Honesty And Integrity : Not yet an extinct species

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Honesty And Integrity : Not yet an extinct species

The great American Humorist , Writer Mark Twain had once said "Honesty: The best of all the lost arts”
Honesty may be the best policy, but there is no getting away from the fact that this art form, is lost. Honesty & Integrity seem like two extinct species in today's world. They no more form a major part of the value system (if at all there is one). But my ideas and to some extent Mark Twain's prophecy were pleasantly shaken by a soul stirring incidence last October, which will always be stuck with me, in my memory, and inspire me.My husband , son and I were on a trip to Egypt and Kerala during the last Puja vacation. The Gulf Air Flight from Bahrain landed us in the wee hours of morning at Trivandrum International Airport. Even though there was a huge contrast between the grand Bahrain International Airport and the quiet Trivandrum Airport, looking still quieter in the early morning , the warmth exuded by the whole atmosphere was extremely soothing. After the baggage collection and immigration process was over, with half night's sleep and many more dreams in our eyes, we proceeded out - into God's own country. Our travel agent had religiously sent the car to the airport to receive us with a huge placard. The day was slowly breaking out and the first rays of sun had started to pierce gently trough the glass windows of the car when we reached our rest house. Since we were too tired from lack of full nights sleep , we did not feel like venturing into sightseeing before grabbing a few hours of sleep and delicious south Indian breakfast. So we told the driver to report after 2.00 pm for taking us to the picturesque Kovalam beach. The driver came dot on time. But we, the lazy tourists could make ourselves ready for the sojourn not before 4.00 pm ( that too after being threatened by the driver that if we delayed further we would not be able to enjoy the beach visit ). But as luck would have it, just after 5 minutes of starting our journey, the four wheeler simply refused to budge an inch . The driver with his little acquired skills of a mechanic, tried to fix the problem , but the snag was bigger than his capabilities could take care of. After trying in vain for 15 minutes, he apologized profusely to us and called up his manager to send another vehicle to the spot where we had halted. That would, take minimum one hour , the manager responded , much to our worry. Since we were leaving for Kanyakumari the very next day, we wanted to have the beach visited that day itself. Even though we had come to Kerala before, this was my son's first visit to this beautiful state. So I wanted to show him around the city and beach before we proceeded further in our itinerary. "Can we get a taxi from here ? we do not want to bother you with another vehicle" I asked the driver. He offered to find us an Auto since autos were more readily available and the main mode of non-public transport there. We wanted to treat this as an adventure . With the help of the driver's communication skills in local language , an auto was hired to ferry us from that point to Kovalam beach and back to town for Rs.300. The auto driver was a tall dark man with thick black moustache. With a cut mark on his face and dhoti folded till the knees, he looked like a rogue straight from a south Indian movie. I was feeling a little apprehensive looking at the appearance of the fellow. "I think he he is drunk" I told my husband. But he allayed my fear by saying "It is his accent , that's all. I do not think there is any thing wrong with this fellow. Do not worry, he is OK ". So three of us boarded the auto. It was my son's first Auto ride and he was quite thrilled with the idea. 10 minutes after we started , the auto driver stopped near a petrol pump and asked us if we could give us his fare in advance so that he could fill some fuel in his three wheeler. I promptly took out a Rs.1000/- note from my hand bag and handed over to him . After filling fuel , he gave me the change and started his vehicle.After driving through the M.G. road for about 20 minutes, we came to the road leading to kovalam beach and finally reached the beach. Auto driver in his broken English said he would wait for us at the parking bay. We had a great time at the beautiful beach adorned by huge coconut and palm trees. We became kids again and played with the waves on the back drop of the setting sun. After playing hide and seek for a while the setting sun finally said adieu to the horizon. We also said good bye and walked up towards the parking place. For a moment I was struck with an idea , "what if the Auto was not there. We had already paid full fare". But the idea vanished immediately with as much suddenness as it's appearance. We found the Auto there with the driver on it, his radio tuned to a local station. Generally a believer in the goodness of people, I felt guilty at the momentary thought about the integrity of the fellow and tried to make up by making polite conversation with the chap on our return trip. Since we had enough time in hand , my husband suggested going to a Shopping Mall to buy some classical music CDs. So I tried to tell the driver to take us to a Big Market. He took us to one of those swanky malls and dropped us there. We got down and started exploring the mall at Trivandrum with each one of us going to their favorite corners. After half an hour , while making a desultory survey of the south cotton suit pieces available there , I heard a loud scream "Sir Sir " from near the ground floor escalator. All three of us and some other listeners too started looking down at the screamer. He was none other than our Auto driver. In his shabby attire and uncouth look he was looking like a cat among the pigeons inside the glitzy milieu. He came up seeing us and told that due to some mistake he had returned us Rs.200/- less at the petrol pump. He discovered it after counting his day's earning earnings at home and had returned from there to give back the money to it's owner. Since he had left us in front of the mall, he hoped we would still be there. I was plain and simple speechless. Here is a man , who has taken the trouble of coming back from home travelling 6 kms. to return 200Rs. which is no case a small sum for him. Rs.200 may not be a big sum for us, but for this fellow , it may as well be equivalent to a day's net earnings. His action made all the civilized onlookers dumbfounded and very small. In a country where for a few Rupees , a constable bargains with the terrorists for allowing the RDX laden truck to enter the city of Mumbai, where big corporate like Satyam cheat millions of investors behind a high profile facade , where scholars do not bat an eyelid before resorting to academic dishonesty, where the other name for bureaucracy is corruption and joining politics or govt. services is considered a gateway to achieve this, this humble semi literate half clad person was possibly giving us the most profound lession in human behaviour. I had tears in my eyes when I saw him extending Rs.200/-(by now crumpled in between the folds oh his Dhoti) apologetically towards me. I opened my purse, took 100 Rs. out and pushed it in his palm besides the 200 Rs. he was holding and said "Anna , I am sorry, I forgot to thank you properly. Thank you so much for taking us around your beautiful city. please buy some sweets for yourself with this 300 Rs." . Even my Hidesign purse was too small in value to take the Rs.200 back. He was refusing to accept at first , but finally gave in when other onlookers explained to him in his native language. He bowed and went away , leaving all of us saluting to his gesture in our minds. He had given a new lease of hope to us. After all every thing was not lost. There were still people who even under failing circumstances did not compromise with their beliefs, their ethics. When India celebrates today sixty two years of freedom , I bow to people like this for bringing back my trust in humanity....
“No legacy is so rich as honesty.” - William Shakespeare

IMMIGRATION AT A USA AIRPORT

Sunday, August 30, 2009

IMMIGRATION AT A USA AIRPORT

When my husband joined Kennedy School Of Government , Harvard University for his second part of Masters in Public Policy Management, first part being completed at National University, Singapore, we started making plans to join him there. I had heard that post 9/11, security system in USA had become very stringent , it was difficult to get a visa and visitors had to undergo a lot of harassment by the customs and immigration officials upon arrival at the port of entry. Since I was going alone with my son , I was really aprehensive about the visit. What if they stopped me at the airport and did not allow to enter . I had read in the news paper about several incidents of racial profiling of Indians. I started rummaging through the websites to find out more about obtaining a tourist visa and and the steps to be taken for a smooth immigration. What I gathered from the websites and experienced visitors that once in the US, you’re under the jurisdiction of the USCIS, part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), who have an almost dictatorial powers to stop you from entering the country even if you had valid visa . You have to answer questions put by these agressive, brusque, bullying, stern and intimidating officers in a courteous , no-nonsense manner. One of my friends told me “It seems they have frisked several politicians like PV Narasimha Rao. They removed his dhoti, they have done it with NDA ministers like George Fernandes. So be very careful. Carry all your papers with you. No one will come to your rescue if there is any problem". Even though I was highly scared , I did not have any other option since my son and I wanted to meet my husband there. So I told my husband, who has a positive phobia towards using cell phones to take a local mobile connection and carry it with him when he came to receive us at the Logan Airport, Boston.

My son, oblivious of all the scary thoughts churning inside my anxious brain , was making his own plans for the proposed trip to USA. Before I went for my visa interviiew, my boss told me to carry as much documents as possible to prove our intentions of returning back to India. "You are young and you are an IT professional. So they may just presume that you would enter with tourist visa and refuse to budge out ". So we went for the visa interview with enough ammunition in the form of statements of asset , proof of holding a public sector job etc to convince the authorities about my certain return. But I should not have taken so many documents, since they did not even bother to see any. We got our tourist visa and got the tickets booked in British Airways to Boston with a 5 hour stop over at London , since there was no direct flight from Calcutta to USA. When we landed at Heathrow Airport, the security checks were much more than I had anticipated. They even asked me to remove my gold bangle and send it with the mobile for checking. Since I never kept my hands empty after marriage, I just tied a handkerchief around my wrist and gave the bangle for testing. I was not the only one. Every one, whether white or coloured was going through the stringent security checks. But instead of feeling irritated , my son told me a very important thing then. He said " mama, if they are checking every one so seriously , there is less possibility of any untoward problem on the way forward". His confidant pronouncement did give me a new sense of security and safety through out our USA trip and I never disliked or felt irritated by such enhanced level of checking.

After spending about four hour or so at heathrow which looked more like a small town than an airport, we boarded our next BA flight for Boston. I called up again my husband from the airport to make sure that he was coming to receive us with his cell phone so that I could inform him in case there was some problem. The BA flight from London to Boston was quite a contrast from the flight from Calcutta to Boston. The later one was filled with Indian people (mostly Bengali) , one of the Air Hostesses was Indian , bengali announcements could be heard in addition to Hindi and English , there were Hindi movies being shown on your TV and you had an option of Indian meal, whereas former had predominantly foreigners with nothing Indian or Asian about it. We were the only Indians apart from another old lady . These things like absence of my people did not help to alleviate my apprehension. My biological clock was giving the sleep signal even though the local time still showed there were still 5 hours to go to sleep. Keeping all our worries in abbeyance both of us went off to sleep till we were aroused by the air hostess to fill arrival/departure record card (I-94) . She politely requested us to help the other Indian lady having trouble filling her form . After the flight landed, we all proceeded towards the immigration area. There were two queues , one for the ‘US Citizens’ and the other for ‘All Other Passports’. I was checking and rechecking our passports and arrival departure cards . You are getting paranoic- observed my son. "If the officer is not satisfied with our answer, he might not permit us an entry. Also the length of time you are permitted to stay is decided by the immigration officer ." I told him. Our turn came quicker than I had expected , the long queues were vanishing fast. After the finger printing and digital photography was over, the officer asked me how long I wanted to stay in USA. I said I wanted to stay for 3 weeks since he was going to stamp the duration on the passport. Then he asked me "Madam , When did you last visit US " . Since this was our first visit , I answered accordingly. He smiled and said " This is your first visit and you want to stay for only 3 weeks . You must stay longer and enjoy our country. You are going to lve it , I can assure you that. Have a great stay " and then proceeded to stamp our passport for six months of stay which was the highest duration allowed on a tourist visa. He gave us a friendly smile and attended the next man in the queue. As we went to collect our baggage , I was thinking how unnecessarily we form wrong impression on certain things and worry ourselves. The so called immigration process , thought of which had intimidated me so much, ended in just 2 questions and that too in such a friendly manner. As we proceeded towards collecting our baggage, I was remembering how I was harassed by the immigration officer asking me all sorts of irrelevant questions at our very own Kolkata airport while going to Singapore. Strange that we never never felt embittered by that incident.

That is why when all the chaos about Shahrukhan being detained at Newark Airport started with alleged ethnic / racial profiling , I wanted to contribute my personal views of the incident which was published on merinews.com. (http://www.merinews.com/cj/tsarmisthapati) .

Gift from Son to Mother-Rendezvous With P.G.Wodehouse

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Gift from Son to Mother-Rendezvous With P.G.Wodehouse

Wear the old coat and buy the new book - Austin Phelps

Last Saturday one of my neighbors called up to help her procure a copy of the book “David Copperfield”. “Can you get it for me from one of the book stores on your way back from office”. By then I was already home. “ you are forgetting , today is Saturday and we have half day office. I am already home. I will get it for you on Monday” I replied. “Oh no” came the disappointed response from the other side. “ I want it today only and I have checked in the local book store. They do not have a copy in the local book store and it is not there in our library as well. Some one has already issued it”. I just could not understand the urgency on her part to get hold of the book . "But what is the hurry. What is the problem if we get it on Monday?” I asked baffled. “Problem is of 10 Marks” She answered. Then she told me the whole story. It seems in her daughter’s school they had asked the children of a specific class to read the said novel during their summer vacation . In case children did not obey, they were threatened with a question carrying 10 Marks in their literature paper from the novel. Since Monday was the D-day of literature test, my neighbor was frantically looking for the book. I was really impressed with the way the school was trying to force reading habits in children because the children and more than them the parents understood only the language of MARKS. But I could not help feeling bad for the children all the same. If they are not reading books outside their course books, they are missing out on one of the greatest pleasures of life. There can be simply no substitute to reading.

After I spoke to her I remembered one incidence which one of my colleagues had narrated few months back when we were coming from our office library after returning a book. It seems her niece and nephew had come to Calcutta during the summer vacation and my colleague had kept a few new books as gifts for the kids. But the kids did not seem to think much about books as gifts. As the vacation advanced , kids were getting restless. My colleague suggested them to read the books during their vacation in Calcutta. After reading a few pages each, both the kids came up to my colleague and started saying reluctantly “Aunty we have completed one chapter from the book. Can we do the rest tomorrow?” My colleague said she was flabbergasted. The way the children were reacting, as if they had been given a home work or some daunting task to be got over with instead of an entertaining and enjoyable experience. “What is happening to the kids of this generation ? Why is the reading habit fading away?” she asked the billion pound question.

While trying to give an answer to the issue she had raised, I could not help reminiscing about my kid-hood and adolescence days. I think we were more fortunate at least in one respect from the kids of today. We did not have so many distractions in the form of Satellite Television, Mobile Phones, PCs and Laptop Computers loaded with games, internet connection allowing connectivity with millions through social networking sites like orkut or facebook. There were no Gameboys , Xbox, Nintendo or PSPs during our time. Since I was brought up in a medium size town in Orissa, we had first exposure to television or Door Darshan only during the 1984 Olympics. Even Door Darshan apart from 'Krishi Darshan' and 'aapke khat' had very few things to offer. One Hindi movie per week, 2 Chitrahhars on Wednesday And Friday and one serial per day was all that was palatable in DD’s menu. So books were my best companion from childhood days. From Grandma’s stories to Amar Chitra Katha, from Aesop’s Fable to Panchatantra and Jataka Tales, from Enid Blyton to Agatha Christie, Sherlock Holmes to Classics I was graduating from one step to another in the company of my favourite books and authors. Once I stepped over to my adolescence days, choice of books and authors changed to George Orwell , Fredrick Forsyth, Alistair MacLean , Jeffrey Archer and so on…Then one day in hostel one of my friends lent me “Right ho Jeeves” by the comic genius P.G.Wodehouse and I got hooked to the Wodehousean style of Humour. Till date I just can not get enough of the foppish Bertie Wooster and his valet cum keeper , the inimitable jeeves carrying on with feudal spirits , of the eccentric Ermsworth constantly being given a trying time by his sister constance or of the tyranny of the formidable aunts Agatha and Dahlia. The oldest member recounting the golf course stories, stories of suave charming Psmith (P silent) , eternal day dreamer Ukridge , Mr. Mulliner’s nephews and the flamboyant Uncle Fred still take me to a different world. The list is endless and Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, who according to many was one of the greatest authors of first part of 20th Century has remained my most favorite author. Like the short stories of O’Henry, P.G.Wodehouse’s idyllic world is evergreen , ever fresh.

Coming back to present, after these two incidences, I decided to introduce literary works of great authors to my son ,so that he had wide literary exposure . Luckily he reads a lot and enjoys reading as much as watching TV or playing games if not more. So when we went for his birthday shopping, among others I bought two omnibus editions of Jeeves series and Blandings series by P.G.Wodehouse as birth day presents for my son and hubby. I was not sure whether my son at such a young age would be able to appreciate the Jeeves stories or not. But none the less I wanted to give it a try. And to my pleasant surprise, he started reading the book even before I could formally gift it to him and seems to be enjoying every bit of it. He has almost finished half of it (some times he even misses his favorite tv serial to read) and is waiting to read the other one after I gift it to his father. Today is his birthday; and he has given me again a gift on this special day by appreciating the work of one of the great authors of all times....

"In a hundred years' time `the kind of man who reads P.G. Wodehouse for pleasure' may become synonymous with an extravagantly fastidious taste. And that indeed is as it should be." Evelyn Waugh - 1939

Visit to Home During Puja Holidays

Monday, October 5, 2009

Visit to Home During Puja Holidays

Ever since I stepped out of the cocoon called home to study Engineering at a different place, it has almost become a ritual for me to look for the holiday list after getting the annual calendar in the new year.Then the expert eyes would start making permutations and combinations to fill in the gap between seemingly consecutive holidays to produce a contiguous long one with the help of French Leaves . Since our institute followed the maintenance of stipulated number of Net Instructional Days very religiously, there were very few unscheduled holidays. Mass - Bunking was a big No-No as there was this fear of delay in the semester completion which would ultimately result in prolongation of the course duration. No company was expected to wait long er than usual for admitting the new recruits. So mass bunking during my time in my institute was not without the fear of jeopardising one's career. Therefore , these consecuting holidays appearing on the calendar coupled with a few french leaves (without allowing the attendance to drop below 85%) were my only road to making home bound trips other than during the semester breaks. Even though my college was at a place 170 Kilo Meters away from my home town, the very idea of having endless hours of gossip with sisters in the comfort of home and not being forced to gulp the almost unpalatable food provided in the hostel, never failed to entyce me. Even after so many years of leaving hostel, getting married and settled in job , the same hankering for a block of leave and going home to spend them still continues. Earlier I used to think, may be, my going to hostel at the tender age of 16+ or getting married at a young age of 19+ has contributed to this hankering. But later on I realised every Indian married lady, whether working outside or houswife, feels the same way about going to her parents' place.

Since I have always been posted outside my home state, I always depend upon the strategic combination of holidays under NI act and casual leaves or previlege leaves to go home. Now ofcourse situation is little different from college days. That time there were no luxury of CL, PL or Sick Leave. But then I had to only take care of my own requirements. Now a trip is planned only when my husband, my son and I, all three of us are free. And Durga Puja time in the state of West Bengal is one such occasion when the state almost comes to a standstill as far as work is considered. So puja vacation gives you an opportunity to have a long holiday. Thus almost every year during the Durga Puja celebrations, I make a beeline for my parent's place with family. When the whole of Kolkata is abuzz with activities, excitement and thrill before the Durga Puja, I have another excitement added to it, the excitement of home-coming....which starts from the day of booking the reservations. Enquiries from parents and sisters start pouring in from the month of August itself. Since all my sisters are also working and stay in the same city, they make arrangements well in advance so that we get to spend maximum time with each other. Every one goes into a gift-buying spree keeping others choices in mind.

This year too we went to Orissa to spend the vacation on a 10-day long trip. As usual I had a wonderful time at home. All the gossips which were not already disected through phone, were put on table over cups and cups of steaming aromatic tea with fried snacks. The hassle-free movie watching condition at Non-Metros were fully exploited. Even though I am not much of a pandal-hopper, still I accompanied my mother in visting a few pandals to seek blessings of Maa Durga resplendent in her attire. Even though I had carried a lot of novels to read in case I got time, I could not even unpack them from the suitcase. There was no fixed time for getting up from sleep in the morning. Special delicacies were being prepared every day by mother's cook who like Anatole is God's another gift to gastric juice. My parents who are always under the impression that I do not get enough to eat in Kolkata, make it a point to overfeed me which invariable results in making me heavier by a few pounds by the end of the holidays. Great luncheons were hosted by my brother-in-laws at the best hotels. My son had an even more enjoyable time, spending with his cousins. No one left any stone unturned to make our vacation an extremely enjoyable one.

With no office to attend , not having to get up in the morning and no botheration of managing the house, holidays were period of absolute bliss in the company of near and dear ones. But like all good things, Puja Holidays also came to end. With a heavy heart, I started packing for our return. Every one started asking about my next visit to orissa as I was thinking of Maa Durga's next visit to earth coming year.

Well, holidays are over and it is now time to get back to work and join the humdrums of home-office-home. But then if there would have been no work, would the holidays have felt so great. So decided to work hard after the rejuvenating vacation so that I can party harder the next time....

"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep."

-- Robert Frost

Partying In The Time Of Parole : Mockery Of Democracy

Monday, November 30, 2009

Partying In The Time Of Parole : Mockery Of Democracy

As the Delhi Government looks for a last moment damage control exercise to shelter itself from the court stricture and public displeasure and the Police and Government authorities are involved in a blame game to pass in the buck for granting parole to Manu Sharma, convicted for murdering Model Jessica Lall in Tamarind Bar in 1999, the collective loss of value, morale and ethics of the nation as a whole stands exposed. It uncovers the moral failure of the public servants and the public , of the jurisprudence and the justice seekers, of the government and the citizens with the same multitude. When one goes through the whole gamut of incidents ranging from the murder of Jessica Lal to partying of the murder convict during his parole and the extraneous grounds on which the parole was granted at supersonic speed , three major things hit our sensibilities the hardest.

Firstly, even though blind folded statues in our court rooms signify non-discrimination and impartiality while imparting justice, the reality is completely different. In actuality, law, it’s keepers the cousre of justice itself are different for people of different strata of the society. Otherwise, how does one explain the fact that when the normal time taken by the Delhi Govt. was more than 6 months for granting or refusing parole to an ordinary prisoners, in case of Manu Sharma , son of an influential politician of Haryana, the whole thing was expedited and processed within twenty days. According to a government official, out of the 132 applications received till September 15, only 11 were granted parole, 33 were rejected and 88 were kept on hold. This small population of 11 prisoners incidentally includes Manu Sharma and Vikash Yadav , two powerful persons in Haryana and Uttar Pradesh Politics respectively. Sharma, who is serving a life sentence for murdering Jessica at Tamarind Court, a Delhi restaurant, in 1999, was let out on a 30-day parole earlier on September 22 which was later extended to sixty days. Parole is generally granted to prisoners in order to give them a feel of the normal life outside the jail , to reunite them with the outside world with a view to reform them, or in situations of extreme personal exigency. In this case, however, all these purposes were defeated. During the parole period left Chandigarh, Sharma was spotted partying at the LAP Lounge Bar on November 7, in violation of his parole norms, which prescribed him to be in Chandigarh, thus showing no signs of reform. The three reasons cited for parole were either too flimsy or unacceptable. The first one was to attend a religious ceremony in memory of his late grandmother. This was not a sound ground for parole, as his grand mother had died more than a year ago . There may be many other prisoners out there in the jail one of whose relations might have died more than a year back. Can they be considered for a parole on the same ground ? The second reason for asking parole was to visit his ailing mother, who was so sick that she was addressing a press conference in their family hotel in Chandigarh on the occasion of Under 19 sports tournament for women . The third was to attend to his business. It was found out that his business was not suffering any loss owing to the lack of his presence. But even if business would have been actually suffering, could it have been a valid ground for granting of parole, because , in that case all the convicts should be let out on parole to look after their , business , money matters and real estate. It is therefore clear that parole was granted to Sharma on inappropriate considerations and the genuineness of the grounds were never verified or scrutinised properly. According to top Police Officials of Delhi, they had not recommended Manu Sharma’s Parole. But it seems the Delhi government took special interest in the matter, sought a second report from the Chandigarh police and cleared the process for an undeserving convict, whereas many deserving cases are either rejected or kept pending for months together. Not only was it granted at lightning speed , it was further extended by another month during which period he was spotted at Delhi Night Club LAP . So it is only the powerful people with influential connections having long strings to pull whenever required and who can get away with any wrong doing can make the law come to their rescue at their time of need. The very assumption that they are immune from the long hands of law makes them murder some one for refusing to serve them alcohol after the bar is closed. This is exactly what must have transpired in the minds of Manu Sharma or Vikas Yadav before Jessica Lall or Nitish Katara were killed. Despite Government and Police attempt to intimidate and harass the witnesses and allow the convict to roam freely in the society, due to wide public outrage and large media coverage, the killer of Jessica Lall was finally convicted and put into life imprisonment in 2006. But history repeats itself in the form of an undue grant of parole (on same grounds which were rejected last year) and again a public outrage forces the govt. to look for cover and the convict returns to the jail before the parole tenure or partying time ends. Also the brazenness and complacency with which Manu Sharma was partying during the parole or his mother addressing press after supposedly being sick speaks volumes of the way these people take the law for granted.
Secondly, what strikes one’s sensibility is the fact that why do we wait till nov. 7 to raise our voices whereas the parole was granted on 22nd September ? Why did every one wake up only after he was found partying at a Bar in Delhi and not before it. The Delhi police say it was alerted to Sharma's presence at the club after a fight broke out in the area. Otherwise, he would have been misusing the parole tenure and continued to be partying in the night clubs till his extended parole period ended. He is quite a known personality and many would have known about his parole and the lame grounds even before 7th of November. But instead of complaining against him , people were boozing with him. We do not have any qualms about ostracizing a leprosy patient or an AIDS patient who have not done any thing more wrong than contracting some viruses or bacteria. But people revel in the company of these rich and famous criminals and even try to be in their good books who are the most virulent specimen in the society . More often than not , the ‘powerful’ tag neutralizes all other evils in a person. According to Arjun Rampal, owner of the club, LAP, where Manu Sharma was seen on 7th night, Sharma was allowed into LAP only because he was with a member of the club. But should not the clubs use their discretion and prohibit such people from entering the club who are on a parole to attend their sick mothers. The acceptance level of evil in the society is a cause of real concern . We may or may not be corrupt, but giving social respect to corrupt people is like promoting dishonesty and legalisising corruption. Hence citizens of this country who give respect to persons committing such heinous crimes because of their power , money , connection and influence are equally to be blamed as the government which bends rules for such personalities.

Thirdly, even though there was a collective outrage by the media and the public , our politicians either are silent on the issue or feign ignorance.Is it because an influential politician’s son is involved ? The politician father has left no stone unturned to influence the law in favour of his son . But still he turns out to become peoples' representative . Why is it that our politicians , whether rule makers or the opposition do not think twice before making a mountain out of a mole hill when a political mileage is to be achieved but the same people look side ways when such gain seem to be in sight. As the voters of this country , we are to take a part of the blame for electing such politicians as our representatives.

Therefore this whole issue and many similar issues are not only ( even though majorly )because of bad governance , but every individual concerned is responsible in some way or other. Till the collective ethos of the country does not change for better, there would be no stopping of the spoilt brats of powerful fathers from taking the lives of innocent victims without even batting an eyelid....

Democracy forever teases us with the contrast between its ideals and its realities, between its heroic possibilities and its sorry achievements : Agnes Repplier

Me And My New Year Resolutions……

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Me And My New Year Resolutions……

Good resolutions are simply checks that men draw on a bank where they have no account - Oscar Wilde

Even though I make them every year only to break them every year, often forgetting them by my Birth Day, I don't seem to have got tired of them . Well I am talking about my new year resolutions or resolves in the past 25 years. The failure of not being able to attain the goals year after year has not deterred me from taking more vows in the beginning of the very next year. Ever since I knew the meaning of “New Year Resolution” , I did not fail to perform this annual ritual of making a commitment towards a lifestyle change (for better ofcourse) for every morning of the new year. By the time New Greeting Cards were sent through snail mail (during non sms-email-facebook-tweeting era) I had a long list of bad habits I'd like to get rid off and before Christmas festivities were over, I would be finalizing my New Year's resolutions with lofty goals for the New Year. The vows were ofcourse different during different phases of life depending upon the prevailing circumstances .

When I was in School and college, attaining academic excellence was of supreme importance in my life. So during those period, the resolves normally ranged from stuyding hard , improving grades , learning some thing new ( a game or a new language) , become more organized, manage time to become more independent etc.. etc.. According to a Time report a poll had found that while 65% of people who made a resolution in 2008 kept their promise for at least part of the year, 35% never even made it out of the gate. Well I think I was always in the 65% , since my resolves stood ground atleast for some days ( the duration span mostly being inversely proportional to the effort in sustaining the effort) before giving in to greater forces. After receiving the new year diary , I would make a time table with specified hours for study , extra curricular activities , recreation, house cleaning , socializing etc. First few days were always as per the time table. But as days rolled by , leisure time were waxed and the study time waned the total time in the routine remaining constant. And , by the time first quarter of the year passed, new year resolves were things of the past and in all probabilities forgotten by grey cells only to be reminded during exam times. But as an incorrigible resolution maker, again in the next year I would resolute to renew all old resolves while adding a few more to the old inventory.

After I got married and settled in job , my New Year commitments were entirely different. My responsibilities were now of dissimilar nature and so also demands and expectations from me. After my son was born, I started adding those extra pounds and had little time for any thing else . I could hardly fit into my old clothes and on top of it would be stressed most often trying to manage work and home with two small children ( my husband some times behaves smaller than my son) to take care of . So every year I would come up with new agendas. If I saw a lady driving smartly on the city roads and my chauffer giving me a hard time, then driving on a regular basis was my resolve for the next year. If I was suffering from stress and anxiety in the last week of December , then I would vow to lead a stress free relaxed less grumpy life with overdose of Yoga and Meditation. Going for a swim atleast during the non-winter days was one year’s resolution when the realization suddenly dawned upon me one day that it is a great calorie burner added to the fact that it might prove to be life saver at certain unforeseen circumstances. Giving up Tea was also in the chart one time but probably the shortest lived resolve. One year I even thought of reforming myself by becoming more assertive and not taking all the crap people said . But the three things which never failed to make it to the chart every year were 1) lose weight 2) exercise more 3 ) eat healthy. I need not say how much committed I was towards these self improvement exercises as My present physical state is a good report card and speaks for itself.

So all these thoughts of lifestyle changes using New Year Resolution as a means for remaking my life have not been very effective so far. But then I am a born optimist and a great believer in the saying “Failure is the stepping stone to success”( Only thing is in my case success seems to be residing on the top floor of a 25 storied building with no lift ) . So not to give up , this year too I dared to make a resolve , to supervise my son’s studies seriously. I told him “you will be in class IX and both you and I need to take care of your academics seriously” . Although he laughed at it at first possibly factoring in my past performance , he was still apprehensive. He should not have bothered much of course because by the time his final term got over my vigilance had become 10% of original. He is still waiting for it to come down to 0.

Since I am publishing this post more than 4 months (that too after being subtly reminded by friends and colleagues that I am getting lazier day by day) , my Son was a little curious to know about the subject of the post . After listening about the topic he rolled his eyes cynically and asked “don’t you think you are a little late to write about new year resolutions, we are in April now” . I told him we have the advantage of being able to make resolutions and introspect about them atleast two times a year. Once according to the Gregorian calandar and again in April when in many regions of India, the Solar New Year begins (Vishub Sankranti , Vishu, Baisakhi , Poila Baisakh ) . Since today is Oriya New Year Day , this is the right for reflecting on why my stack of good intentions before the new year were often derailed and drained within a few weeks.

As I think and ponder over them , the First thing which comes to my mind is that my goals were probably too many at a time and hence unattainable . One must prioritise the resolutions and choose the one most essential or most critical at the moment . Trying to reduce , learn piano , master continental cooking all at a time is a ridiculous proposition for normal and lazy human beings like . So One At a Time is the Mantra. Secondly instead of having vague subjective goals, it should be more objective , focused and for smaller period to start with . For example instead of Exercise More and reduce weight, it should be like spending 45 min on the treadmill for atleast 5 days a week or trying to reduce 1 Kg in one month. This way goals can be measurable as well as accomplishable. Thirdly The resolutions should be shared amongst friends and family members even at the cost of inviting their cynicism. They can help us by accompanying us in the path or their stimulus in the form gentle nudges when we digress from our path can help in generating the required response in us. Fourthly , resolutions should not be done whimsically without much thought or planning . More the amount of emotional investment we make towards our resolves more is the desire and motivation to keep it going . Last but not the least is the perseverance . There is no substitute to hard work . So this is the most vital ingredient in making the resolution recipe a mouth watering one.
Now coming to my next year’s resolutions , yes I have already made one . This time no excuses will be allowed and no rationalization of lapses and failures. I have resolved to be a more punctual , more sincere and more serious blogger and would contribute at least two posts for month . Now that I have made it open on the net , please don’t forget to give me that much needed push in the right direction when I don’t appear to work hard enough …

A New Year's resolution is something that goes in one year and out the other. ~Author Unknown

TO BE HAPPY OR NOT TO BE...

Monday, June 28, 2010

TO BE HAPPY OR NOT TO BE...

A Freudian slip is when you say one thing but mean your Mother ..

When my Son was promoted from junior school to middle school , there was an orientation program arranged by the school authorities for the parents of the new middle schoolers. There were many changes in the school rules and regulations between primary school and middle school and the Principal and other coordinators took great pains to make the parents and guardians abreast of those changes. Amongst various other things they harped on the fact that children now should be made to take part in choosing their own clothes and other personal belongings which would help them in decision making in their later lives. I liked this point and really appreciated the need to let the child decide on his own requirements with ofcourse gentle guidance from the parents.

From that day onwards whenever we had to buy some thing for him, be it clothes or winter wear or shoes, both of us would go instead of me buying and thrusting it on him . In any case , I had enough experience by then what happened when some thing which he did not like was given to him . There would be no formal protest or opposition but those unliked things would never see the daylight outside the closet.

I do not know if it is because ladies are more equipped physiologically to take care of the children or of the joy they get from doing things for their offsprings , it is always the mothers who shoulder the larger portion of the work load when it comes to taking care of the family even when both the partners are working . My case is no different . Added to that like most of the working-outside-mums , I too am never spared of the Guilt of leaving my precious one in the care of a third person for the larger part of the day. Hence all my time outside the work was devoted to taking care of my son , starting from attending to all the meetings and forums and special days in the school to taking him to his chess and TT coaching or accompanying him to tournaments where he participated. I just didn’t want him to feel that he was missing something because his mother was working . This role-overload sometimes left me strained in the attempt to balance the roles of a mother and a working professional , but never the less the satisfaction it provided made up for all the physical stress. To some extent it did take off the negative vives of the continuous guilt feeling. Since my husband is not very fond of shopping , shopping for electronic gizmos being the only exception, purchasing the rest of the items needed by our home or for gifting others has always been my responsibility. And if it is some thing for my Son’s use , both he and I go and even though the first round of selection is made by him , for the final thing he would require my suggestion. My son is a great company and both of us always enjoyed these little outings combined with lunch or dinner. He is in a growing stage now and one day I observed that he had outgrown his Sandals and required a new pair. I told him we would go one day after the office hours when I could make it a little early from the office. But that time being the month of march , leaving at a decent time to go home pick up son and go for his sandals buying was just not becoming possible. Almost every weekend we were having guests. It was getting procrastinated and my son was getting restless. I offered him to come to my office so that we could straight head for the market . But that was clashing with his play time and he was in no mood to abandon his one day’s game . So one day he told me “ why can’t I go myself with bhaiya ( our domestic help who goes to pick him from school) and get it myself on my way back home from school?” I didn’t know what to say . He had never gone without me to buy any of his personal belongings . I was not sure whether he would be able to choose on his own. But still I consented since his sandals were in very bad shape and I knew I would not be able to make before 1st April. My domestic help is with us for many years , a very responsible boy and like a family member. So I gave him the money and necessary instruction to buy the sandals. I was feeling very bad since my son had to go and choose alone for the first time. I called him up when he was in the store , but he said there was no problem and he could purchase what he wanted. After I came back home , I was curious to see what he had bought. This was his first independent purchase. When he showed me, I was really impressed with his selection . He had chosen a very nice pair and probably if I would have accompanied him , my choice would not have been as good. I knew my son was now a grown up boy. He could now take decisions without his mother's help. Had it been any other circumstance, I would have been very happy thinking my little son had become independent enough to buy his own shoes, to take decision and make selection. For some one who always depended on his mother for making the final choice, this was a big achievement. But somehow I could not be very excited or exalted. It was a mixed feeling which was gripping me that time. The very thought that he was forced to behave in a more mature manner than his age demanded because my preoccupation at work or lack of time available for him during that period was getting heavier than the feeling of pride that my boy was a self sufficient boy now. Taken in isolation this is quite a simple occurrence . A student of class 8 buying his own shoes is probably not a very astonishing thing . But the plethora of complex psychological thoughts churning my mind that time was just unfathomable. I would have been probably very happy at this occurrence had I been a stay at home mum or had he done it when I was able to give him time , but his doing it as a matter of compulsion or because of being left with no other choice was just too much for me to bear. Would he have to go alone , if I could have spared some time for him – was the thought which constantly chasing my already guilt burdened mind.

If there was one thing I was very clear about from my teendhood days it was the decision to work whatever may be the situation. I continued my resolve in the adolescence days, joined a professional course and continued to study and complete my studies after marriage. I was enamoured by the glamours of a Private Sector (if possible an MNC) job and wanted to go up the ladders of one such organization. But once I became a mother and gave him one year of undivided attention after my little one’s birth , career took a backseat. As my child was growing up I felt raising up the child with care produces a bond of high intensity. So I decided to start working only after my son was one year old . It was the precise intersection of my mother's most passionate impulse as a mother, the obsessive almost physical love for my child and the fervent wish since childhood to make something of myself beyond the domestic boundaries, to have an identity of my own , to do justice to all the years of hardwork. I started considering my circumstances and various possibilities. Nothing can ever compensate the pang of seeing your child clutching to your dupatta while you leave for work or being under continuous guilt of leaving my precious one in some one else’s care. On top of that it is always the mother who has to remember the vaccination dates , interview date for kindergarten school , buying gift for a birth day party or decide the daily menu for the day keeping in mind tastes of all the members of the household. But then I am one of those individuals who do not cope really well with staying at home all day. I would feel aimless and inconsequential without a career. I thought a mother feeling duty-bound to stay home “for the sake of the child” won’t be an ideal parental presence in the long run. My mother was a house wife and I had never felt the misery of latch-key children. So probably never knew the woes of children of working mothers. My husband and my in-laws who were staying with us supported my decision to work and luckily we had enough support to help with other domestic chores and take care of the child during my absence. So I decided taking my circumstances into account to join a public sector organization where I would be able to cope with both work and home and make a successful balance of both and thus gave up my supposed to be better private sector job which had higher demands in terms of time and energy. As a result I could give my son enough time and take part in all the activities he was associated with , be it a chess tournament or quiz show. My office timings were regular and I did not miss tucking him to his bed or feeding him dinner or help him with his bag packing because I was having a late business dinner. All these things of course did not come without the occasional stress , anxiety and overwhelming ness of trying to juggling between both the worlds . Attending the Parents Teachers Meeting at 8.30 , dropping him at home and making it to office at 10 without breakfast was quite unnerving at times . And I would crib at the daily life which was becoming more like fire drill exercises . As I felt guilty over additional time away from my child, I normally did not go out for merry making without my son. Even my Son won't go and spend one night alone in any relative's house if i didn't accompany. I sometimes cribbed about having no time for myself. I always waited when he would grow up b be independent and start doing things on his own without my supervision so that I could have time for my own activities..

But then why am I feeling so bad because my Son was compelled to do something and he did it quite well without my help or support. I wanted to work , I wanted him to be independent , why then I am unable to feel happy that he has become independent … Why am I not sure TO BE HAPPY OR NOT TO BE HAPPY… Can I ever be sure what I really want..

Because I feel that in the heavens above
The angels, whispering one to another,
Can find among their burning terms of love,
None so devotional as that of "Mother,"
Edgar Allan Poe

My Experiments With Weight Loss

Sunday, March 8, 2009

My Experiments With Weight Loss

On the international women’s day, I dedicate this post to all those ladies with eternal quest for the perfect figure.....

I can not exactly remember when this burning desire to reduce body fat engulfed me. I suppose it was few years back. I am not certain whether it was after I started getting chance remarks like " you should seriously think of morning walks or join a gym / yoga classes " or when old clothes just would not fit me any more , when there were not enough choices in front of me in my favourite boutique or when the doctor measuring my blood pressure was surprised that the instrument's tape was’nt wide enough to wrap around the arm completely. But I am sure, the last straw was when my friend who I had gone to receive at the airport , exclaimed with an unconcealed glee “You have become healthier than I last saw you !”

The euphemism was not lost on me. The conclusion was obvious – I was putting on weight. I pressed the panic button and started making action plans for my battle against the bulges.

Being an MBA, I wanted to approach this problem methodically, in an organized manner with proper plan of action and follow up. My first course of action was to consult experts in this field , a dietician and a nutritionist. The dietician was supremely happy to have got a customer like me, (since 10 years back not many people visited dieticians unless advised by their medicos). With lot of seriousness , she told me that the key to weight loss lies in one simple theory : “your body should burn more calorie than it absorbs. Hence the extra calorie requirement would be taken care of by burning the existing body fat.” The way she sounded, she could well be explaining Einstein’s theory of relativity. Any way, after making a few enquiries about my weight , life style, food habits she gave me a diet chart to be followed religiously with 1 hour of brisk walking every day . But after 45 minutes of consultation when I came out of the dietician’s chamber, poorer by 400 bucks and richer by a diet chart , I was none too happy. The chart suggested taking protein rich , low carb , low fat diets with high fibre content. I had to take 75 gm of fish , 55 gm of cereal , omelettes made of egg white only , lotus seeds as snacks , one fruit at 11.45 am and one fruit (with low glycemic index) at 4.15 pm etc…. etc. I knew it was going to be really difficult to adhere to such schedule. This made me a little sceptical, but never the less I wanted to give it a try. I gave proper instructions to my cook to prepare food according to the diet chart and bought a weighing scale for proper monitoring during cooking. After I started on the diet, almost every day I checked the weight at least twice to note any improvement. But to my utter disappointment, I could not notice any alteration from the initial reading. May be the scale was not calibrated to read micro or nano grams ! Whether due to the frustration of not getting any immediate result or the continuous struggle to keep binging impulses at bay, slowly and steadily I started weaning away from the diet plan to my original diet, the place from where I had started. You can not just have one bread , egg white and lots of salad for break fast every day, refuse ice creams / pastries or chocolates when offered, have tea without sugar for long , replace evening snacks by lotus seeds and still survive. For a week or so, as a temporary measure, it is tolerable. But as a long term measure , it was just not acceptable, at least not to a foodie like me. I realized now more than ever before that – Every thing good in life is either illegal, immoral or fattening !

So I started looking for less impractical solutions. I searched the web, scrammed through the books on obesity, read any available articles on weight loss, watched Television Shows, discussed with friends and relatives hoping for a miraculous short term solution. I spent more time reading “How to lose 10 lbs in 7 days” than my favourite author. Most of my talks with friends revolved around this topic. As a result of my quest for the elusive short cut solution , I became an expert on BMR, body Mass Index, Calorie Meter, Daily Calorie requirement, Glycemic Index, Satiety Index, low-cal food, calorie burning food and many more such terms. I tried experimenting with Atkinson Diet, Lauki diet, Warm water with lemon juice , phenugrik powder, etc. etc. , but to no avail. There was again no improvement in the readings of the weighing scale. As every other forms of human effort, I realised there was no short cut to success in fat-loss as well and definitely there was no substitute to hard work.

Hence I decided to join a Gymnasium for workouts as exercising seemed to be the key to obtaining a great physique. I bought a pair of walking shoes and a track suit from the nearest Reebok outlet and jumped on to the band wagon of avid gymmers. But there too life was not a bed of roses. The only machine which suited my temperament was the treadmill and there would invariably be a big rush for the same as my time coincided with many other office going gymmers. Hence after I returned from gym, I would have had to rush to make it to the office on time. Not only that, I constantly missed my morning news paper sessions and chit-chats with my hubby in the morning. I tried to shift my gymming time to the evening. But even that did not work out, as it was too much to expect from a lazy person like me to go for work-outs in the evening after a hard day’s work at office. Also it interfered with the time I was spending with my son and neither of us was ready to sacrifice that at any cost. Similar things ensued for Yoga classes and late evening walks. Since I could only afford to go for walks at unearthly hours, I did not get any company and solitary long walks were getting on my nerves ! So I was back to square one.

There were also other options like slimming tablets, dietary substitutes, low-cal sweetners , morning walkers, ab-rockers , thermal belts , massagers etc. which are advertised daily as the sure shot solutions. But then I just did not want to go for anything which was not backed by medical science as I am a strong believer of the fact that for my son “Healthy(Fat) mama” is any day better than a “Sick mama”.

10 years down the line, the bottom line is, I have not gained much apart from experience. May be the burning desire in me which forced the plunge into less-fat regime, just did not have enough heat. Probably my short-term desires over powered the long-term goal of a perfect body. There can be no other explanation for the lack of success. But there was an exception. The only time when without even trying I managed to shed a lot of weight was the time when I was in Singapore and where my husband was undergoing his Master’s course. Since I was there for only 2.5 months, we did not have any domestic help. So from the morning I landed there, I was busy cooking , washing , cleaning , shopping and doing other house hold chores. Add to that, my husband decided to play host and invited his friends with their families to our apartment for a taste of Indian food. I on my part tried my best not to let them down. Consequently, by the time my this trip came to an end, I was weighing a few kilos lesser . It is another thing that I managed to get back all those lost kilos and may be a few additional ones after my return to the mother land. But this definitely gave my dear hubby a brilliant idea that instead of investing in gyms and dieticians if I just got rid of my domestic helps, much better results could be ensured. But I declined the proposal demonstrating the practical difficulties associated with it.

All the same , until recently , I was feeling extremely guilty with a sense of failure for not having been able to achieve a goal set by me years back. I always cursed myself for not posessing that "Do or Die" attitude. But recently , I came across an article which gave me a new lease of guilt - free life. This article had published a research finding saying the body weight of a person is not only a function of diet and metabolism but also has some thing to do with the genes. I mean genes also have some role to play in making a person a Laurel or a Hardy. Bless those scientists, this was a great guilt lessener for me. Now I am armed with a scientific explanation to counter my unconscious guilt feeling of not doing enough in war on fat. This also solved the mystery to me, why some people having all the luck in the world, do not seem to put on an extra ounce even after binging to glory.

Lastly on the international women's day I am taking five resolutions which will help me overcome this silly issue over fat tissues : a) I must learn to accept my self as the mirror reflects b) I would rather change my wardrobe instead of trying to change myself to fit into it c)I will not allow Slimming clinics , Fancy fitness clubs, health food centers, manufactures of so called slimming equipments to feed my quest for the perfect figure..d) will try and increase the absolute body mass of people around me , so that my relative weight becomes lesser and e) I will never be jealous of any man or woman with greek god/goddess like figure as I now know the amount of hard work and sacrifice that goes into it.

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MEN WILL BE MEN

Sunday, March 29, 2009

MEN WILL BE MEN

MEN WILL BE MEN
“Oh my my, does God still create these kind of caring, sensitive and romantic men” I exclaimed with utmost disbelief and a tinge of sarcasm. I was watching the movie ‘Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge’ with my husband on Television . An extremely romantic scene was in progress. The heroine (Kajol) , after observing a fast (owing to a traditional ritual called Karva chauth) fights with the hero for not caring about her , only to realize he hadn't eaten the whole day without her either.

It did not take me very long after marriage vows were exchanged to realise that life (read married life) was not a quintessential Mills & Boons Romance chapter. The Tall, Dark, Square-jawed hero with bulging biceps and huge bank balance who invariably set the pulses of young girls racing , seemed to exist only between the covers of a Barbara Cartland Novel or in Bollywood movies. But Sharukh Khan, delivering a romantic coup-de-grace on Kajol by declaring that he too had not taken a morsel , re-enacted the archetypal sensitive , caring hero of childhood dreams . The real life husband , sitting next to me and munching popcorn resolutely, appeared to drill a hole on the canvass of my colourful illusion. I, decided, then and there, to teach him a lesson on marital sensitivity by advising him to take a leaf out of this highly instructive bollywood movie and its great hero. With such a powerful visual lesson, I thought he would learn and stay learned for good !

So, I asked him “ do you even know when I fast ? Some times you ordered chilli chicken on one of my fast days . Why God does not make more men like Shahrukh at my time !”

But my optimism about the educative capability of Bollywood movies for a diehard realist like my husband was misplaced . Without batting an eyelid, he shot back “Hold on ! This guy is doing nothing great or exceptional. Any other man in his position could have gone on hunger strike for a month if the lady in question was Kajol. After that it was a half an hour long lecture on how privileged a man would be to have the opportunity to court Kajol etc. etc. As always, he was doing the talking with me as his captive victim! Exasperated, I started cursing myself for starting the topic and decided never to use reel life examples for settling real life scores.

Few years back I was taking JAIIB exams consisting of 5 papers. I had completed the first four papers and was left with one paper to complete the certificate. One of my colleagues who was then posted at Andaman & Nicober Islands called me up before the exam to wish me luck. Since it was an online examination, result was out after as soon as the paper was over. I came home happy after passing and later in the evening my friend called me up to congratulate on my result. I was highly impressed and told the same to my hubby since he was not even aware I was taking some test. I told him “ See, you do not even care to know whether I am at all taking any exam or not and look at my friend. He is so concerned, not only did he call me to wish luck, he also took the trouble of finding the result. I wish you learnt some thing from him”. Prompt came his reply “This is most unfair. You are getting me all wrong. I could have done much better than what your friend has done. I could have even sent a card and couriored some flowers . Only problem why I have never been able to do any such creditable thing is because none of my Lady Colleagues ever feels like taking any exam. So you see, you can not blame me for not being a caring person”. Once again I was flabbergasted and just did not know how to react.

Recently , one of my friends who stays in Delhi had suddenly called me after Valentine’s Day and we had a long chat . Amongst other things, she described me how she celebrated Valentine's Day with her hubby with candle light dinner, soft music, dim lights followed by a romantic movie. After the conversation, I was wondering aloud “Wow, even after 15 years of marriage, people have so much of romanticism left”. My hubby must have overheard me, since I was thinking a little extra louder. He got up from the bed, opened the door to the balcony and started gazing at the sky. “Hey what are you doing outside, please close the door, AC is on” I chided. To which he answered “Last time this sort of thing had happened, four stars had fallen from the sky. So I was waiting to see, what is it this time” and entered the room swiftly before I could bolt the door from inside.

Of late, I have been getting the opportunity to leave office a little earlier than my usual departure time. I decided to utilise these extra hours to complete pending personal jobs. On one of these leisurely days I visited the salon for a long overdue haircut and told the hairdresser to give me a new hairdo. I was quite excited after the make over and waited for my hubby’s return from office for his reaction / comments. Well, when he did not seem to notice any thing different, I started giving subtle hints. When even that didn’t work out, instead of beating around the bush, I blurted out “ can’t you find some thing different in me”. After scrutinizing intently for 5 minutes , he sounded “oh, you are wearing a new outfit! Good one, when did you buy it”, looking at my two year old faded salwar kameez. I felt like banging my head against the wall. But some how controlled my temper and told him coolly “ I think you badly need to consult a psychiatrist and an ophthalmologist. My new hair style is 3 hours old and clothes have experienced at least 40 washes…”. “This only proves I am quite normal , so I don’t need to go to a psychiatrist. A research study says two things most married men never seem to remember or notice are their wives’ birth-days and hairstyle alterations” he said in his characteristic dismissive tone. Disgusted I said “ I think I should be given a Magsese Award for putting up with you” and left in a huff. But I could hear his voice echoing from the back “Thank God, you didn’t expect a Nobel . I know dozens of wives who think even the Nobel Peace Prize is not an adequate compensation for tolerating their husbands”.

Finally when I threatened that I was going to narrate my experiences in my blog, he was least bothered. Instead, he declared patronizingly :

“By all means, go ahead. You must publish these things in your post, only then will you realise that your experiences are shared by 99.999% of married ladies and rest .001% simply lie………”