A sari state of affairs

Kerala, to me, had always evoked pictures of ladies in gold-bordered white mundus, beautiful backwaters and coconut trees. Reality could not have been more different – Ernakulum was no different from any other dusty Indian town caught in the big town v/s small city identity trap. There were coconut trees, but no more or no fewer than you found anywhere else in India. But, the greatest disappointment was the clothes, or rather the lack of expected clothes. Every single lady I saw, from the secretary of the Chairman of the Port Trust to the lady hawking vegetable under the shade of a tree, was in a brightly coloured synthetic sari.
Synthetic saris in the heat and humidity of Kerala? Utterly ridiculous, right?
Wrong!!! Apparently brightly coloured synthetic saress made sense – they were cheaper than cotton mundus, were much easier to maintain, and did not get crumpled in less than an hour. The argument must have been compelling for so many ladies to have made the sartorial switch from the garments favoured by generations of Malayali women, but I was never convinced. White is a reflective colour, and cotton a material that breathes – nothing makes more sense in a place like Kerala than a white cotton mundu. But I guess nobody really has the time or the inclination to maintain cotton clothes any more.
This happened was a couple of years back.
I noticed a continuation of the same phenomenon during the Ganapathi visarjan processions in Mumbai. There were women attired in colourful saris dancing gaily. But where was the traditional Maharashtrian nine yard sari? Everyone, young, not so young or old was in a single coloured georgette, chiffon, satin or synthetic sari, decorated with sequins and machine embroidery done with gold thread. Kan cholies had given way to heavily embroidered blouses with interesting necklines.
It is the same trend at society weddings – anyone wearing a sari is in a flimsy sari with heavy embroidery. At one time, not too long ago, the only choice a bride made was on whether she wanted to get married in a Benarasi or an Kanjeevaram sari – now, I have actually forgotten the last time I saw a bride wearing something other than a ghaghara choli with very heavy embroidery.
Nobody even seems to want to wear handlooms any more.
Baluchari, paitani, , chanderi, sambalpuri, tangail – even the names are sheer poetry – they are all gradually getting replaced by the saris that have no heritage, no tradition, and no particular merit. Embroiderers are replacing weavers at a rate so fast, I wonder how long weaving traditions will continue.
Again, I understand why people would rather not wear handlooms – they are difficult to maintain, and do not drape as well as the more clingy material. Whether you have a figure to flaunt, or want to pretend you have that figure, handloom saris are not for you. Even the best draped handloom sari always adds a couple of inches to your hipline, and totally smothers your waistline.
But why is nothing being done to save our weaving traditions? People prefer other materials for the saris, but is there any reason why an authentic handloom border and pallav cannot be stitched onto a chiffon or a satin sari? Surely our fashion designers can make it fashionable to flaunt our traditional weaves, if only in the form of a gorgeous pallav?
When it is so obvious to a person like me, why are the people who actually work with weavers not being able to think of it? Two days later, we will be celebrating the Birth Anniversary of Gandhi-ji. Everyone will pay lip service to him, and forget all about him. Along with all that he stood for, we also seem to have forgotten the weavers who’s cause he expounded.
At the rate at which we are going, soon, there would be no weavers left in the country. And that would be a very sari state of affairs indeed.

Circle of Knowledge

At my older son’s school, they put up what they call the ‘Circle of Knowledge’ on the notice board every month – a circle with radiating spokes giving a ‘before’ and ‘after’ snapshot of what the children knew about the topic that was covered the previous month.

Last month’s topic had been plants, and I noted with wry amusement that the net contribution by my son was all of zero comments. A quick count of the number of spokes showed that there were fewer comments than number of kids in the class, so naturally, everyone could not be represented. And since some names appeared more often than others, clearly it was a question of who shouted the fastest and the loudest, not necessarily of who knew the most.

“So, are you going to give your mother the privilege of seeing your name up there at least once before the end of the year?”, I joked.

“Definitely”, the son replied, before we both walked into the classroom.

While coming out, I saw another mother scrutinising the chart, with bored looking son trying to drag her into the classroom. I wondered, as I always do, whether that mother read any of the comments or just checked to see what her son had to contribute. I did not have to wonder too long.

“You are so stupid”, the mother exploded. “Why don’t you participate more in class?”

“But, Mamma, …”, he stammered. All his bravado evaporating in an instant.

“What Mamma-shamma? You are so stupid”, she reiterated. “How many times have I told you to speak more in class?”

“But Mamma, I answered.”

“What answer-shanser? Look, you have said only three things. This boy other boy has said five things. Why do you have to be so stupid.”

To say I was stunned would be a slight understatement. Anyone possessing basic mathematical skills could see that if you divided the number of comments by the number of students in the class, you got a figure of less than one. So if the kid contributed even one comment, the kid had actually fared better than average. And if this child had indeed made three comments, he was something like four times the average. Had I been in that mother’s place, I would have been delirious with happiness. Instead, she was yelling at her child for not being as good as (what she defined was) the best in the class.

I am a very ambitious mother myself, and often yell at my son for not performing as well as I would like him to academically. But I demand from him what I think he is capable of, not what someone else is able to do.

Kids all evolve differently, and at different rates. If the parents and the teachers do not realise that, would any of the kids be able to achieve their full potential? And how can you yell at someone who is doing so well for not doing better?

Come to think of it, was it the fault of the mother or of the school? When a school goes out of its way to announce that it doesn’t believe in competition, and that everyone is a winner in their own way, would it not make more sense for them to put up an anonymous ‘Circle of Knowledge’?

Or am I just overreacting?

The World Calls him a Terrorist

[A couple of years back, I got into an argument with a bunch of otherwise sensible Americans who seemed to want to brand all were Muslims as terrorists, unless proved otherwise.
Since I had heard this real story from my hubby (who was then traveling within the Arab countries 20 days a month) just a few days before, I had to write it up.

The story is from the PoV of the head of my hubby's firm, and is appropriate to recount during the month of Ramzan.]


He stepped out of the private elevator into the lobby of Kuwait’s tallest building, after an invigorating half-hour session in the gym of the Chairmans’ Club, feeling better than he had for a long time. The work was decent and the pay was good, but to be honest, the Middle East was not Wall Street. And while the people were nice and friendly, they were a long way off from being the scintillating company. Perhaps things would change after his wife joined him after Christmas. But till then, he really should take advantage of the lean season enforced by Ramadhan to work out in the gym more often.

The lobby was empty. It was only the second time he’d seen it this way – the first was when he’d crawled out of the office at 3am, after a gruelling session with the investment bankers in charge of his company’s IPO, and even that time, his colleagues had been with him. It took him a moment to realise why – the faithful were all away breaking the Ramadhan fast. All Kuwait was feasting with their family and friends, and he was all alone, a stranger in an alien land – in all his years, he had never felt as lonely as he did at that moment.

“Sir, would you give me the pleasure of sharing my humble food with me?”, the voice jolted him out of his reverie. He looked around in search of the owner of the voice and found the smiling face of the doorman.

He stopped on his tracks. The doorman! The person he passed every day, without even glancing at him. The person who must have held the door open for him dozens at times, and who he acknowledged automatically, if at all. What was he doing here – why was he not away with the rest? He noticed the neatly rolled up prayer rug and realised that the doorman must have said his prayers right there – made sense, he couldn’t leave his post after all, he had a job to do. He made a mental note to try and find out the man’s name, so he could recommend his name for the next increment.

“Sir, would you partake my food?”, the doorman repeated.

“Me??”, he stared incredulously at the steel container that contained the doorman’s only meal of the day.

“Ji Hazoor. I was going to break my Ramadhan fast, and since you are here, would you do me the honour of having your meal with me?”

He hesitated, and the doorman misunderstood the reason for his uncertainty. “Please Sir. The food is very clean. And my wife is the best cook in Kuwait. Never will you taste biryani as good as hers – not even in your fancy restaurants. Please Sir, share my meal.”

“But, but”, he stammered, and then blurted out the real reason. “But there is not enough there for both of us, and you have been fasting all day. If I share your meal with you, you’ll go hungry.”

“Sir, my religion tells me to share my food. You cannot refuse it.”

“But what about you?”

“Sir, if I do my duty, Allah will take care of me. Please, sir, share my food with me. It would give me immense pleasure if you do. Please, sir, please.”

The aroma of the cooked meat and exotic spices was wafting up, and he could not resist any longer. Rolling up his sleeves, he sat down awkwardly next to the doorman, and had the best meal of his life.

The World calls him a terrorist, but he is the hungry man who happily shares his food with a stranger.

That horrid A-word

Most people claim they became an ‘Aunty’ the day they got married - a carefree girl one day, a universal ‘Aunty’ the next. Strangely, I avoided that fate for a very long time. The first time I was called “Aunty” was when I took my six week old baby out for an evening stroll. Revelling in the bliss of being “Mamma” to my kid, I don’t think the fact that I was finally being called “Aunty” even registered in my mind.
To be honest, unlike a lot of other women, I have absolutely no issues about being called “Aunty”, provided I am being called “Aunty” by someone who’s mother is likely to be roughly the same age as me. I don’t mind being called “Aunty” by the twelve-year old who lives on the floor below mine, even though she is nine inches taller than I, and carries herself with infinitely more sophistication – after all, many of my school mates have kids her age.
But I saw red when the college-going brother of one of the residents of my apartment block called me “Aunty” in the gym the other day. I knew he was innocent of wilfully causing offence, and that if he had any inclination of the cauldron of resentment he was stirring up, he would not have used that word. But somehow, knowing that only made things seem worse than they already were.
That pipsqueak actually considered me an antediluvian specimen fit only for a museum, which is why the word slipped out of his lips so effortlessly. The word was a challenge and I did not shy away from picking up the gimlet.
“Aunty, can you please use this treadmill, and let me have that one?”
“ ‘fraid not. I prefer this treadmill because the full blast of the AC is on the other one.”
“But Aunty, I can direct the AC to the ceiling. I prefer the other treadmill because I am planning to jog and that is better for jogging.”
“I’m jogging too, so I’d rather be on this treadmill.”
He gave me a look that clearly said that he did not consider anything I was capable of doing worth dignifying by the word ‘jogging’, but since he could not physically claim the machine I was on, he started his warm-ups.
To say I was stung was an understatement. Bad enough being repeatedly referred to as “Aunty” by someone just about a decade and a half younger than me, but worse yet when he makes snap judgements on my physical fitness or lack of it. I knew someone like him would run much faster than I do, but I was determined to outlast him on time and distance covered – and I knew I could.
He started off at a speed far from prudent, and in less than a minute was forced to reduce his speed considerably. Meanwhile, I gradually increased my speed as I always do, and got into a groove at a speed not very much lower than his. Ten minutes later, he was starting to pant, and it was with nothing short of sheer glee that I accelerated for the first of my short bursts of speed. He had no choice but to try and match my speed, but before he could, I slowed down again. By now he was totally confused, and reduced his pace too to match mine.
Ten mintues later, he was panting so hard, I was starting to get worried about him. Five minutes after that, when I was seriously contemplating calling the instructor the get him off the machine, he finally gave up. He could barely keep himself standing during the cool down phase, and the moment the treadmill stopped, he stumbled off and collapsed onto the nearest bench.
On the way back home, I found him sitting near the steps presumably waiting for someone. I could not resist the chance to rub the indignity of losing to an ‘Aunty’ in.
“Hi, you haven’t jogged before, have you?”
“Erm, erm, no. Not really. Long time ago in school, I used to take part in sports, but I started jogged on a treadmill only recently.”
“Don’t give up just because you are not able to do it now. Take it from me - building up stamina takes some doing. Last year this time, I could barely job five minutes, and look at me now. Just keep at it. I am sure you will be able to do it too.”
I know it was a really cheap shot. But then ‘Aunties’ are known to be nosey and to give unsolicited advice, aren’t they?

Plumbago

The first time I saw a Plumbago flower was at the nursery when I was stocking up on plants after moving to Mumbai. It was love at first sight, and within a week of getting the plants home, a generous splash of violet added a much needed colour accent to my window-sill.

Strangely, after bringing the plant home, I started spotting it everywhere – outside a swanky showroom near Andheri market, on the window sill of a house I passed everytime I went to the market, outside the photo studio. How the plant had managed to disguise itself so thoroughly till I came under its spell is one of those mysteries unlikely ever to be solved.

Finding out what the plant was called took some doing – I had to look through dozens of thumbnails of blue/ violet coloured flowerers before locating this one – but once I had the name, there was a mine of information to be found.

Did you know that Cape Leadworth, as it is commonly known, was introduced to the capital city of Greece as a part of the beautification plan of the city prior to the Olympic Games, and that the flowers and the city are now almost synonymous with each other? I did not know that either, and finding that out did elevate the status of blue jasmine from that of a prolific bloomer to that of a semi-exotic import.

My Plumbago plants flowered faithfully all year round – I would go for weeks without any other flower, but blue jasmine I never had to do without.

Then, in March, almost without warning, the plants both dried up – the leaves turned a brittle brown and the shoots became little more than just twigs. I kept trimming off the dead branches, but even though I knew the plants had no life left in them, I could not bring myself to pull them out and re-use the pot for something else.

Two weeks later, while plucking off the dead leaves, I sighted a speck of green. I tried not to get too excited about it, but couldn’t help myself. Barely a couple of weeks later, the resurrected plant gave me its first flower.

One plant has passed on, but the other one has filled up the entire pot, and my window sill is once again alive to the dash of colour.

Emperor gets new clothes for the Carnival

I had been curious when I saw two days blocked off on my older ones’ time-table for ‘Children’s Carnival’. A normal person would have just waited for a few days to find out what it was, but when did anyone ever accuse me of being even close to normal?

So one day, the inquisition started –

“Does your teacher talk about the Cranival in class?”

“No!”

“Are you sure she has never mentioned it?”

“Yes (and will you quit asking me questions and get on with watching TV?)”

I should have stopped at that, but I made one last attempt at milking him for information –

“What do you think this Carnival thing is?”

“Dunno. Maybe it has something to do with carnivorous animals.” With that dismissal, he turned his back towards me, so I would not ask him any more silly questions.

To say I was amused would be slight understatement.

And I was also astounded by the kind of mental leaps the untrained mind was capable of. Sure there was nothing in common between a celebration and meat eating mammals, but to even make that connection was joining dots at its more elemental form. We train ourselves to do that when we are much older and wiser – how much better it would be if we never forgot the skill.

I told the story about carnivals having something to do with carnivorous animals to practically everyone I met (in real life, or online). Most were, like me, were a mixture of amazed and amused.

Then, someone told me that my son had actually nailed it on the head. ‘Carnival’ and ‘carnivorous’ both had as their root, the Italian word ‘carne’ (or the Greek word ‘carn’ – depending on which account you believe) which means ‘meat’. ‘Carne vale’, or ‘farewell to meat’ refers to the fact that those were the last days when one could gorge on meat before giving it up for Lent. In hindsight it was perfectly obvious – the connection between the two words had been starting at me all this while and I had failed to see it.

I never knew that, but then nobody is expected to know everything. What irked me slightly was the fact that with all my superior education and knowledge, I had not been able to correlate the two words.

But was my failure all that surprising? Not at all – the educated brain has been trained not to be fooled by superficial similarity, and I fell prey to that conditioning.

Why is the Emperor not wearing clothes?

Old friends

I did my high school and undergraduation in Calcutta, and after moving out the city lost touch with practically all my school and college buddies. Some I would unexpectedly run into them at strange places, and would trade often outdated information about classmates, to hoard it till I bumped into the next person.

Then, I discovered social networking sites, and started rediscovering old friends. It started with one friend, her friend list led me to two more names, and those friends to still more. Once started, the flood could not be contained, and I literally found dozens of people I had even forgotten existed.

I met a friend when she was in Mumbai, and serendipitously, there was another friend having lunch with her son at the adjacent table. We got her into Facebook, and she got her friends.

Google did its bit too – a familiar face in the newspaper, a google search for a familiar name with a less familiar surname. She was on Facebook too, and was in touch with a whole new bunch of people.

Chance meetings in photo-studios. Invites sent to long forgotten e-mail addresses. How did we ever exist before social networking?

Today, six of us met over lunch.

I had been looking forward to this all week, but was still slightly apprehensive before the meeting.

Sure we had all interacted on Facebook - had seen pictures of each other’s kids, vaguely knew what the other had done and who they had married. But how would it be when we actually met? Would we have anything to talk about, or would there be awkward silences? Surely we had all taken radically different paths post college – would we at all have anything in common except the fact that we studied at the same school a few lifetimes ago and now live in the same city?

I think we subconsciously picked the restaurant that we did was because we knew the food there was really good, and could compensate for a slightly strained atmosphere.

But all that apprehensive lasted till I met two of my friends outside the restaurant, and did a group hug. The years dropped away, and we were communicating like we had probably never done even in school.

Six spouses, ten kids, dozens of jobs, numerous cities and countless experiences later, we were still the same people that we had been all those many years back.

Actually not! We had all gone our separate ways – banking, flying, journalism, consulting, fashion designing – somewhere along the line we had all got married and had kids. We had evolved as human beings. And at the end of the evolution, we had ended up as very similar people. Surprisingly , we had similar values, and we agreed on a lot of points that we normally do not agree with too many people on.

Nearly two decades after passing out of school, we each realised that it may have been a shared history that brought us together, but it was something else that made us friends.

I don’t remember ever having spent so much time over a lunch, and we would have cheerfully spent a lot more time if we hadn’t been thrown out of the restaurant because they had to shut down for the afternoon. We chatted outside the restaurant for another half an hour, and very reluctantly tore ourselves away. But only after promising to meet again very soon.

After all, we are old friends. And real friends can easily pick-up right where they left off.