The 'Bai' Commandments

Childhood is always a very carefree and inhibited time in all our lives; and this inhibition pervades even in the way we talked to everyone. Manners and etiquette were taught early in life but somehow, we never used them much and continued speaking our minds, no matter what. Of course, most normal people would realise that this isn't how we are supposed to act and augment their actions to be more courteous and socially acceptable. But then, I've never been able to fall under the category of 'normal' under any circumstances...
When I was 7 years old, my mother asked me to clean and lay the table with place mats. Now, unlike other mothers, mine believed that no child is too young to learn how to be independent and must learn to contribute to the household chores, be it through cleaning, laying the table or conversing with those who ring the doorbell. Me, being the perennial lack-wit, got angry and thought I could hit home as to what I thought was 'child labour' by saying, "Am I your servant?!" My mother looked at me for a few seconds, burst out laughing and told me to just lay the table. Not the greatest victory then, I guess.
But the concept of a servant is something we are so used to now that we cannot seem to live our lives without them. Society, being ever so pseudo-caring, decided that 'servant' doesn't have a very positive ring to it, and so replaced it by a number of different terms, foremost of which being 'the Bai'. Each region does have its own term for the 'labour class', but the universal term tends to be 'Bai' (in borrowing from Maharashtra, home of everything Indian and Bollywood...apparently). Now, every household has one (or maybe more) and those who don't are marvelled at their ability to still keep living without falling dead from exhaustion. There are certain parameters that every 'bai' must qualify in order to be allowed to work in a house hold. I would like to call them the Five Commandments:

• Thou shalt not steal from thy owner's house (my mom's major concern over work even)
• Thou shalt not take leave unnecessarily.
• Thou shalt not ask for unreasonable (very subjective, of course) amounts of money in lieu of thy services.
• Thou shalt clean thoroughly and to the owner's satisfaction.
• Thou shalt not flirt with the husband of the house.

Each and every one of these Commandments must be strictly adhered to, no questions asked. There are always exceptions to both owners and Bais, but they are very rare cases. The 'bai' who comes to my house recently quit as she could not adhere to my mother's strict standards and so, the work has been demoted to the rest of the family. It's only when you dry your own clothes, sweep the entire house, wipe it dry and cook that you realise how much respect must actually be given to these women who do so day in and day out. So, as my mother goes mad searching for another person who is willing to work here, I am left scrubbing vessels and stacking clothes. Now, I wonder where the soap powder is...

Çiao!

Coffee or Tea: The Quintissential Question

This a speech I made from almost 3 years ago. To this day, this remains the only time I've ever gone up on stage and never had a mini-heart attck or the need to faint within 5 seconds. Despite my many eccentricities, I have unfortunately never been able to quite get over stage-fright...

The English, being the snobs that they are, have their own little world of rules. While some govern the etiquette of speaking and walking, others deal with which side of the road to drive on. But one of the most interesting facts about them is their mind analyses the answer to the question, “Tea or Coffee?”. If the answer is tea, then all is well and it is decided that the speaker is sophisticated enough to grace the company present. But if the answer is coffee, then you are in for a rude shock. The immediate assumption become that you are one of the lowest of the low, uncouth and disgraceful. You become so repulsive that the English hurl their worst moniker at you; American. The horror this instills in one versed in the English ways is unbearable. There have been reports of people being driven to madness by the inherent embarrassment and shame. So never underestimate the power of this Brazilian bean; it may help you stay awake but it can also be a death warrant if ever seen on English shores. Tea lovers, rejoice; for there may still be hope to revive the dying interest in tea. Now, as I sit with a cup of both tea and coffee before me, I ask you; is it right to be asked to choose between energy and sophistication? You be the judge.  

Views from the Carnatic

One of my oldest article/opinion pieces:

First things first, Carnatic music does not kill, despite what many detractors have claimed. Granted, to the unskilled ear it may sound like someone screaming randomly and for no apparent reason but this music transcends understanding. It is an art that takes years to perfect. I admit, once again to the unskilled ear, there may be no difference between a professional singer and the random neurotic outbursts of an OCD patient but that can't be helped. People have their own opinions about this specific branch of music. While some call it cacophony, others derive pleasure from its mere mention. To each his own, as people say. Note that I have said 'his' own. Fifty years ago, this would have been apt since music was seen as a purely male dominated arena, as to conform with society. Women were forbidden to practise it as it was considered too high a status for them. Funny, seeing how every single raga has a female name! I guess only die-hard fans could bear such inequity. But times have changed and as the relentless tides of change progress, sanity and equality has been restored to Carnatic music. It has been shown that no matter what music has evolved into now, the basics that govern Carnatic music govern it too. So the next time you turn your nose up to this 'cacophony' as you call it, remember that it permeates through your music too.

Such Beggary

It's always been said that India is a land of diversity; but what people (including me until recently) fail to realize is that this diversity even extends to India's beggars. Just as handicrafts, cultures and languages change as one travels from one region to another, so does the type of beggars one encounters.
Chennai hosts a very aggressive breed of beggars who take pride in their occupation and don't take no for answer. I was recently on the receiving end of one of the above mentioned society's wrath. While minding my own business, waiting at the bus stop, I was accosted by a woman asking for money. With a turn of my face, I attempted to dismiss her but the next moment, I felt a stinging slap on my cheek (It's amazing how often I seem to get slapped by random people off the street) and felt my face being turned to her. With regal demeanor, she began yelling at me in the filthiest of Tamil terms asking if I considered myself too high brow to give her money and how dare I turn away from her. Thankfully, the bus arrived just then and I escaped with nothing but a bruised ego and a burning cheek.
 Hyderabad offers yet another view of this diversity. Though similar to Chennai, these beggars take it one step further by adding competition to their personalities. When I was 9 and before I was sentenced to a prison term (read: shift to Saudi) I was walking down the road and found a 10 rupee note lying on the ground. Not knowing of the words 'good Samaritan' at the time, I took the note and continued walking. Later in the day, when I was travelling with my parents, we stopped at a signal and a beggar passed us. I decided to give him the note I found on the ground and once done, I was sitting contentedly when another woman clouted my head and asked me for money too. When I refused, she began yelling at me asking how I had enough money to give the other man but not her. I explained how I had found the note but she still did not relent and followed us for 2 more signals before giving up. Ever since then, I've resolved never too use any money found on the ground for personal gains.
 Delhi truly offers some of the shadiest beggars I have ever seen. They will literally do anything but beg to obtain money, even if it involves a little bit of 'golmaal'. Once, my uncle came to drop us off at the railway station and as he was backing up we heard a scream and something falling. After getting out of the car, we saw then an old beggar woman had been knocked down. After being helped up she began threatening my uncle with the police and other such stuff till he loosened his purse strings and let a few 100 rupees fly. Later, in the train, a fellow passenger told us he had seen the whole thing and that the woman had thrown a stone at the car and fallen down at the exact moment to simulate the entire episode. Such is life in the capital of 'the greatest democracy in the world'.
 Mumbai offers a more business oriented outlook to beggars but not all. When I asked one of them why he was begging when he was able bodied and could go find a proper job, he replied,"Mere paas time nahi ahi, saab." I guess he hasn't heard of the spirit of Mumbai where holding just a day job and not multi-tasking is considered lazy....
 Finally, Bangalore offers us a very cosmopolitan beggar as well as the pinnacle of beggar evolution: Eunuchs. I recently dropped a coin in a beggar's bowl and was shocked to hear him say, "Danke" which is  thank you in German. Eunuchs on the other hand need no introduction. They are literally highly evolved beggars, steeped in the nuances of the science of beggary. They hunt in packs and rob you of more than just your money. A recent auto ride was the scene for one such encounter where I escaped pretty much unharmed while my friend was poorer by 300 rupees and suffered a traumatic experience that isn't going away anytime soon.
 Thus is the geography and diversity of the Indian beggar. I wonder what international ones would be like.....

Çiao!

Lost in Translation

Translations are a dicey business. You never know what can happen when something is taken literally without using the 'little grey cells' inside all those millions of heads. Over the past few days I've noticed a few examples but one stands out unequivocally. A few days ago, I had finally decided to eat at my college cafeteria, albeit only for breakfast. The humble idli was my choice and just as I was about to take my plate away to enjoy my first experience of cafeteria food, the server asks me, "Saar, do you want gunpowder?" My mind went blank as I just stared at his face for a few minutes. For those of you who do not know, I study in an institution where even the mere mention of war elicits a visit to the closest Father for a 'serious talk'. And since when have explosives been a side-dish for breakfast, except for Wiley .E. Coyote?? But I was in an adventurous mood that day so I just nodded expecting a load of black powder to be dumped on my plate and maybe even a complementary gun to boot. What I didn't expect was a coarse, brown pile of powder with enough oil to stop your heart just being slopped on to my plate. It was then I realise that 'gunpowder' was actually chutney powder. Now, who's brilliant idea was it to go call something so simple a weapon of mass destruction? It isn't even that spicy, for God's sake!! Then there's jaggery. Alright, I admit this story could just be me being the absent-minded boy I am, but it does illustrate how translation can deny people of really nice things. When I was 6, I had just found out about jaggery and wasn't too familiar with English. So I went and asked my grandmom what jaggery was in English. My grandmom was slightly confused how to explain how jaggery and molasses are related, so she just told me something in Tamil that translated to 'brown sugar'. Now, I blame the next part on TV. During this time, my family and I watched this serial where this little boy was drugged using 'brown sugar', the drug. Unfortunately, to my infantile mind, I understood this as jaggery and since then feared the sticky sweet till I was 16,  when I finally realised that jaggery and brown sugar just aren't the same. I had wasted 10 years, a whole decade of my life running away from jaggery, all because of my grandmom's inability to explain its meaning. (P.S. I don't blame her at all) Of course this is coming from the kid who wrote 'My father in a wood-cutter' when asked to make a sentence with the word 'wood-cutter'. I still argue that that was a brilliant sentence and really does make sense, despite what my parents say. But that was a long time ago. All I'll end in saying is, be careful what you translate, you don't want your hands to go pluck mangoes!! (I'll leave you to figure out where I got that from. If you're a Malayali, directly translate it into Malayalam. If you're not.......get someone to do it for you! ;)

Çiao!