Whatever happened to the Hindu quality of modesty and humility?
I keep getting press-releases from one Rajan Zed, who is apparently a leader of great stature and substantial achievement. Zed is an Indo-American leader who was invited to read historic first Hindu prayers to the Nevada Assembly and the Nevada Senate, as well as the United States Senate in Washington DC.
This seems to be one of his major claims to fame, followed by regular press-releases he issues on various subjects on Hinduism. Most of his statements are confined to the misuse and abuse of Hindu icons, offensive use of language and so on and so on and so on...
Now, there is nothing wrong in that. We do need stalwart statesmen such as Zed to keep the Hindu ball rolling (do we really, I can hear a few voices asking in the background).
One thing I do find a bit irritating about his statements is that he keeps issuing comments about what is happening in Britain. There is no doubt that he has every right to be concerned about what is happening to Hindus in any part of the world, but surely he cannot claim to understand the issues of British Hindus as well as British Hindus themselves? Yet, in utter isolation, without any reference to British Hindus themselves, he keeps issuing statement after statement about our situation here. Most of them do not even help our cause here, but simply relegate themselves to the 'uh-oh, yet-another-statement-from-the-Zed-PR-machinery' pile.
But every time he issues a statement, I cannot help chuckling in amusement and raising my eyebrows in embarrassment. That's because he always describes himself in his own press-releases as an 'acclaimed Hindu statesman'.
That brings me to my original point - whatever happened to Hindu modesty and humility?
Should one describe onself in the choicest words of praise?
Perhaps you should not read too much into this. The chap is full of energy and plays an active role in dozens of organisations fighting the Hindu corner with aplomb and ease.
But I just wish he can stop describing himself as an 'acclaimed Hindu statesman'. Publicly displaying one's high opinion of oneself is a bit cheesy and embarrassingly corny, to say the least!
Tuesday, 30 June 2009
Sunday, 14 June 2009
Bust up in Brum
My employers are quite generous - although they make me work in Birmingham three to four days a week away from home, they put me up in a serviced apartment right in the middle of the city centre.
I mean - how much more convenient can you get? I step out of the apartment and I am right there in the heart of Birmingham's coolest streets loaded with shops, restaurants, train stations, bus stops, malls, supermarkets, cinemas and all kinds of things a person living alone wants at arm's length.
This morning however I work up with a rude shock.
At around 7.00 AM, there was screaming and shouting outside. I popped my head out of the window, and to my horror discovered a young man (Indian or Pakistani) standing outside the club opposite my apartment covered in blood. He was swaying around while two policemen held him and two other men watched.
I became aware of another group of caucasian men and women standing twenty yards away, held in check by another group of policemen. It was quite apparent that there had been a fight between the two groups and the young Indian (or Pakistani) man had taken a rap.
There was a lot of shouting and screaming going on. The two men who were standing next to the blood covered victim gesticulated rudely at the caucasian men (and women) standing further away and used the choicest of four letter words. Not to be daunted, they responded in a similar fashion, while the police tried to restrain both parties.
In the meantime, the blood covered young man swayed a bit more and sat down suddenly on the ground. A scantily clad girl detached herself from the other group and came running to the Asian group, and I could see that she was actaully crying and pleading about something.
Four policemen had actually cornered the blood-covered youngster into a doorway and he suddenly sprang up and swore at them, "I am the victim damnit... do you hear? I am the victim. And yet you w**kers are holding me from all sides while the guy who hit me is standing there looking completely free."
The Police tried to restrain him back, while he became even more hysterical.
A few minutes later an ambulance roared into the street, and the young man was escorted promptly into it.
Exactly six seconds later, he sprang out of the ambulance without his shirt and started jumping up and down while the police ran behind him.
"Why is the guy who did this to me not getting arrested then ei?" he screamed at the police. "Why are you restraining me while he is free? Why is he not in this police car on his way to the station?"
The police had their best wooden expression, which they had probably spent years perfecting before being let loose on our streets.
In a few minutes the hysterical man was bundled in, the ambulance roared away, and the police hovered on taking a few more notes from both the parties that were left behind.
They put up a police tape all round the club - probably to gather forensic evidence later.
The incident set me thinking - Britain seems to be heading towards an overdrive based on alcohol, sex and drugs. Clubs and pubs have become breeding grounds for violence and frustration, not just entertainment and music.
From what I gathered during the screaming and shouting, the violence had erupted over a girl.
There was so much frustration and anger involved.
The Bhagavad-gita, that book of timeless wisdom spoken by the Supreme Lord Sri Krishna declares:
kama esa krodha esa rajo-guna-samudbhavah
mahasano maha-papma viddhy enam iha vairinam
"It is lust only, Arjuna, which is born of contact with the material modes of passion and later transformed into wrath, and which is the all-devouring, sinful enemy of this world."
His Divine Grace A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Founder of ISKCON explains in his purport to this verse that when a living entity comes in contact with the material creation, his eternal love for God (Krishna) is transformed into lust, in association with the mode of passion. Or, in other words, the sense of love of God becomes transformed into lust, as milk in contact with sour tamarind is transformed into yogurt. Then again, when lust is unsatisfied, it turns into wrath; wrath is transformed into illusion, and illusion continues the material existence. Therefore, lust is the greatest enemy of the living entity, and it is lust only which induces the pure living entity to remain entangled in the material world.
The Bhagavad-gita scientifically explains how lust and anger lead to loss of intellect and utter bewilderment:
dhyayato visayan pumsah sangas tesupajayate
sangat sanjayate kamahkamat krodho 'bhijayate
krodhad bhavati sammohah sammohat smrti-vibhramah
smrti-bhramsad buddhi-nasobuddhi-nasat pranasyati
"When a man dwells in his mind on the sense objects, an attachment for them arises. Desire is born of that attachment. From desire anger is born.From anger comes delusion, from delusion springs failure of memory. From wrecked memory results the ruin of the understanding and then he perishes."
The incident in the pub arose because a few men dwelled on a sense object which awoke desires. When there were obstacles placed in the fulfilment of their desire their anger led to violence. It was all fuelled by their alcoholic indulgence and in reality this leads to the forgefulness of one's originally blissful and eternal spiritual position.
As I was about to close the window I noticed another young man standing next door. Like me, he must have been a silent witness. He suddenly looked at me and smiled as if to say, "What a fuss!"
I noticed that in the early hours of the morning, he was sipping an alcoholic drink too.
I smiled back.
I mean - how much more convenient can you get? I step out of the apartment and I am right there in the heart of Birmingham's coolest streets loaded with shops, restaurants, train stations, bus stops, malls, supermarkets, cinemas and all kinds of things a person living alone wants at arm's length.
This morning however I work up with a rude shock.
At around 7.00 AM, there was screaming and shouting outside. I popped my head out of the window, and to my horror discovered a young man (Indian or Pakistani) standing outside the club opposite my apartment covered in blood. He was swaying around while two policemen held him and two other men watched.
I became aware of another group of caucasian men and women standing twenty yards away, held in check by another group of policemen. It was quite apparent that there had been a fight between the two groups and the young Indian (or Pakistani) man had taken a rap.
There was a lot of shouting and screaming going on. The two men who were standing next to the blood covered victim gesticulated rudely at the caucasian men (and women) standing further away and used the choicest of four letter words. Not to be daunted, they responded in a similar fashion, while the police tried to restrain both parties.
In the meantime, the blood covered young man swayed a bit more and sat down suddenly on the ground. A scantily clad girl detached herself from the other group and came running to the Asian group, and I could see that she was actaully crying and pleading about something.
Four policemen had actually cornered the blood-covered youngster into a doorway and he suddenly sprang up and swore at them, "I am the victim damnit... do you hear? I am the victim. And yet you w**kers are holding me from all sides while the guy who hit me is standing there looking completely free."
The Police tried to restrain him back, while he became even more hysterical.
A few minutes later an ambulance roared into the street, and the young man was escorted promptly into it.
Exactly six seconds later, he sprang out of the ambulance without his shirt and started jumping up and down while the police ran behind him.
"Why is the guy who did this to me not getting arrested then ei?" he screamed at the police. "Why are you restraining me while he is free? Why is he not in this police car on his way to the station?"
The police had their best wooden expression, which they had probably spent years perfecting before being let loose on our streets.
In a few minutes the hysterical man was bundled in, the ambulance roared away, and the police hovered on taking a few more notes from both the parties that were left behind.
They put up a police tape all round the club - probably to gather forensic evidence later.
The incident set me thinking - Britain seems to be heading towards an overdrive based on alcohol, sex and drugs. Clubs and pubs have become breeding grounds for violence and frustration, not just entertainment and music.
From what I gathered during the screaming and shouting, the violence had erupted over a girl.
There was so much frustration and anger involved.
The Bhagavad-gita, that book of timeless wisdom spoken by the Supreme Lord Sri Krishna declares:
kama esa krodha esa rajo-guna-samudbhavah
mahasano maha-papma viddhy enam iha vairinam
"It is lust only, Arjuna, which is born of contact with the material modes of passion and later transformed into wrath, and which is the all-devouring, sinful enemy of this world."
His Divine Grace A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Founder of ISKCON explains in his purport to this verse that when a living entity comes in contact with the material creation, his eternal love for God (Krishna) is transformed into lust, in association with the mode of passion. Or, in other words, the sense of love of God becomes transformed into lust, as milk in contact with sour tamarind is transformed into yogurt. Then again, when lust is unsatisfied, it turns into wrath; wrath is transformed into illusion, and illusion continues the material existence. Therefore, lust is the greatest enemy of the living entity, and it is lust only which induces the pure living entity to remain entangled in the material world.
The Bhagavad-gita scientifically explains how lust and anger lead to loss of intellect and utter bewilderment:
dhyayato visayan pumsah sangas tesupajayate
sangat sanjayate kamahkamat krodho 'bhijayate
krodhad bhavati sammohah sammohat smrti-vibhramah
smrti-bhramsad buddhi-nasobuddhi-nasat pranasyati
"When a man dwells in his mind on the sense objects, an attachment for them arises. Desire is born of that attachment. From desire anger is born.From anger comes delusion, from delusion springs failure of memory. From wrecked memory results the ruin of the understanding and then he perishes."
The incident in the pub arose because a few men dwelled on a sense object which awoke desires. When there were obstacles placed in the fulfilment of their desire their anger led to violence. It was all fuelled by their alcoholic indulgence and in reality this leads to the forgefulness of one's originally blissful and eternal spiritual position.
As I was about to close the window I noticed another young man standing next door. Like me, he must have been a silent witness. He suddenly looked at me and smiled as if to say, "What a fuss!"
I noticed that in the early hours of the morning, he was sipping an alcoholic drink too.
I smiled back.
Sunday, 7 June 2009
Will someone do something about the British weather please?
Everything in the UK is great - except for the weather.
I mean - here we were, enjoying perfectly fine weather sunning it out in the 25 degree heat, and the next day, it pours like a thingummy-come-torrential-flood. Someone should tell the weatherman (or the weather-woman in these days of political correctness) to just make up his (or her) mind.
The worst part of the rain is my utter helplessness in mowing my lawn. If it pours for days on end, the grass starts growing faster, and in all its wet resplendence it defies the blades of my lawn-mower.
Of course, right now my lawn looks like some tropical jungle. This is because while the sun was shining I was out cycling on the canal tow-path. And now that the rain has announced itself as the main deterrent to any lawn-mowing desires I had left, I am unable to swing a blade in its direction.
When I was holidaying in India, I got used to walking around in bermudas, t-shirts and flip-flops at 9PM in January. I was just about getting used to doing that last week, and the weatherman (er - the woman?) decided to turn.
I must admit - Lord Sutch of the ex-Monster-Loony-Raving-Party had made an election promise that, if practically possible, would have made me vote for him and no one else.
He had made an attractive promise in one of his manifestos, way back in the 1990s. The Party had declared that if it was elected, it would tie a rope around Cornwall and tug the British Isles back by 20 degrees South. The idea was for us rain-harrassed and cloud-covered Brits to have the same weather as sunny Spain.
If only that was possible, Britain would be the best place one could ever wish for!
And if wishes were horses, beggars would ride....
I mean - here we were, enjoying perfectly fine weather sunning it out in the 25 degree heat, and the next day, it pours like a thingummy-come-torrential-flood. Someone should tell the weatherman (or the weather-woman in these days of political correctness) to just make up his (or her) mind.
The worst part of the rain is my utter helplessness in mowing my lawn. If it pours for days on end, the grass starts growing faster, and in all its wet resplendence it defies the blades of my lawn-mower.
Of course, right now my lawn looks like some tropical jungle. This is because while the sun was shining I was out cycling on the canal tow-path. And now that the rain has announced itself as the main deterrent to any lawn-mowing desires I had left, I am unable to swing a blade in its direction.
When I was holidaying in India, I got used to walking around in bermudas, t-shirts and flip-flops at 9PM in January. I was just about getting used to doing that last week, and the weatherman (er - the woman?) decided to turn.
I must admit - Lord Sutch of the ex-Monster-Loony-Raving-Party had made an election promise that, if practically possible, would have made me vote for him and no one else.
He had made an attractive promise in one of his manifestos, way back in the 1990s. The Party had declared that if it was elected, it would tie a rope around Cornwall and tug the British Isles back by 20 degrees South. The idea was for us rain-harrassed and cloud-covered Brits to have the same weather as sunny Spain.
If only that was possible, Britain would be the best place one could ever wish for!
And if wishes were horses, beggars would ride....
Saturday, 6 June 2009
hum ho haa heee - yet another cabinet reshuffle
After being bored to death by the expenses scandal (I mean do we really care which MP purchased what kind of toilet seat and claimed how much back, for heaven's sake?), we now have the survival drama.
What will happen to Gordon? Will he survive or will he not?
The spate resignations from Cabinet Secretaries last week probably added to the worried look the PM had on his brow during the last press-conference. But he seems to have survived - for now at least.
But like Hazel Blears who proudly displayed a brooch that said "rocking the boat" as she walked out on him, the EU election results may well do just that - and rock the boat.
If Labour comes a dismal fourth, will the rebel MPs put up and shut up? Will Cameron increase the tone of his call for an immediate General Elections? Will Brown buckle or will he buck up?
Questions.. questions questions... and all we have to do is to wait till Monday for the answer, when the EU elections results start coming in.
At the end of the day, I know that whoever comes to power, one thing will remain: this Government and future governments will continue to treat the Indian faith traditions (Hinduism, Sikhism, Jainism and Buddhism) as an 'after-thought'. They will continue to speak to us on a 'tokenistic' basis, while they maintain conscious rigour and characteristic robustness in engaging with the Abrahamic traditions.
No doubt, the Abrahamic traditions have a claim of historicity - after all Christainity has been around here for more than any other religion; Judaism has been here sevaral hundred years before the Indian faiths even dared to show their face; and Islam has received special attention for all kinds of reasons.
However, Hindus, Sikhs, Jains and Buddhists are often left feeling left out while attention on the Abrahamic faiths is steady and consistent.
Only a few months ago I was at a reception organised by the Communities and Local Government Department. Although they had laid out sumptous tables with kosher and halal meals, not a morsel of food was suitable for an orthodox Hindu who would only eat strict vegetarian food that did not contain onions or garlic. Jains of course would have had an even more difficult time since they eat nothing that is grown under the ground. The dietary rule is only an illustrative example of how Hindus keep getting sidelined - the list can go on.
But to cut the long ramble short - what difference does all this talk about expenses and Gordon's survival make to the Indian traditions who are an afterthought? Hum, ho, haa hee - not much, me doth think!
What will happen to Gordon? Will he survive or will he not?
The spate resignations from Cabinet Secretaries last week probably added to the worried look the PM had on his brow during the last press-conference. But he seems to have survived - for now at least.
But like Hazel Blears who proudly displayed a brooch that said "rocking the boat" as she walked out on him, the EU election results may well do just that - and rock the boat.
If Labour comes a dismal fourth, will the rebel MPs put up and shut up? Will Cameron increase the tone of his call for an immediate General Elections? Will Brown buckle or will he buck up?
Questions.. questions questions... and all we have to do is to wait till Monday for the answer, when the EU elections results start coming in.
At the end of the day, I know that whoever comes to power, one thing will remain: this Government and future governments will continue to treat the Indian faith traditions (Hinduism, Sikhism, Jainism and Buddhism) as an 'after-thought'. They will continue to speak to us on a 'tokenistic' basis, while they maintain conscious rigour and characteristic robustness in engaging with the Abrahamic traditions.
No doubt, the Abrahamic traditions have a claim of historicity - after all Christainity has been around here for more than any other religion; Judaism has been here sevaral hundred years before the Indian faiths even dared to show their face; and Islam has received special attention for all kinds of reasons.
However, Hindus, Sikhs, Jains and Buddhists are often left feeling left out while attention on the Abrahamic faiths is steady and consistent.
Only a few months ago I was at a reception organised by the Communities and Local Government Department. Although they had laid out sumptous tables with kosher and halal meals, not a morsel of food was suitable for an orthodox Hindu who would only eat strict vegetarian food that did not contain onions or garlic. Jains of course would have had an even more difficult time since they eat nothing that is grown under the ground. The dietary rule is only an illustrative example of how Hindus keep getting sidelined - the list can go on.
But to cut the long ramble short - what difference does all this talk about expenses and Gordon's survival make to the Indian traditions who are an afterthought? Hum, ho, haa hee - not much, me doth think!
Thursday, 16 October 2008
hoarding all the way...!
ever wondered why indians keep hoarding stuff in the house? it seems so difficult to throw out things well past their sell-by date; so unimaginable to give away stuff you dont use but may still be useful to others; and unacceptable to to take stuff to the tip and get rid of them for good.
everything starts with yoghurt containers. now, why does my wife carefully wash them and keep them stacked in a corner in the kitchen?
"well, they are the best containers when guests want a take-away after a meal at our house!" she grins, when i question her.
she also has other stuff that keeps accumulating. a bottle contains rubber-bands that she carefully peels from packaging, another box contains gift wraps that she carefully unwraps in a crease-free manner and stacks for future re-use, and a corner in the garden shed contains stacks of old disused pots that hasnt seen daylight for decades.
when i try to throw some of these away for good, she gives me a stern look and admonishes me with a curt retort, "it's all about recycling and being eco-friendly. don't you think that reusing this stuff will save the planet's resources?"
my son on the other hand hoards toys, balls and coloured pencils. it doesn't matter if the toys are broken and unuseable, if the football is punctured and has lost its bounce, or if the coloured pencil has lost its stub and cannot be used again. they pile up in a corner in his room gathering a bit of dust and all of his unidvided attention.
if I do try to throw any of his stuff, he would look at me in great anguish and with as much seriousness as a five year old could possibly muster and say something like, "daddy, i love my transformer, please dont throw it away. Pleeease?".
of course, i would have to sigh and change my mind.
my father is a completely different hoarder. he loves trinkets and tools. if he dismantles an old table to throw away, he would carefully remove all the nuts and bolts and keep them sealed in a plastic bag in the garage. if he discovered a piece of string or a wire lying around in the house, he would roll it up neatly, label it correctly and store it efficiently in a carboard box kept for knick-knacks.
the amount of junk he accumulates leaves me breathless. if i do question him on the utter uselessness of hoarding so much junk, he would just look away quite conveniently or look busy changing channels on the tv.
last month, the tap in my bathroom broke. the plumber said that it was an old model for which no one manufactured a washer that needed to go under the tap. my father just raised his eyebrows, quitely rummaged through his pile of junk in the garage, and marched triumphantly in with the plastic washer that was an exact fit.
my mother, who is an avid reader of books, hoards just that. old books, brown books, colourful books, torn books, used books, unread books, dog-eared books, crisp and clean books, and i-dont-know what other category of books sit on a shelf in her room. i thought she might like to give some of the books she had already read to charities like OXFAM. but no, she loves her books and wouldnt dream of giving them away."i keep reading them again and again," she declared in a very proprietary manner. "and i find deeper and deeper meanings in them every time i read them again."
now, i always thought that i was not a hoarder. i do throw away as much as possible. or do i?
my wife walked in to my study yesterday, and threatened to throw my desk out for recycling if i did not do something about the second draw. "what second draw?" i asked her puzzled. "it looks perfectly ok to me."
"does it now?" she smiled sarcastically. "look at the miles and miles of cable and wires and all kinds of things inside it. you probably dont need them, probably dont use them, and yet you cant throw your useless cables away, can you?" she enquired scathingly.
i sighed and spent two hours this morning going through old cables and wires. she was right - I discovered three earphones belonging to three old mobile phones that i have thrown away, six old telephone cables that i used for connecting pc to phone line during the dial-up days, and several old pencils and pens that refuse to write.
healer, i should have said to myself, heal thyself.
everything starts with yoghurt containers. now, why does my wife carefully wash them and keep them stacked in a corner in the kitchen?
"well, they are the best containers when guests want a take-away after a meal at our house!" she grins, when i question her.
she also has other stuff that keeps accumulating. a bottle contains rubber-bands that she carefully peels from packaging, another box contains gift wraps that she carefully unwraps in a crease-free manner and stacks for future re-use, and a corner in the garden shed contains stacks of old disused pots that hasnt seen daylight for decades.
when i try to throw some of these away for good, she gives me a stern look and admonishes me with a curt retort, "it's all about recycling and being eco-friendly. don't you think that reusing this stuff will save the planet's resources?"
my son on the other hand hoards toys, balls and coloured pencils. it doesn't matter if the toys are broken and unuseable, if the football is punctured and has lost its bounce, or if the coloured pencil has lost its stub and cannot be used again. they pile up in a corner in his room gathering a bit of dust and all of his unidvided attention.
if I do try to throw any of his stuff, he would look at me in great anguish and with as much seriousness as a five year old could possibly muster and say something like, "daddy, i love my transformer, please dont throw it away. Pleeease?".
of course, i would have to sigh and change my mind.
my father is a completely different hoarder. he loves trinkets and tools. if he dismantles an old table to throw away, he would carefully remove all the nuts and bolts and keep them sealed in a plastic bag in the garage. if he discovered a piece of string or a wire lying around in the house, he would roll it up neatly, label it correctly and store it efficiently in a carboard box kept for knick-knacks.
the amount of junk he accumulates leaves me breathless. if i do question him on the utter uselessness of hoarding so much junk, he would just look away quite conveniently or look busy changing channels on the tv.
last month, the tap in my bathroom broke. the plumber said that it was an old model for which no one manufactured a washer that needed to go under the tap. my father just raised his eyebrows, quitely rummaged through his pile of junk in the garage, and marched triumphantly in with the plastic washer that was an exact fit.
my mother, who is an avid reader of books, hoards just that. old books, brown books, colourful books, torn books, used books, unread books, dog-eared books, crisp and clean books, and i-dont-know what other category of books sit on a shelf in her room. i thought she might like to give some of the books she had already read to charities like OXFAM. but no, she loves her books and wouldnt dream of giving them away."i keep reading them again and again," she declared in a very proprietary manner. "and i find deeper and deeper meanings in them every time i read them again."
now, i always thought that i was not a hoarder. i do throw away as much as possible. or do i?
my wife walked in to my study yesterday, and threatened to throw my desk out for recycling if i did not do something about the second draw. "what second draw?" i asked her puzzled. "it looks perfectly ok to me."
"does it now?" she smiled sarcastically. "look at the miles and miles of cable and wires and all kinds of things inside it. you probably dont need them, probably dont use them, and yet you cant throw your useless cables away, can you?" she enquired scathingly.
i sighed and spent two hours this morning going through old cables and wires. she was right - I discovered three earphones belonging to three old mobile phones that i have thrown away, six old telephone cables that i used for connecting pc to phone line during the dial-up days, and several old pencils and pens that refuse to write.
healer, i should have said to myself, heal thyself.
mind the generational gap
my dad and mum love to watch two tv serials: kahani ghar ghar ki (the story of every house) and kesar (thats the name of a girl). my son loves to watch dora the explorer.i love to watch news at ten.my wife can watch pretty much anything and is not fussed.but the sheer variety of tastes in watching tv in my house is bewildering.of course, i can never tell the difference between one hindi serial and the other. most of them have a rich family in it.
if the daugther-in-law is an angel, usually the mother-in-law is a devil, or vice-versa. they usually have a few murders, rapes, take-over bids, birthday parties, weddings, divorces, deaths, accidents, mistaken identities, baby-swappings at birth and the usual chanting of a theme song thrown in for good measure. most of the characters look the same. sometimes the good guy in one tv serial is the bad guy in the other.
i once told my mum, "dont u think that the name kahani ghar ghar ki is a bit out-of-place? the story in ur tv serial never happens in every household - it is quite unique and comic. they should be change the name to 'kahani ghar ghar ki nahi' or something like that."mum and dad gave me a dirty look like i was some scarred left-over from a rubbish dump the cat had foraged and rejected.
that was the end of my trying to make any sense of my hindi-serialo-phobia.so i bravely tried to sit down with mum and dad for five minutes to join their favourite hindi shows, but ended up feeling totally lost and bewildered. day after day, night after night, they watch the same stories re-hashed, regurgitated, re-created and redeployed in different permutations and combinations, but the essential ingredients are always the same.
don't they ever get bored? but no - o no - they r glued to the tv set in complete and utter dedication.my son is the same - dora the explorer is the apple of his eye, bob the builder is his hero, and the backyardigans are the shennanigans of his comedy store. he can be happily glued to the tv set without batting an eyelid at anyone else for the entire happy hour that his mother allows him to watch every day.
my wife's attitude is the best. " i really dont have to watch every single episode of the tv serials," she explained earnestly. "if i see one episode a month, i can understand the story of the entire month, so why waste time seeing it every day anyway?"
if i am lucky enough not to be in front of my computer, and if i am lucky enough to find that neither the first generation nor the third generation of my family are hogging the remote control, then occassionally i get the chance to see my favourite programmes. these are sky news, bbc news 24 and news at ten.last night as i managed to settle down to a quite moment of news-watching, my 6-year old son waddled down the stairs in his pajamas which were too big for him, and said, "daddy why do you always watch the news? its so booooooring.'
what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gooseling. or is it the other way round?sigh!
if the daugther-in-law is an angel, usually the mother-in-law is a devil, or vice-versa. they usually have a few murders, rapes, take-over bids, birthday parties, weddings, divorces, deaths, accidents, mistaken identities, baby-swappings at birth and the usual chanting of a theme song thrown in for good measure. most of the characters look the same. sometimes the good guy in one tv serial is the bad guy in the other.
i once told my mum, "dont u think that the name kahani ghar ghar ki is a bit out-of-place? the story in ur tv serial never happens in every household - it is quite unique and comic. they should be change the name to 'kahani ghar ghar ki nahi' or something like that."mum and dad gave me a dirty look like i was some scarred left-over from a rubbish dump the cat had foraged and rejected.
that was the end of my trying to make any sense of my hindi-serialo-phobia.so i bravely tried to sit down with mum and dad for five minutes to join their favourite hindi shows, but ended up feeling totally lost and bewildered. day after day, night after night, they watch the same stories re-hashed, regurgitated, re-created and redeployed in different permutations and combinations, but the essential ingredients are always the same.
don't they ever get bored? but no - o no - they r glued to the tv set in complete and utter dedication.my son is the same - dora the explorer is the apple of his eye, bob the builder is his hero, and the backyardigans are the shennanigans of his comedy store. he can be happily glued to the tv set without batting an eyelid at anyone else for the entire happy hour that his mother allows him to watch every day.
my wife's attitude is the best. " i really dont have to watch every single episode of the tv serials," she explained earnestly. "if i see one episode a month, i can understand the story of the entire month, so why waste time seeing it every day anyway?"
if i am lucky enough not to be in front of my computer, and if i am lucky enough to find that neither the first generation nor the third generation of my family are hogging the remote control, then occassionally i get the chance to see my favourite programmes. these are sky news, bbc news 24 and news at ten.last night as i managed to settle down to a quite moment of news-watching, my 6-year old son waddled down the stairs in his pajamas which were too big for him, and said, "daddy why do you always watch the news? its so booooooring.'
what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gooseling. or is it the other way round?sigh!
Monday, 4 June 2007
Garbhology and the art of social discourse
Whew - the Dandia and Garbha charity event I attended last weekend at Copeland school in aid of social projects in India were frantic. The charity event was organised by the Lotus Trust in aid of Vrindavan Food for Life and Bhaktivedanta Hospital in Mumbai. Over five hundred people danced their way through traditional devotional music well through the night, glittering in colourful silks and exotic jewellery. And yes, even the men – the youth in any case - seem to favour silk kurtas and all kinds of silver jewellery embedded in odd parts of the body that makes no sense to me. It must be a sign of my middle-agedness,
I am not exactly an elegant dancer, but one of those 'getting-along-in-a-moderate-way' types. But my friends Rishi Kumar and Sanjeev Patel were like twins who were born to dance or something like that. They whizzed past everyone in intricate twirls and synchronised steps, with their Dandia sticks whirring in the air like some helicopter come to pick strawberries, leaving the rest of us gasping for breath.
And then there was my good friend Prash. He suddenly decided to spring one of his unknown acquaintances on me. The acquaintance was quite harmless, but rather boring in a manner of speaking – boring because when the first words of greetings were exchanged, none of us knew what to speak to him.
My other friends Amit, Devesh and I were just warming up to some chilled-out debates around the latest Pirates movie, when Prash must have decided that we needed to be punished for not including him in our male-bonding prattle. Prash, who is known as the original nalayak in my friend circle, conveniently disappeared two seconds after dropping his acquaintance on us. Exactly ten seconds later, Devesh and Amit politely excused themselves and planted their tactful selves one row ahead of me.
Politeness personified that I am (he he he), I stuck around rather bravely with Prash’s harmless friend, trying to break ice. The only problem was that the ice was as hard as South African diamonds, and there was no thaw in site.
Luckily for me, Shyam, who has just come fresh from India, walked by with a warm greeting. I managed to dump Prash's harmless friend on him - whew- and almost felt like one of those fortunate blokes who had just managed to break out of Alcatraz.
One of my mates wants to get married in an honorable sort of way (identity protected so his position is not compromised. Well to be honest, I am protecting his identity for my own protection – he would probably give me a black eye if he saw his name in print here). The poor bloke gets twenty elderly maasis descending on him at every social event, trying to match him with single girls at events like weddings and Garbhas. When my mates were pulling his leg in a humorous but honorable way to make a move and talk to some of the two hundred single girls single girls dancing and prattling around the hall, a young man who had just come from India overheard the friendly banter.
"Do you know how I can meet someone too?" he whispered to me in all earnestness. "I do want to find someone to get married to.'
In the meantime, my son Neel kept popping up every 5 minutes between his fledgling dance steps to take a sip from a mineral water bottle I held in my hand.
Fifteen minutes later, the man who had just arrived from India announced, 'Hey I am going to join that group with that aunty in that pink chaniya-choli. She is teaching some groovy moves to the guys and gals dancing with her.'
An elderly man sitting nearby came down heavily on us and said sarcastically, 'Soooo? All of you have left your wives on the other side of the room and you are having fun here by yourselves, are you?'
‘Kaka, don’t preach,’ sniggered someone. I felt a bit guilty and tried to look away. One must respect elders after all, not to forget spouses.
I managed to look to the far end of the room and noted that all the spouses were having a great time dancing with other women – none of them seemed to be missing us and seemed to be having a great time anyway.
I got home tired and weary, way past midnight - only to be woken up at an unearthly hour, at the crack of dawn by Leela maasi - my wife's elderly mentor at the temple. She wanted my wife to get to the temple early in the morning to help make samosas for the shop (that is my wife’s weekly seva at the temple).
'Maasi?' I croaked half-asleep. “”Whadya want?'
'Deepali chhe?' she demanded in a voice of authority that no one else in the entire temple could even attempt to muster.
I dared not tell Leela maasi to stop calling so early in the morning, and just passed the phone meekly to my wife.
Talk about paper tigers!
I am not exactly an elegant dancer, but one of those 'getting-along-in-a-moderate-way' types. But my friends Rishi Kumar and Sanjeev Patel were like twins who were born to dance or something like that. They whizzed past everyone in intricate twirls and synchronised steps, with their Dandia sticks whirring in the air like some helicopter come to pick strawberries, leaving the rest of us gasping for breath.
And then there was my good friend Prash. He suddenly decided to spring one of his unknown acquaintances on me. The acquaintance was quite harmless, but rather boring in a manner of speaking – boring because when the first words of greetings were exchanged, none of us knew what to speak to him.
My other friends Amit, Devesh and I were just warming up to some chilled-out debates around the latest Pirates movie, when Prash must have decided that we needed to be punished for not including him in our male-bonding prattle. Prash, who is known as the original nalayak in my friend circle, conveniently disappeared two seconds after dropping his acquaintance on us. Exactly ten seconds later, Devesh and Amit politely excused themselves and planted their tactful selves one row ahead of me.
Politeness personified that I am (he he he), I stuck around rather bravely with Prash’s harmless friend, trying to break ice. The only problem was that the ice was as hard as South African diamonds, and there was no thaw in site.
Luckily for me, Shyam, who has just come fresh from India, walked by with a warm greeting. I managed to dump Prash's harmless friend on him - whew- and almost felt like one of those fortunate blokes who had just managed to break out of Alcatraz.
One of my mates wants to get married in an honorable sort of way (identity protected so his position is not compromised. Well to be honest, I am protecting his identity for my own protection – he would probably give me a black eye if he saw his name in print here). The poor bloke gets twenty elderly maasis descending on him at every social event, trying to match him with single girls at events like weddings and Garbhas. When my mates were pulling his leg in a humorous but honorable way to make a move and talk to some of the two hundred single girls single girls dancing and prattling around the hall, a young man who had just come from India overheard the friendly banter.
"Do you know how I can meet someone too?" he whispered to me in all earnestness. "I do want to find someone to get married to.'
In the meantime, my son Neel kept popping up every 5 minutes between his fledgling dance steps to take a sip from a mineral water bottle I held in my hand.
Fifteen minutes later, the man who had just arrived from India announced, 'Hey I am going to join that group with that aunty in that pink chaniya-choli. She is teaching some groovy moves to the guys and gals dancing with her.'
An elderly man sitting nearby came down heavily on us and said sarcastically, 'Soooo? All of you have left your wives on the other side of the room and you are having fun here by yourselves, are you?'
‘Kaka, don’t preach,’ sniggered someone. I felt a bit guilty and tried to look away. One must respect elders after all, not to forget spouses.
I managed to look to the far end of the room and noted that all the spouses were having a great time dancing with other women – none of them seemed to be missing us and seemed to be having a great time anyway.
I got home tired and weary, way past midnight - only to be woken up at an unearthly hour, at the crack of dawn by Leela maasi - my wife's elderly mentor at the temple. She wanted my wife to get to the temple early in the morning to help make samosas for the shop (that is my wife’s weekly seva at the temple).
'Maasi?' I croaked half-asleep. “”Whadya want?'
'Deepali chhe?' she demanded in a voice of authority that no one else in the entire temple could even attempt to muster.
I dared not tell Leela maasi to stop calling so early in the morning, and just passed the phone meekly to my wife.
Talk about paper tigers!
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