldn't be able to go into any lake in Ireland then!

Rockin' the baarder...

2008-01-03T11:43:00.000+05:30

We wisely skipped the rockin' pre christmas party, if it ever occurred (I have my doubts). Instead we waited for New Year (a more secular day) and partied in our own inimitable baarder style. That basically meant partying with all old coots we live with and a couple of non coot friends. And of course, the coots out danced, out drank, out partied us young things. One of them even got these crazy lights - indescribable!

Of all places, the baarder was happening!

Unfortunately, the next day I was subjected to the beret editing my work! He's on an editing spree- none have been spared. To celebrate this he brought out the smashed milk can hat. So now we have a Stevensonian stand off between Dr. Milk Can and the benevolent (comparatively) Dr. Beret. Fun n games! [No doubt that last exclamation point would be edited out with a stern 60 minute ramble if he ever saw this blog. And that would be followed by a pathetic me back on the job market).

In between all this we were mightily entertained by K chasing V around the office after supposedly digging his nose. V is notorious for her fastidious nature. Need I say more?

ROCKIN'...

2007-12-04T18:03:00.000+05:30

So there we were, two and half madrasis and a half northie, partaking of that quintessential madrasi rite of evening filter coffee...when some creature pops up and tells us, “Excuse me. But you look like rocking people” Gee, thanks! Really needed your endorsement.

It continued, “My friend over there says you are wearing really cool outfits…owns a shop….blather blather…I’m a musician…..a rocker...blather….going to be a pre Christmas concert here in the market area. Would you like to come?....blather…and then it went back to its table.

A little later, we were joined by a friend, making it one and half northies at the table, when all of a sudden the thing came back and started about the concert again. suddenly it did a doubletake and said, "you're new" to our northie addition. "are you from madras? no? then you must be from pindi". He just refused to listen when he was repeatedly told she was from Delhi. Suddenly he says, "Paul McCartney and John Lennon....you do know who they are?....blather....prudence....love ya”. Phew and finally it went away.

Middle aged men who wear what they think are hip clothes (shorts, tee and unbuttoned shirt!) and spout drivel about music to try and chat up random people are beyond pathetic. And this was a terrible specimen…just his choice of venue in chatting up women….a woodlands type restaurant? What is wrong with this creature?

Thank God for strong filter coffee that sustains one through such ordeals.

Encounter with the parallel me...

2007-11-28T10:28:00.000+05:30

I got a missed call from me.

Yup! It showed the caller as me. And when I looked at the number, it was the same as mine except for one digit. So I called the number and was told it was switched off. Then I got someone else to call the fake me, and it showed up on her phone as calling me though my phone didn't ring!

Hence, have decided that a parallel universe me was reaching out. The other explanation floated was GOD, which is an unacceptable theory for an atheist. So, I'll go with a matrix like parallel universe concept....complete with glitches in the matrix that allows for such bizarre occurrences.

Number crunching...

2007-11-23T17:44:00.001+05:30

Phew! Had a most exhausting day of doing nothing productive...ran around getting signatures and filling up forms for the trip I took to singara Chennai. Considering I was returning a fair chunk of money, it should have been simple but no...had to get signatures from departments who were not really concerned with my trip. All I can say is...

BUREAUCRAZY!

Skirmishes…

2007-11-21T17:23:00.000+05:30

It’s a war zone here…each of us has our own bunker (where we hide our heads like ostriches) – our computer screens with headphones on and music playing. We have become so entrenched in our bunker that we communicate with neighbours through the wonders of GTalk.

All this to avoid being bereted! Had a close call today…managed to escape after a brief skirmish. Snack time is a dangerous one. It’s when our guard is down and we are ready to venture out for forage…and there is the beret waiting to pounce!

The status czar...

2007-11-16T18:13:00.000+05:30

Google is addictive, especially GTalk.

The past few days, a few of us have been on GTalk quite a bit, all the while sitting next to each other in office. One of these people has been dubbed the status czar. She loves to keep tab on everyone's google status and quiz them on the story behind it. Perhaps she's polishing up her reporter's inquisitiveness skill?

She's such a czar, that I'm constantly on my guard about having ambiguous status messages! Have to avoid that at all costs! Not that it stops the czar from querying.

Assumptions, assumptions…

2007-11-14T16:28:00.000+05:30

We love to assume…sometimes its justifiable but usually its because some neuron gets zapped and we decide that something is just so, in spite of a lack of evidence or even evidence to the contrary.

I overheard a conversation on adoption and genetics. There are actually people who think that you can ascribe bad behaviour and attitude to genes and conveniently forget the bearing upbringing has on a person's pysche. Of course, good behaviour (whatever that may be!) on the other hand is invariably considered to be due to a good upbringing.

Then I had someone assume I smoked...just like that, for no particular reason. Me being a non smoker and a strong anti-smoking soul, got miffed and with clenched teeth retaliated.

Still, it rankles.

All I can say is that some peoples' neurons are zapped beyond repair. Perhaps parochialism and illogical thinking are genetic too.

Lost and Found…Agra

2007-11-13T16:09:00.000+05:30

2:00 a.m. “A station has come. Is it Agra? Go and see. Everyone! Get ready”. “Oh, its not Agra”. Imagine this conversation going on endlessly for over 4 hours! This was the nightmare I was in on the train back to Delhi. A gang of Tamilians were all geared up to hop off at Agra but the train being late they had to wait till 7:00 am to actually hop off. In the meantime, they repeatedly disturbed me (and no doubt others) by having this circular conversation, interspersed with side dialogues on the inadvisability of having tea as they might miss Agra!

I’ve never been to Agra and have always wanted to visit…..though right now I don’t think I will cos I’m sick of the place! Why cannot people get off trains without waking the entire world up? This was as bad as the two old men who discussed the relative merits of various idli places in Bangalore and Madras, on the night train between the two cities, till way into the night or rather early morning!

The intelligent tsunami…

2007-11-06T15:38:00.000+05:30

I was talking to some fishermen on the Madras coast. They said that the authorities were making noises about moving this community way inland…obviously a location more in keeping with their livelihood. Anyhow, these guys said they were determined not to budge. The powers that be told them they were in imminent danger of a repeat tsunami so they should move. The fishermen asked me, “Will the tsunami hit just us and avoid the shiny new buildings coming up on the coast? We didn’t realise the tsunami was selective and so intelligent!”

One fisherman also quoted CRZ at me and said no construction can be done 500m from the high tide line so what about the University of Madras, eh? When asked who said there could be no construction, he looked at me pityingly and said, “Madam, there is a law”.

Where have the Chronicles gone?

2007-11-05T14:08:00.000+05:30

Met an old friend from the salad days. Somewhere during our catch up routine, he said that he’d read the Chronicles with much enjoyment and whatever had happened to them? Wonder if it was politeness or the beer talking? Nevertheless, it’s nice to know that someone remembers the Chronicles! Every once in a while a kind soul or two mentions the chronicles but the vast majority, I remain convinced, have spammed it.

A mini rant – what is with these Auroville shops in Pondicherry? They seem to perversely enjoy closing at times when you would expect people to be in the shopping mode, like Sunday evenings. The only time I could spare, and all my favourite shops were closed!

Good news! I am back into the reading mode! Have finished David Attenborough’s autobiography in two days of intermittent reading. For a while, I was worried I’d lost my ability to put away a few hundred pages at a time but ze appetite is back. HURRAH!

Landscaping tips for the discerning few…

2007-11-02T11:48:00.000+05:30

Here is an on dit for all you folks interested in “How to keep a fashionable city”. The latest in urban landscaping is….wait for it….plastic Palm Trees! Blew your mind didn’t it? Hold on there is more. The colour of your plastic palm tree is of paramount importance. You must use a bright cheerful yellow. Occasionally you may dabble with green fronds and yellow trunk but don’t make it a habit. The pièce de resistance, are the lights that you just have to string up on the palm. This adds just the right touch of glitter that is so essential for a well dressed plastic palm tree. To see some classic pieces of this style of urban landscaping please visit Madras Central Station and Pondicherry (diagonally opposite Surguru hotel and near the bus stand where you turn for Cuddalore).

Whoever came up with the palm tree idea, has certainly done one better than the minister for Tamil culture who ingeniously spread Tamil culture by erecting large hoardings along the ECR, “Long live ancient glorious Tamil” or something similar. I totally learnt every bit of Sangam literature from seeing a dozen of those billboards. It was magical, my version of the Road to Damascus only in my case it was the East Coast Road.

On the move, I was chillin’ at home….

2007-11-01T17:30:00.000+05:30

Was on my first work trip the past couple of weeks, and of all places, I ended up going home! Not that I’m complaining but it makes life that much more difficult. What with colleagues and bosses making daft jokes (which aren’t really funny) about how I get to go home and chill. Let me warn you, that this will be a bit of a rant ‘cos it is rather a sore point with me at present. So…I hardly chilled at home. Been working my a off meeting people and talking and talking. So much so I’m sick of meeting people and discussing issues. I thought the whole point in this job was to use the contacts that one had and get stories and information. Well, duh, I’ve lived most of my life in the south so obviously most of my contacts are based there and so how would I get stories from Jammu? And anyway if it was to be suspected that I was chillin’ at home, why send me? GRRRR.

Anyhow, it was good to be among familiar surroundings. Though certain things that I took for granted suddenly struck me as rather odd. Like our penchant for turning nouns into verbs. My favourites are all the small butcher shops which are called something Proteins like Sadic Proteins. Yes, I concur, you are being rather sadistic with the chickens! And then there is “Vijaya Scans”. What she scans is secret. Have not really noticed that elsewhere. Henceforth will keep me eyes peeled for amusing sign boards in Delhi.

Rocky, the love fest and actual Punjabis....

2007-10-05T11:27:00.000+05:30

So we (cousin & I) have been religiously going to the gym and working our biceps for the past month. There is nice little fellow at the gym who tells us what and how much to do. For the first couple of weeks I kept hearing people call him “Louki” which seemed rather unlikely since that’s a weird veggie (as you can see I don’t care for it). Then my cousin just asked him his name and then there was light and laughter! His name is Rocky. You have to see him to understand why his name evokes such amusement…in addition to the clichedness of that name.

This guy’s sense of humour pops up out of the blue. He wanted me to lift the dumbell from behind my neck upwards till my arm was straight. His explanation, “Like this” (with a demo) and then, “Inquilab zindabad!”

Went to Lodhi gardens with some folks from work. It was very pleasant. We sat under a tree sharing our sugary treats with the ants and making small talk. Then we noticed 4 guys, each sitting on his own and all staring in the same direction. Obviously we followed their lead and stared too….at this couple under a tree who were all over each other. After a while the couple went away and so the guys got up and disappeared….the show was over…time to move on! Bizarre.

Le boss was trying to get my goat by making these daft comments about south indians…the usual everything south of the Vindhyas is Madras. I kept telling him you arent being inventive, I’ve heard all this from the thick headed northies in my family! Then suddenly some circuit in my colleague’s brain worked and he said, “is this the Punjabis you stay with? So, they are actual Punjabis who are related to you?” Duh! Didn’t know you could have virtual Punjabis! So when I asked what he thought I’d been talking about when I said my Punjabi uncle etc and his reply, “I thought you meant transplanted tamilians!” Apparently transplanted tamilians in Delhi become Punjabis! I had to give my cousin’s name (an endless one it is!) for them to be totally convinced. Silly people….never heard of inter-whatever marriages (its not racial in this case so I don’t know what the sociological term would be.)

HELLO!

2007-10-03T18:16:00.000+05:30

Have discovered a fascinating Punjabi habit....they love to say HELLO! This is not on the telephone or to greet someone. That everyone does. No big deal. No....when they want to interrupt someone or focus the attention on them during a conversation they loudly "HELLO" you. The other day had two Punjabis doing the hello routine at the same time! One was me uncle trying to distract us from some serious idiot box watching where the other Punjabi was Helloing some chick in a car. This was Sunny Deol driving alongside the chick and helloing her on a cell phone! Don't ask why I was watching this idiocy...it comes of living on the baarder.

So now the cousin and self have taken to helloing each other and the house in our chute like courtyard! The neighbours (who don't exist) must think we are very friendly bunch- forever greeting each other with such warmth!

Holothurians...ugh!!!!!

2007-09-19T18:40:00.000+05:30

I hate sea cucumbers! To start with what a silly name! The only neat thing about them, in a yech kind of way, is that they can shove their intestines out to escape predators!

Sorry about the bio lesson but I have been trying to write this story on sea cucumbers- they are a Schedule 1 species, which they are an untouchable species in trade/fishing terms. The problem with my story is no one has any verifiable information on the darned things. GRRRR! Ah, well that is my problem..but I just have to say it...I HATE sea cucumbers!

I am a cool, gay Tambram!

2007-09-13T18:28:00.000+05:30

The parochial dude of my last post asked me if i was a tambram. I, of course, said I didn't believe in such labels. And that was the end of that conversation.

I later regretted it. I should have owned up to my tambramness because it turns out the Northies respect tambrams. They consider us cool! I've never heard that word associated with us! This is due to our undisputable brains and ability to land well paying corporate jobs. So, I missed out on asserting my coolness though I have been assured that since I am a gay tambram, I'm extra cool!

Nude lipsticks and six pack abs...

2007-09-10T18:46:00.000+05:30

Life in Haryana can get so that one is reduced to reading some unknown chick mag. There was fascinating article about how to put on your face in 5 minutes in the morning! It actually sounded like an hour’s work. the best part of the article though, was the endless range of products which were NUDE! Me cousin and I had a great time imagining ourselves asking the shop guy for naked lipsticks.

Went for a talk on an extinct bird that may have been rediscovered. Unfortunately caught only the last half of it thanks to blade colleagues who delayed us. Dislike people who function eternally on IST. And then had the cheek to say, "It's okay. Don’t be mad"! Sorry, but I’m actually INTERESTED in wildlife and wanted to listen to this talk! GRRRRRRRRRRRRR. And then the same soul, who after asking what some south Indian sweet was went, “gadagadabuda” when told what the sweet was! Talk about rude! Sorely tempted to make stupid noises when next someone talks in Hindi! Talking of the north-south divide, some random dude who I hardly knew starts off about how you southies always talk tamil to each other! Jeez, who doesn’t talk their language when they meet fellow whatevers? Parochial idiots.

Yipppppppeeeeeeeeee!!! Got my first byline...check out the September 15th issue (www.cseindia.org). Actually have 2 bylines- the floods story and a piece on kala-azar.

I seem to be living at IHC and the international centre. Went for a conference on the Indo-US nuclear deal. This was by the anti nuke camp. All very fine except they were preaching to the converted. I did however learn a little more about the issue and got out of the office for 2 whole days!

Had nightmares the other day, came out of it to realise it was actually a video on mtv. There was shekar suman with these scary six pack abs, drawn face and terrible hairdo (which tried to scream I’m cool and young). On top of all this he was doing a salman khan with an unbuttoned shirt and was pretending to sing. This should come with a warning! No fair springing it on an unsuspecting public.

p.s. Had another painfully one track (not to mention one sided) conversation with you know who... Have decided to buy a bell and ring it after 5 minutes – its time for a change in topic. Your alloted time is up.

Vodka, english grannies and family.....

2007-07-25T23:17:00.000+05:30

Can’t The Hindu find anyone else other than Nirmal Shekar to write in the sports section? For more than a decade he’s been writing the strangest things. His so called analogies are hardly that. Some classic Shekar (on Mirza getting the better of some Russian player),

“Girls her age seldom go to work at that hour, unless they happen to have the unenviable job of listening to — and placating — English grannies’ complaints about a Barclays bank statement or a malfunctioning microwave oven in a voice that frogs might mistake for a partnership call.…………even as the Russian found the surface about as agreeable as one of her countrymen might consider a pub that did not stock vodka”.

Which idiot gave this guy a job writing? There was also some stuff about polar bears which I will not torture you with.

Talking of bad journalism, saw this episode of Hardtalk (on BBC) with Richard Dawkins as the guest discussing his book, The God Delusion. Dawkins was trying very seriously to make a point about how religion pervades everything. How labeling a child as a Christian, Muslim or whatever is not considered to affect the psyche of the child while labeling the kid anything else would be a no-no. Throughout the programme the interviewer had an one point agenda – railroad Dawkins and trip him without really listening to anything the guy said!

Ha! The family (me included) are so good at giving advice. We just hate being at the receiving end! A certain someone recently told off a certain somebodyelse…lets call them M and J! It was rather ironic, since M has similar problems with life and doesn’t do well when advice is dished out to her! A bit of the kettle calling the pot black?

Hmmmm…talking of family….went home to Singara Chennai recently. Only to find my room usurped and my cousin giving me directions in my city!!! This from the creature who was the typical oblivious north Indian till 2 years ago!

Short Circuit!

2007-07-07T23:00:00.000+05:30

To be ethical, this post's title was suggested by a good friend of mine (whose circuits are shorted more often than not!)....

Visited an old (and famously flaky!) friend the other day. On reaching her place, I found her pacing on the terrace as TNEB were tinkering with the electrical supply to the building. Apparently it was a case of high voltage leading to an electrical fire. We had hardly started chewing the fat when this dude started yelling for help. We found him in the middle of some rather thick smoke as his washing machine was burning merrily. Finally everyone exited the building and the EB folks and us got organised and started rushing in bags of sand. In the meantime we called the fire dept who came in time to put out a smoldering fire that the EB folks had missed.

After all the excitement we were gossiping with the local cops when this mama in veshti went by us doing a sprint worthy of Ben Johnson. Why? To collar one of the dudes who went out sand collecting, and accuse him of stealing sand from his house! On being told the situation, the mama insisted that the dude should have got sand from elsewhere! After much soothing of ruffled feathers he chilled out only to tell the cop that electrical fire cannot occur! As if we were making the whole thing up!
(Our considered opinion being he was drunk as a skunk!)

Why o why do I have to come across all the weird Tamil mamas in the world?

CCD and the mentally unstable

2007-06-26T09:42:00.000+05:30

I've fallen into this routine in Delhi - spend the day at me aunts' office, go home to Haryana in the evening and joke (with my cousins) on being stuck in the back of the beyonds. Every now and again, me cousine and I escape from the hinterland of Haryana to the 'civilized' land of CCD, Masjid Moth (Cafe Coffee Day). There, invariably, some friends of the cousine will turn up. Which is usually quite fun. Occasionally though....the last time we were joined by one such friend.....who likes to have these endless one-sided conversations. Invariably, cousin and I keep glancing at each other, fiddling with our cell phones and generally showing manifest signs of boredom.

There is someone on the roads of Delhi, who must have some serious mental illness. I was taking an auto to my aunts' office and since I had nothing better to do I was gazing at what passes for scenery. Suddenly I realised that there was this guy lying on the side of the road sans even the angavastram! That was a sight I could have done without! Apparently that stretch of road is his haunt because he is there everyday when my aunts go to work. Certainly is a jolt for us in our comfortable lifestyles to see what others go through on a daily basis.

angavastrams at Westminster Abbey...

2007-06-16T10:31:00.000+05:30

I was listening to the guide at the British Museum holding forth on Chinese pottery, when this Indian family came up to us. They wanted to know if the koh-i-noor was kept at the British Museum. I was under the impression it was in the crown jewels at the Tower of London. When I said so, the woman said they’d been to the Tower but apparently it wasn’t there. Anyway the guide disabused them of the notion that it was in the museum. Later that week when I went to the Tower, there in the middle of the crown, was this huge diamond and there is was a board saying the Imperial Crown with the koh-i-noor diamond! Wonder how those folks missed seeing it!

Victoria Station is a fun place to people watch. I was waiting for someone when I saw this desi enter the burger king. He was a normal looking desi – sober suit, beer belly and … a blue and red Superman belt buckle!

Went to an English pub and had a tough time ordering beer! The bartender was East European with a killer accent and then there was moi, with a weird desi-american blend accent! Getting a beer was never more exhausting!

These medieval Christians (actually even till later) were strange! They love to bury the famous and rich in their cathedrals. So as a visitor you suddenly realise you are literally walking on somebody’s grave! Rather disconcerting to look down and read, “Here lie the remains of so and so”. At the end of my week in London, I was tired of churches and cathedrals. They started to look the same with graves, stained glass… Though, I made it a point to go to the Salisbury Cathedral since they have one of the original copies of the Magna Carta. Unfortunately, they don’t allow photography of old documents.

Westminster Abbey is the oddest as it is chockfull of commemorative monuments and graves for variously numbered Kings, Queens, other aristocrats, famous poets and writers. Just as I was wondering what they did with Darwin, I discovered he was buried in the Abbey! How sacrilegious!

My favourite commemorative monument was this one to some soldier. It had cherubs and female figures –either the Virgin or some Diana/Athena type female. And the piece de resistance - an older but buff (as someone once said) bearded guy reclining with just an angavastram strategically draped…

Then there was Cromwell’s grave with the dates entered as 1658-1661. He sure did a lot for a 3 year old!! Ha! Elizabeth I and Mary I are buried together in the same tomb. Though the effigy is only of E. Poor Mary didn’t warrant a tomb of her own. Didn’t they hate each others guts?

p.s. Saw this in The Guardian, Friday June 01. The article was about the climate change talks – “Given his track record on this subject, putting Bush in charge of talks on climate change is like King Herod opening a nursery”.

Birth of a Cult...

2007-06-13T11:48:00.000+05:30

The tube is great fun. I love the announcements they make. When the doors of the train open, this solemn deep voice admonishes you to "MIND THE GAP". It sounds almost like a mantra that some wacky cult would adopt. Three words to live your life by.

On my rambles I saw some amusing signs outside pubs. One said "I drink to make my friends seem more interesting" and another said "No football colour allowed inside". I guess just seeing the colours of the enemy team enrages the patrons!

What is with these touristy places and haunted houses? Stratford upon Avon has a haunted house of horses!! And there are 3 haunted houses in Salisbury! Wonder if any suckers actually go to check out the neighing horse ghosts.

Talking of Stratford, the house where the Bard was born is now a museum. And in the garden, there is a bust of Tagore presented to the museum by the Indian consulate or someone. One great writer in the garden of another great writer's house. Still a bit unexpected. And I doubt many non-Indians know about Tagore.

These guides in houses converted to museums are so strange. I went to Anne Hathaway's cottage and the guy talked of how they cleaned chimneys in the good old days. According to him (not sure I quite believe him) they would send a young boy to the roof and send a chicken on a string, down the chimney. The kid would lower and draw up the chicken till the chimney was cleaned. And the final time he would just drop the chicken down into the fireplace! Poor chicken!

Staying on Shakespearean topics, I decided to see Othello at the Globe Theatre in London. This is the third Globe to be built on the site of the original Globe. They have reconstructed it after much research on design and materials etc. Its been made to be as authentic as possible while keeping in mind modern health and safety laws. They even have standing tickets like in Elizabethan times. So, as befitting a poor unemployed ex-student, I bought the standing ticket and prayed that it would stop raining by the day of the play. My sackcloth and ashes routine was much appreciated for it was a nice and sunny on THE day. It was an evening performance for over 3 hours! I thoroughly enjoyed it though sometimes the details of the dialogue got away from me. I think Iago was my favourite. A very nicely done Iago- combination of smarmy bootlicker and evil dude plotting the downfall of ze moor. It was worth the killer cramps I got later that night!

Upon Westminster Bridge....

2007-06-11T15:37:00.000+05:30

My second day in London I walked up and down the riverside and crossed the Thames many times, on various bridges. It was quite a day. I must have spent 12 hours on my feet! Quite crazy.

After gaping at the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben, I crossed Westminster Bridge remembering Wordsworth. I doubt if Wordsworth would still say "Earth has not anything to show more fair...". The view from the bridge was non existent thanks to all the plastic billboards for the tube - hardly what he had in mind.

There were lots of places I had read about in the many books we devoured as kids. I was highly kicked to see Hyde Park, especially the Speaker's Corner where on Sundays anyone can hold forth on their pet peeve. Ring any bells, fellow Wodehouse fans? My favourite association with Speaker's Corner is Bingo Little in a false beard joining a communist rant because he wants to impress the girl he loves (one of the many!), who is communist. Bingo of course is desperate to hide his patrician background by railing at the aristocracy.

Heard of Ganga Jal? London has something similar - Canada water. Just kidding...obviously not! Canada Water I discovered is this region of London on the south side of the Thames. A cousin lives around there so I had to take the tube to the Canada Water station. Odd name. Wonder if they got water from Canada...just like Madras gets water from Andhra.

What is with the British love for silent letters and such? I was planning a trip by train to Salisbury. Stonehenge is easily accessible from Salisbury, you see. I kept pronounciating it as Salisbury, just like its spelt. Logical, I thought. Then I heard the train announcements and the guy was calling it Saulsbury! I should have just called it New Sarum. Apparently that was the original name of the town.

Tourists and mangy squirrels at the Brit Museum

2007-06-06T16:09:00.000+05:30

Strangely the hordes of tourists wherever I went surprised me. Rather silly of me considering I was one of the hordes and it was supposed to be the begining of summer. Of course it was tiresome when I had to wait while the lines inched forward at any tourist site. The worst was at the British Museum. I went there the day it rained cats and dogs. Obviously everyone had the same brilliant idea so just walking through a room was painfully slow. The majority of the tourists at the museum were not particularly interested in the exhibits. Many just stood around and chatted, blocking the way for dedicated museum freaks like self. And then there were those for whom it was a photo op....ooooooh lets take a pic of us with the Egyptian statue thing (actually it's Assyrian but who cares...). GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!

My humour was restored eavesdropping on these American girls at the museum who were discussing the mangy squirrels of Cleveland, Ohio. I quote, "Have you seen the ones in Cleveland. They are like so mangy with like clumps of hair falling out". "Yeeeeeeew"!!! I didn't realise that mangy squirrels were such a big issue in Cleveland. The things one learns at the museum!!!

Inspite of the imagery of mangy squirrels running amok in Cleveland, I had a good time at the museum. I saw the famous Elgin statues which the idiot Brit (Elgin) happily carted away from the Parthenon in the 18th century. Some of these were friezes of centaurs and lapiths (some human like thing) fighting. Exquisite except for the many missing heads of both. I just thought that they got damaged somewhere when I noticed a plaque under many of these friezes. Apparently various French and Italian dudes in the army (of France and Italy of course) coolly lopped off the heads as souvenirs! This was during the world wars or something.

Then there were the Assyrian exhibits. A very gruesome lot, the Assyrians. Lots of friezes again, of lion hunting with some very agonized looking lions, weirdly contorting their bodies. Plus more stuff showing the Assyrians massacring their enemies. Lots of decapitated folks being pulverized under the chariots. These friezes were strategically placed in the great hall where the king met visitors. Excellent psych warfare.

Ryan Air, corpses and Edinburgh

2007-06-02T01:00:00.001+05:30

In case you ever plan on transporting a corpse by air, here's some useful info. Budget airline, Ryan Air allows human remains only on their flights from London's Stansted to Ireland. This was on their FAQs page! Are there really that many queries about flying corpses? Wonder if one has to buy a ticket for the corpse? Would it be half price? After all no beverage service required.

Outside Edinburgh Castle they have two guys in complete Scottish garb much to the tourists' joy. A thrid kilted dude comes along every few minutes and twitches the kilts of the first 2 into place. I dubbed him the kilt checker. Didn't see him adjust the sporrans though! So who checks the kilt checker?

Talking of kilts... in the tourist shops as expected there are lots of kilts on sale. However, I felt that a tartan umbrella was taking things a bit too far. I thought of buying me dad a kilt. Only he would not have been amused. Would probably say something about making him wear skirts.

Curry Capital of the UK

2007-05-25T03:55:00.001+05:30

I've discovered something - England is buccolic! Unbelievably, unendingly so. And I had more than a decade's worth of scenic pastoral England on my train journey from London to Glasgow. Five mind numbing hours of green fields with fat, brown flecked white sheep -all looking damp and dismal. So much so that I actually cheered up when I saw Glasgow. (The Greenpeace types will probably feel I'm betraying the faith. Happy to see the urban jungle, especially one that grew out of shipyard industry? The horror of it all!)

Yet I did enjoy wandering around Glasgow. Wandered into GOMA (I forget what the O is for, MA for musuem of art and G is obvious). GOMA was a mistake (to wander into that is). My Neanderthal brain cannot process abstract modern stuff. I was highly entertained though by this fixture (or whatever artists call their things). Got it installation. It was about the 2 local football (or rugby) teams who are the local India and Pakistan cricket teams but worse (imagine!). They are unimaginatively called the celtics and rangers. There were posters with some African king in a pro celtics poster and for the rangers was Mangal Pandey!

I then went to the Glasgow School of Art which confusingly (at least to me) talked all about this architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh and his work. I had to read the pamphlet (to avoid showing my absolute ignorance about this guy) and found out that he had designed the school and is rather belatedly recognised as a big cheese in the architectural world. So took the tour of the school and learnt a bit more. To be honest it was quite interesting though the guide was over bubbly.

I better talk about curry at least to justify the title. The nice people on the tour bus informed us that Glasgow is the curry capital of the UK. Strange, I would have thought London but no the Scots love their curry. The tour guide actually pronounciated garam masala and curry quite clearly. And I did see many Indian restuarants around town. Even ended up going to one! Not bad but rather oily North Indian food.

Travels with a Backpack (no donkeys!)

2007-05-24T03:09:00.000+05:30

After 2 weeks in the UK, I'm finally getting used to doing things the British way. I have stopped saying, "How's it going?" or smiling at passersby. The first couple of days I wasn't sure if people in the UK greeted strangers like in America but apparently the brits are too taciturn. It is just not done. Now if only I could rid myself of the pesky "like" in every other sentence. How mortifying that I now speak American with ease!

Wee little me had to suddenly get used to the Scottish accent this week, having spent the last few days in Glasgow, Edinburgh and somewhere along the various lochs in western Scotland. The tour guides ham up the accent even more! I thought it was a stereotype- the wee and puir- but I actually heard it! And then there were those incomprehensible train station announcements in Edinburgh. The accent was so thick I didnt get any of it. Worse than the Hindi announcements in Chennai Central where the emphasis and pauses are always off.

Nevertheless, I had a good time wandering around Glasgow and Edinburgh. Edinburgh has this hill on the outskirts which was asking to be climbed, so I did. The view was, as we say in American, LIKE AWESOME! I could see across the Firth of Forth. I have always liked that name. Has a nice ring to it. Unfortunately I had to squint at the view as the stiff winds kept blowing grit into my eyes. Then I had lunch at Deacon Brodie's cafe where they have a rather ugly plaster of Paris Brodie beckoning you into the cafe. Brodie is part of Edinburgh legend. Apparently he was a fine upstanding pillar of society by day, and a burglar by night. Nowadays we elect such people to be our heads of state.

I was unpleasantly taken aback to see Starbucks, KFC, McDonalds etc all over the place. Actually I wasnt too unhappy to see Starbucks as I thought here was something familiar. It was comforting as I was very skeptical of British coffee (if such a thing exists). Sadly, Starbucks in UK tastes even worse (their coffee was never great to start with) than in the US. The latte is basically milk with a smidgeon of coffee. Terrible! The excellent single malt I had earlier today made for the trials and tribulations though!

The Right Side...of the...pavement?road?asphalt?

2007-05-18T05:10:00.000+05:30

Who would have thought I'd have trouble crossing the road. Isn't that something one masters as a kid, especially when one grows up in India where we have it down to a fine art? I thought that when I get back to a land where they drive on the right side of the road, I would rejoice and feel absolutely at home. It was not to be! I'm in England and I keep looking left before crossing and then just as I step off the sidewalk, or pavement or whatever, I remember that left is right! To add insult to injury, I have to start thinking metric again! Just when I had finally got the hang of gallons, quarts and ounces. Though to be honest, I never quite understood ounces. I went to the grocery store today and actually ended up calculating that 1 kg is about 2 lb!

(I feel like George W. when he said something about the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing and simultaneously reiterating his point by flailing his left and then his right hand! You have to see it to get it. As always YouTube can help there. It should be on Letterman's Top Ten George Bush Moments. I shall have to take comfort in the fact that I can spell better than Georgie. I doubt he'd be able to spell reiterate correctly!)

As for my impressions of England...she lives up to her stereotype - damp, drizzly and full of people who call you 'love' and are quite happy to discuss the weather! It is an excellent conversation starter, though there is only so much discussion of the weather that can take place.

The mama sequel…

2007-05-06T20:48:00.000+05:30

Unfortunately for me, I saw the mama again a couple of days ago. I hoped to do the nod-half smile quick getaway but he started talking, “I will give you my address in Chennai. When you visit Chennai you must come and visit. I will be able to advice you. Free advice, ha ha ha”. On what? How to be a narrow minded pompous ass? Gee, I wouldn’t pass that up for the world!

The Simon & Garfunkel song, 7 O'Clock News/Silent Night was playing and the lyrics caught my attention. The format being a newscaster reading the (what else?) news. The last few lines was pure déja vu...

“Former vice-president Richard Nixon says that unless there is a substantial increase in the present war effort in Vietnam, the U.S. should look forward to five more years of war.
In a speech before the convention of the veterans of foreign wars in New York, Nixon also said opposition to the war in this country is the greatest single Weapon working against the U.S.”

This is what Dubya has been saying except he is talking about Iraq. My favourite part being that opposition to the war means playing into the hands of the Enemy and supporting the Enemy and is Unpatriotic! This in the land where the first amendment to the Constitution safeguards the freedom of speech!

The ‘I can blade you cos we are both Tamilians in a strange land’ mama…

2007-05-06T08:51:00.000+05:30

I was walking the dog and I had my headphones on as usual. The dog was being recalcitrant so I scolded him – in Tamil. The next thing I hear is a mama voice piping up behind me, “are you Tamil? Are you from Madras?”. Yipes! I got stuck there for a good 15 minutes making stilted conversation. And that was long enough to get all the pertinent facts of the mama’s life. Fascinating! All about his daughters who live in the US and the green card he hopes to get….and the kicker, “India is the most draabai country ever”. After some desultory remarks he goes’ “A friend of mine, Sundaram came here and married a white woman. He sent me an invitation. Church wedding. I was so angry that I tore it up.” Thrilling!!! I’m stuck making blade conversation with an unpatriotic bigot. In between the ranting, he cleverly slips in the classic Q, “Are you brahmin?”. Wonder what other endearing traits he has. I can wait to find out.

I’m a GAY TAMBRAM!

2007-05-05T09:47:00.000+05:30

I bet it news to you (it was to me!) but its true…for all of 30 seconds! My cousin & I went out for a drink to commemorate my last evening in the OC. We were at the bar when this couple- an old female about 50 or so and a younger guy sat next to us. We made some casual conversation and they seemed pleasant enough. After a while my cousin went out for a smoke and the woman asks me, “Are you two together? A couple?”. I do get asked the strangest questions! I think I give out some ‘ask me bizarre questions’ signals. I was so taken aback that all I could do was gape and say, “uh, no. she’s my cousin’. The woman then promptly lost interest! Make what you will of that.

Yiiiipppppppeeeeeeeeee!! The sabres won against the rangers!!! For the uninitiated I’m talking ice hockey. I got interested in this crazy sport when I visited family in Buffalo. The Buffalo sabres are one of the top teams and since they were my intro into ice hockey they became my team by default. What I understand of the game is close to non existent but it is fun especially when they start brawling, which is quite often!

OC and Marxist theory…

2007-05-04T12:38:00.000+05:30

Life in Irvine, SoCal has been rather bland. But then what else can you expect from white republican middle aged orange county? The high point of the last few months was my visit back to Corvallis, OR. I went to pack up the rest of my stuff and catch up with friends. I swear in the week I was there, I drank more alcohol than in the last 6 months. Shows what a pathetic state my life has come to. One memorable evening was spent discussing political theory over alcohol (of course!). This discussion involved a very eclectic group- 2 Italians, 1 Spaniard, 1 Turk, 1 Kurdish Turk and moi (ze Indian). A slightly bizarre but fun evening was had by all. So there we were all speaking a strange foreign tongue and discussing Marxism and socialistic theories. Wonder what all the Americans around us thought!

p.s. For the folks unfamiliar with the OC (Orange County), its a lovely part of California which is famous for not just the rich white republicans but also for the eponymous TV series about more rich white young things who lead a seemingly charmed life.

American Idol is my inspiration.....

2007-05-04T01:03:00.000+05:30

In case you noticed that my blog url is pronounciate.blogspot and wondered ????? I caught a bit of an episode of American Idol where they had some famous singer (I forget who) as a guest judge who sagely gives advice to the wannabes. Its one of those profound TV moments which on reflection are quite hollow. So the judge goes, "You sang great, blah..blah but you need to pronounciate better". It took a sec for that to sink in…..new word for the English language. Call the OED!!!!!!!

the chronicles updated!

2007-04-19T11:13:00.000+05:30

I thought I'd start this blog as the new face of the Chronicles but wiser counsel prevailed. If the blog replaced the Chronicles email, too many people around the world would be happy at not receiving that email. I can't have that on my conscience. Hence, I came to the conclusion that the wisest course of action was to do both- blog (and seem cool) as well as harass people with the Chronicles email.