Kurukshetra

care for a sadhya?

2011-02-28T23:00:00.001-05:00

enjoy this virtual sadhya!

When Faith becomes the Scapegoat

2011-01-28T12:55:00.000-05:00

The Curious Case of Mallitosis

2010-09-20T20:39:00.000-04:00

Venu Nagavally, Oru Orma...

2010-09-11T16:53:00.000-04:00

http://www.yentha.com/news/view/5/1379

One Big Movement for One Small District

2010-06-04T10:04:00.002-04:00

The torch has been lit. Now carry it on!

2010-04-06T16:05:00.001-04:00

http://www.yentha.com/news/view/5/185

September of Losses

2009-09-04T23:46:00.001-04:00

April might have been the cruelest of months to T S Eliot, but to me it’s been September. Every year as September approaches my heart fills with trepidation. It has been the month that has brought in almost every death that affected me one way or the other.

1996 September took away my grandfather. My grandmother, dutiful wife that she was, promptly followed him the next September. After a brief respite for a couple of years, 1999 brought in the worst of them all. My father. I still remember the phone call that Tuesday night. It was September 21st. Curiously my husband shut the room’s door when he took that call. I was having dinner and watching ‘Something about Mary’ on HBO. I thought the TV’s volume might have bothered him. He waited till I was done with dinner before he told me. After that I always turn the TV off when that movie plays. I don’t think I will ever watch it again.

I’d just seen my dad off at the JFK airport 15 days back. The last I saw of him was just before he turned the corner behind the Kuwait airways counter on his way to board the plane. He turned back and stood there for almost a minute just looking at me till my mother urged him to move on. I can never forget the look on his face and that’s the image of him that I carry in my heart. I never saw him after that. I didn’t make it for the funeral. Told them not to wait for me. I’d rather remember him alive.

I also learnt a valuable lesson that night. ‘Never wish for anything too hard’. You just might get it and it might not really be what you wanted. The day my parents left, I remember thinking, “I’d give anything to go home for a visit.” I got to go home. But the ‘anything’ I had to give was my father.

The year 2000 took away an uncle barely a week after the first anniversary of my father’s passing.

2001 brought no death, but there was a setback of another kind. The twin towers came down in NYC and so did the new startup company in California that my husband had just joined. A few weeks later I made the most memorable journey in my life. I flew halfway across the world, racing across airports with my three month old baby in a sling over my shoulder, my five year old daughter in a stroller and my mom who had fallen sick (she had come to help me with my daughter’s delivery) in a wheelchair.

The next three years went by with no incident. 2004 brought tragedy again. It was the 30th of September and I was just about beginning to breathe easy. 10 pm: almost there, two more hours to go, when the phone call came. This time it was a cousin. One I had grown up with. He had fought with me, told me several tall tales and brought me plenty of books to read. A kidney failure claimed him. He was just 46. He left behind a 36 year old wife and an 11 year old daughter.

The past few years again were uneventful and at midnight on September 30th, as the clock’s needle had edged towards October 1st I had been able to sigh with relief. I usually hold my breath the whole month and breathe only when necessary.

However this September tragedy struck again. This morning I heard what must have been the most shocking and unacceptable death of all. My sister –in-law’s nephew whom I’d known since he was 7 or so. Played with him and quibbled over comic books , when I used to spend a few days every summer vacation at my sister-in-law’s house. I saw him last on September 4th 2008, the day before I came back from India after attending my niece’s wedding. This September 4th, he is no more.

Just 35 years old. Too young to have a heart attack. I am still reeling from shock and my heart goes out to his bubbly and charming young wife and the adorable imp of a daughter who is just 3, and his parents whose grief I cannot even begin to imagine.

26 days more to go… before the wretched month comes to an end.

happy birthday!

2009-06-05T09:20:00.002-04:00

as husbands come, the guy’s one of a kind. she had always wanted a love marrriage… but that didn’t work out. uh uh, her family wouldn’t even entertain the thought. not even in their wildest dreams. so after a search that took more than three years, several misses and close misses, they finally found him for her.

maybe you could call it an arranged love marriage, the parents arranged the match and she promptly fell in love with him.

she had been pulled out of college where she was teaching in the middle of the day. “come on hurry up… someone’s coming to see you.” after the last ‘girlseeing’ fiascoshe was determined it would not happen again. she had reached the end of the tether and had just stopped short of telling her parents that she couldn’t care less if she got married or not and that she had had enough of the humiliation of being paraded in front of a stranger and the following rejections. the only reason she didn’t tell them was because she couldn’t bear to see the hurt in her parents’ eyes. they were getting on in age and well, beginning to get slightly desperate.

she opened her mouth to tell them she had no interest in seeing him. if he was keen on seeing her, he could just see her somewhere without her knowledge. but no one let her speak. “this is it. the search ends here. this will be the last,” they seemed to promise her.

“oh well, i’ll go along with it. but remember, this is the last,” she delivered an ultimatum.

on the way home she was told his ‘qualifications’, his job, and all those trivial details that parents and family are majorly bothered about. what did she care if he worked in a multinational company or where his sibling was married and settled.

“does he have a sense of humor?” does he think his wife is an equal or subordinate? will he treat me as a friend? will he give me the freedom to follow my dreams? will he be around to catch me when i fall? will he be patient enough to put up with my craziness? will he squash spiders for me? will he sing to me? does he have brown eyes? will he boost my morale when i need it most? will he help with the housework? will he be too proud to make up after a fight even if it is my fault? will he just turn around and go to sleep or hold me close and cuddle me? will he love me despite every annoyingly trivial and stupidly major blunder i manage to do through life? will he be man enough to say ,”i love you” atleast once a day?

those were the questions she needed answered, but they had to wait. she would find them all along the way; way deep into her marriage…

“He’s the guy for you,” her brother-in-law who was the first person to see him remarked to her as soon as he saw her at home. “all these years, and all the proposals we went through, nothing gave me a gut feeling that we found the right guy until today. you both will suit each other”. he said as he smiled warmnly at her. as a person who had seen her since she was a little girl, she was almost like his daughter.

finally he was there to see her.she was the first girl he was seeing and she was a veteran by the time, with a heart brimming with cynical pessimism.

the first time they saw each other. what she remembered most was his smile. open, friendly, a smile that touched his eyes. then they were sent to speak to each other alone, to understand each other better. she wondered at the absurdity of the whole thing. what exactly would they learn about each other by talking for a few minutes. but they were to be crucial few minutes. they spoke. a talk which was expected to last no more than 5 minutes somehow went on for longer. the five stretched into 40.

“are you a very serious person?” that was the first thing she asked him.

“do i look like one,? he grinned back at her.

somehow she knew they could get along on the same wavelength. movies, music, poetry, expectations, they discussed a bunch of stuff… at the end of it, both decided to stick together, for better or for worse…

14 years down the line, they still stuck together despite some mostly ups and rare downs. to his credit he never forgot an anniversary or a birthday. he even remembered some valentines days and mothers days as an added bonus. not that they really mattered.he was her daily bread – warm, nourishing, stable and reliable…

he helped her up everytime she fell. stood by her despite all her follies and foibles. made her dream on and pushed her along her chosen path – a fact that even she did not realize-, treated her as his friend, companion, and beloved, made her laugh, made her cry, squashed a whole bunch of spiders and vanquished her demons, allowed her to crush the bones in his hands everytime a contraction took her in the delivery room without batting an eyelid, made up everytime she picked a fight, companiably shared the housework, told her to stand tall and proud before him even after she had done badly, willingly forgave her even after she hurt him real bad, and held her long into the night whispering ,”i love you ” in her ears.

sometimes she felt she would go mad with her love for him, which usually overflowed its banks. she felt she could love the whole world , loving him. but he could never have enough of that love.he was always hungry for more just like her. even after 14 years they still managed to whisper sweet nothings to each other. he still sang to her and when his warm brown eyes looked deep into hers, she felt like she could let go the whole world, just for that one look from him. before him, nothing else mattered, and no one else mattered.

together they had built a shared life of laughter and tears, when faith in each other could get them through the worst, when words were not really needed for a conversation. it was not worth nothing…

that’s the way it is and that’s the way it should be.

with a deep sigh of realization and satisfaction, she placed her hand in his and turned to him and whispered, “happy birthday dearest! would you like for your birthday present one whole heart, untainted and happily given, just for you?”

I am...

2009-04-28T21:55:00.001-04:00

I am Earth
Raw, passionate,
Fragrantly alive
In my cool bluegreens
And lusty reds
Deep, sensuous,
Warm, musty, abundant
Vibrant, mysterious

I am River
Overflowing limits
Of bonding banks
Sinuous, laughing
Tremulous, turbulent
Stretching lithe curves
On the way to join
My deep blue sea

I am Sea
Eternal, longing
Unconquered depths
Of timeless treasures
Forbidden mystery
Tireless, beckoning
Fathomless, calm
Stormy, tempestuous

I am Mountain
Silent, menacing
Darkly brooding
Secret caves
Of hidden turmoil
Fiery passions
Of violent fervor
Cooling mists
Serene, tranquil
I am Earth
River
Sea
Mountain
I am Woman…

Rediscovery

2009-02-05T19:10:00.001-05:00

Sometimes a simple conversation can throw you off balance. It can either turn your world topsy turvy or take you on a ride on a time machine. Sometimes it can come along at the wrong time and make things just worse. Or they can pop up at the right moment and pull you out of the dumps. It can put you in a totally different frame of mind. Take you back to those magical days of youth when u saw rainbows in shards of glass or to mundane days of reality when you view everything through jaded jaundiced eyes.

Thankfully I went back and opened up doors I long thought were closed forever, awakened old memories, heady days of open rains and swirling mists of dust. It made me read again it made me write again. It brought back the songs I had forgottn to sing. Dusted off old volumes and rediscovered Whitman and Neruda. Realized I once dwelt with the likes of Shelly and Keats. I smelt the fragrant earth after the new rains, heard the mountains whispering to each other and relished the liberating pleasure of a simple sneeze. Slowly the slumbering lover, the dozing romantic in me sprang back to life as I tore away the straightjacket from my heart and the veil from my soul.

In my desperate bid to play the adult I had smothered the youth in me. In a never ending quest to maturity, I had forgoten who I was. What was I but for my dreams, my music my poetry, my heartful of passion and unbridled joy? I looked at my love with new eyes and suddenly wanted to be me again. He deserved to see the real me, the one I don’t think he ever knew. I had been acting a role trying to be who I was not, trying to fit into dutiful roles.

Let me be me, the true me, the unfetterd spirit, the dreamer, the lover, the poet, the idealist, the friend, the insufferable pain, the incurable egoist, the enigmatic non-conformist that defies description. Let me rekindle the fire that once burnt glorious in me. Let me be me…let me be free...

Close Encounter

2009-01-30T11:30:00.002-05:00

I’ve heard said that when you have a near death experience,
You see your whole life flash by in a second…
Well, they were wrong. Or maybe it wasn’t near enough…,
The one I had yesterday
When a huge SUV almost crushed my tiny beetle.
My fault… but I swear I didn’t see it coming.
I swear I checked for oncoming traffic.
But then I was in a pretty foul mood
And that probably caused a blind spot.
He/she braked and I swerved
Tragedy averted.
He probably yelled at me.
I don’t know… but this I know,
Someone definitely is watching over me.
My dad or god or my dad as god.
Nothing flashed by me
No elation, no disappointment
No laughter, no tear
No triumph, no failure
Not one special moment from 38 years of life
No suppressed longing no repressed regret
No unbridled joy
Neither were there subconscious memories
All I thought was, “How stupid could I have been!”
“I put my kids in danger! How could I?”
All I heard was rebuke, “How could I be careless
With my kids in the car!”
Chastised, I pulled over for a breather
My daughter, the elder one who realized what just occurred
Hugged me in an effort to cheer
The other one, unaware, carried on demanding what she was demanding…
Life went on, as I drove to their next class
But it was quite a while before my hands stopped trembling.

എനിക്കറിയില്ല

2009-01-21T15:48:00.006-05:00

എന്നോ എവിടെയോ ഉതിര്‍ന്നു വീണ ചില പൂക്കള്‍
ഓര്‍മ്മയുടെ ഉണര്‍വില്‍ നിന്നോ
മനസ്സിന്റെ തുറക്കാത്ത കവാടത്തില്‍ നിന്നോ
എനിക്കറിയില്ല

ഒന്നും തിരികെ എടുക്കാന്‍ മുതിര്‍ന്നില്ല
കാണാന്‍ മറന്ന സ്വപ്‌നങ്ങള്‍ മാത്ത്രം
ആ ഏകാന്ത വഴികളില്‍ അവയ്ക്ക് കൂട്ടായി...

Blame it on Alakananda

2009-01-05T11:22:00.000-05:00

I’ve heard quite a few women claiming to be ‘remote widows’ (you know, losing their husbands to the remote control…) and I’ve read quite a bit about how, like it or not, the male gene is programmed for that love affair with the remote. But I always thought I had escaped the fate, until quite recently.

The change was subtle. I did not even realize it was creeping in. what began as just a minor dalliance during his morning cup of tea, soon blossomed into a full fledged romance. I did not realize how bad it was until a couple of days ago my li’l girl gently pushed my husband off the couch to peer under him.

“Just checking,” she quipped.

“Checking what?”

“Checking if he’s put down any roots”.

I thought that might shame him into hauling himself off the sofa. No such luck. I cannot believe that my husband is turning into a couch potato. Gone are his days of biking, our morning walks, and the ping pong table languishes in our garage gathering dust. He was going to teach the girls to play over the winter break. The nasty cold weather might be blamed for the lack of exercise, but come on, there’s a limit to blaming the weather.

And for a person like me to whom watching TV is simply anathema, I find it intolerable. Like my orkut profile claims I’d rather browse or read a book than stare at the idiot box.

Like every ‘ dutiful’ wife I sat and pondered if it was all my fault and I’ve come to the conclusion that it indeed was. I was the one who arranged for them to meet. It all began last summer. We had only American channels then – the usual Time Warner cable connection that curiously was incapable of playing anything but Disney channel. (two girls-parents not that much into TV, minimum homework, 30 minutes of tv time each… well you do the math.)I soon realized that Disney was anything but what i had associated with the lovable Mouse and the whacky Duck.

While I might never forgive Walt for what he did to a certain little mermaid which incidentally, is favorite fairy tale (the original HCA version I mean), I do have my share of favorite Disney moments. That spaghetti scene in ‘the Lady and the Tramp’ if you ask me is one of the most romantic scenes ever captured on film. However, I staunchly believe that the ‘secret pop star’ Hannah Montana is no role model for my girls. Nor do I care much for Raven or her equally obnoxious brother. But those adorable twins: Zack and Cody and the long suffering Moseby… well, that’s another tale, and I fear I digress.

Coming back to my tale, we soon decided that enough was enough. It was high time they started watching some Malayalam channels for some cultural influence from home. I had enough of her belting out “ pumpin’ up the party now”. Maybe i could get her to hum a few mallu songs. First we tried one of those internet subscribed mallu channels. But it got to be a bit tedious, having to connect the laptop to the tv and switching screens and cables and what not. The idea soon lost its charm. And I did not hear my daughter humming ‘natha brahmathin sagaram…’

Then I slowly mooted the idea of a dish antenna and Indian channels. He was totally against it at first. But one fine day he decided we could go for it.

“Let’s do it. We’ll get a dish antenna and cut the American channels. We’ll just retain the basic channels. Then no more Disney".

Wow! I was thrilled. After mush discussions and consultation, we decided to go for the Asianet -Amrita combo. Idea star singer- all those puranic serials- the shot of spirituality from Amrita - movies. Those were the deciding factors. As a bonus, a couple of Hindi channels were thrown in too. Now maybe the girls will get a good dose of Indian culture. Of course, none of those dreadful tearjerker serials of course. The TV would be strictly off during those hours.

The antenna came by courier. My husband and a couple of friends, after a day’s toil managed to position it and soon we were receiving Indian channels on our TV. It was a Sunday and there was a nice old Lalettan movie on Asianet. ‘Unnikale oru katha parayaam’ I think. After ten minutes my little one wanted to surf channels. She found the Hindi channel. ‘Salaam Namaste’ was on.

“Hey that looks nice!” that was the older one.

“Yes deedi let’s watch this.”

I am sure the trendy clothes and the catchy music caught them.

Hmm, well, err, I let that pass. Oh, from tomorrow I’ll make sure they watch something more enriching.

From the next day I tried getting them hooked on ‘Sreemad Bhagavatham’ and ‘Devi Mahatmyam’. I failed miserably. Though they did show some interest, the timings were bad. After being draconian about their bed time at 10 sharp, I couldn’t ask them to stay up till 11 watching TV. So I gave it up.

Oh well anyway, long story short – they don’t watch much of TV. Nor do I find the programs particularly ‘culturally enriching’. Uh, you know what I mean. I don’t want to explain which aspect of Indian culture includes nubile and not so nubile young things in barely there costumes cavorting on stage with equally ‘misclad’ guys. (Yea, so I am a prude. SO…..? I am a mom too remember, and it’s a mom’s privilege to be a prude in certain things)

But all along, someone else was silently being reeled in. Slowly, steadily, stealthily, till he was totally hooked. ‘chakkinu vachathu kokkinu kondu’.

So here I am or rather me and the kids, left bereft. But I’ll take care of it. If I could bring it in, I can take it out too. So am starting to work on it. I’ll have those channels thrown out soon. Let me poison his mind. (hee hee I feel an evil cackle coming on)

Oh but just a moment, did I just hear my daughter hum a tune? Sounded awfully like ‘kolakkuzhal vili ketto…”

Hmmm, let me consider things for a while. Maybe I’ll just go for a TV curfew time first.

PS: What’s with the title you ask? Well, Alakananda is one of the leading news anchors on Asianet and a hot favorite if Google is anything to go by. You wouldn’t believe the number of people who hunt for her online, and most of them land on my blog. So I have no complaints. So I thought I’ll just give the title to my namesake. Come on, it sounded good to me. You don’t have a problem with that do you? Hey , its my blog remember?

It’s that time of the Year Again…

2009-01-02T22:10:00.000-05:00

Surprisingly not many asked that dreaded question yesterday at the low key New Year ‘party’ I attended yesterday. Low key for a lot of reasons, though I would like to think that the Mumbai terrorist attack was what put a dampener on the festivities. Who am I trying to fool? Our apathy has reached such abysmal depths of shame that Thanksgiving Day parties were going on full swing on 27th November . I know I attended one too. But I at least chose to wear black.

What was it that we were so thankful about? That we were not in Mumbai at the Taj/Trident/Oberoi on that accursed day? That none of our close kith or kin were on that list of blood and smoke? If I remember right it wasn’t even the hottest topic of discussion. They were talking about the decorated bird on the table and the intricacies of roasting a turkey.

The other topic was the upcoming Christmas day celebration coming up at the Mallu organization here. There I did try to breach the male ranks to reach the board members and suggested that we at least observe a ‘two-minute-silence-prayer’ routine before the program started in memory of those who lost their lives. Hey we lost one of ours too… a promising young man named Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan. Bear with me, I devoutly believe that all those lives lost were ours, but tried the Major’s name to gain leverage for my idea.

“Hmm, we shall definitely consider the idea. Thanks for the suggestion.” Ah, a nice way of saying no, I know. Atleast that was better than the other response I got. “ Idea Kollaam. But the situation is not right. It’s a celebration. We cannot bring this in and spoil the mood…” . I was aghast. Where was the enthusiasm with which I was sure my idea would be greeted? (oh well, yeah I had visions of being thanked for my great idea….”oh! wonderful! That is such a nice thought. Why, none of us even thought of it. You are so patriotic….” . ok none of that happened.) Anyway, I was really struck by the desperation with which people tried to ignore it.

And why wasn’t the situation right? Here we were, a big bunch of Indians, far away from home, gathering a few days after a horrific attack on the country, wasn’t it the perfect occasion to express solidarity with our homeland? Were we not morally bound to acknowledge the sacrifice of lives? Should that not have been the first thing on everybody’s minds? Moreover, in my book, a celebration was always a time to remember those that were not with us, those that did not make it. A time to celebrate their lives too.

And ‘spoiling the mood’??????????!!!!!!!

Excuse me! All these onam and Christmas ‘celebrations’ are surefire recipes for disasters anyway. Friendships are broken ever year over ‘prime time’ programs, song selections, rehearsal schedules, boys/girls groups and what not. Moods were going to go awry anyway. Whether the moods of people with such trivial issues were worth considering is a matter of opinion.

So at the end of it I was left totally disgusted with everyone, most of all with myself. I was part of that apathetic bunch too. Why are we all so happy to remain in our own safe cocoons? When are we going to start caring? What wake up call did we need to show some empathy?
Anyway that brings me back to the quest ion I was asked. “Have I made any New Year resolutions?”

Well, I have made one, one which I hope I will stick to through the year. Nope, its not to lose 30 pounds in two months , not that I shall organize my closets and cupboards, not even that I shall hereafter leave the kitchen clean and sparkling every night unlike the ‘yudhdhakkalam’ I leave behind every night.

All I resolved and promised myself was that I would write everyday. Whether I felt like it or not, whether it sounded good or bad. Whether I post what I write or publish it or just let it languish in some oblivious corner of my hard disk. In sadness and joy, in health and sickness, for richer or poorer, I’ve decided to stay true and truly wedded to the only thing I think I can do- write. A minimum of 500 words a day. Let me see if I can do it. If I can, I’ll keep you posted. :)

Home Sweet Home

2008-07-08T17:19:00.000-04:00

PEOPLE,

Its been a while. a loong long while... and finally...

I AM GOING HOME!

AFTER 2 AND A HALF LOOOOOONG YEARS I AM GOING HOME :))

I CANNOT WAIT TILL I GET TO MY OWN SWEET PARADISE THIS SIDE OF HEAVEN.

FOR THE NEXT FEW WEEKS AM GOING TO BE SHUTTLING BETWEEN NAGERCOIL AND TRIVANDRUM.

SO LONG AND FAREWELL TILL THEN. CATCH U ALL LATER :))

Wedding Blues

2008-05-29T14:17:00.000-04:00

It was yesterday when realization suddenly struck me. Barely a week to go, there’s a wedding in the family and what am I doing, stuck halfway across the world. It sinks in slowly that I will be missing the wedding. Though I knew right from day one when they fixed the date that I would be missing it, I guess I chose to ignore the fact. Veteran escapist that I am, I just pushed the thought away, tucked it into the remotest corner of my mind and refused to let it out. And like all things that you prefer to keep hidden away have the tendency to pop up when you least expect it, this has popped out too. Like my messy kitchen cabinet that one fine day decided it could take no more of my stashaways and burst open right in the middle of a fancy dinner party I threw.

If I just sit back and close my eyes for a moment I could be transported right back home. I can see the utter pandemonium reigning supreme there. I can just hear my bro-in-law yelling at my sis for having forgotten to remind him to invite that cranky old neighbor who fortunately moved to the other end of the country two years ago, while she desperately hunts for that all important telephone directory that contains all the addresses and phone numbers of anybody who is anybody. “I swear ----, that I just left it on the table for a while when I went to answer the door. When I came back it had simply disappeared. It’s eerie,” she griped to me over the phone. Supernatural forces at work I am sure.

And all the other one million little things that were adding chaos to the utter confusion. If the painter came, the carpenter wouldn’t. If both decided to honor the house with their presence they would manage to trample all the newly planted shrubs and plants underfoot. Or the borewell motor that just decided to stop working a week before the wedding. Well, that particular mechanic… he was off to a wedding himself. “Close wedding sir, my wife’s third cousin’s grandfather’s uncle’s neighbor sir. How can I not go? How will I face them again?” of course, he had to attend it.

I can hear my brothers arguing about which color would be best as the stage backdrop at the reception or whether the stage should be decorated with just flower bouquets or whether a couple of bonsais need to be thrown in too, for effect; my elder-bro-in-law quietly and efficiently giving instructions for hall-arrangements-public relations etc. he is a miracle worker who can get things done without any of the accompanying turmoil that usually accompanies the other members in the family; my elder sister is probably busy trying to decide the day’s menu while my sisters in-law are doubtless trying to keep the early, ‘much-too eager- to- help,- but- hindrance- actually-visitors’ entertained. My mom’s probably happily swapping tales with my bro-in-law’s mom. And the kids? My umpteen nephews and nieces? While the guys are probably being chased around on errands, the gals must be sitting around discussing… what else, but what to wear?

Sitting here with my eyes closed I can just imagine them all sitting around the dining table, hear the carefree chatter, the querulous complaints, the hysteric laughter (courtesy my sister - oh, you should hear us three sisters get together, we’d give the three witches of Macbeth a run for their money any day when it comes to cackling), the giggling fits and loud arguments that must be going on. Why I can even smell the jasmine strands they must be tying up, the sambhar bubbling in my sister’s kitchen, and the rasavadas they must be having with tea.
.
Over the past few weeks every phone call home has been an update on the wedding scenario. Whether it was the trip to RmKV, Thirunelveli for the ‘sari to be given to the bride’ or the trip to Balaramapuram for the ‘mundum neriyathum’, again to be given to the bride, and the groom’s ‘mundu’, or the myriad trips to bhima/alukkas/josco/our family goldsmith for you know whats. Or how exhausted my sis-in-law and sister ended up after having 'invited' 80 houses in a single day!

Right now I know the colors of everyone’s sari, both the ones for the wedding at Trivandrum and the reception at Nagercoil, what each person is wearing the day before the wedding and so on and so forth. Right from my sister’s ‘third- layer- of –onion- skin- color’ (which she believes is not too flashy and is befitting to the dignified ‘mother-in-law’ look) to my niece’s ripe mango bordered by apple peel a day after its been peeled. (Note to guys who read this: don’t even go there. You wouldn’t even be able to envision those colors. It’s a gal thing. Unfortunately you lack the gene. That’s why pumpkin and peach are just fruits to you).

I wonder if they’ll rag this couple too, like they did when my eldest nephew got married. Well, things had quietened down and it was time for the bride and groom to retire to their room. All the kids under the able leadership of my husband locked up their room and refused to part with the key unless my nephew shelled out good money. And then started the craziest auction of all. Finally when the price reached Rs.10000 and there still seemed to be no sign of going, going, gone, my nephew decided enough was enough and decided to move on to one of the posh hotels in the city. Even they wouldn’t charge that much for a night’s stay. And best of all they could have some peace and quiet and ‘quality’ time away from the jingbang. Anyway, things were settled then for a modest Rs.2500/- and the money was handed over to my husband, him being the oldest among the ‘kids’.

Anyway, the tale of that money is not over yet. We decided to give it to my sis for safekeeping until such a date when the whole family had gathered together under one roof. Unfortunately, it’s been 7 years and 4 months now and the family has grown bigger by 6 (that particular couple themselves have a couple of kids now) but the day has not yet arrived. Hopefully that will happen sometime soon and when it does, my sis has some serious accounting to do. Seven years worth of interest you see ;)… From what I hear, this nephew, the one getting married now is gearing up for all eventualities. With a crazy family like ours, you can never be sure.

And why am I missing the wedding or rather weddings (because a couple of months later, my niece is getting married too). I miss my nephew’s because my daughter has exams just then, vacation does not start yet. And my niece? She’s getting married a week after my kids’ school reopens after summer vacation. Methinks I smell a strong conspiracy. My bro and my sis, along with the numerous planets and stars in their ascents and descents ruling and lording it over their respective houses, have hatched a sinister plot to keep me away. How come they couldn’t find a date to accommodate me otherwise? Chechi and chetta dears, you have some serious answering to do.

I know we're going to be sorely missed and when you all pose for that big family photo on June 4th, there's going to be a big void that only the four of us can fill and I know what each one of you will be thinking at that moment,-"Wish they were here!"

30 Questions Tag

2008-04-25T13:57:00.000-04:00

BVN tagged me on this....

1. LAST MOVIE YOU SAW IN A THEATER:
Katha Parayumbol (I actually teared up at the end. Never thought I’d see the day when Mammootty could do that to me… but come to think of it, I’d rather give credit to Sreenivasan)

2. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING?

‘All Quiet on the Western Front’ by Erich Maria Remarque for my bookclub. It’s a reread, but it did not affect me this way the last time I read it about 15 years back. Guess I am growing old.
Also ‘A Swiftly Tilting Planet’ by Madeline L’Engle. Part of the Wrinkle in Time Trilogy. It’s a kids’ book, but don’t let that deter you. Beautiful and haunting. i think a grown up would enjoy it more.

3. FAVORITE BOARD GAME?
Good ol’ ‘Thaayam’. But I need my sisters-in-law to play along to really enjoy it. Without that, hmmm, scrabble or is it monopoly?

4. FAVORITE MAGAZINE?
Come to think of it, I barely read magazines now. There used to be an old humor mag called ‘Madhu Muskan’ published years ago. Remember it anyone?

5. FAVORITE SMELLS?
There used to be a sprawling ‘vaasimottu’ in my grandparents’ house. Neither the house, nor the tree exists today. But a sapling of it, brought home and planted near our front gate thrives today. It flowers in the evening. And sitting out on the verandah when it’s in full bloom… while at Disney’s Animal Kingdom last year, I found a plant in full bloom. The fragrance just hit me and for a moment, I was home.
The earth after the first rain.
And then of course am a sucker for that smell of newborns… and the smell of Pears soap. Somehow arouses the maternal instinct in me, which my kids otherwise manage to quell.

6. FAVORITE SOUND?
Rain… as it can only rain back home.
And the sound of the key turning the lock, signaling that my husband is back home.

7. WORST FEELING IN THE WORLD?
Feeling that no one misses you. Imagine calling up home and someone saying, "this vishu everyone was here except ‘so and so’, with the 'so and so' not being you.

8. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU THINK OF WHEN YOU WAKE?
I’m packing the kids off to school and coming right back to bed.

9. FAVORITE FAST FOOD PLACE? Thattukadas (is there a recurring theme running through this tag?) Nikhunjam.There used to be a Downtown in palayam back in the early 90s. too bad it's closed down.
Here, maybe Philly steakhouse (love their gyros)

10. FUTURE CHILD'S NAME?
I think I am done with that. But then hypothetically speaking… Dattatreya and Mrithyunjaya (since we’re speaking hypothetically, thought I might as well go for twins. I would love to see my neighbour get her tongue around that one! The kids I hope would appreciate their classical names. Atleast I didn’t name them like this.)

11. FINISH THIS STATEMENT. "IF I HAD A LOT OF MONEY I'D...? go home. And then maybe a world cruise, stopping enroute to buy that sun-drenched island.

12. DO YOU DRIVE FAST? Nope, irritate my husband by always driving 5 miles BELOW the speed limit. He sticks to the speed limit by the way.

13. DO YOU SLEEP WITH A STUFFED ANIMAL? Nope have a much warmer bed buddy to hug;)

14. STORMS-COOL OR SCARY? Both. Great BMW (you know what I mean and its nothing to do with wheels) combined with #13.

15. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST CAR? Maruthi 800. Navy blue.

16. FAVORITE DRINK? My morning cuppa chaya with chukku and elaichi. Then rosemilk and mango lassi.

17. FINISH THIS STATEMENT, "IF I HAD THE TIME I WOULD ..... write that book.(hah! Who am I kidding? I would still do what I do now. Absolutely nothing. )

18. DO YOU EAT THE STEMS ON BROCCOLI? Yes. I run it in the food processor and mix it in with my chappathi atta. That way we all eat broccoli. Even the kids don’t complain.

19. IF YOU COULD DYE YOUR HAIR ANY COLOR, WHAT WOULD BE YOUR CHOICE? Some day I want to get a tri-color done, just to freak out my kids.

20. NAME ALL THE DIFFERENT CITIES/TOWNS YOU HAVE LIVED IN. now that’s some list… Nagercoil (it’s home), Trivandrum(that’s second home), Bangalore (my dream, which I desperately hope will not turn into a nightmare), Bensalem-Philadelphia(great place. First in the US), Santa Clara (hated it), Petaluma(nice place but too short a time), Chennai(I hope I never have to live there again), Raleigh(so far so good). Now ,all I want to do is put down roots someplace.

21. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH? Nah…

22. ONE NICE THING ABOUT THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU. BVN :) he has a great sense of humor.

23. WHAT'S UNDER YOUR BED? Fortunately there is absolutely no space to shove anything under my bed. If not… I wouldn’t be able to yell at my daughter for hiding away trash under her bed.

24. WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE BORN AS YOURSELF AGAIN? Yes please. Wouldn’t trade places for all the sun drenched islands in the world. Maybe just not as lazy…

25. MORNING PERSON, OR NIGHT OWL? Night night night.
“They called me an owl
For I keep the stars company.
And when the world stirs to life,
I turn my back upon it.
And like the wicked vampire
I return at dusk
To suck life out of night.”

26. OVER EASY, OR SUNNY SIDE UP? Sunny Side Up. Such a cheerful way to start the day :)

27. FAVORITE PLACE TO RELAX? On a hammock under the palm trees on that sun-drenched island. But until I write that book that will make me all that money that will help me buy that island, I think I’ll settle for that old divan at home (as in nagercoil).

28. FAVORITE PIE? Pecan Pie. Love the Apple Pie from Koshy’s in Bangalore too.

29. FAVORITE ICE CREAM FLAVOR? Rum n’ Raisin. but nothing beats the Vanilla at Warren’s Nagercoil. That’s the only flavor they have.

30. OF ALL THE PEOPLE YOU TAGGED THIS TO, WHO'S MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND FIRST? Don’t know. So am not tagging anyone. I hope someone surprises me. Anyone listening?

P.S. : Dilip Krishnan has taken up the tag over at rediffiland.

Into the Scheme of Things

2008-04-07T20:59:00.000-04:00

Funny how you make
An infinitesimal blob
In the middle of nowhere.
Like moths drawn to their Fate
Drawn to your useless ties.
Dancing to the tunes of Maya*
As she dances to the cosmic drum.
In the mad cavorting of life
When you think you had a glimpse
Of Eternity in another’s eyes
Days when sleep eluded you
And like the ill-fated monster
You “cried to sleep again”.
And through it all,
The wonderful, fantastic, misery
And the pain of human life;
A pain so brutal;
A pain so beautiful; a pain that soothes the heart,
In this crazy world,
Where the dying mourn the dead.

The Cry

2008-03-12T21:40:00.000-04:00

Days of white heat and pouring rain,
When the mountains cry in anguish;
You float by, but hear no whimper.
When the fury ebbs, the mountains sigh.

Deep within, the earth roils;
Her sweat pours forth
A beautiful bloom,
Borne in the prime of pain.

As furrow by furrow,
Man hacks through
In search of gold,
Of gold and lust.

Lost amidst the days of yore,
Some atavistic memory
Cries out to a prehistoric God,
That silent rides the mountains high.

Date with Destiny

2008-02-11T16:07:00.000-05:00

“Kanden Kaaliyai,” that was all he said. But in those two words was a sense of longing which was 35 years in the fulfilling. A hunger he had carried in his heart since he was 15, the longing to see his ishtadeivam, Kali, and not just any Kali mind you, but Sri Ramakrishna’s Kali, the Mother at Dakshineshwar, She who had inspired him and set him off on a proud spiritual quest.
Though he had travelled all the way to the other side of the world, a trip to Kolkata never seemed to materialize. He covered all the metros… Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi … why he had even made the Kailash Manasarovar yatra, but Kali’s city somehow eluded him. Finally when his sister and family made the trip and brought back Kali’s Prasad for him, he could take it no longer. He had decided once and for all that he was going to make it, he was going to rendezvous with the Terrible One within a year, and he did.
And finally when he did set his eyes on Her, surely he closed them in bliss. A tumult of emotions that welled up within him surely flowed down his eyes unabashedly; tears of pure unadulterated joy, of a longing finally fulfilled.
And at last when he was tranquil enough to let his little sister know that he had seen Her, he knew that no words could fully express the magnitude of what he had experienced. So he resorted to one of Tamil’s greatest poets, a wizard of words who long before Shakespeare proved that brevity is the soul of wit. Kambar, who spoke volumes in the two words that fell out of Hanuman’s mouth when He returned to Rama after his successful quest to find Sita. “Kanden Sitaiyai,” was all He said. But He conveyed a world of meaning in those two words.
And so, he borrowed the words of his sister’s ishtadeivam to tell her that he had finally succeeded in his quest. After all, she was the only one in the family who could really appreciate the fine nuances, the power, and the significance of those two words,” Kanden Kaliyai”.

Another Diwali, Far From Home

2007-11-12T07:38:00.000-05:00

I love Diwali. It is the only festival in our parts that sanctions non-vegetarian food. Dunno what the story behind that is, but whatever it is I have no complaints. Every other festival calls for an over dose of sathvik food. And a couple of days before the onset of the veggie festivals itself I go into pangs of anxiety. ‘Green Anxiety’ -a sudden and inexplicable need to stuff my face with anything which once had legs/fins/shells/or got laid (ummm you know what I mean; so minds out of the gutter please). I simply go pure non-veg in preparation for (sometimes just a day of) the vegetarian ordeal ahead. I get almost panicky, and stay up till midnight to have my last omelet at 11.59 pm.

Diwali lets you go tamasik. I really don’t know if that is a Tam tradition on a Mallu one. Anyway, its one of the best features of living in a mixed culture like that of Kanyakumari district. See, like I said once, the best of both worlds. In Kerala, Diwali is not at all a big thing. Just a bursting of crackers, And often even that goes by with just a whimper. Mallus are big on crackers during Vishu, or so I understand.

Anyway back to Diwali, and this time too as usual, I was tempted with e-mails and now scraps on orkut too, from the folks back home, all about the awesome mutton curry my sis-in-law made or the delectable chicken biriyani my sis made. Yea that’s de rigueur, mutton curry and dosa for breakfast and chicken for lunch, either fried or as biriyani.

And then the diwali palahaarams. The sweets and the savories. Parippu vada is a must for us. The rest can follow as the case may be. Stuff that everyone made, -the friends and neighbours- would come pouring in. and it is sweet indulgence indeed to sit with family and a cup of chaya around the dining table, comparing the merits of my mom’s vada against my aunt’s or the silkiness of our kesari against that of our neighbor’s or how so-and-so’s unniyappam could have been just a li’l bit softer. And two days after diwali all the parippu vadas mysteriously reappear as rasa vadas. I love the parippu vadas just for that, in anticipation of the rasavadas that are to follow.

This year round, our family seems to have had a standard menu when it came to the palahaarams. Whether it’s the Nagercoil/Trivandrum/Bangalore/Vishakhapatnam or the US branch, everyone went for unniyappams and parippuvada. The more enterprising ones (read everyone other than me) made more stuff like seven cups and kesari and diamond cuts etc. I made unniyappams for the first time this year. I went ahead with it since every time my mom or sis-in-law made it at home, it would come out perfect, soft and ‘poo pole’ (soft as a flower, so to say) and would stay so for days, unless it got over by then. It’s this foolproof recipe that we got from a neighbor, which uses just rava, jaggery and ghee. It simply cannot go wrong, something like ‘Unniyappam for Dummies’.

Well I proved them all wrong. I have this unique talent for making the most ‘fail-safe’ recipe fail. If a recipe can be messed up, rest assured I shall do it. Even if it cannot be, leave it to me, I’ll find a way. So my unniyappams turned out rock-hard. Mind you, they were tasty, once you managed to break through the crust without damage to your teeth.

They reminded me of the ‘eripadakkams’ or ‘throw crackers’ back home. You know the ones you hurled hard on the ground and they went boom. Those were my favorite kind of crackers and I miss them so. And maybe that is why I unconsciously made my unniyappams turn out like them. Ahhhhhhhh that’s it. That’s why they failed, I didn’t actually mess up. It was my sub-conscious effort to psychologically reconnect with my cherished childhood and indulge in comforting, warm, fuzzy, nostalgia to counter the debilitating effects of being far from home on a much loved festival. (phew!)

So folks, Happy Diwali or like we say it, Deepavali! Yeah yeah, I know I am late. I was too busy indulging in my favorite pastime – nostalgia of course!

The Grand Old Man in the Closet

2007-10-29T12:21:00.000-04:00

Yup, he’s out. Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot and Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards, better known as the dearly departed Headmaster of Hogwarts, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore is gay.
His creator JK Rowling pushed him out of the closet just last week while answering questions at Carnegie Hall. Well, that was a bolt out of the blue.

Yes, he was pushed out, he did not come out on his own. What I do not understand is why Jo had to do it. What points was she trying to score? Of course, she has always been awfully PC right from the start. She has been very careful to show no discrimination based on race, religion, sex, gender, class, financial condition or intelligence. But she always steered clear of sexual orientation, to an extent that all teachers at Hogwarts were portrayed as almost asexual. Maybe this was because the books primarily started off as children’s books, before they became darker and more serious, as the series progressed.

Except for the late revelation about the ill fated love of Prof.Severus Snape, we know nothing about the love lives of the rest of the teachers at Hogwarts. No mention about spouses or children or families. Many did speculate if the kindly Headmaster with his twinkling blue eyes and joi de vivre and his stern, strict but warm hearted deputy Prof. Minerva Mc Gonagall had something going on. A case of opposites attracting. Apparantly not.

What we now know is that Dumbledore desired a man, a dark sorcerer no less, Jo’s Hitler - Grindelwald. But once they separated ways, what did he do? Did he not want to seek love after that?

So coming back to the revelation, why did Jo do this now? Was she trying to score points with the homosexual community? Wasn’t it a bit late for that? If she did, she should have said so in at least one of the seven books- atleast the last one where she brought this much loved, character a notch or two down, and revelaed to us his feet of clay. When she showed us that Dumbledore was only human, she could have revealed this too.

And more importantly, if she wanted to show that she had no sexual prejudices, the fact should have come from the man himself. Since he kept it a secret, does it mean he was ashamed of it? So how does that make her look?

Frankly speaking, though I have nothing against anyone’s sexual preference, I feel that this was totally unnecessary. At this point anyway. The man is dead and buried/cremated/whatever, His tomb has already been plundered. Voldy’s gone forever and everyone has got on with their lives. And most of us have come to terms with his humanity. Why dig up this new controversy now?

Jo, leave him alone. Just let his weary old bones rest in peace, atleast hereafter.

Matters of Faith and Other Such Things

2007-09-13T07:10:00.000-04:00

Go on, make your own statement. Never mind that it might hurt the sentiments of a billion plus people. After all, they are the punching bags. When they believe, it is superstition, when others believe, it is faith. When they protest it is stoking communal flames, when others protest, they are fighting for minority rights.

Where are you oh breastbeaters! The harpies and bleeding hearts who cannot bear a pinprick against humanity? Oops my mistake. Their hearts do not bleed or their voices shrill for everyone. Hmm, they do not even consider you human. What was I even thinking of? Like the emotions of a billion plus even matter!

And all you billion plus out there, followers of the most ancient faith in the world, pray while you can. ‘Your’ government by tomorrow probably would have outlawed your favorite gods and made praying to them illegal. After all what proof do you have of their existence?

All you have to show is millennia of unwavering faith that stood the test of time and sword. Or maybe you have a few paltry epics and songs composed as manifestations of purest bhakthi, in moments of Supreme Oneness. All your Thyagaraja Swamis and Tulsidases and Meerabhais and Chaithanya Mahaprabhus were probably hallucinating. Hah! Just psychological bull…

As for your countless gods, did you know they are being stretched out on Freudian couches and 'erudite' papers are being published about them. Go read them for your daily fix of the most absurd and most outrageous interpretations ever.

After all, what ‘scientific proof’, what hard proof do you have to explain your beliefs? Never mind that you follow the most scientific of faiths or that your faith has been the only one that has allowed scientific enquiry.

And while you are at it, don’t you dare question the beliefs of others. I could come up with a bunch of them, but my faith, which inculcates in me a basic respect for all faiths, prevents me from making such mindless statements.

Around the world, even the mighty tread carefully when it comes to matters of faith. Even the most innocuous details are handled with respect. Because when it comes to faith, it is a matter beyond question, beyond political statements, often beyond rational justifications, beyond government interference.

But over here, anyone can have a go. It’s a free for all. After all, who care about you? Even you do not. It is those among you that make such statements. Why else would you elect your spineless and senseless leaders? Fall at their ‘worthy’ feet, why lick their boots if it so pleases you, carry them on your heads and beg them to debase you. You deserve those who rule over you.

Meanwhile I have only one thing to tell the UPA government: “Koththi koththi muraththil keri koththatheda makane…”

P.S. Hate mail expected. Do drop in a line.

The Art of Missing Home

2007-09-05T22:50:00.001-04:00

It’s nostalgia time again. Yet another onam and yet another year ‘celebrating’ it away from home. And yet another day of my inbox filled with images so idyllic, so bucolic, so pure… I doubt if I would be able to find the originals even back home.

What is it with the Malayali and nostalgia? For a clan that has never hesitated to go and put in roots all over the place (remember that chayakkada on the moon?), or think twice before bidding goodbye to the beautiful shores of home, it is surprising that this is often the ruling emotion.

Yes, don’t you think that it is highly odd that the average Malayali spends most of his life dreaming of the other shore? When he is home, he dreams of leaving for (usually) the ‘gelf’ or the US. Once he gets there, then the rest of his free time (and he probably gets a lot of it considering the fact that now he does not have to tie and retie his mundu/lungi/kaili… as the case may be…) now is spent reminiscing about what he left behind.

Is it an incurable case of the GO TOSS (greener on the other side syndrome)? Is it programmed into the Mallu gene that in order to fully enjoy his Malayaliness, he has to go abroad or at least far away from that strip of land stretching from Kanyakumari to Gokarnam (I stick to the traditional boundaries and you know why). Sort of like it being a pre-requisite that being a Malayali means having to leave your beautiful land behind. He woos the world to come visit God’s Own Country. But all he dreams of is to leave it behind. And once he does that, that’s when realization hits… that it really is God’s Own Country… so now its nostalgia time…

And all the ones who left, what do we do? We have an uncanny knack for seeking each other out. Often one look at a person is all it takes. Facial features? A tell-tale moustache? The shape of the thali/mangalsutra? A golden anklet peeping out under the hem of your skirt? (believe me, that has been an identifier on me so many times. Apparently only the mallu wears gold on her feet. Others are more respectful.) Or more obviously, a heavily accented remark that ‘simbly’ gives you away.

And once we seek ourselves out what do we do? What else but bond of course? Other communities have accused us of being a lot of things, most of them unpleasant I assure you, and chief among them is that we are clannish. Maybe we are. But then, aren’t we all? So that’s where the bonding comes in. we majorly bond over our food, our music, and our politics more than over anything else.

We drool thinking of our kappa and meen curry, our appam and stew, our beef ularthiyathu and poricha kozhi; karimeen fry and chemmeen chammanthi; our avial and theeyal, pulissery and erissery, kaalan and olan; our matta rice, our ada prathaman, and our chenda muriyan; our sukhiyan and vazhakkyappam. Ahhhh… by the time we are done with the reminiscing, the most resolute of us can do nothing but rush to the nearest Indian grocery store and buy every ‘Daily Delight’ and ‘Wynad’ product in sight. What would we do without them to sate our insatiable appetites for ‘home food’. Bless those souls! We are slightly mollified, but after all that there is still a slight feeling of incompleteness… ah the fish we get back home tastes so much fresher, and the nenthrapazham so much sweeter…

And then our music. Show me one malayali who does not taste ecstasy as the notes of ‘alliyambal’ come wafting by. Ahhh those old Malayalam hits. Pure ambrosia I tell you. I have already elaborated on the topic of old Malayalam songs here. So I am not going into that again. But let’s suffice it to say that if there is one topic that the naturally argumentative mallu would be in absolute agreement about, it is on the topic of our one and only Dasettan. I don’t think the proud malayali is prouder of anyone else than he is of Yesudas. That is one person he would not hesitate ever to call his own.

A while back I heard someone conducted a survey to find out who the most popular/influential/well-liked Malayali is. They had on their lists Mohan Lal, Mammotty, VS Achuthanandan and others. It was a sign of monumental idiocy that Gana Gandharvan KJ Yesudhas was not on the list. If he had, then no doubt about it. He would have won it hands down, head and shoulders above the rest, in a landslide victory, to upset all upsets, a mother of all wins, so to say…(uh pardon the overflow of clichés. I tend to get carried away.)

My personal point of view is that when Dasettan sings ‘Hari Muraliravam…’ Earth herself stops midspin to listen. No two ways about it.

And I am pretty sure that every Mallu get together ends like ours does: marathon singing or anthakshari sessions extending into the wee hours of the morning. A nostalgic, heartfelt journey down memory lanes, all through old movie songs and KPAC Drama songs. Nothing else brings us closer like those old songs do. Discovering a fellow music lover, especially one who loves old songs is one of those wonderful “Ah!”moments that rank right up there with the best.

And then our politicians. Our Leaderji and Mon-ji Anthappan and Achumama. Love them or hate them; ignore them you cannot. Thanks to all those channels, and the wonderfully talented mimicry artists, our politicians give us so many hours of delightful laughter. And hats off to the ‘vitcims’ too. I don’t think this could happen in any other state in India. To not just make fun of the powers that be, and get away unharmed, but also to have them join in the laughter as well. That’s democracy for you. Having leaders big enough to laugh at themselves.

So that’s the Mallu for you. We wallow in delicious nostalgia, in remembrances of things past. And maybe that is why one of my sisters who has never lived anywhere other than in Nagercoil constantly wishes she could go away… live somewhere else, just so that she could savor that wonderful feeling of longing to go back home. Leave home so that she can long for home. Some paradox huh the mallu psyche? No wonder that punchline of Lalettan is one of our favorites. “ Joli kittiyittu venam onnu leave-edukkan!” (Lemme just get a job, then I can take a day off!)

Of Blogs and Blocks

2007-06-27T00:05:00.000-04:00

It’s a block. A humongous one the size of Texas and it is bothering me no end. Thanks to it, a couple of stories and a few posts lie languishing in my system, unfinished and unappealing. Whatever it is, I find it very convenient to blame it all on the all-encompassing WRITER’S BLOCK. Thank god for whoever invented or discovered it. I can lay the blame at that door for my inabilities and shortcomings and frustrations and lack of time and loss of the creative urge and ….. hey who am I trying to fool here…. Simply put, lay the blame for my laziness.

Another one of my favorite excuses these days is that my kids’ school is out for summer and as the wonderful, serene, devoted mother that I sometimes imagine myself to be, I should be spending quality time with them. I fool no one who knows me with this excuse of an excuse, certainly not my children. They know me for what I am. Grouchy, moody, not very patient, not very motherly mom who would rather curl up someplace with a book rather than play ‘Teacher-Teacher’ or ‘Tea with Barbie’ with them. But hey, I try. No one can blame me for not trying.

Somewhere at the back of my mind is that ‘MOTHER’ I see myself as. Ever patient, always smiling, ever ready to drop everything at a moment’s notice and play with them any inane game, answer everyone of their questions to THEIR satisfaction, come up with wonderful ideas for art and craft projects, throw wonderfully innovative and charming birthday parties that are the envy of their friends, make delightful dresses for them, bake the best cookies from scratch, write a fabulous book about a boy wizard who lived and whom the whole world knows about unless you were on a 10 year vacation on Mars… oops sorry I get carried away at times.

Anyway, the result is that I am not spending much time with them or getting anything else done for that matter. While I do spend considerable time with them, so that I do not go on a guilt trip, I do not think that that time qualifies as a full blown excuse for not writing (who am I fooling again? I am always on a guilt trip) So there goes my excuse number two.

So what do I actually do? One thing is for sure. I trawl the Internet, visiting fellow bloggers. At the end of it all, I am in no better shape. I’ll tell you why. There are these bloggers, all meaningfully employed, busy with their own official and personal lives and yet manage to find time to write wonderful blogs that are thought provoking, well thought out, interesting, with scintillating humour, excellent language and what not AND they update their blogs with unfailing regularity. Some of them even visit other blogs and leave interesting and meaningful comments (rather than the usual gr8, cute, good etc etc.) their comments carry substance. My dear bloggers/readers you know who I am talking about. You would recognize yourselves in these lines.

And here I sit and fret why no one visits my blogs. And why most people who visit do not bother to leave comments. Do I ever ask myself,” How many blogs have I visited and gone away without leaving my footprints?” uh uh. No way. (hey I am the vaathi here . not the prathi. So do not ask me difficult-to-answer questions).

Moreover, after reading all those wonderfully well-written blogs, I also lose whatever shot of confidence I have in my so-called writing abilities. (Yea yea I know. But do indulge me and allow me the freedom of wallowing in the morass of self-pity and inferiority complex here) I feel I am no good and ask myself what in the world I am even doing here. Whatever made me put up my ‘writing’ for the whole world to read. At which crazed moment did I even think of creating my own blog. Whatever was I thinking? At least I can take solace in the fact that I write under my pen name, thus saving me the embarrassment of acknowledging ownership of my ridiculous blog in case I run into the one in a million chance of meeting anyone who might have actually read them. (Whew, that is some long sentence. I thought it would never end)

And just when I hit rock bottom, the nadir, so to say of my confidence level, I get mails and comments from my miniscule and still returning readers asking me why I haven’t posted for a long time, asking me where I have disappeared to. I am gently shaken. Ah, so people actually do want to read what I write. Then I cannot be that bad after all. I can feel a small wave of confidence rising up from somewhere deep within. It grows and grows and rises as one huge tidal wave (ah, methinks this allegory reminds me of something else… get your minds out of the gutter. I was only thinking of the tsunami) comes crashing out to crumble that humongous writer’s block. What block? I thumb my nose at it… so I come back to write about what else but my inability to write. So here I am, back in the loop.

Hey you all, all of you who inquired and asked me to update my blogs, it means a lot to me. Thanks for that shot in the arm. Guys, you know who you are and thanks a million. I am sorry I found nothing better to write about, but am glad I finally wrote something.

The Sardines and the Sea

2007-05-15T13:35:00.000-04:00

The sardines, I cut them up today. They had been occupying freezer space for quite a while.

From the huge one in the Indian grocery store to the smaller one in my apartment.

They carried with them the scent of the sea. The heady salty aroma that carried me back home in a whiff.

Well, home or close to home.

They had the same smell as the sea. Reminded me of beaches near home. The salty slightly repugnant air of the sea.

The air along my ravaged coasts. The beaches that bore a haunted look after the sea came in to swallow her children, and left behind an ocean of tears.

A terrifying hollow empty sea of desolation and devastation. Emotions till then unassociated with home, or my beaches.

White tales of horror, the unending sorrow of the dead living. The phantom cries of the children and the deafening roar of silence.

Do Spare a Thought

2007-05-02T22:12:00.000-04:00

Dear Reader!

Please spare a moment to follow this link. To read this post and sign the petition. This is something that goes beyond religion. Please don't let a bunch of maniacal morons destroy our heritage!

http://ramasetu.blogspot.com/2007/03/setu-wonder.html
http://www.petitiononline.com/ramsetu/petition-sign.html

Thank you.
alakananda

In the Summer Time...

2007-04-19T15:54:00.000-04:00

Mathew says I’ve got to do a tag. A tag of summertime memories. Now how did Mathew know that I have been kicking around this exact same idea for a while now? A post on my summer time memories. Unfortunately, he’s said quite a bit of what I would like to say. So let me dredge up stuff he hasn’t mentioned. Here I go…

Back to those lazy, golden summer days, when life was just one big slurp of ripe mango, the sweet twang of ripe tamarinds, a big bound volume of comics, and a kaleidoscope of colors, of broken glass bangles. Days of simple innocence and unadulterated bliss, when the ULTIMATE source of delight and entertainment was a stack of unread books and a few ripe mangoes.

Even now, sometimes, when the sunlight falls on me from just that particular angle, when the cool breeze blows by, ah, just so, I am suddenly a kid again, transported back on a whimsical burst of nostalgia. I just wish to close my jaded eyes and go back … HOME.

Mangoes: Think summertime and the first thing I remember are the mangoes. The ripe, golden, luscious neelam mangoes that grew in our compound. There were three trees at home and in April May, they were laden with fruits and during the onam season, we put up our swing from its branches. Besides those, mangoes would come pouring in from my grandparents’ house, neighbours, and sometimes my father would buy them from vendors who sold them door-to-door. Breakfast , lunch and dinner at times, used to be just mangoes. I still am partial to the neelam mangoes despite having tasted more celebrated varieties. We didn’t leave raw mangoes alone either. That was a special treat too. Chop ‘em up, thrown in pinch of red chillie powder, salt, a couple of small red onions minced and a dab of coconut oil… (As I write this, you can sail a boat in my mouth. Am drooling so much)

And what do I miss most in the US of A? Mangoes of course, from India. What we get here I tell you, are pathetic excuses for mangoes. I cannot wait till they start letting in mangoes from India. Today those three trees at home are no more. In their place stands a more ‘modern’ house, with all the works. But I miss the mangoes…

Friends: I grew up almost as an only kid despite having 4 siblings. Blame it on the fact that they were all much older than me and were starting families of their own. When my sisters came home for holidays, I fought with my nieces, but my nephew and I were/are as thick as thieves. But I did have plenty of friends among neighbors and cousins and we had nothing to do during those long summer vacations, but play all day, and eat mangoes.

‘Yoga prize’: Nothing to do with ‘yoga’ mind you. More to do with yogam or luck. Most mornings we woke up to the sound of long drawn out cries of “yoga priiiiiiiiiiize!” there were some little kids in the neighbourhood who would sell these little raffles. They had tiny squares of folded paper stuck on to a large poster and the square or tickets cost just 5paise each. If you were lucky, you won a little bit of money. Just like the scratch and wins of today. Instead of scratching, you open the folded squares. The highest amount you could win was usually Rs.5 or Rs.10. a princely amount in those days. I remember the day I won Rs.5 one day. Was treated as a queen the rest of the day, which means I got my pick of the mangoes that day. I would love to wake up to that cry again and rush out with a ten paise clutched in my hand to try my luck. Feel the excitement and anticipation in the moments when a ticket was ripped out and opened…

Games: We had not only the usual hide n’seek, SAT, and scavenger hunts, but also a host of games we made up ourselves. We even had a game which was mostly play acting. We called it ‘nada kali’. I guess we called it that since we sat playing it on the ‘nada’ or steps leading into the house. And the board games, Snakes and Ladders, Hind Trader (a desi version of monopoly), Thaayam (Ludo/pacheesi), Jodi(something like mah jong – sounds like mango doesn’t it?)

Broken Glass Bangles: Please don’t be mistaken. These are definitely not associated with what you would think. no broken dreams, no unhappy endings, nothing lost whatsoever… these were just the pieces of broken glass bangles we saved religiously to play with. We had whole tinfuls to show off. We played, thaayam and the game jodi that I mentioned. We drew a small square/circle/polygon/any amoeba of a shape, and gently threw in a handful of the broken bangles, taking care that none crossed the outline. Every piece was part of a pair and the player had to take out the pairs one by one without moving any other piece. Move a piece and the turn passes. Take them all out and earn an extra turn. Oh the hours we spent, pouring over the bits of glass trying to find a way out… and sucking on mangoes while praying that the person currently playing would move a piece and be out. The only problem was that the mangoes made our hands awfully sticky.

Tamarinds: After mangoes, the second best thing we loved to munch on were tamarinds. Ripe, brown, tart, with just a hint of that sweetness… ah just the thought makes me scrunch my eyes shut and click my tongue… you know what I mean. Mango and tamarind season coincided with summer holidays. And the tamarind season had phases and we children were involved in all the phases. First the ripe tamarinds would come home in huge sacks. They would be spread out in the sun a couple of days. Then the fun would start. First the shelling phase when we got all the tamarinds out of their thick shells. Then came the deseeding. We had a special little tool called’ pulikkuthi’ a miniature spear kind of thingy. We sat around using it to take out the seeds. And this was the time when we would start popping pieces into our mouths. We were allowed a couple of pieces but not more than that. We would eat them and then go snitch to each others’ parents about the extras. Then followed a couple of days of ‘I won’t ever talk to you again’. And by that time, the tamarinds were all shelled, deseeded and nicely sun-dried and ready to be packed up with salt in huge ‘bharanis.’

The tamarind seeds were not ignored either. First we would play with them. ‘ottaya rettaya’. Simply meaning odd or even. Take a handful and have the next person guess whether u had an odd or even handful. Once we were done with that, the seeds were roasted or boiled and we loved munching on them during our games. (never mind that they had the same effect as ‘chakka kurus’/jack fruit seeds. : ))

Books: “Polonius: What do you read my lord?

Hamlet : Words, words, words. “

Yeah I could never have enough of the written word. I would read anything that I could lay my hands on. Enid Blyton, Amar Chitra Katha, Poompatta, Balarama, Tinkle, Ratnabala, Gokulam, Indrajal Comics, Tin Tin, Asterix came much later ‘coz only then i could truly appreciate the nuances of the genius of Goscinny and Uderzo. The William books my Richmal Crompton, the classics… Jane Austen, Brontes, Mark Twain, abridged versions of Shakespeare, Mythologies and folk tales from around the world, etc etc. I had a cousin who worked at the Kerala University who would get me books from the libraries in Trivandrum, my sister got me books from her college library and I had my own network of friends to keep my bookshelf well stacked. Even now when I go through my old library at home, I smile at the well thumbed pages, sometimes with splotches of yellow on them … mangoes of course. Told you, they made my hands very sticky and the juice used to drip down my chin.

When I was forbidden to read at the dinner table I read all the labels of the pickle, sauce and medicine bottles kept on the dining table. I just could not stop reading and that is why I do not have the heart to tell my daughter to stop reading and go to sleep when I find her still up at midnight, curled up in bed with a nice fat book.

After I was done with everything I had available I would peek through the glass doors of a locked bookshelf at home that held books that were off limit to me, wondering when I would be able to lay my hands on them. Ah, that came sooner than I thought. Someone left the key in the lock one day. : )

Trip to Trivandrum: Every summer I would spend anywhere from one week to a month in Trivandrum with my sister’s family. For a small towner from Nagercoil, those few days in the ‘big’ city of Trivandrum was the highlight of the summer holidays. Shopping for clothes and other ‘fancy stuff’ in the ‘big’ shops there, a visit to a department store where you could actually go around the store and pull things off the shelf by yourself into your shopping basket (wow that was the height of cool! I even used to marvel initially at the milk that came in plastic packets. After all ours back home came directly from a cow!), a couple of dine-outs, ‘ball’ ice creams from Shimla ice cream parlour, these were all ultimate treats. And yeah, my sis has a mango tree right behind her house too, plus the mangoes which came from Nagercoil.

So that was what my summers were all about. Today those friends/cousins are scattered all over the world. One of them is no more, and most of our kids barely know each other. Even we grown ups just about manage to keep in touch. With some of them, I have totally lost touch.

I sometimes feel sad that my daughters are missing out on something very vital despite the overload of entertainment surrounding them. When I talk to them about it, they voice the same concern too. To them, my childhood days were simply utopian. Lazy summer days of nice, clean, wholesome fun… and did I mention the mangoes? Ah… the mangoes!

P.S. Mathew had tagged me long back. But halfway through the tag I lost steam. Was caught up with a hectic social life. I can’t complain. Till a couple of months back, I hardly had one; a social life I mean. So I sat down to finish this tag today. I was told to come up with 8 things I enjoyed during my summers. Thank you Mathew for forcing me to go down memory lane on a very enjoyable trip.

People I tag: Dilip Krishnan, PK Madhavan, John Sudhakar, Neelambari, BVN,(Mathew tagged him too, but he hasn’t done it yet) and dunborn traveller.

The Wonderful and Living Art of Bonsai (Cont'd...)

2007-03-06T14:47:00.000-05:00

Let me move on to the common accusation that bonsai is a way of inflicting cruelty on plants. Well, the answer is no. Or it is only as cruel as maintaining a well-manicured lawn or a precisely laid out garden, or for that matter, growing a potted plant. In these cases too plants are not given full freedom and allowed to grow as they want to. Don’t we mow our lawns, trim our trees, and pull out weeds? Who are we to decide which plants are useful and which are not? Everything fits somewhere into the scheme of nature. Don’t some gardens feature topiaries with trees trimmed into grotesque shapes? Bonsai is definitely kinder than all that. At least the natural beauty and shape of the tree is maintained, nothing but the size of the tree as such is altered.

So, let me assure anybody who reads this that bonsai is not cruel to plants, so please don’t have any guilty feelings associated with it. I do agree that as bonsai becomes popular, there are people, even intellectuals who are going about criticizing it and vilifying this beautiful art. Somehow, their voices are heard more than that of the person who truly understands what bonsai is. I guess it’s because they’d rather spend more time with the tress they love than go around trying to defend themselves.

So I, a person who loves bonsais, enjoys them immensely, but with absolutely no patience to dedicate to the art, have taken it upon myself to dispel at least a few misconceptions. Perfect proof for the fact that the trees do not suffer is the fact that the leaves of a bonsai tree are always normal sized, so are the fruits and they taste awesome too, bursting with flavor and richness. Now a tree that is being tortured wouldn’t yield that would it? Only happy trees yield flavorful fruits.

As for it being an aberration, an act against nature, did you know that Nature herself makes bonsais quite often? Ever seen banyans and peepals growing out of cracks in walls, wells and on rocks? They are all bonsais too.
Nature Herself is the Grand Master of the Bonsai grower and he takes his lessons, his tips and cues from Her. Bonsai is merely an imitation in a small scale, the grand scheme of Nature. A Bonsai grower admires, enjoys and respects Nature wherever her goes and this bond of affection inspires him to protect and preserve Nature.

Moreover, from my personal acquaintance of this bonsai grower from my hometown, let me tell you, I am yet to personally meet a man who loves nature more or has done more for the environment. He is single handedly responsible for raising awareness about the environment among school and college kids in Kanyakumari district. He has grown and supplied thousands of saplings to ashrams, schools and colleges and involved students in tree planting and reforestation projects.

If you are familiar with the landscape of Kanyakumari district, you would be familiar with the small hills on the outskirts of nagercoil. They are the foothills of the western ghats. The hills near Chunkankadai, behind Sree Ayyappa College, till a couple of years back, were just barren with nothing but wild grass growing on them. This man has changed those hills into a thriving mini forest with the help of OISCA, a Japanese environment friendly organization, and school and college kids. He not only plants trees, he arranges for their watering and goes back to check on their progress. With him, it is not just a case of ‘plant a few saplings, pose for a few pics and forget about it.’ Thanks to him, Kanyakumari district is greener. And his services have been recognized with awards several times from OISCA and other societies. Just the fact that this man grows bonsai is proof enough for me that it is not an act of cruelty to plants, because he can never ever hurt a tree.

Moreover, bonsai is an art form which originated in the East, whether India, China or Japan. The East is known for its holistic and spiritual approach to everything. We revere and worship nature, we would never harm nature. We who believe in ‘Vasudeiva Kutumbakam’ and the presence of the ‘Brahma Tejas’ in all life forms wouldn’t do something that hurts nature would we?

The Wonderful and Living Art of Bonsai

2007-02-26T15:45:00.000-05:00

I had put up a picture of a bonsai bougainvillea on my rediff iland blog and I received quite some interesting comments, and of course as expected, some remarks about it going against nature etc. well, I hope to dispel a few myths and misgivings here. (Please note that all pictures here have been posted with permission from the owner of these beautiful trees. If you need to copy or borrow them, or learn more about them, please contact the owner at nikkibonsai@hotmail.com)

Let’s start at the beginning. Bonsai is the fascinating art of growing miniature trees in shallow pots. An art believed to have originated in China and perfected in Japan. Some believe that it has Indian roots too. Our ancient physicians tried growing hard to come by plants/trees in their own homes in pots as vamana vrikshas or miniature trees. There are also those that believe that visiting Buddhist monks who traveled back to China wanted to carry the sacred banyan and peepal trees with them and did so in small pots. By the time they reached their homes after years of travel, they had well developed Bonsais in their hands. Well, whatever the origin of this unique art, whether the Bharathiya connection exists or not, it is now known as a Japanese art form.

Way back in 1971, Raveendran, a young student at the Trivandrum Law College was hunting in the British Council library for some law books when he came upon a book about a fascinating and new art form. An avid lover of plants and the owner of an enviable collection of rose plants, the young man was intrigued by the book in his hand which opened up to him a fascinating new way of growing trees. Of course, it was a book on Bonsai, which he borrowed that day, and like they say, there was no looking back. His law practice fell somewhere along the way. “I cannot tell a lie,” he chuckles when asked why he did not pursue the profession. Today, however, he has in his amazing collection more than 400 well-developed bonsais in a range of styles and several at various stages of development. This is one of the best though not very well known collections in the country.

Raveendran concentrates mainly on tropical bonsai, which suits the climate of Nagercoil where he lives. So you would find in his collection 35 year old banyan trees, peepal trees, and other varieties of ficus, jambakka, tamarind, bougainvillea, the Indian laurel or kanikkonna, etc etc. It is an amazing sight indeed to see the janmbakka tree, FULLY laden with fruits or the cute Chinese oranges or kumquats weighing down the branches. Come vishu, and the kanikonna tree is one burst of golden yellow and the tree as a whole is placed along with the other items of vishu kani in his pooja room, not just a bunch of flowers. Now, how many people have the fortune of that kind of vishu kani?

Now, on to the nitty gritty of Bonsai. How does one create a bonsai? From what I hear from this expert, it is an art, which requires a lot of patience and dedication because unlike other art forms, you have to wait years before you can actually see the result of your work. And how is a tree miniaturized? They are grown in shallow pots, ’shallow’ being the operative word here. They are supplied with nutrients and water, well, in a controlled setting. This reduces their size. At intervals, (every year or so) they are repotted, since the soil they grow in gets depleted of minerals and new soil in provided after every repotting. Unlike many believe, the roots and shoots are NOT CUT OFF during the repotting. Just a few auxiliary roots and shoots are trimmed and pruned so that they don’t creep up all over the place. The most important root of a plant, its taproot is never touched and the plant is gently repotted with all the care that a newborn baby being placed in its crib gets. Believe me, I have seen the man in action. He could not have been gentler with his children, and it is a delight to watch him work with his plants/trees.

The branches are also gently guided into interesting and beautiful shapes and styles using twines and thin wires. No, the plants are not hurt, not even a scratch is afflicted on the bark in the process. Once the branch grows thicker, and into the desired shape, the wires are removed. There are several styles of bonsai, chief of which are upright, twin trunk, cascade, wind-swept, forest (group plantation) etc.

(To be Continued...)

Tag...You're It

2007-02-08T17:52:00.000-05:00

BVN has tagged me. Ah, this is the first time I have been tagged. Honestly I am excited, while others might say, “Get a life woman!” Plus, he has added a link to my blog. Does that mean I have finally arrived in Blogosphere?

Three things that scare me

1.Spiders
2.The phone ringing in the middle of the night
3. Alzheimer’s disease

Three people who make me laugh

1.Jagathy Sreekumar
2.My l’l girl acting oh-so-mature
3.Tom and Jerry

Three things I love

1. My husband waking me up with my morning chaya
2. The sound of my kids playing WITHOUT squabbling.
3. My ENTIRE family, getting together for a late night round of Chinese Rummy and laugh fest. (A rare event now, with everyone scattered about)

Three things I hate

1. Cats
2. Waking up very early in the morning
3. Coming back to an empty house after a nice vacation back home

Three things I don't understand

1. Why some Americans still call Iraq ‘I-rock’. Come on, after all this, you’d think they’d at least learn to say the name of that country right. Forget about identifying it on the map.
2. How people actually find the comedy of Kaundamani and Chenthil funny.
3. Why guys are still fantasizing about Jaya Bharathi and Seema, and googling for them. (believe me my stat counter does not lie, and those are two of the top keywords that bring people to my blog almost EVERYDAY)

Three things on my desk

1.A very fancy basket that was supposed to help me organize and put away stuff. But it just holds a whole lot of junk, and adds to the clutter.
2.A dirty tea-cup with dried up tea stuck to the bottom.
3.An antique looking pair of jhimkis/jhumkas.

Three things I am doing right now

1.Thinking up of the best excuse for not cooking dinner tonight. (Can’t say I was tagged can I?)2.Trying to think of something funnily clever for this tag.
3.Listening to early Ilayaraja numbers.(poonkathave thazh thiravai right now…)

Three things I want to do before I die

1. Float down a Venetian canal on a gondola. Just hubby and me. No kids plz.
2.Publish a book/ grow a Bonsai.
3.Go on a Kailash Manasarovar Yatra like my brother did.

Three things I can do

1. Cook up a mean Kothuporotta.
2. Find something to worry about on an absolutely perfect day and in the process, make life generally miserable for everyone around, esp. my long- suffering husband.
3. Remember a whole lot of trivia, and the lyrics of most old evergreen mallu songs.

Three things you should listen to

1. Balamurali Krishna singing’Entaro Mahanu bhavulu…’ Sublime.
2. When someone says, “Don’t look now”.
3. People concerned about the environment

Three things you should never listen to

1. Telephone cross-talks
2. The person who thinks you were put on the planet to hear him/her talk.
3. Someone who says, “Nah, you’ll never be able to do that.”

Three things I'd like to learn

1. How to make really good ‘ada prathaman’.
2. To play the Veena again.
3. To write without rambling

Three favourite books

This is a tough one for a bookworm like me.

1.Poetry of Keats, Tagore, Bharathi, Neruda
2.Mystic Musings by Jaggi Vasudev
3.Harry Potter, Mr. God This is Anna

Three favourite food

Another tough one for a foodie like me.

1.Eggs in any form except raw
2.Nikunjam chillie chicken/killipaalam thattu chicken fry with chappathi/porotta
3. Red rice, sambhar, fish fry combo/rice, pappadam and chammanthi.

Three beverages I drink regularly

1. My morning cup o’ tea. Am a dopey eyed zombie till it goes in and wakes me up.
2. My own smoothies/mocktails using any fruit or juice I can lay my hands upon. Mandatory ingredients being mango pulp and rose syrup. (yeah, go puke.)
3. Sweet Sodanga. (soda narangavellam/bonji J. by another name…fresh lime soda, lemon soda, fizzy lemonade, etc. but nothing comes close to the ones we used to have, on the way back to the YWCA hostel, from the pettikada on the lane along University College, near Spencer’s -now Foodworld.

Three TV shows/books I watched/read when I was kid

1. Almost everything by Enid Blyton
.2. Amar Chitra Katha, Tinkle, Indrajal Comics, Poompatta, Balarama, Chandamama
3. Giant Robot, Barbapappa(anyone remember that?), old popular American and British TV serials aired on Rupavahini, Sri Lanka’s Doordarshan. It took a while before my part of the country could watch Indian TV. Funny huh?)

Three people I like to tag.

1. Dilip Krishnan
2. Sabin Iqbal
3. PKMadhavan

36 and counting...

2007-02-05T12:53:00.000-05:00

haven't posted anything in a while. things have been really hectic here. anyway today is a special day and i thought i'd break my silence today.

yes, ladies and gentlemen...(fanfare..drumroll...) i am officially on the wrong half of the thirties today. i turned 36. yikes! (yes, i do share my birthday with bachchan jr.) surprised that a woman has revealed her age, that too one in her mid thirties (is that really me?). i don't believe in being coy about it. my age is my age is my age. like it or lump it. who am i trying to fool? whether i admit it or not, i am as old as i am.

that doesn't mean i accept it. i simply cannot believe it. it wasn't long ago that numbers like 30 and 40 were soooooo far away. those people were so old... now i am there myself, almost nudging the BIG 40, and do i feel old? nah! i feel just the same. my family still doesn't use my name and the term 'mature' in one sentence. if age is supposed to bring wisdom well, my shipment certainly got lost somewhere along the way. i still believe that age is all in the mind and my mental age is still very very young. i just don't feel old at all.

i guess that's what happens when you are the youngest in a family of five, with quite an age difference between you and your siblings. everyone still treats you as the baby of the family. though it can get annoying at times, it has its own advantages. no one really blames you when you goof up.

"after all isn't she a kid," is their magnanimous, forgiving, and indulgent words.

nevermind that the kid is 36 today and herself the mother of two kids! believe me you can get away with almost anything.

my daughter asked me how old i am today and when i said 36 she was aghast," amma, but that is OLD!"
"yeah! so what?" i asked.

i don't blame her. i was there myself not long ago. when anything above 25 was old. well, here i am a 'thaikizhavi' myself. and i have the grey hairs to prove it too. i have the whole set of stuff... crow's feet, laughlines, and if i really try hard, on a good day, i can detect the faint beginnings of a turkey neck. but you know what, i will not acknowledge them for what they are. crow's feet? why crows feet? i shall call them dove's feet. that takes the harshness out of it and makes it sound softer and nicer. so its dove's feet for me. i don't mind the term laughlines though. suggests a happy picture, though personally i think its a misnomer. frown lines, more likely. ah, but i shall continue to call them laugh lines. and the best part. turkey necks. whoever thought of them? the more i think of it, i expect my self to burst out gobble gobble at any moment.

however, i hate those horrible grey hairs. everyday, a close examination (i do try not to get too close) reveals a new grey hair. i tell you its just not fair. my sisters never greyed this early. nor i think my brothers. they were well into their late forties before the traitors started showing up. oh yeah, there's a couple of decades between me and 3 of my siblings but i guess i take after my dad. he had greys when he was 30.
i refuse to dye my hair, though my kids beg me to. because i think that would be the final blow. sort of like giving in to 'age'. i shall hold off for as long as i can, before i accept the fact that i am growing old.

after all, ,'i refuse to go gently into the night' (with due apologies to dylan thomas). why should i age gracefully? i shall fight it tooth and nail.

meanwhile i shall just go on and have one helluva birthday!

A Musical Journey Home

2007-01-10T21:44:00.000-05:00

I am just catching my breath now after a hectic year-end and New Year. We were away in the Smoky Mountains for New Year, at Gatlinburg, Tennessee. It was a much-needed break and though all my best bud/husband and I wanted was just some rest and relaxation, our girls wanted to explore and catch all the sights in town. We ended up walking around and scored off on the tourist brochure, Ripley’s aquarium and museum, the Guinness museum, a dumb ‘earthquake’ ride and the sky tram. The elder one was rather disappointed that we couldn’t make it to the ‘haunted house’ adventure as they did not allow kids under 6 in there, which meant the younger one had to be left behind. I might have enjoyed the ‘haunted night walk’ though. Apparently, a lot of paranormal activity has been reported here. If you ask me I don’t think any other country is as obsessed with the paranormal as the US of A is.

Anyway, after the enjoyable trip, it was a five-hour drive back home and we wanted to get back home before the ball dropped at Times Square. We are rather particular, at least my husband is, that we are home when the New Year starts. The drive back was the best part of the journey. My husband was very sleepy and I normally never sleep while traveling – it does not matter what mode of transportation I am in. Normally he resorts to music to keep him awake. This time too we did the same. Only difference is that this time, we decided to sing.

Now please don’t think I am an excellent singer. I can’t carry a tune to save my life. I don’t even sing in the shower, because I sound so bad even to me. But when it comes to lyrics, I have a photographic memory. Even songs that were composed long before I was born, I can give you the words in a gush. Come to think of it, I remember the words to the old songs much more than the new ones. I guess ‘inanity’ is the key word here. The new songs don’t make much sense do they? On the other hand, my husband is a pretty good singer, but hopeless when it comes to lyrics. He belts out absolute nonsense in perfect tune. I need to be around to rein him into sense. So together, we make a great pair. Perfectly in harmony, we make good music together.

It all started when my daughter asked me to sing one of her fav songs,’thedi varum kannugalil…’. You see, in spite of being so bad I do get requests for songs. I guess that’s the advantage of having a ‘captive’ audience. They couldn’t escape from the car you see. So they made the best of it. Then my other li’l girl told me she wanted lullabies and I launched into what according to me is the best lullaby ever written ‘omana thingal kidavo…’ composed by Irayimman Thampi to lull the baby Swathi Thirunal into slumber. My mom says as a kid I could never have enough of that song and I have passed on that love to my kids. Both are suckers for that song, even when I sing it. I am so emotionally attached to that song, that I consider it blasphemy when someone tries to play with that song- like AR Rahman did. I seriously have a bone to pick with him. And what a song to introduce it into! I might have forgiven him if it was set in a dignified scene or woven into a classical piece, but this… Come on, I know all about artistic liberty but there are some things YOU SIMPLY CANNOT PLAY WITH. This is one of them. Look what happened when someone tried to write a sequel to ‘Gone with the Wind’. They reduced the towering Scarlet O’Hara into a simpering Mills & Boon kind of dumb heroine. Ewwwwwww.

Anyway, back to my road trip. Soon the girls were nodding away and we had a few uninterrupted hours ahead of us. There would be no cries for “Amma play ‘High School Musical.’ “No I want to hear ‘Cheetah Girls’…” “Amma she is drinking from my water bottle..” “Amma tell deedi not to touch my car seat….” Ah simply heaven. So we decided to go ahead and have our own ganamela. Usually such sessions start with ‘manikkya veenayumayen’ or ‘alliyambal. While on the subject, is there any Mallu who doesn’t go into throes of delicious nostalgia when they hear these numbers from the full-throated ease of that Gana Gandharvan Dasettan? But this time we kicked off with ‘aayiram paadasarangal’ and floated gently on ‘nadhi’ along with Naseer and Sharadha in their houseboats, as we moved on to ‘kayampoo kannil viriyum…’ of course ‘thamassamenthe varuvaan.., paarijaatham, ente swapnathin, and innale mayangumbol’ followed. And the beautiful ‘oru pushpam maathram’. it’s a rare Malayalam quawwalli piece.

We moved on to a bunch of forlorn female numbers, all expressing the wait for the beloved, ‘thaliritta kinaakkal, anjana kannezhuthi, oru kochu swapnathin, manathe mazhamukhil, priyathama…, vaasantha panchami naalil’…in this vein there are a couple of other songs also tho not female voices, ‘ezhilam paala poothu, oru mukham maathram kannil. These songs express so much longing and hope for love, quite heart wrenching. That took us to another song from etho oru swapnam, ‘poomaanam’ that song has a smoldering, haunting, sensuality about it, I don’t know if everyone feels that way.

The songwriters of those days knew a thing or two about underplayed sensuality. Look at thottene, sara ranthal, sangamam etc etc.It was beautiful the way they portrayed emotions and longings and the music only served to highlight the feelings. They were all beautiful, sensual, and erotic without being vulgar or crass. None of that ‘in your face vulgarity’ you see in the songs today. I am thankful that at least Malayalam songs haven’t yet come to that. At least I believe so.

I remember watching etho oru swappnam on doordarshan starring the original superstar and strong man of Malayalam cinema…’ oru bhoomikulukkam undayirunnenkkiilllllllllllllllllll…… JAYAN of course as, hold your breaths… a sanyasi! Speaking of Jayan of course we sang kannum kannum from Angadi, another sweet romantic number with Seema chechi.

That took us back to her first film, avalude raavukal. A much maligned film if you ask me. I remember the cheesy posters all over town back when I was a kid in Nagercoil. Back then there always used to be a ‘Malayalam’ film screened every week in the town’s seediest theatre, with huge x-rated posters whether the movie featured them or not. I remember quite a few movies that were maligned this way in spite of being quite good movies. ‘thakara’ ‘eenadu’, ‘vayanaadan thampaan’. I caught all these movies much later on TV and wondered what exactly all those posters had meant. I saw nothing of the sort in the movie. That was when I realized how decent and realistic Malayalam movies were seen as porn and ridiculed. But let us not go into that here. Maybe that is the topic for another blog.

Anyway, I saw avalude raavukal, on Asianet and I was really disturbed, by the character of Seema. It haunted me for quite a few days, how circumstances and fate force her into the oldest profession. I felt sad watching it. I know many people still leer at that movie and watch it probably to ogle at Seema, but I thought it was a disturbing tale well told. And the songs (isn’t that what this blog is supposed to be about? Sorry for the digression) …. God they are beautiful. Raagendu kiranangal.. it sums up the story in a few lines, (reminiscent of kannu thurakkatha deivangale) and that lullaby, unniyarariro… both haunting music.

Then we moved on to Salil Chowdary. Ahhhh what can I say. We Mallus are a finicky lot when it comes to our language. We make fun of the way other language speakers cannot pronounce our words, tongue twisters though they are, their diction etc, their failure to grasp the nuances of our language…(come on guys everyone cannot enunciate words with the ‘sphudatha’ of Dasettan). Despite this, we have whole-heartedly, accepted Salilda who hopelessly breaks up words and syllables where they are not supposed to be broken. It just goes to show the man’s genius and how passionate we are about good music. We can overlook such small issues when it comes to beautiful music. To show our ultimate acceptance, we even sing manasa maine varu like Manna Dey sings it. With a hard ‘r’ in ‘varu’ and not the soft usual mallu ‘r’ which Dey saab probably could not manage.

We roamed all along the kadaappuram with Parikkutty as he sang his heart out, pouring his woes to kadalamma. Kadalile olavum, karalile mohavum adangukillomane adangukilla…’ what more can be said?. Simple and true. Of course, when it comes to Chemmeen, I think all of us Mallus break out into goose pimples and can never say enough. What a movie, what a story, what acting, what music, what photography…. I could go on. We sang all the songs, I think in the middle of ‘pennale pennale.. I heard my daughter mumbling in her sleep ,”I like that song…” thankfully she went back to sleep again.

While in the Salilda phase we skipped with the ill-fated Elsa and Raju as they sang mada prave vaa and ee malar kanyaka, unaware of the tragedy that was to befall them. We sang the sad songs too. Who does not love the heart wrenching pathos of sandhye and sagarame..? I love that movie madanolsavam. Every time I watch it, I manage a couple of wet hankies. I love the scene where Jayan (in a rare cameo) says in a hushed voice, “She is dying.” Lifted straight from the original novel ‘Love Story’. I love it. Kamalhassan and Zarina Wahab were wonderfully adorable as the young lovers and newly weds.

Speaking of young lovers, we paid tribute to manjil virinja pookkal, we sang all the songs in that cult movie, the movie that made history… “Good morning Mrs. Prabha Narendran…’ and the rest as the cliché goes is history. While the insipid Shankar disappeared (ok he makes occasional appearances to get beaten up by the hero, usually Lalettan. Ah the irony of it!) And the talented Poornima Jayaram decided to bid adieu to a promising career to be Mrs. Bhagyaraj, it was the creepy villain who went on to conquer heights and redefine the limits of Malayalam cinema with his brilliant and understated acting.

You know we were careful to stick to the old numbers; we vehemently refused to stray into the 90s. Early eighties were as far as we go. So unfortunately, we included only ‘thenum vayambum’ by Raveendran Mash. But then his music is divine and the more recent ones we kept aside for another trip. Early eighties saw the wonderful songs from chillu. The only good thing about that movie was the music. The whole movie was one gloomy, dark, stretch and I had no idea what exactly happened in the end, except that someone went crazy. I almost did, watching the movie. Malayalam cinema went through that dark phase at one time. Everyone was either crying/dying/sick/unemployed/unloved/misunderstood/poor/insane or hopeless and helpless. Jalaja and Venu Nagavalli specialized in these kind of roles and raised depression to the level of high art. And their faces suited it. Gloomy and overcast all the time. Tell me have you ever seen them smile? If at all they did, it looked odd and out of place on their faces. But there were some beautiful songs in these movies. Like in chillu. The eternal favorite of old students and alumni… the nostalgic tribute to good ol’ student days. ONV’s memorable lines in ‘oru vattam koodi..’ and that other song, chaithram chayam chaalichu… and natha nee varum (I don’t remember the movie). The songs of ulkkadal, chithira thoniyil, nashta vasanthathin, shara ranthal…

We went back again to the 50s and 60s to sing pulayanaar maniyamma, which had Naseer attempting to jolt Jayabharathi’s memory through music in prasaadam, thaazhampoo manamulla, manjalayil mungi thorthi (I think that was the only Jayachandran number), oru nimisham tharu, and of course that evergreen favorite of jilted boy friends. ‘sanyasini…if sanyasini comes, can sumangali nee ormikkumo be far behind? We sang the whole list, sumangali…, thirayum theeravum…, mangalam nerunnu njan. Wonderful songs.

We went back to an earlier era with the quaintly beautiful ‘ellarum chollanu, chandana pallakkil, kuyiline thedi, ashtamudi kaayalile and remembered the lovely Ragini fluttering her eye-lashes as Satyan sang ‘periyare…’ we frolicked with Ramanan and his flock of lambs as we crooned ‘kanana chayayil.’

There was a brief interlude of mappila paattukal with ‘pathinaalam ravuthichathu, kadali vaazha kayyilirunnu, paavada venam, etc. and a KPAC phase with paambukalkku malamundu, marivillin, ambiliyammava, punchiri palu, illi mulam kaadukalil etc.. A short tribute to Kamukara with aathma vidyalayame and eswara chintha (we did not want to get too philosophical. So we stopped with that and did not venture into other such numbers like kaadu karutha kaadu, manushyan mathangale, kaadaru maasam, kaatadichu etc… which are otherwise excellent songs.

Then we sang a bunch of songs, all celebrating black. I think no other language has so many songs that celebrate the fact that black is beautiful. We have ‘karu karuthoru pennanu, kakka thampuratti, mari malar choriyunna karumbi penne, karutha penne karinkuzhali, and of course the more recent karutha penne from thenmavin kombathu and karuppinazhaku which we left out that day.

We sang just one Tamil number ennavale adi ennavale, which is sort of ‘our’ song. We have an ‘our’ song in Malayalam too, ‘enthinu veroru sooryodayam’, but we did not sing that song as it is newer. We have another special song too. One day I asked my husband just for fun what song he would sing to me and he said ‘nin thumbu kettiyitta churul mudiyil…’ and that was the only time I regretted chopping off my locks. (As an aside, I choose to forget that his first response to that question had been,’kali, bhadra kali’.)

Both of us are crazy about songs and can keep talking about songs for hours. I remember, when we were engaged, I once wrote to him quite a long letter with just words from Tamil, Malayalam and Hindi songs and I was touched and surprised to see that he replied the same way too. For a person who did not care about lyrics, that was some effort.

So there we were, almost at the end of our journey. We were nowhere near depleting the vast treasury of beautiful old numbers, but it was time for us to stop. The kids were slowly stirring in the backseat and the elder one soon woke up and asked us unbelievingly,” Have you guys been singing all this time?” “Weird” she concluded and went on to wake up her li’l sis. We decided to sum it all up with ‘keralam keralam, and maamalakalkkappurathu…”. We wondered if we should end with harivaraasanam or jana gana mana. Since it wasn’t exactly a bhajan session we went with jana gana mana and threw in sare jahan se achcha too for good measure.
And at exactly 30 minutes before midnight we turned into our driveway, to the strains of ‘jaya jaya jaya jayahe. We got home in time to welcome the New Year and with happy memories of a much enjoyed, musical, nostalgic drive back home. And looking forward to a beautiful melody of a year ahead…

The Last Wish

2006-12-16T21:28:00.000-05:00

My head swims and there’s lead in my legs
I fall along the path and the five men walking ahead
Fade away from my crazed vision.
None pauses or turns around…
Somewhere I hear a question asked
And the wise eldest answers
With not a step missing.
No one stops, not even he,
The archer, whom I loved most.
I fade away, and then,
I feel strong arms around me and an anguished voice
“No my dearest, I will not leave you,
To die a dog's death on this deserted path”
Somewhere in the air, amid the stench of death,
Wafts the fragrance of a precious flower
And the cry of a demon’s death-
Somewhere the click of dice
And the scent of blood in my hair.
I lay dying and in my last breath,
I breathe a prayer-
“My Lord, I wish that in our next birth,
You would be the first born.”

(Inspired by MT's 'Randaam Oozham')

The Magic of Motherhood

2006-12-11T13:25:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I got the news that my niece had her baby; a little girl who looks absolutely adorable; who even manages a wide eyed smile for the camera within a few hours of birth. This is my niece’s second baby and I know that she and her husband were desperate for a little girl. I can imagine how thrilled they must be.

I often wonder what it is that makes us mothers go in for a second child. The first time, ok, we don’t exactly know what this labor pain is all about, not first hand anyway. But the second time round, would anybody in their right minds submit themselves to that kind of torture willingly? I am sure every soon-to-be mother in the throes of a contraction must have had this thought running through her mind at least once,” Oh, my God. This is it. I am NOT going to have another baby!” And the same woman would be right there again in a couple of years or so.

What exactly is it that makes a mother go through it again. Not just the labor pain. That is sometimes bearable compared to the horrible morning sickness some of us have to endure. Unlike labor pain, morning sickness is not something that would go away in a matter of hours.

And did I say ‘morning sickness? The worst misnomer in human history if you ask me! I am sure some guy who had absolutely no idea what he was talking about came up with that term. Morning sickness indeed! It was a twenty-four hour sickness in my case. I was puking away to glory for 5 months or so during my second pregnancy, feeling absolutely rotten, until one fine day, I suddenly got a whiff of Pears soap from somewhere. I don’t know how, but it worked like magic.

My first baby, her smell, what it felt like to hold her in my arms for the first time, the strength of her tiny hand curling around my finger, giving her her first bath by myself, everything came flooding back to me. A sort of indescribable calm descended on me. Of course, the nausea didn’t stop till after a couple of weeks more, but I was in a better frame of mind, I was ready to face all the morning sickness in the world. That smell reminded me of why I was going through it all. It gave me strength and comfort. Of course, I had no such experience to fall back upon during my first pregnancy, so it was pretty much awful till I stopped puking in my 5th month.

It is probably a trick of Nature, to make you forget the pain, the moment you hold the baby in your arms. You have absolutely no recollection of the acuteness of the pain but for a vague memory, until you go through it again. Maybe it is all part of Nature’s plan to proliferate, a throwback to prehistoric times when human survival rates were at their lowest. You had to keep them coming, and what better way than a simple ‘obliviator charm’?

However that theory just takes away the magic of motherhood. So I do not accept it. Also, if it were true, like the human appendix which has shrunk thanks to it non use, evolution should have taken care of that temporary amnesia too, in this day and age when the rates of human survival are at an all time high. In fact Mother Nature should actually intensify the memory of that pain if she has to get some kind of grip on the exploding population.

So I still believe it is the Magic of Motherhood, which is at work here and not some long forgotten human gene. And on that note I sigh off, promising you more about the Magic of Motherhood in my next installment.

The Dilemma of a Kanyakumari Mallu

2006-12-11T12:55:00.000-05:00

This morning I must have received at least 5 greetings in my inbox. All from fellow Mallus wishing me on Kerala Piravi, November 1st, the day of the formation of the linguistic state of Kerala. They all carried beautiful hauntingly nostalgic, sunny, images of God’s Own Country, especially so for a person far away on the freezing shores of USA. (As I write this, the temperature outside reads 2.8 degrees C).
And this being the Golden Jubilee Year, everyone seems extra jubilant. I can imagine what the scene looks like once you cross the border over from Tamil Nadu into Kerala at Parassala. Malayali Mangas, wafting by in traditional Mundum Neriyathum or Kerala sarees, men all,sober looking in jubbas ans mundus… Celebrating fifty years of a glorious state.
Today is the day most of the Indian states, under the constitution were formed, thanks to the massive efforts of the Iron Man of India, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Most of them were craved out linguistically and someone had done a whole load of difficult Math and Geography to get the demarcation all in order. Okay that was just a background filler in history.
And back to the present, as I go through those greetings, I am at a loss as to what to feel. I don’t know whether to be happy or sad, to celebrate or not to celebrate. It is the same every year. After all, I belong to Kanyakumari District, the southernmost tip of the Indian Mainland and the piece of land Kerala exchanged with Tamil Nadu in favour of Palghat district. To me, it is a day of angst, stemming from the confusion of a Kanyakumari Mallu who neither belongs here nor there. It’s a quandary of sorts. What do I celebrate/mourn? A loss of identity/gain of a pluralistic culture?
Now for a bit of history once again, for the benefit of those unfamiliar with the place. Until quite recently, -50 years is not such a long time in history, especially Indian history-, till 1956 to be precise, this piece of land was part of Kerala or rather the erstwhile Travancore kingdom. In fact, the capital of Travancore before it was shifted to the more centrally situated Thiruvananthapuram, used to be Padmanabhapuram. A beautiful palace still maintained by the Kerala Government bears testimony to this.
Kanyakumari (hereafter when I say that it refers to the whole district and not just the tip of India where the three seas meet) has a population of both Malayalis and Tamils and it used to be rather equally balanced, with maybe a little more on the Tamil side. After independence, came the time for state formation and the majority Tamils under the dynamic leadership of Marshall Nesamony wanted to join ‘Mother Tamil Nadu’ while the Malayalis of course wanted to go with Kerala. I hear there were a lot of riots and protests and so on and so forth and finally fortune favoured Tamil Nadu. So come November 1st 1956, Kerala was formed, and Kanyakumari was made part of Tamil Nadu. Honestly, we don’t really have any complaints, I am just airing my thoughts, and I don’t want anyone to mistake my intentions. These are just musings and I DO NOT want any separatist fires lit.
Now on to why we wonder if this is cause for sadness or joy. After all, this is the day Kerala gave us away to be eternally branded Pandis, however good our Mallu credentials are, in favour of Palghat. First of all, no one likes being given up. It is such a lonesome unwanted feeling. So how would you feel if Kerala gave you up to gain Palghat? Like somehow they were better than us? Well, that hurts. And what hurts more is that the politicians of the state which ‘magnanimously’ accepted us went around mouthing inanities such as ‘nellai engal ellai; kumari engalukku thollai” literally meaning, Nellai (thirunelveli) is our border and kumari(kanyakumari) is just a bother. Hmph! Well, happily they don’t say that any more.
Anyway, Tamil Nadu seems to have realized that a state which can boast of 100% literacy, has such a rich culture, and contributes so much to the exchequer through rubber, spices, seafood, rare minerals etc etc(our wealth is boundless, I name just few) couldn’t be such a bother after all.
So there we are, clubbed ignominiously along with all other ‘maru nadan’ mallus (expatriates). However, we differ from all those other Mallu communities outside Kerala. We did not come from Kerala and settle here. We BELONG here. Our roots are still where they were put down originally, as opposed to uprooted and re-rooted. (This point I borrow from a speech once made by a genius of the Malayalam Film world, the ‘unimitated inimitable’, Jagathy Sreekumar, at the anniversary celebration of Mithram, a Mallu Organization.) In other words, we are a native community. Only geographical borders can be altered. It’s harder to alter cultural ones.
For someone like me, born years after the states were formed, the so-called ‘struggles’ and significance of the separation do not really matter; they are all just part of history. I think we would rather think of ourselves as being able to belong to two worlds ‘have the best of both worlds’ so to speak. So I am just going on to extol the virtues of kanyakumari, my own little paradise this side of heaven.
Case in point. Kerala might have given us away, but they, well atleast the capital Thiruvananthapuram is so totally dependent on Kanyakumari for their day to day life, they wouldn’t exist without us. Say, we guys decided to tell you one fine day,” Ah, we don’t feel like doing any driving today, we are on a break, so none of our lorries are going to bring you any stuff today,” YIKES! Scary thought huh? Life would pretty much come to a stand still.
Not a single marriage would take place that day. No flowers, no banana leaves, no bananas, no vegetables, no lemons, no rice, no pappadams, etc etc. Why even God would miss us. Where do you think all those lotus flowers and jasmine and tube rose garlands adorning Sri Padmanabhan and Aattukaal Amma and others that side of the border come from? In fact, if a loaded lorry doesn’t cross the Kuzhithura bridge, the whole of Chalai the bustling, crazy marketplace of Trivandrum would resemble a ghost town. Ah, do I detect a twinge of regret?
My husband and I have this argument every other day. He conveniently chooses to forget that though settled in Trivandrum, his native place lies on the other side of the border.
And Tamil Nadu, where would you be without the income from our spices and rubbers and the rare minerals filling up your coffers? We single-handedly raised the bar on education in Tamil Nadu, simply because we are 100% LITERATE! Now which other of your districts has that distinction? Or for that matter, a commendable ratio of men and women. We do not practice female infanticide. Never mind that it took years before the Govt, finally realized that the 100% literate district did deserve a professional college.
Significant industries haven’t yet come up here of course, but I don’t think we need to complain about that. Thanks to that, we breathe purer air. However, I do not understand why two major establishments, the ISRO center in Mahendragiri and the Koodankulam Atomic Power Station officially belong to neighbouring Thirunelveli district, though the bulk of them lies in Kanyakumari. You do the math. I DO NOT want to go in there.
Another sore point is that, when I was in school, we Mallu kids had no opportunity to learn our language. There was just one school in Nagercoil, which taught Malayalam as a second language and well, all of us did not go to that school. Some of us went elsewhere. Nevertheless, you know what, I have no regrets. I consider it a blessing in disguise because, that helped me start a lifelong love affair with one of the most beautiful and ancient languages in the world.
Yes, I am proud to say that I learnt Tamil as my second language for 15 years. I stuck to it even when at a later stage I could have opted for something more fancy like French. In addition to the exotic aura, the French kids could score higher too. But my conscience wouldn’t let me give up good old Tamil.
So when it comes to my own mother tongue, I am home schooled. Like I said, the best of both worlds, I now know both languages fluently. And you know what the best thing is? I speak much better Tamil than most Tamils, well, maybe with a faint Mallu accent. Some words give me away. I always say dosha. Never dosa. (If you are a Mallu reading this, you know how the pronounciation goes. I don't think I can spell the equivalent in English, though 'sha' can be a stand in. Our Mallu 'sha' is quite different.) I remember sending my 9th standard class into peals of laughter when I answered ‘pashu’ for some question in the Tamil grammar class instead of ‘pasu’. Ah, well, some words give me away.
So what? I can actually say azhagu, pazham, mazhai and Tamizh as they are supposed to sound, thanks to the fact that I am a Mallu. No one sniggers when I ask for some ‘vazhi’. So, before I get tarred and feathered as a Mallu bigot, raise your hands, all you Tamils who can actually pronounce ‘zha’ without a struggle? Or even say it at all. You know the letter ‘zha’ is the beauty of Tamil. ‘Thamizhukku zha azhaku’. And it takes a Mallu to make you see that. So there!
Therefore, Kanyakumari-ites of the world, unite. We have nothing to lose. We have an identity of our own. Never mind if the Proper Mallu calls you a Pandi. Never mind if neither the ‘true’ Mallu or Tamil accepts your own brand of Talayalam. Our place is a happy melting pot of both the beautiful cultures. We are an ‘avial’ of our own, a rich blend of the essences of both Kerala and Tamil Nadu. We can celebrate both Pongal and Onam.
And you others, just don’t make the mistake of asking us Mallus where we came from before we settled in Kanyakumari. We bristle at that question. We belong here. We are children of this soil. And we can all go on and celebrate Kerala Piravi or Union with Mother Tamil Nadu or whatever. We shall not mourn a loss of identity, nor suffer the angst of the neither here nor there syndrome. Instead, we shall celebrate a happy union of cultures, of being able to easily belong in both places. After all, isn’t that the true essence of being Indian? Celebrating our wonderful diversities as one unified nation? Let’s raise our glasses to both states. After all two toasts are better than one.
If nothing else, we shall at least celebrate the fact that we do not have to wake up every morning wondering if there is a hartal that day or not. We do not have to land at a railway station or airport praying that the autos and taxis are running that day. We do not have to have a bandh just because Pluto got chucked out of the solar system. That if you ask me dear friends, is the best thing that happened to us Mallus of Kanyakumari District.

The Magic of Motherhood

2006-12-07T10:49:00.001-05:00

http://alakananda.sulekha.com/blog/post/2006/11/the-magic-of-motherhood.htm

An Apology from the Modern Indian Woman

2006-12-07T10:40:00.000-05:00

We Indian women-
We are a breed apart.
One of us stopped the sun;
While another burnt a city ;
One reduced the mighty Trinity;
To mewling infants at her bosom.
One smart lady outwitted Yama,
To snatch her lord from his noose;
[He was probably worth it]
One handled husbands five,
And was more a man than the mighty five;
One has to her credit an earthquake ;
While others had gods
Eating out of their hands.
But the poor Indian woman Today,
Running between her kitchen, the labor room
And the office…
Where does she find time
For such simple joys of life?