The 3 mistakes of my life : Review

(Minor spoilers ahead)

What are the odds of you picking up the 3^rd novel of an author and misunderstanding his purpose of writing since the novel is named “The 3 mistakes of my life”? Pretty good, I would say. However, despite the bad reviews, it was not bad as I had anticipated it to be. In fact I liked it for a number of reasons [but not drastically so], at times better than “2 States” [2S]. 2S, beyond a point, boiled down to nothing more than a very filmy version of boy meets girl from a different community, and the south Indians ripping on the north Indians and vice versa. Come on, when food served on a banana leaf, are you expected to eat the leaf as well? Anyway, I digress here.

Reasons I liked T3MOML: First, it gave me a nice perspective into the life in Gujarat. Sure it was nothing earth shattering, but the characters were a welcome change from the studs who made it to the IITs (FPS) and IIMs (2S) and screwed around with their GPAs and their girls. It was nice to know three very ordinary men for a change who start a business venture and strive to make it big. Not the usual investment bankers and the consultants CB likes to write about, but the owners of a sports goods store. The characters seemed more real this time, with their own fears, Omi fearing he will end up being the priest of the temple, Ish fearing he will never be able to live his dreams [of being a cricketer] through Ali, and Vidya fearing she will end up as one of those doctors who didn’t want to be a doctor in the first place. Amidst all these confused and disillusioned people, there is Govind, focused, ambitious, someone who has a plan in life, both for himself and for his directionless friends.

The events take place amidst a chronology of events that happened for real- the Bhuj earthquake, the Godhra riots. It does not do much value addition to the plot, but helps weave the story in the time frame that is visualized from the perspective of those events. How their lives are affected by the earthquake or by the riots? You would find out as the novel unfurls.

The story has its own off-putting moments, but those flaws are more attributed to CB’s style of writing in general than the story in itself. CB’s stories always involve a lot of drama and melodrama, especially at the end, and this one was no different. A fight scene that lasts for pages gets you thinking, does CB write books keeping in mind that someday a Bollywood movie would be made out of it and he would earn more recognition and money thus? It’s already happened with FPS [3 idiots] and ON@TCC [Hello]. Also, it’s an oversimplified style of narration, something that I wouldn’t attribute as a flaw but more as his own style of telling a story.

Something common amongst all the female characters of CB’s books are the fact that all of them are extremely forthright, liberated, and desperate to make the first move. Kissing [and sex following] are second nature to them, and so is flirting. While Ananya in 2S came from a conservative Tam bram family, yet boozed and ate meat, Vidya from T3MOML leaves no stone unturned to lure her tutor.

In any case, the lack of the words IIT and IIM in his story was a welcome change. Or did I miss those words?

Most wouldn’t agree with me, but I liked the book better than 2S. I like FPS most, followed by this one, 2S, and ON@TCC. The last one was a disaster. It shouldn’t have been written in the first place.

In any case, T3MOML isn’t that great, but is worth a read.

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Wat-er you doing?

A house couple of blocks away is the cause of my annoyance these days. At the most ungodly hours of the day, sometimes during late afternoon, sometimes even later at night, the sound of water flowing down the terrace bothers me. This happens non-stop for about 30-40 minutes everyday. So what’s going on?

Nothing as significant as the water tank bursting. It seems the water tank overflows everyday and goes unnoticed at least for 30 minutes.

Now I have never really spotted anyone in the house. Sometimes when I spot the maid sweeping the marble floored balcony, I try shouting and signaling to her about the water overflowing, wondering how come I can hear the loud sound of water flowing 100 feet away and she, living in the same house, cannot. She gives me a blank expression most of the days, as if I have just asked her if she regularly watches porn on television. She stares at me blankly for a few seconds before she goes inside, dangling the broom in her hand.

I am told the owner of the house is a big shot, running several beedi factories.

I am told he owns multiple houses in the area, all three storied or more.

I am told the guy has strong political connections. He is even rumored to carry arms.

I am told he is a Bangladeshi [where Bangladeshi is a general term used for illegal immigrants from Bangladesh who make big money by unfair means and are trying to take over, a sharp contrast to the majority who live here and are tagged “bhadralok” with white collared jobs].

I guess I am being subtly hinted at not to mess with him.

I wonder why none of the so called white collared bhadraloks ever complain.

Dear beedi jalaile Bangladeshi owner of multiple homes, I don’t really care about what you do for a living. I don’t care whether you own a chain of beedi factories or carry arms and armaments. My intentions are pretty clear. First, I would like to box the ears of that maid who is hard of hearing and stares at me blankly whenever I try to tell her to switch off the water supply. And second, I would like to box your ears too, for being this careless, irresponsible brat who isn’t responsible enough to make arrangements so that water doesn’t keep overflowing and get wasted. What, are you shooting for tip tip barsa paani? Ever heard of words like civic sense, water scarcity, and basic sensibility?

The constant sound of water overflowing is more disturbing to me than watching Rakhi Sawant on television. What a sight it would be when you and your maid will hold ears and do sit ups in the middle of the road. Why didn’t anyone think of this plan to make careless people more aware?

Just because you don’t pay for water doesn’t mean it comes for free. It is for people like you that everyone of us is paying a price.

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Deceptive Names

Remember Chiraunji Lal Khosla (Cherry) in Khosla Ka Ghonsla? In one of the epic lines from the movie, Chiraunji Lal confronts his father, saying something like “Aap sar se paanv taq Kamal Kishore lagte hain, par kya main aapko Chiraunji Lal lagta hoon?” [Father, you look like Kamal Kishore or a young lotus from head to toe, but do I look something akin to the translation of Chiraunji Lal to you?]. Chiraunji Lal was no old, bespectacled, paunchy, bald man, in case you haven’t seen the movie (Actually his father Kamal Kishore was all of these). He is very much the good looking computer engineer hero. Then why the name Chiraunji Lal?

I found myself asking the same question as I waded through the streets, lanes, and bylanes of Kolkata. First, I observe that the streets of south Kolkata have far more happening names than north Kolkata. I am told that north Kolkata is the original Kolkata while south Kolkata developed much later. So while touring the city, you can see a marked difference in the streets, the houses, and the designing of these two segments of Kolkata. While north Kolkata has more dingy streets, unmaintained, narrow, with tram lines criss-crossing and old buildings, south Kolkata is more posh with broader streets and taller buildings that look much new. If you have been to Shyam Bazar (north), and been to Ballygunge (south), you will know what I mean.

In any case, comparing the two wasn’t the idea here. My post is rather about the deceptive names of the roads here. Forgive me, I am not getting personal or disrespectful here, but when you hear a depressing street name like Raja Khogendro Nath lane, you expect a depressing street alleying into narrow houses that look dark from inside even in broad daylight and have shabby looking petticoats drying off their street facing verandas. In fact there is a category of names- Umesh Chondro street, Raja Monindro street, Bhupen Bose avenue, and other streets named after great men [I wonder why most streets are named after men and not women, but that is a different perspective altogether]. And then there are names that evoke distinct memories. Park Street always reminds me of the most happening area of the city, replete with fine dining, the best Chinese food, and coffee and cake shops, and of course St. Xavier’s College. Similarly, College Street evokes memories of book shops, nearby schools and colleges, the Calcutta University grounds, Coffee House, Presidency College, shops selling medical paraphernalia, and so on.

Anyway, I find some names very fancy and thus deceptive. The other day, we were invited to someone’s place in Diamond Park. As the name suggested, I imagined a happening area, clean and spic and span, the streets shining like diamonds. Neither did I find diamonds, nor did I find a park. I was rather disappointed to see a very typical Kolkata neighborhood with sprawling flats and just a little bit of greenery. The other day the car was stuck in a traffic snarl. There was still quite a bit of water logging after the rains, and the place looked anything but happening. Not familiar with south Kolkata, I craned my neck to read the neon sign on one of the shops that said “Lake Gardens”. We drove quite a bit in the area, but I neither found a lake nor a garden. Residents of the place can enlighten me, and who knows, there might actually be a lake I missed. However, the traffic snarl and the congested roads with people spitting here and there no way lived up to the image of the fancy name “Lake Gardens”.

I wonder what is the history behind naming a street, an area, even a city or a country the way it is named. Can someone tell me the history behind naming places like Amherst Street (that reminds me of Amherst, Massachusetts), Ultadanga (which means an upturned boat), Phulbagan (a flower garden), and thakurpukur (which has no meaning because it means God and a pond. I wonder what God and a pond are doing together)?

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34 C

Yes you heard me right. 34 C. That’s what I semi-whispered to the only woman in the lingerie shop amid a bunch of men whose ages ranged from 14 to 54. I was not really on a bra-hunting spree, I’d much rather go to a shopping mall and help myself without the world knowing of what I needed. I’m not really in the age range where I turn tomato-red when sanitary napkin ads come during commercial breaks or I flip channels to hear the mellifluous voice of a bunch of village chicks singing naughtily “Bol sakhi bolt era raaz kya hai” [What is thy secret, o sister?]. However I didn’t see any need to get hold of a microphone and declare to the world what I was looking for. But when a friend from the US asked me to get her a few of those 34Cs from Kolkata, I had to oblige.

I wasn’t really happy seeing so many men ready to serve you in a lingerie shop. Where were the women? I hushed my needs to the only woman I could spot in the store. First, she must have been hard of hearing, for she looked at me and urged me to voice myself louder. I was half-tempted to indicate the bus route 34C telling her, “Remember the bus route that goes from Esplanade to Baranagar? I want that bus number”. I realized how funny I would sound without making myself understood, first, because the odds were high that she would get more confused, and second, because who knows if the buses 84, 109, and 203 also went between the same places. So I braced myself and muttered only a few decibels louder- 34C.

“Color?”

“Uh …. White, black, pink, whatever”

“Design? Lace? What type?”

Uhh… I was shifting uncomfortably, wishing I’d be anywhere but here. “Anything will do. Laces?”

And just when I thought my plight was over, I found something akin to a nightmare coming true. For she turned to the boy, barely 20, and repeated, “34C. Show white, black, pink. With laces. Show it to her”, she pointed at me.

I was tempted to protest, “Not me, my friend”, but shut up as it sounded so lame.

The boy rummaged through the hinterlands of the shop with neatly stacked boxes with pictures of voluptuous women showing half covered assets and looking at various angles away from the camera. Unable to find what I was looking for, he further turned to the man in his 50s and repeated the instructions given to him verbatim.

How I wished I had turned to powder and vanished.

So after what seemed like a lifetime of searching, rummaging, and asking questions about suitable alternatives, the old man came up with a few boxes of what I needed, handed it over to the young man, who in turn handed it to the lady who dutifully bared the contents of the box in front of everyone. I was thinking of ways to conceal my embarrassment when I heard a thick, authoritarian voice from behind me, “42 C dikhaiyega” [Show me 42C]. Where were these liberated women when I was looking for them? The woman attendant quickly went to interact with the 42C woman, and I was left at the mercy of two men who insisted the product I was seeing was world class.

“Take this, it’s export quality, very comfortable, very stylish”. To emphasize his point, he held the piece of cloth in between his hands like he would hold an elastic band, and stretched it a couple of times. “Ekdum stretchable kapda hai. Export quality”.

Suddenly I knew what I had to do. No longer able to witness a person from the opposite gender stretching a piece of cloth of supreme privacy to me, coaxing me to buy it just because he could stretch it anyway he wanted to, emphasizing the ultimate comforting experience I will be embarking on if I wore it, I left the boxes at the counter, muttered something incoherent, and started towards the exit. To which the man looked confused, wondering if he had got me the wrong stuff by mistake. He shouted, “34C nahi chalega kya?” [Won’t 34C do?]

Whatever hope of privacy I had left like the smoke out of the chimney. The whole world now knew what size I was looking for. It was barely any consolation that I was not looking something for myself. I finally paused and looked one last time at the man, “It’s for a friend. I will ask and come back”, and sped out of the door.

I felt so stupid, trying to convince the world that it wasn’t something for me but for a friend. As if they cared. I know I am going back to nowhere except the shopping mall in Seattle where I can settle things within the four walls of the fitting room without the world knowing about what exactly I wanted to buy. As far as my friend goes, I’d recommend her she do the same.

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You have all my attention

After juggling between a rather insipid Chetan Bhagat read and another [umpteenth but inspirational] book on weight loss and slimming, I finally laid my hands at the right book, right because it has just the right kind of humor and the right level of satire. It’s not a story, it’s not a gyaan book or a guide book, it’s a rather funny documentary of things we grew up around during the 80s and the 90s. Reasons I liked the book are:

1. Stress was laid on simple issues and not on simple style of writing. Some books are so simply written that it simply takes the fun out of reading them. What’s the point in reading a book if you don’t encounter words whose meanings you didn’t know, facts you vaguely knew of but never really delved deep into, and a unique writing style that makes you think- Wow, I wish I wrote like that !!

2. I like the book because after reading it, the first thing I thought was- “If I ever wrote a book, it would be like this”.

3. GB writes about issues you grew up noticing in your everyday life- Terrorism, NRIs, sexually frustrated computer engineers [and men in general], politics, weddings, the television industry, bollywood movies, and more. His blogs sometimes talk about cricket and politics, both of which don’t interest me much due to my own personal preferences, but the topics discussed here were the right ones to sustain my interest.

4. A collection of essays- a unique style of writing. When I buy a book, I ask myself, “Why should I even bother to read this book? What kind of enlightenment will it provide me?”. If you’ve read it, you’ve just found your answer. I wouldn’t be surprised if this book was recommended next as a text book in educational institutions. Impressionable minds could do with some great perspective on societal issues.

5. It makes me wonder- What is he going to write about next? A documentary on Rakhi ka Swayamvar? The different kinds of psychos wandering aimlessly in the world of internet? The kind of guy you should never marry? Things not to do when in the US? The plight of someone who sits through the songs and acting of Himesh Reshammiya? Time will tell.

Kudos to the GreatBong on a great effort of writing. Thou hast not disappointed thy reader(s). If Prabhuji has found a fan in you with undeniable loyalty, you have found one in me too. Your book was worth my time, money, and expectations.

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A coast closer to the roomie

These days, I feel so overwhelmed with the amount of changes I have been going through, and will be going through in the next few months. I feel the same anxiety that I felt while leaving India four years ago. How would the place be? How would I go apartment hunting? Will I be able to make good friends? Who would I share my apartment with?

And with that, I now I have with that the pain of leaving Seattle. I never realized how I fell in love with Seattle until I had to leave it. Every street walked on, so many restaurants visited, so many things done, so many memories built. The few times I visited the east coast, I always told myself that this is not where I would ever want to live, that I am a west coast person. Someone up there was laughing at me.

However in all the chaotic thoughts that ensued, I sigh in relief, having a good reason to look forward to the move. Long back I used to have a virtual roomie. My only relief and reason for excitement comes from the fact that I will be moving closer to the roomie. Well, not exactly so close that I could smell the food he cooks and he could hear me when I sing in the shower. It took me almost 6 hours of flying time to meet him. Now it will be 6 hours of driving time. But even that in itself is great for me.

Of course I am aware of the practical constraints, and know that the meeting frequency will soon be on a declining curve. Even then, the mere thought that I can start early morning and meet him for lunch is excitement.

I had first met roomie in the US during a certain Thanksgiving [2007 I think], and it was a mad trip of east coast exploration, all mostly in trains and Greyhound. Neither of us knew how to drive then, yet nothing deterred us. New York City, Washington DC, Princeton, Baltimore, we had seen it all. The next trip happened during the next Thanksgiving in Philadelphia. Then roomie visited me in Seattle. What an amazing trip it was, we went to every place I had wanted to show him, and more. Two months later, we met again, in a big group, exploring Virginia. And two months later, we were on another long road trip to Yellowstone National Park.

The great west coast-east coast distance never really deterred us from meeting and doing something that both of us love – Traveling. Every trip we made had so many fun memories. I was fondly going through all those pictures, smiling, grinning, and smiling again. I know I will be leaving behind amazing friends in Seattle. But I am equally excited that I’ll be at a drivable distance from the roomie. Sure he will graduate in a few years and will move. But till then, I hope there would be many more fun meets, peals of laughter, movies watched together, restaurants explored together, singing, driving, planning, traveling, arguing, differing, books recommended, letters exchanged, and in all this, building beautiful memories together. It’s amazing how with some people, you don’t even know how to make conversation, there is so much difference (or indifference) between you two. And then there are some people with who you don’t even need to think while making conversation. You might as well be in the parking lot waiting to start your car and meet a friend when roomie calls, and the next thing you know is you have spent more than an hour in the parking lot just talking talking talking, the waiting friend long forgotten. Such is the bond I share with him.

Ever been in trouble, knowing someone who will help you is just a phone call away?

Ever missed a bus or lost directions to a place and called up someone living 3,000 miles away, knowing that you will be guided no matter what time it was?

Ever panicked when something didn’t work out, only to send an email and have things taken care of?

Ever felt lonely and then just dialed a number and talked for hours, forgetting every sadness in the meantime?

Ever giggled so much that your tummy hurt like crazy?

For more than multiple reasons, I feel thankful and blessed to have such an amazing friend in my life.

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Strings Attached

"Ma'am thring", I felt a tug at my dupatta and turned back to find a little boy barely a little above my knees in height. I was the assigned invigilator in the exam hall.

"What?", I asked, confused.

"Thrriiiinnnggg !!! To tie my answer paper", the little chap sounded a little impatient.

At that moment, I could have picked him up and hugged him, he looked so cute while trying to explain himself. And it made me wonder- Why does a little child not even old enough to enunciate the word "string" properly has to go through the torture of writing an exam?

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Thousand pics worth how many words?

I am in the process of compiling a folder with all my travel pics for my family to get some vicarious pleasure. I started to make sub-folders for the different trips to various places. One sub-folder was marked “Yellowstone National Park, July 4^th 2009”.

I went to my original Yellowstone folder with pics and videos, and realized that there were actually 9 of us on that road trip. It was a 3 day trip and 6 of us had a camera. Unsurprisingly, the folder contained at least 5,000 unsorted pics.

I still remember the chaos it created last year, when everyone wanted to share their pics and have a copy of the other person’s pics. Some of us stayed up the whole night to compile all the pics in one central folder, from which copies were made for all of us. When I got a master copy of the folder, I promised to sort them and keep a few. I must have lost patience midway. I am talking of 5,000 odd pics at least. As you can imagine, I never shared the album with anyone, never uploaded it on Picasa, because I [wrongly] thought that a day will come when I will sit and sort through the pics, get rid of the repetitive ones, and compile an album. No prizes for guessing, that day hasn’t arrived till date.

When I skimmed through the albums again, I realized that it was a lot of repetition. Excited at seeing the old faithful geyser, 6 of us had taken some 50 pics of it from 6 different directions. That made it some 300 pics of a single geyser. There were dozens of places we visited.

It reminded me of earlier days, well, not that early actually, something about 5-10 years ago when digital cameras were not in vogue and I used the good old Kodak KB 10. 36 pics were all that you were allowed, and being on the spendthrift side, I had actually made an entire trip to Chennai, Tadoba, Mangalore and Pondicherry with some 90 pics. 90 was a lot back in 2004. In 2010, it is nothing.

So while the quantity went up, the quality came down. It’s been a year almost and I haven’t found the patience to sort through the pics and delete the ones I do not need. I see myself smiling in front of another range of mountains. I skim through and find at least 6 different pics with the same pose. Pic 1 is that of a waterfall. Pic 2 is of the waterfall and me. By pic 3, there are a few more friends with me in front of the waterfall. By pic 4, we are no longer smiling at the camera but are making faces and making “V” horns behind each other’s heads. By pic 5, we look bored and are no longer standing, but sitting. It’s monotonous to skim through them and sort them. 10 minutes of editing and I am done. I am bored. I have lost patience.

On the other hand, I see online albums of some friends and go wow. The albums look so crisp and well edited, not the same mountain range taken from different angles and having different permutations and combinations of people in front of it. Compiling an album [esp an online album] is like editing a movie. You need to flip through the representative pics and see variety. You need to skim through and get an overall idea of the trip.

So while I write this, I have established a thumb rule for my future trips. If I cannot show one day’s worth of places in 100 photos, I am probably not going to do a good job of editing anyway. I skim through the Yellowstone pics again and feel this inexplicable pain, lethargy, and inertia as I start to delete pics. I do not feel like deleting them. I flip from one to the next, trying hard to decide which is the best one to keep.

So tomorrow I am going to downsize my Yellowstone album. My personal target is a total of 500 pics. That’s a lot still, but do you realize it is decimating 90% of the pictures? Yet I am going to do it. And in future, I hope I just don’t stand in front of a flower, a train, a mountain and take pics incessantly. I hope I stop to actually appreciate the beauty of things around me, smell a flower, take in some fresh air, throw a few pebbles in the stream, do anything but randomly grab my camera and go click click click. And remember my thumb rule. If you can’t show your day’s worth in 100 pics maximum, you cannot show it anyway. A picture is worth a thousand words. You don’t really want a thousand pics to tell your story.

So click on that travel folder you have ignored all this while, go through the pics, and go delete delete delete. Trust me, you don’t need most of the pics. Only a few representative ones will do.

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A feverish rant

It’s been a while since I’ve cried so much, and while I type this, I feel the pain in my head throb and transport into my heart, breaking into a zillion pieces. I don’t really know what triggered the tears all of a sudden, it could be hormones, it could be the fever, it could be PMS, it could be the fear of getting menopausal 20 years down the line. I was looking at the screen and the next thing I know is I am crying. Usually the way it works is that something goes wrong, I think of it, and I start to cry. But it didn’t happen that way. I am still crying, and as I do that, I think of all the things that have gone wrong in my life- a job life gone amuck, relationships gone haywire, friendships turned sour, the driving theory exam I failed last year, the traumatic memories of paying tax returns instead of getting a refund, and the flight I missed to San Antonio two years ago. I wonder if this is how I am trying to process the sorrows inside me- things unspoken, things I have never told anyone. I feel vulnerable, it could be the fever, the sore throat, the all day weakness and not having eaten enough. It could be the trauma of grading a few math answer scripts in school where children have solved sums defying all laws and theorem. It could be that person who told me that he wishes I never get a student visa approved and stay in India [If he read my blog, he’d surely read a hate post about him right now]. I think of the only cricketer I have had a crush on though I couldn’t care less about cricket, and cry some more that he is married. I try to think of happy thoughts- think of Seattle, think of baby Kalyani, think of my sunshine car and all the road trips I have made with her [It’s interesting how I miss my life in Seattle and everything associated with it while I am low]. But deep within, my heart feels lacerated. And like a broken record, I keep weeping, with low intensity first, getting higher and higher till I lose energy, and then the cycle starts all over.

I am sure I will wake up with a bad headache tomorrow morning, but knowing me, I know this that I would have also had my sense of humor back by then. By tomorrow, I would have resurrected the walls against my own vulnerability that keeps me sane, strong, and going in life. What a relief that it is Sunday tomorrow and I don’t have to rush to school first thing in the morning.

-

Pardon the non-sensical post. It's just hormones. Or fever.

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The right door

4 years ago, I had rejected University of Michigan, Ann Arbor to join UW, Seattle. I don’t really know why I chose Seattle over Ann Arbor, given that I knew nothing about either. Both schools were equally good in my field, and I didn’t really have anything against UMich. I was confused for a while, so I asked a few people. Most said Ann Arbor snows like crazy [I am not much of a winter person], though Seattle rains no less. I think I was more familiar with the name Seattle [thanks to Sleepless in Seattle]. Someone suggested there would be a strong Indian crowd in Seattle, thanks to Microsoft and Amazon. Then it was a big city [unlike Ann Arbor], etc etc. The decision was made for me. I was going to Seattle. It’s like- I had two doors in front of me, one with UW written on it, and one with UMich written on it. I had opened the door to UW.

Good and bad, my life in Seattle has been eventful ever since. I finished school, decided to say “no thanks” to PhD in a year, got myself a job, and started working. I hiked, I learnt to drive, I joined salsa classes, I acted and performed in plays, I joined the local dance group, and much more. However, I don’t know how life would have been had I chosen the door with UMich written on it. Maybe I would have finished my PhD. Maybe I would have learnt to like the snow and started skiing. Maybe I would be married by now. Who knows? My friend tells me the tango dancers network at UMich is amazing. Another friend from the business school speaks highly of the place. These are friends who went to UMich. But I’ll never know what was in store for me if I went to UMich, will I?

Today, I stand at a similar crossroad in life, only more difficult. I have 6 PhD admits with scholarships. Worse, 4 of them are similar ranking schools. I don’t really have a choice of city versus college town, as all of them are college towns. All of them are offering me similar packages. The time required to graduate is more or less the same. It’s like facing the same situation 4 years later, this time, only worse. 4 doors with different names in front of me. Which door do I choose? Of course no matter whatever door I choose, I’ll have an eventful journey ahead of me. But will I ever know what I missed out on? What if after choosing “A”, things don’t work out? I’ll always wonder what “B”, “C”, or “D” had in store for me. I was hoping my gut feeling would come handy and help me make a choice. But my gut feeling isn’t communicating with me. Mother suggested writing down all the names in little pieces of paper and asking baby Kalyani to randomly choose one. On a side note, my bollywood-influenced mother further listened to my plight and told me with all seriousness and sympathy, “I can understand, it’s like having to choose between Ranbir Kapoor and Shahid Kapoor for a husband. Both of them are so good”. I had cracked up on the phone 3 months ago when she told me this.

Anyway, I have kind of made a choice, but I had no reason to disapprove of my other choices. The super good schools that were my first choices all rejected me, and now I am left with decently good schools, and I just don’t know what to choose and what to leave behind. And I know that no matter what door I choose, I will always wonder what the doors I left behind had in store for me. Like my architect friend SD says, embarrassment of the riches. Sometimes faced with choices, you know this is THE one and you will not go for anything else. And sometimes faced with choices, you just don’t know what to choose to make you feel that was the right choice.

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Bars and Barriers of Language

My aunt from Chennai (G’s mom) decided to visit us in Kolkata a few weeks ago. I was ecstatic, given that I’ve always been close to G’s family, her mom, and her daughter (baby Kalyani). There are people you meet in life and develop an instant bonding. This was one such family.

My mother however was a little reluctant because of the language barrier. My mother speaks reasonable English and Hindi, but feels most comfortable communicating in Bengali. Here she even assumed that aunty cannot speak anything other than the language of andre pandre (Tamil). My mother’s worries was based more on the lines of if she would be able to be a good host, how would she communicate with someone who speaks Tamil, if aunty would like Bengali food, etc. It’s a different story that my mother soon discovered for herself how well versed in Bengali aunty was. The moment my mother heard it for herself, they were inseparable buddies, constantly conversing in Bengali. I have never seen two strangers bond so quickly. Language was no longer a barrier, since one of them spoke the language the other understood.

My mother’s reluctance to meet someone she assumed she wouldn’t be able to communicate with got me thinking. How do couples in inter-caste marriages cope? What if neither understands or speaks the other person’s language? Where is the level of comfort then? Are couple okay communicating in a language each understands, but is not necessarily the native language then? Like a Bengali married to a Tamil speaking in English and Hindi for the rest of their lives? What language do their children speak then? All the languages involved, or none? Do they just resort to speaking the comfort languages like English or Hindi?

On similar thoughts, have you ever wondered how babies communicate to the world around them without knowing any of the languages? Without speaking a single word, babies deftly communicate their needs- hunger, anger, sleepiness, pleasure, and more. As baby Kalyani is growing up, she has developed her own special language to communicate with the rest of the world. A little more than 19 months old, with 6 teeth in all, she can tell you all about what she needs with her body language. She will scream “daadan” if she fancies something. So you take her to a shopping mall and she likes a particular dress, toy, even a little boy (yes, I am not kidding), and she will stretch out her hand and scream “Daadan”. She once wanted to hold a newly born and screamed “daadan” while moving towards the baby. We prevented her in time before she leapt at the little one.

These days, baby Kalyani has a special way of communicating that she wants to be taken outside. She will tell you “Bye shikkin” (probably her version of a bye bye trip, or her way of saying bye, see you). So when G is done bathing her and dressing her in her spring dress, smelling of soap and powder with neatly combed hair, she will demand to be taken outside for a drive. I once called G when they had just finished dinner and the little one demanded to be taken for a long drive at 10 pm !!! All I heard was screams of “bye shikkin”. On another occasion, they had barely boarded the train when the little one wanted to be set free so that she could run about inside the train. How successfully she communicates what she desires in life !!!

While some of us hesitate communicating with others from different cultures, not wanting to appear like a fool or be misunderstood for having said something inappropriate, nothing matters to little babies. Communication is instinctive for them, they know they will make their voices heard and their demands catered to, no matter what language people around them understand. Babies will make you understand their language.

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Chepe Boshun

“Chepe Boshun”, I heard someone instruct sternly in the metro rail as I waited for the train to start on my Day 1 of shopping. WOW, I had not heard these 2 words in years. I don’t even know if there is an apt translation for it, but for the simplistic “Please squeeze in a bit to make space for me”.

Chepe Boshun is something you get to hear very commonly if you use the public transport in Kolkata- buses, metros, anywhere you can think of. Dada, ektu chepe boshun. Dada ektu shorey daran (please move and make space). Asked and masked with courtesy, don't fail to recognize the underlying threat in the request if it isn't carried out instantly. What a complete contrast between the concept of space in two countries: In the US, you are expected to keep an arm’s distance while standing in a line. Privacy and space are important. Period. You’d never sit next to a person you don’t know in a bus if there is an empty seat.

My prolonged absence from Kolkata has led to some profound observations. These observations are solely mine of course and cannot be traced back to any scientific paper, journal, or article. First, the average obesity or the flab-index of the Bengali has gone up. Second, the seats in the metro were wrongly designed in the first place, to seat eight women, shopping baggage and wiggling kids et al. Perhaps a few extra inches to the seats and the problem could be solved. Or would it? Women are designed to be plumper around the you-know-where areas. Nature meant it to be so. Lack of exercise and a proper carb-rich Bengali diet definitely ensured so. I tried feigning an act of wiggling myself, thighs and butt and all, to fake an act of actually moving this way and that way to make space. Honestly, there was no space to make. And this brought me to the last deduction. The average observation power of the commoner has gone down. You see, there’s no cardinal rule about how many ladies a “ladies seat” should seat. 8 adult, “fully bloomed” women can barely make space for each other without some elbowing, rubbing sweaty arms, and muttering expletives while ducking under each other’s armpits. So the next time you see 7 women and a mere 2 inches of space, please don’t try to wiggle into those 2 inches, barely touching your bum to the seat and falling all over the place every time the brakes are slammed. It’s okay to stand for a while, isn’t it? I’d prefer it any day over pushing, elbowing, and squeezing in under sweaty armpits. As I try to shrink myself to half my width, almost wincing at my physical proximity with another sweating soul I am sexually not attracted to while trying to accommodate another pushy woman who just screamed “Chepe boshun”, I try to think of my choices. My reverie and my musing about my theories have been obstructed suddenly. I look at the fat woman, vermilion on forehead and all, towering above me and looking like the live version of Goddess Kali, only taller. Asked and masked with courtesy, I don't fail to recognize the underlying threat in the request if it isn't carried out instantly. I contemplate telling her, “Chepe boshte parbo na” (I cannot squeeze in, sorry and thank you). I imagine how her facial expression would change. Suddenly, my choices are clear. Quietly, I obey her and jiggle myself some more so that she can sit. I’m willing to travel like cattle herd jam packed in trucks for the next 30 minutes. I’ll get off the train in the next station to ensure her a seat. I’ll learn to drive the next time if need be.

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The rupee-dollar-rupee economics

When you are about to make your first trip to the US, everything seems expensive, especially if you are about to embark on a journey of poverty as a graduate student. No wonder you and your mom spend days making a list of things to be taken to the US, and making trips to the local stores to buy it. Soon the 23 kg of your suitcase is filled with bottles of hair oil, tooth pastes and brushes, beauty products, gamchas (if you are a Bengali), cheap plastic mugs (though you’ve just heard from the senior there that everyone uses toilet paper, and there is no concept of “washing yourself” after doing the big job), sanitary napkins, packets of spices, dry sweets, chaanachur, corn flakes, and everything conceivable under the Indian sun.

The first time you leave for the US, everything gets multiplied roughly by 50 (dollar à rupee).

The senior who told you about the toilet also told you that you will be spending approximately $400-$500 for rent in a shared apartment. You do a quick calculation and realize you will be spending a software engineer’s starting salary on rent alone. And that too while you are sharing the apartment with 2-3 other people. Every can of gulab jamun you buy is going to cost you the price of 80 gulab jamuns in India. You keep stuffing your suitcases- Indian spices, rice, aata, puffed rice, poha, and clothes till you realize you can take no more. This is while you are still in India.

The calculations continue even when you have landed in the US. You and your family does some more math to figure which way of calling is cheaper- from India to US or vice versa. Your granny starts weeping over the phone when you tell her that you have just spent some $200 shopping at Walmart. With time, your brain numbs to the constant calculations and conversions of currency (though your family’s doesn’t, they still ask you to hang up after 5 minutes of conversation, assuming it must be costing you a fortune). In a year, you no longer calculate how much you’d pay if you enjoyed the same commodity in India. In 2 years, you don’t even hesitate booking for a vacation to Florida, renting a car, or even buying a car (if you have had a couple of internships under your belt by then).

And then you make that long awaited trip to India, and things change.

Now that you are in India, everything gets divided roughly by 50 (rupee à dollar).

You eye that expensive sequined saree in that upscale Park Street shop you always drooled over from outside a couple of years ago, but never dared to enter. Now you confidently walk into the shop and ask for the price.

5,000 rupees only madam (this constant subservience and referring to people you don’t know and have no business of knowing as “syar” and “madam” and nodding your head still drives me nuts. Using “only” with everything you say is another one).

You do a quick calculation. A hundred something dollars only.

Cool, I will take it (you mom eyes you as if she has seen a ghost).

You go out with friends to that upscale local restaurant, eat to your heart’s content and ask for the check. The waiter looks at you with confusion when you realize, “Oh, I mean bill please”.

One thousand rupees. $22. Even less than what you’d pay for an upscale restaurant in Seattle for a single meal.

You look at others. “I’ll take care of the bill”.

Everyone eyes you with admiration. The neighbor aunty just made it a point to talk to a distant relative with a nubile prospective looking for a groom.

You start taking a cab to everywhere because you realize the cab fare will be equivalent to your bus fare for a single ride in the US. This is while your mom fervently protests and begs you to take that bus and save some money.

You go to a bookstore asking for the latest bestseller. You do some math. $4 only? Okay, I’ll take it.

You go to Barista and end up paying Rs. 100 for some horribly sweet coffee. Your friend baulks. You are unperturbed because you know you are paying a lot less than what you’d be paying for a Starbucks latte (last I got one it was $3.90).

You go to your favorite sweet shop, buy a kilogram of ras malai, and happily pay $6. That’s what you’d pay for a plate of two sorry looking rasmalais squeezed out off their juices in the US anyway. Hail India.

And even before you know, your bank balance has dipped by a couple of thousand dollars and your waistline has expanded by a few extra inches. But that’s a different story.

Personally, I feel prices of things in India have gone up by at least 4-8 times. My baseline of course is prices of things back in 2006. Fish costs more, sweets cost more. A glass of lassi at Haldiram’s costs you Rs. 24, something unthinkable in 2006. The brief 4 hours I spent at the New Delhi airport, I was horrified to skim through the prices of eating places at the airport. I could actually afford to buy nothing as I returned to India with 100 rupees and my credit card. If Kolkata is this expensive, I can imagine how expensive New Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore are going to be. Yet I have spending power now, thanks to the dollar-rupee economics. So if you are a graduate student about to embark on a US trip, do not fret. Things might look very expensive now, but the next time you are here, everything is going to look dirt cheap.

Time to make another list now. This time, not the hair oil or the poha or Ganesh atta. This time, it’s sequined sarees and embroidered clothes and some jewelry.

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