Sunday 24 April 2011

MUM's the Word. Naaah!

Well I thought i'll bid farewell to blogging till my exams are over, but i am wasting a lot of time as it is , so why not blog? ..I can survive another guilt pang.

well my mother is out of station and here is how things are going.

Some relatives call to console and offer help , acting on the presumption that my life has qualitatively deteriorated due to my mother's absence, but very often they are disappointed...let me give a small example:

aunt: " hiii what are you doing?"

me:  "  eating muri (puffed rice) with chola"

aunt: "see this is what happens when mums go away....."


me: " when mum is here i eat the same thing without the chola...this.. I bought"

aunt:  "O"

(I guess she assumed everyday my mom had no job except cooking for 24 hours and preparing gourmet meals for me)

Shifting to slightly spiritual stuff now.

My mom has this puja corner where she devotes many hours doing things like reading thin books in a sing-song voice once a week (I am stating facts not disrespecting "the" gods.:P). Needless to say before going she instructed her husband, my dear father in an earnest tone "shokale thakur debe"...(hilarious literal translation is "giving god") ...err well that refers to the elaborate ritual of wiping all the photos of the divine beings and showering water over the shiva linga and laying out food (read three tiny cubes of sugar) and water for them.

In my childhood I was very fascinated by this process and took great pleasure in doing all this....not out of any religious feelings but because i saw it as an extension of my "rannabati khela"...or playing "ghar-ghar"....obviously such innocent charming perspectives do not exist now.  My mother laid the important morning divine duties on my father's able shoulders and I was asked  to light the incense sticks in the evening--talk about labour hierarchy. She left on wednesday. Yesterday (saturday)..... Dad and I, in a sublime moment, looked at that corner, ...it was covered in dust. Like remorseless beings we laughed and joked about this great fault. Waiting for retribution (trust me one month before my exam that is a brave act).


Another key area where I will shift my focus now is the kitchen. We have a huge problem there since I am a vegetarian and my parents are not.  So today I made two veg dishes and this is what followed:

me to dad: I cooked....

dad: what?

me: panir and soyabean ka bhurji and baby corn

dad: --------------- (expression was as if I had stabbed him)

me (sheepishly) :  uhhhh mashi (maid) has cooked fish for you

dad: (weak smile, recovering-from-a-near-death-experience type expression)

....

so yaah my dear well-wishers we are managing fine....nutritionally speaking of course...about the Gods..ahh they have a will of their own ...why bother !

tata !







me:

Tuesday 19 April 2011

Spare A Thought Please.

I am still debating whether to write on this issue or not, I might come across as preachy and an annoying miss-goody-two-shoes, but, what the hell...!


It is about something that I have felt right from my first day in college and sadly I still feel the same way--- students just do not bother to talk in a respectful manner when they are communicating with teachers.


I remember back in my school days, a teacher's entry would mean that sing-song "goooooooood morrrrrrning ma'm" and a similar ritual when they left. The rule was the same regardless of the fact whether we liked or hated the teacher. Asking questions to a teacher would mean talking in the most respectful way possible. Things changed in college. 


My college was nothing better than a school, it was a virtual prison, yet I noticed from the first day that remarkably different tone which some students used while talking to teachers. What surprised me all the more was the fact that the teachers did not rebuke them, may be that was  the norm. Teachers can be friends, and one need not always be almost sycophantic while talking to them but still the basic tone of respect (god-knows what I mean by that, do not ask me to explain) was lacking in a few people (not all mind you).


But that was almost 5 years back, what prompted me to write this today is something that occurred yesterday. A person (this was not the first time) talked to a teacher in a way that made me feel as if the teacher was a log lost junior buddy, on top that the tone was one of accusation. 


I agree that all teachers are not great at teaching, some of them are lousy persons and go on making our lives miserable in class and they might even be clueless about what they are saying, BUT  at the end of the day, they are teachers, someone next to your parents (please do not make faces, i know it sounds super-idealistic but that is true). 


You do not have to fall in love with the teacher and you can utter curses under your breath when he or she leaves the class, and have a gala time mimicking them but the minimum you can do is show some respect while talking- and THAT  is not buttering, THAT is basic (very basic) courtesy.


I do not know about the teacher-student equation in other countries and I do not want to know. I like the way things were when we were back in school. One can be friendly and close to the students yet there is always a thin line between casual disrespect and warm respect. Am i overrating "respect" ? may be. Don't care. Each to his own, this is my view and I jolly-well stick to it.


Tataz