Rumor has it

Did you hear...?

Rumors are fun. Really. Even when they are about you, sometimes they are fun. Apparently, in this part of the world, there is a rumor (or a rumor that there is a rumor) about me that I have a boyfriend. Nice, no?

I can imagine my close friends pointing and laughing at the very idea. If there is one thing that is an established fact among my friends, it is my absolute ignorance about "dating", "relationship" and things of the mushy kind. My best friend's favorite jibe at me is about how I wouldn't even realize it if a guy were trying to ask me out. So, there could be a measure of truth in the rumor - I might have a boyfriend about whom I myself am not yet aware of. I give it to the rumor-mongers.

And there are other generic rumors. My favorite one at school was, "no class today". I personally tried to start a rumor once - that the teacher slipped on the stairs and fell down, so no class. I had always imagined that scene with the teachers I did not like. My attempt fizzled out. Not even one soul in the class considered buying the lie. 

That was one of the earliest failures in my life. But I did not lose hope. I decided to perform a Root Cause Analysis for the fiasco (budding software engineer). I arrived at these causes:

1. Lack of lying skills - I had to admit, the teacher slipping in a staircase that consisted of 3 tiny steps and being rendered unable to come to class was a bit of a stretch on one's imagination.
2. Unconvincing body language while lying - This problem is caused by problem 1 because body language  efficiency is directly proportional to the "believability" of the lie.
3. Lack of support - Even my close friends did not support me in the effort. They did not have to believe in the rumor, they just had to talk about it.
4. Lack of incentives - I should have garnered support and offered incentives such as guarantee of not including their names in the mischief makers list if I got caught, bondas in my house that evening or something like that.

So what do we infer from the paragraph above? Rumors are instructive. They indirectly encourage self introspection.

And then there are rumors on a slightly larger scale. There was a rumor in our area that a certain ghost was frequenting the railway crossing at night time. I always wondered why ghosts chose night time. Probably because they are typically dressed in white and have a pale white complexion. If you look at it from a "rational" perspective, they are spotted at night due to better visibility conditions at night, with a dark background. Anyways, this rumor was harmless and in fact, had a positive effect, because kids were scared to wander far from the house at night and not many people frequented the railway track for digestive waste disposal.

And....rumor has it that people who type too much will not get dinner tonight. So, I am cutting this post short. 

P.S: It is rumored that those who read this post and do not leave nice comments on FB or Twitter will be tormented with more such posts. Just FYI.

I don't swear

It is now very fashionable to inject swear words into one's vocabulary. And it irritates me. It also seems to be something people think they can flaunt. Not shamefully, but proudly. And then there are those who support such people. I don't know who makes me more indignant.

Decency has lost the appreciation it deserves. Vulgarity and cheapness have pushed it out of the social limelight and are basking in their new-found social acceptance. I partly blame social media for this. People are now proud to display their mediocrity. They beam ear to ear when they talk about how perverted they are. Showing lack of respect to others has now become the "in thing".

Being frank and outspoken is very different from being brazen and rude. And again, it is peer pressure that makes people accept most of the nonsense that is promoted these days. And when people like me do not join the bandwagon, we are criticized. No, we are bullied.

Well, I am not someone who will "go with the flow". I am this way and I dare anyone to try and change me. If you feel it is your freedom of expression to belittle everyone around you, it is my free will to not listen to you.

If you think I am old fashioned, who cares? I do not think much about you, so your opinions don't matter either. One thing is for sure - however low these people stoop down, I will not reach down and call them names. I have a blog to rant about it. Without swearing.

Frankly, my dear!

He was not the most handsome man. He was not the fairest of them all. He was not received in the best families. He was the scandal of the town. Expelled from a prestigious institute, cast out of his family, a speculator and a gambler who consorted with "unchaste" women. 

No, I am not talking about the Madurai accent speaking, unwashed, dirtily dressed uneducated guy with the uncombed hair who is often the hero in recent Tamil movies. He abuses women, beats up innocent people, sometimes commits murder and lives like a pig. He is even rude to the purity-personified heroine who doggedly pursues him just because the producer of the movie paid her to do so. After the intermission, he is still the same animal which now develops "love feelings" for the heroine. He follows her around like a puppy and she takes her revenge by making him do stupid things, which are different from the stupid things he did before the intermission. Enter villain/villains in the climax and it is mostly the heroine who is raped or killed or commits suicide. The hero is brokenhearted and alive. And that is the sad ending for you which somehow evokes appreciation from the modern movie-goers.

Okay, that entire paragraph was digression from what this post is about. Where was I? Yes, I am talking about Rhett Butler. All you practical jokers (I know I said jokers instead of practical-joke-crackers, relax.) don't even try to ask in which hotel he works. If you don't know him, go and read Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell.

He was not the most handsome man, but he was handsome. He was a rebel but not a menace to society. He had common sense but not arrogance. He was opportunistic but not selfish. He was outspoken and confident but not brash. He teased the quirks in women, but did not insult them. He respected ladies. He was frank but not rude. He seemed to be very unattached but he was patriotic and loving. 

He admired and respected the woman he loved. He understood her, spoiled her like a child and let her stamp her feet through all her tantrums, soothed her fears, bore her idiosyncrasies, laughed at her rude remarks and still retained his dignity. And when she had been blind to his love beyond a point, he told her, "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn" and walked away!

I admire Rhett for his suaveness, cool head, practicality and genuineness. And frankly my dear, he is one man who should not have been just fictional.

Note: This post is just about Rhett Butler, the fictional character. People trying to read between lines please note that you are expected to only read the lines that have been written. The rest are blank spaces.

The whistle blower

I have often heard elders appreciate youngsters with a "fire" in them. I am one of those. With a slight difference. I have an innate arsonistic tendency. 


They say there is no smoke without fire, isn't it? I can't express in words as to how thankful I am for that fact. You see, I have been gifted with a nose only for cosmetic purposes, by the almighty, for reasons only He knows best. I cannot catch a whiff of anything unless it is shoved right under my nose within a radius of 10 cms. 


I was once in Bangalore, staying in my mother's friend's house for a brief period. I was a fresh college pass-out, and had landed in the inevitable IT job. I was there for my "KT" period. (For the uninitiated, KT stands for "Knowledge Transition". I learned to my consternation that the only thing that got transitioned was time. There was no knowledge whatsoever to begin with. The wisdom that I managed to draw from my seniors was that nobody knows what they are doing.)


It was a quiet, pleasant morning in Bangalore. I was alone since aunty had left early to work. I was waiting for the auto. Meanwhile, the coffee-paithyam that I am, I strolled into the kitchen and switched on the stove to heat the milk. I then stepped out to look for my ID card - yes, I also spend half my life searching for things. I finally managed to find it and rushed out since I had heard the auto come around. I was beaming ear to ear since I had located my ID card in record time and also remembered to lock the door, AND heard the auto. I was proud of my intuition, astute detective skills and auditory sharpness.


I went to work and promptly paid a visit to the coffee room after dumping my bag in the chair. I called my amma to report my day so far and picked up a cup to get coffee from the vending machine... YES, finally, I remembered the milk on the stove. 


"Ayyayo amma!"


"What did you do now? I thought you were doing fine today. Did you get into some other company's office?"


"No no, milk..stove.." I floundered, aghast and disappointed with my memory, and my nose for not detecting the smell of over-boiled milk.


I quickly called aunty. I began "Aunty...I..." in a panic-stricken voice.


"Yeah yeah, there was a lot of smoke, the watchman noticed and called me. They got in with the spare key that I had given the watchman. I am now at home, clearing the mess." I could sense the note of resignation in aunty's voice. (Huh! This and all I can sense. But not smoky smell.) For the rest of the duration of my stay, I gave up coffee. 


I would like to say that I have been very careful after that incident. That I do pranayam everyday to clear out the access issue in my respiratory system and to improve the smell-sensing algorithm in the nasal module in the nervous sytem(oops! work jargon hang-over!). But. No. 


Amma never lets me boil milk or contribute in any activity that involves active duty in the kitchen for fear that I will, literally, bring down the house. I take care of the peripheral and boring activities like scraping coconut. The most boring job on earth (But it does have perks. One gets to smuggle some shredded coconut every time amma looks away). Peeling the skin off boiled potatoes (I openly demand a certain number of peeled potatoes in return for just peeling the potatoes and not trying to cook them).

My friend Bala, the true friend that he is, made a life changing suggestion to me after numerous such incidences when I did have to boil milk when amma was away from home and I had a craving for coffee. He told me that there is something that will literally blow a whistle when it is time to switch off the stove. The milk cooker. 


But then one day I forgot to fill water in the whistle...

Patima

My grandmother has always been a busy lady. A typical R.K.Narayan novel type grandmother. A formidable, tough person who has never known a day that has defeated her. The world's best cook, a busy bee and a lady to whom no one has dared to speak back, yet.


I am not sure why I write this post now, but I just had to. The image that comes to my mind as soon as I think of my patima (as I call her) is, my patima with her wet hair tied in a Kothavaranga pinnal and knotted below, muttering sacred chants, with "Sambrani" smoke coming out of the sambrani holder in her hand, going about the house to spread the purifying smoke all over the huge house. There is nothing like that image to make me feel at home.


She would wake up at 4:30 AM every single day, take bath (hair bath every day) and wear her "madi" clothes. She would then enter the Pooja room and sing slokas for the next hour. Sacred chants in Sanskrit and Malayalam. I have never heard her sing any other time, all my life, except for during the early morning.


We never had to wait for coffee because, by the time we woke up at 6:30 AM, patima would have boiled milk and prepared fresh decoction for filter coffee. We did not have the custom of having tiffin for breakfast. It was brunch, as that was my late grandfather's preference. Patima has never changed any habit in the house, that had been originated by my thatha. So brunch it is, to this day. She would finish cooking at 8 AM, sharp.


We lesser mortals had brunch n left to our vocations - school or office. Patima would then spend the next hour - hour and a half in the big garden. One half of the garden had flower bearing plants - Changu pushpam, bougainvillea, etc. The other half was a kitchen garden: Plantain trees, coconut trees, Sapotta trees, "Keerai", and I don't remember the rest of it. She spent a good deal of time there, watering the plants and walking around the garden.


Brunch was 10:30 - 11 AM for her. And then, a short nap from noon to 1:45 PM. 2 PM has always been coffee time at home. Tiffin was at 4 PM. Upma, Dosai, Idly, etc. After that, she would sit in the front yard of the sprawling house and start removing the leafy portions from coconut tree leaves and keep the stalk for making homemade broomsticks. She used to keep trays of pulses and cereals in the sun for drying. Once in a month, she would replenish the permanent stock of thattai, murukku, cheedai, adhirasam and omapodi. 


I have not had Omapodi that is even half as good as my patima's till date. I don't think I ever will.


Evening was flower-stringing time. She would "thoduthufy" jasmine flowers for me and my amma to decorate our braids and for the pictures of all the deities in the pooja room. I used to sit by her and she would regale the same family history type story for the 1000th time. I can recite it even when woken up from a dream.


One favorite hobby of mine was blackmailing her that I would touch her before her "madi" period got over after the evening pooja. I spoke about it here. It was fun and I did it often ;)


6 PM was worship time again. She would light the lamp only after which we were allowed to switch on lights in the house for the evening. After pooja, it was dinner time at 7 PM. Then she would chat with our tenants or watch TV for some time. She called it a day at 9 PM. 


Now, she lies in the same bed, day after day, hour after hour, watching the same 4 walls every single minute. I feel bad for her, because, I have always known her as a very active person, who had a solution for everything; One whom no one could restrict or argue with. But I guess, no one can argue with old age.