Dayz at home....

3 Rambles... sitting at home for want of the Internet and writing to myself... :) Well.. broadband chaalu now and the blog should be back to being regular now!

Date: April 07, 2007 Time: 14 past Midnight!

Yup I’m home… N taking on my various roles… Errand boy, Man Friday, Electrician, Mechanic, Cook, Teacher even!!

Chill… smoothen the lines on your wondering face and read on…

The day begins lazily enough but there’s always something like the tubelight konking off or the car tyre going flat etc etc…! N yours truly comes to the rescue! From Bank jobs to supermarket running to sabji shopping..! :)

Missing: time for herself and someone.. anyone to listen to her constant bakar!! And so she conveniently shifts herself to the upper floor of the house and calls it her own… and sits down to write (to post it later for want of the Internet) so that you guys can jhelo her bakar!

Predictions: ‘Iski 6 mahine me shaadi kara do nahi to pakka kuch to panga karegi!’ & Another one that says, ‘she’ll have a late marriage and then an extra marital affair as well!’ Chak de fatte!! :P

Repurcussions: less than 7 days at home and sabki zubaan par ek hi line, ‘tere liye ladka dekh rahe hain!’
Yours Truly: ‘Kyn bhai???!!!’
Dusri line: ‘Kaisa ladka chahiye?’
Yours Truly: (mann hi mann) ‘Dhoondte reh jaoge!’ (n out loud) ‘haal filhaal koi bhi nahi…!’
Teesri line: ‘Koi hai to bata de…’
Yours Truly: (again mann hi mann) ‘Hmmmm…..’ (n out loud) ‘Ya Right!!’

Mami: ‘so now we’r on the lookout for you..’
YT: Not interested Mami..
Mami: arre par dhoondna to padega na!
YT: at least.. bare min.. 3 years!
Mami: your mother will sort you out! 3 years!! Dream on girl!!
YT: Ma ko mai samjha chuki hoon!
Mami: aise thodi hi hai ki nukkad pe khada hai aur hamne pasand kar liya.. waqt lagta hai!’
YT: forget waqt shaqt mami! 3 years k pehle to don’t even start searchin!
Mami: I already have one!
YT: (mann hi mann ek baar fir!) Bas yehi bacha tha! Itni katha aur fir ye!!!!!! (out loud again..) Mami still not interested..
Mami: (now goes on and on without paying any heed to the refrain of ‘not interested’!!!!) Arre actually a friend of mine mailed, maine to mail abhi padhi bhi nahi hai, Mamaji read it upar upar se since it was my friend’s mail na…! (YT mann hi mann… bachaaaaaaaaaoooooooo!!!) The boy is very well settled.. very sweet boy… she did say she’s looking for a girl for him.. He’s in England you know! (Background me se Mamaji… ‘bol bol.. ek baar milegi to at least!) And he’s working with the Swiss Bank!
YT: (finally breaking through it all…) Mami talk to Mom!!
YT’s Mom: Oh wow!!! Swiss Bank! Beta kya buraai hai? Rich guy… u anyways need a millionaire! (yup she said need! She seriously thinks I’m heavy duty high maint!)
YT: Cut it out Ma!! Lets go! (They were in Ma’s clinic and her only rescue was the clock showing 9:10 pm whereas the clinic should’ve closed at 8:30!!)

Next up: Bua!! ‘Nilu maine teri beti k liye ek ladka dekha hai!’
YT’s Ma: (knowing that if this call is entertained the night is screwed!): ‘Nahi Bhabhi… she’s not interested abhi… baadme kabhi baat karte hain!”
YT: Baat?? Abt what??
YT’s Ma: (signals silence to her and continues to chit chat with bua!)
YT: conveniently walks into the TV room and lets the noise of the idiot box engulf her!!

In a wile: Pring Pring! Again!!!

Masi: Hi beta!
YT: (always happy to hear Masi..!) Hi Masi! How ru??
Masi: (completely ignores the question and proceeds…) So teri shaadi ka kya plan hai ab? Ladka dekhna shuru kare??
YT: sighs! (short lived joy!) Not for at least 3 years Masi!
Masi: Aise thode hi.. ek saal bas!
YT: Talk to Mom Masi… (and runs for cover!!)

Go ahead.. ask her what’s with the 3 years funda… ‘In 3 years I’ll be 27 or somewhere there! Tab khojna shuru karenge to kaafi dhoondna padega.. Ladki vaise hi Manglik hai! (yeah yeah! Cheers to me! :P) So effectively another year gets safely added to their search… 28! She’s hoping for one more year.. 29ish! 5 saal to tale.. baaki ki baadme sochenge!! :D’

Question 2 in your heads… ‘Why’s she running from shaadi?’ Answers: ‘She has the answers but she can’t tell ‘em to you just yet…’

In the meanwhile… People have started receiving their offer letters and she’s still wondering where hers will be!!

Also.. a deeper look at the social fabric around us.. A beggar takes the name of ‘Shani Maharaj’ every Saturday and earns big money.. more than what the minimum wage act prescribes for him if he works everyday! Yup: Instead of earning 2100 + Overtime working everyday apart from Sundays in a month he prefers to earn 3500 only ‘begging’ on Saturdays and squandering the rest of the week (True story..)! All this in the name of superstition! This needs to change if India truly wants to turn into ‘Splendid India’ (as quoted by a great friend!) ‘Beta dua milegi…’ and plink goes a coin in the beggar’s vessel! Bhagwan ke naam pe fir chaahe kuch bhi kara lo…!

Head nodding away into nodland now.. sleep well till my next bakar..!! :D

Next Bakar: Date: The very next day! Time: Sometime after the Miss India Contest!!

The day began with her assuming role of teacher cum manager for ‘The Learning Tree’! It’s something Ma’s started.. a franchisee actually of Mastermind’s Abacus where they make you use the abacus to do all kinds of arithmetic and you eventually learn to do it fast enough in your head without the abacus! It’s called ‘Brain Development’! (remember the pamphlets Ma n me had dropped on our post diner adventure? That was for this!) Well.. I have a class of 8 really sweet kids who wear their Learning Tree Red T-Shirts and come to class for two hours every Sunday morning! :)

They look at me n Mom and go, ‘Good morning Ma’am’ and all you can do is smile back and look on amazed…! Eager, curious, sometimes nervous, impatient, happy, mischievous children! (The minute they get a moment they love to chit chat away and yours truly conveniently asks them to use their brains and move on to the next exercise!) :P

Clichéd as it is, I’m not the only teacher there.. they all teach me too! It’s quite an experience.. in the 2 hours I spent with them today my biggest lesson was ‘Patience!’ Some are so fast they’re always on the next page… the others are slow and you need to teach them and then re-teach them… talk to them, make sure they understand… Make sure they can keep pace… The differences of human nature make themselves so visible that they are hard to ignore.. and it’s seriously phenomenal!! Happy, quiet, naughty, talkative, pranksters, shy and subtle…. But li’l darlings all of ‘em! (This from a person who’s never really been all that fond of kids… I’ve liked them.. but from a distance.. This has been my first close brush with them and I’m enjoying the painting that’s being created!)

My services did not go unrewarded… the teacher cum manager was rewarded with her first salary! ‘A cadbury’s fruit n nut!’ :D

Referencing back to the Miss India contest… The saris were nice but it was evident that none of them had walked in a sari before the D-day!! (sad…! To all you people who want to understand the romance of a sari go here.) One question that was asked provoked some thought in my head..

Ques: If you had to devote your life to a social cause which would it be and why?
A very typical question… notice the ‘if you HAD TO’! My instant thought was female foeticide.
The why is anwered by these statistics:

"In India, the 2001 census reveals that the overall sex ratio is 933 females for every 1000 males, showing a marginal increase of 6 points from the 1991 census of 927. However, this is a very sorry state indeed and we are doing much worse than over a hundred years ago when the sex ratio was 972 in 1901, 946 in 1951 till the 933 today.

The child sex ratio is another story altogether. This child sex ratio has shown a steady decrease since 1961 and shows no signs of improving. From the 976 in 1961, we moved to 964 in 1971. In 1981, we evidenced a further decline to 962 and even further to 945 in 1991. Today the child sex ratio is 927, a full 18 points drop. This can only mean one thing. More and more baby girls have either been aborted or killed as infants since 1961 and that this trend continues strong even today. Indeed, an improvement in the child sex ratio has only been marked in one state, Kerala, and two Union Territories, Lakshwadeep and Pondicherry. Everywhere else, there is a decrease in the number of girls. The greatest offenders in this area are the northern and the western states, with Punjab and Haryana leading the pack. In Punjab, the child sex ratio has decreased by 77 points to a new and horrifying low of 798 females to a 1000 males, and Haryana has seen a decrease of 60 points, meaning there are now only 819 females to a 1000 males. Other offenders high on this list are Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, Chandigarh and Gujarat. What is also disturbing is that this trend is also noticeable in other states, which evidenced a relatively healthy child sex ratio in 1991 and has now radically decreased.

Using the statistics, it has in fact been calculated that more than a hundred million women are missing. A hundred million women who should have been part of this society have been denied a life because their parents wanted a son."

(Taken from http://supremecourtofindia.nic.in/new_links/eff.pdf.) Scary right??

Another question about your biggest strength and weakness brought back memories of all the SWOT’s we’ve done for ourselves and for various industries, organizations, case study analyses, project reports et al!!! MBA revisited! :)

Wanton thought: Variation is life’s only constant! Cheers!

And Here I Am, This is Me again! Date: Now April 11 (past midnight na! :D)

The line’s of the blog’s description have been playing over and over in my head…

The day has been quite uneventful as such…

1. Meeting with the tax consultant… not for me re! For the school that I’m teaching in and managing.. ‘Learning Tree’ to discuss and figure out the documents that need to be in order and the kind of taxes that will be levied etc. etc.!

2. A trip to the station to meet the rare part of the family that’s actually thin!!! A cousin of mine! How she manages to stay that patla when even her genes defy that is always amazes me!!

3. Next up… A call from my sibling wishing me ‘Happy National Siblings Day!’ :) A prompt call to all my other siblings followed and the telephone company benefited!! :P

4. A finaliazation of the designs I came up with for redoing the Interiors of a factory office… A large chunk of empty space… 4 walls, a floor and a roof and my imagination to play around with! It’ll be blue and pine wood now… a break from the metallic feeling of the fabrication unit! There’s this cutest dog, Ronnie there and he totally freaks out on Parle-G! :) he’s getting used to my presence there!

5. A call on the landline that I happened to receive which went, ‘Hello Mummyyyy… mai Rohit bol raha hoon!’ My only reaction – ‘Beta number check karo ek baar… mai aapki mummmmyyyy nahi hoon!’ :P (My Mom’s reaction to that was uncontrollable laughter!!)

6. A post dinner walk with Mom and Nirma relived! Found two cute pups and played with ‘em.. Ma’s frightened reaction was come away.. they’re stray.. thoughts of disease and then their mother attacking rushed to her head all at once!! (Mothers!!! And the rare occasion that mine exhibits typical Mommy behaviour!) My first thought was actually of Baba and Blacky! Blacky could simply sniff out Baba and then would come running from totally out of nowhere and grab his leg! After recieveing a lot of petting and pampering Blacky was firmly told to stay and the sweet li’l thing would actually stay put wagging his tail vigorously!

That’s about it!