Of rosaries, fireflies and kittens

One of my most vivid memories of childhood is the family rosary that is said at the end of the day in my ancestral house in Kerala. In my Dad’s house, rosary was an informal affair. This is a house of six sons, so it was a miracle that my grandparents got them to say rosary and that too without missing it a single day till today.

On the other hand, in my mom’s house the balance was in favor of girls, as my mom has so many sisters and few brothers. Therefore rosary was a serious affair and my otherwise sweetheart of a grandfather would become a disciplinarian during rosary time. Since we split our stay in these two homes, the contrast in the families was quite evident in many areas…one of them being the family rosary.

Family rosary in Kerala in both homes still reminds me of a house with dimmed lights, the altar ablaze with candles and the entire family sitting in various parts of the house. Some people would sit on the ground in front of the altar, some on the chairs in the living room, some outside and my mom with me on the verandah, as there was no way I would sit still for the 45 minutes of the rosary. Wherever people sat, they joined in, as one harmonious group. However this is where the similarities in both households ended.

My moms mother, was very fond of cats. And every time we went home there would always be a poochakutty (kitten) for me to play with. And during rosary, as though by some devilish design, the kittens would be at their naughtiest best. They would catch imaginary insects with their front paws and do somersaults in the air and other such naughty antics that would make it impossible not to giggle. My grandfather would raise his voice often during the rosary and call out my name in a warning tone and I would recede into my mother's lap for a few seconds. But the devil had other designs, because the kittens would come up with some more hysterically funny tricks and I would be giggling again. And they made sure that they used the altar room floor for their antics!! My cousins in the house, who were trained by my grandfather to sit down quietly during the rosary, would look at me with gleeful delight, because I dared to break the family rule of maintaining pin drop silence during the rosary.

My grandfather would sigh as the rosary proceeded with my giggles in the background. After the rosary he would give his favorite daughter, my mom, the 789th talk on bringing up kids the proper way, and how he had bought up his kids so well and even though she is now married to a guy from Pala (who are no good compared to the genteel people of Changanassery) she should still uphold the family values etc.etc. My eldest brother would sit through the rosary quietly and even lead at times. So the general consensus was that he had taken after my mom’s family. The family would then look at my second brother M and me and say with a twinkle in the eyes that these two had a surfeit of the father's genes in them.

The Pala barbarian, the daughter of the family was married to, would of course be safely ensconced in his home, going through the family rosary at breakneck speed as his Dad was hard of hearing, so that the brothers could open the bottle while the evening was still young. He would have warned his wife in mock seriousness before she set off to her home with his kids, that he wanted us back the same way he had raised us and not changed to wussies, which is what he thought people from my her side of town were. :p My mom countered gamely by saying that a few days of good upbringing at her house, would do a world of good for her kids. :)

During the rosary, there were other distractions too. Thousands of minnaminungu (fireflies) would adorn the darkness around the house like serial lights. Before the rosary we i.e me and my second brother M, would have already kept our Horlicks jars ready for the catch. And we would fill these jars with these tiny glowing worms that we caught. They made such a pretty sight with their flourescent light glowing in the jar. My mom would make us release these before we went in to sleep.

After the rosary, my mom’s brothers would take out the jeep and drive over to my Dad's house, where their drinks awaited. The brothers in laws got along really well. After dinner my maternal grandfather would make a small drink and tell us stories about saints and martyrs. This would be followed by lights out as the family retired for the day.

Rosary, in my Dad’s house on the other hand was preceded by my Dad and his brothers making elaborate arrangements for the drinking and card session that invariably followed it. This would be preceded by my Grandma and aunts preparing the snacks to go with the drinks. With six sons, my grandma was a whiz in making non veg snacks that served as accompaniments with drinks. When everything was set, the family sat down for rosary. Rosary, unlike in my moms house would be uncomplicated and without the long boring prayers and it would be over in half an hour. After which we could go out and play and make noise and run after the fireflies. There was no bedtime curfew and soon people from neighboring estates would join in. The partying will go on late into the night, as most of these men went to school and college together. It is a time of camaraderie, jokes and political discussions. The tradition lives on to this day. Surprisingly there are more priests and nuns in my Dads family than my moms!

In spite of these contrasts I liked living in both houses.


(This post was inspired by this post
by Alexis, which reminded me so much of my home in Kerala)

Saturday pataka!!

Yesterday was the annual St Joseph’s College fest “Equinox 2006”. Quite an enjoyable day at the college grounds. I missed last years fest as I was working that Saturday, so we i.e my friends and me decided to go this year. The last show on the menu was various bands playing their music. The ground was packed. Since it was threatening to rain, we decided to keep to the periphery of the crowd so that we could make a dash for it when it starts pouring.

The band was in full swing and suddenly one of the band members, a chubby guy, got caught up in the heat of the moment and took a swinging dive into the crowd. He must have been inspired by similar stunts by popular bands as seen on TV. Inspite of the ground being packed something strange happened. The crowd parted like Moses parting the sea and the band member fell flat on his face onto the ground.

I just collapsed laughing.

The crowd helped him to his feet and tut tuted at the plight of the poor guy. He limped back bravely to the stage with a strained smile, waving bravely at the crowd. Everyone was commiserating while I could only clutch my aching tummy and laugh. That was Saturday pataka after Friday Dhamaka.

What a weekend!!

The Wonder Years Tag!

I wrote in a previous tag that I miss childhood. That got me reminiscing and one day I chanced upon this post by Pophabhi where he has described Vishu during his childhood. His description is so vivid and the memories seem so warm like the glow of lamps in the poojamuri. We all have vivid memories of our childhood, both good and bad. And I realize that it would be so therapeutic to revisit childhood and relive those memories. So I decided to write a post on it. And that is how this tag was born.

The Wonder Years Tag

1. Write 8-10 things about childhood ( 1-12 years) that you miss.
2. Write 8-10 things that you disliked about childhood.
3. Tag a few people.


What I miss about childhood

1. I miss being pint sized. Because my dad would carry me around and I could sit on his lap, my favorite place to sit, while he read the newspaper.

2. I miss being fed by my mom while I read an Enid Blyton with great concentration. I used to be hand fed till I was 8 because I was a lazy eater. Then in school, my class teacher found out about this and refused to let me go and play till I showed her an empty tiffin and I learnt to eat on my own.

3. I miss the story telling sessions by my grandparents/dad in the night before we fell asleep. My dad was a horrendous story teller, so he read from books and usually fell asleep before he finished, which prompted me to pick up the book and finish it while he snored. This also developed the reading habit in me.

4. I miss the amazement that books created and the places it took me to, sitting right here in Bangalore.

5. I miss the fuss when I fell sick.

6. I miss childhood Christmases. Christmases in childhood were so special! Decorating the tree, making the crib,helping mom make the cake and lots of things besides that. It was like living in the Winter Wonderland.

7. I miss the childhood vacations in Kerala, when you could run and play in the estates and do anything you wanted. Today I am grown up and expected to behave like a propah lil miss.

8. I miss the carefree days of wearing frocks and going topless during summers.

9. I miss childhood birthday parties and giving sweets in class and wearing ‘colored clothes’ to school on my birthday.

10. I miss getting away with just about anything because I was the youngest.

What I disliked about childhood

1. Drinking milk. I disliked being forced to drink milk and almost every time I vomited it out but my mom wouldn’t relent.

2. Hospitals, Doctors Clinic, Injections,medicines and Vaccinations...I always got fever after that

3. I disliked dinner because I was a hyperactive kid and would be too exhausted and sleepy by dinnertime. But there was no escaping dinner and till today dinner reminds me of hot rice and drowsiness.

4. I disliked spicy curries and biting into a green chilly. Even mildly spicy curries would have me drinking tonnes of water and eating sugar. A bowl of sugar was a permanent feature on the dining table in our house. (I love spicy food now)

5. I disliked hot food because it burnt my hands and I wouldn’t touch it till it was cooled.

6. Being bathed by mom, because she used the hard Pears soap, supposedly the safest for the skin. It would poke me. Till today the smell of Pears, reminds me of childhood baths.

7. Polishing my shoes

8. Fountain pens. It leaked and I was a splotchy mess by the time school got over.

9. I disliked doing the ‘drill’ in the sun, which was compulsory practice for sports day.

10. Getting up in the morning for school :)

And with great delight, ignoring the epithets flowing in my direction I tag.

1. Alexis
2. Mind Curry
3. Jiby (if you have the time)
4. Thanu
5. Praveen
6. Lijo
7. Jeseem
8. BVN
9. Mathew
10. Dhanush
11. Quills
12. Kusum
13. Leon
14. Pophabhi
15. Fleiger

...and anyone else who would like to take this trip down memory lane :)

The singles dilemma

“So how come you are single?” this is a query guaranteed to make me slap someone, one of these days. What pisses me off is the absurdity of this question. And I do tend to snap when someone asks me this question. Not because it is personal but because it is so stupid.

Yesterday a male colleague asked me this question. Normally I would have given a deliberately vague answer but I am a little fed up of the frequency of this question since coming to this company and so turned around and counter questioned him sarcastically.
"So how come your sister is single?”
He got the point and mumbled an apology.

What irritates me is the fact that I have to give him and others an example to drive home the point. Can’t they see that having a boyfriend is not common but uncommon for an Indian gal…even in the Metros. I can count on my fingers the number of gals among my college mates who have boyfriends, and these are long term relationships. Then why do they ask such questions? And it is not just me, but lots of single gals who complain of the same.

This incident set me thinking of this whole GF/BF thingie. For most of us girls, getting to know a guy and in the event that you hit it off with him, then going in for a steady relationship is not as simple as it seems. For most of us (please note the emphasis on ‘most of us’) a BF is a potential life partner and hence we tend to look for people from within our community or religion. This rules out 90% of the guys we meet. The remaining 10% are scattered and the chance of bumping into someone on your own is slim.

For guys the above-mentioned aspect may not be a consideration at all (or maybe yes, please correct me if I am wrong). There are a few gals who will get into a relationship just for the heck of it, or because it is cool and because you can go for a movie together etc. Quite ok if both parties are not serious. But for the rest, it is not that simple. Our society rules state that a girl should have a good reputation(whatever the meaning of the stupid term) in order to qualify for the post of wife. And since most Indian gals have to get married, it sort of puts a dampner on any hopes of having a relationship that may not work out (read as 'past history').

Besides we have parents to think about and touchy brothers too, who would not like to be informed by their friends that they saw their sister with a guy at the theater unless he is her steady/fiancé/husband/classmate/known colleague.

A few creeps also spoil the party for the good guys. These and a lot of other factors, makes girls vary of dating or having a boyfriend. Which is why so many young people are single today. Most of them are resigned to it, while many especially guys miss having female companionship.

Among my colleagues who stay in PG digs or away from families, many date regularly, chiefly because the fear of being caught or seen by the family is absent. Dating is slowly becoming an accepted thing, but the hesitancy to be seen together unless the couple is very serious is still the norm. There is hope yet. If not our generation, I am sure the next generation will have things easier on this front.

The gentle way of life

Early in the morning, the road in front of my house looks like a farmers market. My house stands where the village limits ends and the tarred road begins. There are about 20 or 30 push cart vendors living in the village. The village still lives in the last century, like so many pockets of areas around the city. The difference between the city and the villages are growing and these people present an interesting study of a people who live in the same city as us but are very different from us.

The push cart vendors (both ladies and gents) congregate in front of my house and then unpack their wares, mostly fruits that would be neatly covered and tied down with plastic before they retired for the night. The vegetable vendors would have already left to pick up produce from the middlemen’s trucks that come into the city bringing fresh vegetables. A farmer will sell his cauliflower for a rupee or two to the middleman and these are sold in the city for Rs.20/-. So it is not hard to imagine the plight of farmers. However the middlemen’s syndicate is very strong and they use mafia style tactics if any farmer tries to sell produce in the city on his own. Sometimes abject misery makes these farmers come furtively into the city at night, to sell their produce. We always make sure we buy from such people. The government has set up a farmers market in the outskirts of the city, but hardly anyone ventures there. City folks are busy people who do not have time to go shopping for vegetables through traffic jams to far away places. The very idea is self defeating.

These vendors like most village folk have a personal rapport with most of the ladies in the area especially South Indian ladies my moms age or ladies who have come from small towns and hence can relate to them. They talk the same language and their conversations are about the weather, children, illnesses, natural cures and just about everything that people in villages sit and talk. When they get back from their villages after important festivals, they bring back something for us. Fresh farm produce, home made sweets, drumsticks and a variety of other things like bangles for me when I was a kid. Their generosity despite poverty is heartwarming. It is not a rare sight for a lady from the village to come knocking on our door for a bit of sambhar or curry or medicines, the relationship we have with them is that of friendly neighbors. For them, our families are like an oasis in an otherwise strange city.

In the evening I wait on the balcony to see them trooping back. There is a bounce in the step and a song on their lips as they plan to go to the movies or discuss the latest releases. Small gifts like a bunch of curry leaves or coriander leaves, a few bananas are left on the gate post for my Mom, a small token of friendship and respect. These are the people who bought Neem leaves when we had Chicken Pox or a herb that is used for treating Jaundice when I had Jaundice. They make it a point to stop and ask our welfare and fill us in with the latest news like weddings and babies in the family.

What saddens me, when I see these people is the realization that they rightfully belong in the villages. They seem so misplaced in the city. I wish that villages provided them livelihood so that they could stay back and carry on with their unique way of life. I dread to think of an India without villages, villagers or village culture. Our villagers are the repositories of our culture and heritage and I wish the government realizes this and does something.

I have a lot of admiration and gratitude for the myriad people like Bina Ramani who have promoted and preserved the rural arts and crafts, but we need more or the gentle people of the villages who are the last remaining practitioners of the Indian way of life will be wiped out to be replaced with a class catering to the cities as cheap labor.

( Do check out this heartwarming tale by Abhishek)

Anything sells

Today when I went to Infant Jesus church I remembered an incident that happened approximately four years ago. We had gone to this famous Infant Jesus Shrine in the south and a guy selling various religious objects approached us. Among the prayer books, medallions and plastic figurines of Infant Jesus were plastic boxes with a small piece of bone kept on cotton. I have seen such a relic in another shrine too, where a piece of some saints bone is kept for public viewing.

According to this guy, the bone was Infant Jesus’ bone and he would sell it for Rs 1000/-. My brother M as usual picked up a box with exaggerated interest and then turned to us with mock amazement and said “Just imagine...Jesus was boneless from childhood! Wow!!"

The man slunk away while we were laughing...we felt a little sheepish that had he our attention for a while. Dunno how many gullible people are venerating the ‘bone’ of Infant Jesus in their homes today? :P

Happy Diwali everyone!!!

Parasites

Today I was watching the news…it showed an Asian boy being rushed to a hospital in London for emergency treatment. The people in the hospital reacted quickly as the people who had ferried him from a country in Asia …all whites, looked on anxiously. It didn’t matter to them that the child was non-white…they did their best to save his life.

Over the years so many people have gone from Asia, Africa and other third world countries of the world and settled in England and US and some other countries of Europe. We have enjoyed their hospitality and made use of the sworn principals that governs these societies i.e …freedom of speech, religion and beliefs. And today, we have like snakes, bitten the very hands that feed us.

No matter where we go, we take our prejudices, fanaticisms and intolerance with us. It seems to be genetically rooted. We carry our personal vendetta with us and incubate it in the fertile climes of the foreign soil where our beliefs and prejudices are respected under free speech and then strike at the country of our origin and at our hosts…like parasites.

We use the freedom of speech the West grants us to stifle the freedom of speech of people who disagree with us. We abuse their hospitality by turning on the very society that gave us shelter, work and a charter to live as human beings.

Today the West is under siege. It’s principals eroded by the very people it gave shelter to. The West is facing its greatest challenge. Will it buckle under like France that banned any form of overt religious symbolism or hold onto the principals of individual freedom which may see a return to intolerance. Only time will tell. I for one am waiting to see the compromises the West will make to deal with this abuse of their trust.

Quick on the draw

I was Google chatting with this famous guy blogger the other day. The chat went thus:

Him: You on Orkut?
Me: I was, not any more
Him: Why?
Me: Well, it is more like a pick up zone...
guys seem to think it is a place to meet girls
Him: That's what I heard
I am in Orkut...
but no has tried to pick me up yet
Do you think there is something wrong with me? :)
Me: ROFLMAO!!!!

Spot ‘em young and watch ‘em grow!

Nowadays when I open my mailbox, I see many job offers, due to my other blog. Earlier it was small companies, nowadays it is big ones. A mail from the HR of a large American media house caught my eye the other day.

This company entered India around the time I finished college. When they advertised for 'Content Writers' I remember applying for the same even though 'Content Writing' would be too narrow a field for me. I did not get a reply. Of course I was in a good company then and I did not bother. I got another mail by the same person yesterday for the same job, describing his organization hoping to entice me. Finally, today I replied back. I told him about the fact that I had applied to his company earlier and asked him why the scanning process of his company did not spot me then. I went on to ask him how he could justify the fact that they had not even considered my resume! I got an incoherent reply that I didn’t understand and politely sent a letter of disinterest in working for his organization. I hope he does a thorough check of the recruiting procedures of his company, because another friend and classmate of mine who applied with me is now an established writer with a foreign magazine.

I am afraid I am very arrogant with HR folks when they call asking if I am interested in joining their organization and I have every reason to be. I have proved myself and I don’t need to take the nonsense that is the recruiting procedure of people in the communication and support services field.

The scanning process of candidates for interviews is ridiculous. Usually it is the HR team that does the initial scanning of resumes and it is here that the biggest mistakes happen. Spotting a good candidate for a particular job requires scanning of resumes by a person in the same field. But this rarely happens. The HR team does the first scanning of resumes and forward these to departmental heads. By this time many good candidates are rejected or ignored due to the inability of HR teams to evaluate the resume due to their lack of knowledge in this particular skill.

The interview procedure is even more ridiculous. Most of the time, the last incumbent would have quit and people with no knowledge of the field will interview the candidate. I had an HR executive calling asking me if I know how to draft a Press Release. It is like asking a Doctor if he knows medicine!! And this girl belonged to the HR department of one of the largest Semi Conductor companies in the world!! I wasn't looking for a change and declined the offer.

In my first and second job, the concerned Manager insisted on going through the resumes themselves and that is how I was spotted. In my last company, when I was short listed for the job, the then HR Manager protested vehemently because " she is too young"!!!! My boss put his foot down and I was given the job. Since then he made it a point to go through every resume that comes for a job in his department. His actions didn’t go down well with the HR powers-that-be, but it spoke volumes of his perception of the HR department’s abilities to get him the right talent.:p It was no wonder that his department had 0% attrition.

I am afraid that such practices by HR departments are robbing companies of talents and talented people of the right jobs. My classmate in college a really gifted and wonderful writer now works in software marketing.

How many such talents have been snuffed out no one knows.

The ideal man

Who would be my ideal man? This was the topic of conversation last Saturday between us friends. Each of decided to give this topic a really really wild shot. No holds barred kind of expectations from our future mates. ( guys pleej to note this point)

I am not a teenager anymore, when your idea of the ideal man would be a judicious mix of the looks of a romantic star with a body of an action hero and the sense of humor of a comedian. So my shot at the ideal man was very ‘wild’ too but in a different way. Here’s my take:

My ideal man would have had a live in arrangement with a gal for at least a year. (Freshers need not apply.) The one year would have made him fairly used to living with a gal and it would have smoothed out the rough edges off him. He would of course be over the girl too by the time he becomes my ideal man :p ( It would be just like being gifted with a cute puppy that is housebroken and trained, my idea of a perfect gift!)

There was pin drop silence when I let out this piece of information and then lots of “What!!!!!!” and “Are you crazy?!!??!”. Then strangely enough there was a grudging acceptance of my view of an ideal man. After all we were being wild and not boringly serious weren’t we? The girls still had the age old feeling of distaste at the thought of a man who had already lived-in with another woman. But the more we talked about it, the more the idea became palatable to the crowd. Suddenly the girls began seeing more and more advantages in such a guy.

Ok I admit that maybe subconsciously I am trying to do away with the first few difficult months in a relationship when a guy has to be housebroken (:p). (yeah girls I can see the nodding of heads).

As the gals warmed up to the idea some brilliant suggestions started pouring out. For example, one bright soul in the group hoped that that her ideal guy would be used to helping his ex putting mehendi on her hair as she finds it difficult to do it on her own, another hoped that her ideal man would have been taught by his ex to put nail polish on her toes, yet another gal wanted him to be thoroughly coached in cooking by his ex…. and there is more. One gal wanted her ideal to be trained by his ex in aerobics and another in pole dancing. By this time we were rolling on the floor laughing. I shall refrain from revealing some of the ahem…other talents the girls wanted in their ideal guy.

I for one am happy that we had that talk session. It was liberating in a sort of way because from a hesitant start the girls got really creative ( the Breezers helped). And after the discussion as it always happens with us, we fell into a collective silence, as we ruminated on the fact that each of us had a personality of our own and based on that we had some idea of the kind of man we would like to spend our lives with… and the sobering fact that for most of us, an arranged marriage awaited in the distant future.

But till then we are gonna party!!! :p

(Penned this in-flight on my lappie with a weirdo sitting next to me trying desperately to peep into my lappie)

Songsters of the sky

Verditer Flycatcher
Photo courtesy Kolkata Birds

As a kid, around 8/9 years of age I found a couple of magazines in my Dad’s small library of magazines and books, which he had collected while in the Gulf. The magazine was titled ‘Outdoors’. I think it was a Canadian magazine. The colorful pictures of sprawling blue mountains, snow covered slopes, rivers winding through snow and the sheer beauty of the landscape had me hooked. In the same section of the library I found books by Jim Corbett, and E P Gee and some other authors. I was a voracious reader then and these books were devoured in a trice. ’Outdoors’ was a magazine for hunters and I soon developed distaste for it. My Dad had apparently picked it up at the Airport Book Shop.

However chancing upon this magazine and these books on Wildlife was a life changing moment for me. I had found my calling, my passion…perhaps it was the genes…perhaps not as my Dad was an accomplished hunter in his younger days… or maybe yes, because he changed after he read Jim Corbett, E P Gee and Rudyard Kipling. Till today my Dad cannot explain how or why he purchased these books as he had no inclination or interest towards environmental issues then. But these books somehow landed in his possession as though placed there by fate for me to chance upon. I of course expanded this library. My Dad gladly let me take the books for my collection and these books were the first ‘serious’ books among my Golden Key comics, Enid Blyton, Asterix, Tin Tin and Kiddy Encyclopedia collection.

It was the book, The Wild Life of India by EP Gee that influenced me the most. It’s simple narration and helpless tone over the fast vanishing wild life of India was just the thing to ignite and interest in wild life conservation. I must confess that one cannot just read a book on wildlife and get enthusiastic about conservation. The matter has to take root in your heart and in your mind. As a kid I was fascinated by birds, I have been through the ‘jumping from the table flapping my arms trying to fly routine’ several times. I have spent hours watching birds fly in formation is sheer joy and free abandon from the terrace. The sheer color of their plumage and absolute freedom to swim in the air held me in thrall. E P Gee talked at length about Salim Ali in his book, a man he admired a lot. So it was no wonder that my interest in Birds took a firmer root when my parents presented me with a book on Indian birds by Salim Ali.

Salim Ali pioneered ornithology in India and made it a serious pursuit. It is because of him that ‘Birding’ and bird conservation has become a passion for several individuals and organizations who are now working doggedly to save India’s birds from extinction. Salim Ali died in 1987 when I was a few years old. I wish he had been born a little later so that I could get to meet him and shake hands with him. He is a living proof of the existence of God. Who else but God could have put him in our midst to remind us of these tiny and gentle creatures that form a vital link in the cycle of Nature. Besides delighting us with their color, wonderful plumage and sweet songs.

I am by no means a professional birder or ‘twitchers’ as they are called. My support for the various organization working for conservation is monetary, besides the regular birding outings with our amateur group and awareness camps in college and now in office. However birds are my life long passion and I cannot imagine a world without them. Spotting a rare bird is like a ray of hope that all is not lost. I cannot describe the delight of spotting a bird, recognizing it and following it with your binoculars. It is an addiction and like an addiction there is always one more spot you must try …and you keep walking and tracking through calls or a flash of color or movement in the foliage …till you realize it is sunset and you got to head home.

Nov 12th is Dr Salim Ali’s birthday. God bless you Dr Salim Ali!

( I am travelling from tomorow. Hope to log in and reply to comments. See you guys next week. Poomanam too will be updated only next week. Caio!)

Winds of change

Today was Karnataka bundh…but I went to work and found quite a few people at work especially the unmarried gals many of them living in PG digs. Over the past two weeks I have met and befriended most of the girls working here. It doesn’t take long for girls to become friends, though I see the opposite in guys. They tend to make a couple of friends within their team or have friends outside the office. Whenever we are, we girls immediately form a group; it is the most natural thing that happens. Soon your problems become theirs and vice versa and we sort of know what is happening in each others life. A married gal would greet another in the morning with a question about her day after she went home, unsolved tiffs with hubby or inlaws or other irritants that would be general knowledge among the gals.

In my last company I was witness to a spate of weddings of my gal colleagues. Most of them marrying with stars in the eyes and then the troubling lightening crash to absolute boredom or irritation with married life within weeks!!! The married gals of course, chuckled with an "I told you so" kind of look.

Today I see a subtle but definite change in the attitude of girls. After living under oppressive and restrictive middle class parents, then tasting freedom and financial independence at PG digs and employment, they are not willing to get back to that kind of lifestyle via marriage. As I write this post four marriages are in the divorce court from my last company and an equal number in this office too. In all these cases, the girls just could not take the pressure of job and housework and realized that they had a choice not to live like this. They had done their best, but when you have lived in a PG/home where food was served on time and all you had to do was make sure you got up in time and reached office in time, they kind of wonder why they have to give up such a lifestyle. The US work culture, lets face it is not conducive to an Indian kind of marriage where the woman does most of the work. And this realization is dawning on girls nowadays. Today gals are taking a good hard look at marriages and what is in it for them. The fact is all of them know what’s in it for them…housework and the onus of looking after another human being. Besides nosey interfering in laws and relations. This is the cold analysis of a marriage from a working gals viewpoint.

The married girls on the other hand, swear that their daughters will not be brought up to believe that marriage is the ultimate goal in a girl’s life. And this generation of girls will soon be upon us and they sure will be very different from this present generation.

Like most oppressed people, the womenfolk of India, at least the younger lot too is beginning to raise their voices and rebel. The world of the Indian gal is in a churn and I for one wonder what this churn will throw up. Will it be embittered feminists or die hard single career girls? No one knows, but the change is underway and what direction it will take depends a lot on the Indian guys.

Will the Indian man rise to the occasion or through his refusal to change make extremists of these girls? The juggernaut of change cannot be stopped but I hope it goes in the right direction.

The ball is in your court dear Indian gentlemen!

I'm happy!

No folks I did not win a Jackpot or a promotion. I am happy because of some other reasons. When I came into this office I was given a brand new comp with *UGH* freeware like OpenOffice *puke*. I immediately got rashes (I swear this is true) and demanded to see the Sysadmin. Now my Chief Syssie here is a jovial Bong, sweet and chubby and round as a Rosogolla. (But the poor man has a completely mallu team. He still manages to smile despite such tragedies). So I told him of my problems and he laughed. ( He laughs at anything... for example I remarked that it looks like it is going to rain and he was ROFL.) So my MS Office problem had him shaking with laughter and every muscle and fat group in his body got a well deserved exercise. ( The fat group clearly outnumbered the muscle group though at the ratio of 1: 756385754)

Amidst uncontrollable laughter he told a rather shy chota sysadmin to attend to my distresses. The rather shy chota sysadmin came shyly into my cabin and opened ‘My Computer’ very shyly. Then he blushed when he saw that he had forgotten to install MS Office. So he downloaded MS Office and went away blushing.

A few minutes later another chota sysadmin who was a little better than the other rather shy chota sysadmin in the shyness department came and installed Photoshop. After which another chota syadamin came and installed Corel Draw. After everyone had got a chance to come and install something or the other on my comp, the March Past of the Sysadmins stopped. ( it was fun and educative while it lasted, I got to see a variety of Sysadmins and their bumblings. Made me feel very human ) For example:

Chota Syadmin: I have installed Adobe Photoshop for you.
Me: er… I want Adobe Photoshop and not Adobe Acrobat.
Chota Syadmin: ooops ente daivame!! Sorry tow!

So now I have my beloved Microsoft Suite of products without which I frankly cannot live. ( I can almost feel Aashiks evil grin right now :p ).Maybe I am too used to it. I have been using MS Office from the time I was a teeny bopper and could reach the keyboard. It was easier to use the thesaurus in MS Word than consult a dictionary with a million pages and tiny miniscule print. And of course the teacher was none the wiser. I even got honorable mention for ‘Consulting the Dictionary’.

I know, I know I keep taking digs at MS but then I take digs at my Mom and second brother too don’t I? You take digs at people you love. See, I never make digs at Anonymous commenters!!!

After the installation, suddenly all the documents changed their icons and the familiar MS Word icon appeared on them like magic. It was truly a wonderful and breathtaking moment. And then I clicked on MS Word and as the familiar window opened I almost kissed the monitor. (Trust me after beholding Open Office Writer you will kiss even your boss.) So me is back on track and life is good once again.

Pssst don’t think I wont take digs at Papa Billy and his armamentarium. That will continue as an when it irritates or annoys me.

On blogging...

Picked up this heaven sent tag from Pradeep. Been wanting to write about blogging for some time now.

1. Are you happy/satisfied with your blog, with its content and look? Does your family know about your blog?

I am very satisfied with my blog, because I have no aspirations or ambitions for it. All I wanted was to write without censure and editing. My family knows about this blog and I started blogging with their approval. I am happy with the feel as I am not obsessed about my blog.

2. Do you feel embarrassed to let your friends know about your blog or you just consider it as a private thing?

I am careful about who knows about my blog. I come from a conservative community and everything I write has the potential of a scandal. So only some close friends and relations know about my blog. I also work in a company that requires me to admit to any blogging activity and so I write under a pen name. I would love to blog under my name but then it would restrict the freedom of expression and I do not want to write politically correct posts.

3. Did blogs cause positive changes in your thoughts?

Yes. I never thought when I started blogging that anyone would be interested in my writing. But surprisingly there seemed to be an increasing number of guys reading my blog. And they were such gentlemen!!! And I say this not because they liked my posts, but because they seemed tolerant of a gals outlook on life and guys in general. My perceptions about guys have changed. I have realized that the community of guy bloggers are thorough gentlemen or maybe only gentlemen blog :) I feel good to have connected to so many people.

(All you gals scouring shaadi portals...you know where to get the best guys...at my blogs!!!!!!!! And it’s FREEE!!!!)

:p

4. Do you only open the blogs of those who comment on your blog or you love to go and discover more by yourself?

There was a time when I had time to blog hop and that is how I discovered most of my blog pals and I sort of settled into reading some on a regular basis because I like their writing. Through my blog pals many people discovered my blog. But nowadays, I comment only on posts that I like reading. If I come across interesting blogs I do comment.

5.What does visitors counter mean to you? Do you care about putting it in your blog?

I put it the Statcounter at Poomanam on Leon's advice last October (2005). It has been a real eye opener. I realized that there are more silent readers than commenters. I get an average of 10k hits at Poomanam and 2 K hits per month at Think Pad. I did care about putting in one at this blog for the same reason. However the fact is, nothing affects my writings. I write what I want and will keep writing till I feel like, whether there are readers or not. That is my blogging philosophy.

6. Did you try to imagine your fellow bloggers and give them real pictures?

No, I didn’t.

7. Admit. Do you think there is a real benefit for blogging?

By real if you mean ‘monetary’ then I do not know. Otherwise it is a great help…most reticent people turn very eloquent while blogging. And once you get used to expressing your thoughts, you get a clearer picture of who you are and what you want in life. I would call bloggers a ‘mind community’. When you see a person in flesh and blood, some prejudices like the way a person looks or some mannerisms can cloud your impression of the person. But in blogs you respond only to the person’s thought process, which I think is the most honest form of interaction.

8. Do you think that bloggers society is isolated from real world or interacts with events?

I don’t think there is a bloggers society. I think we all have our offline life and do not spend our entire time at our blogs to be called a society. Blogging is just another small part of our daily lives. But when it comes to calamities, bloggers do rally around and do their best to help.

9. Does criticism annoy you or do you feel it's a normal thing?

Criticisms of my writing style annoy me because I am not a professional writer. My blog is like my personal diary. You don’t peep into people’s diaries and comment on their writing styles do you? My blog is the same. Just another random rambling. Criticism also means you are taking away the right of a blogger to freedom of expression. Period.

I also do not like expectations from me, something that is happening regularly these days. I do not like my blog (Poomanam) being in the limelight though inadvertently it has. I want it to be considered just another blog and not a regular syndicated humor column, which seems to be the popular perception now.

10. Do you fear some political blogs and avoid them?

I don’t fear political blogs. My favorites are on my blogroll at Poomanam. But I know nothing about politics so don’t comment on political blogs except at DOC and Vinod's and lately Brijesh's blogs… and that is because these people tolerate my comments and have not booted me out yet. :p

11. Did you get shocked by the arrest of some bloggers?

I didn’t know anything about this. But if they have used their blog for criminal or anti State activities then they deserve it.

12. Did you think about what will happen to your blog after you die?

It will die with me. My blog is uniquely me. My friend and my brother has my User ID and password. So they will keep it open I guess till there are readers for the archives.

13. What do you like to hear? What's the song you might like to put a link to in your blog?

I would like to hear:

WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD - Louis Armstrong

I see trees of green, red roses too
I see them bloom for me and you
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world

I see skies of blue and clouds of white
The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world

The colours of the rainbow, so pretty in the sky
Are also on the faces of people going by
I see friends shakin' hands, sayin' "How do you do?"
They're really saying "I love you"

I hear babies cryin', I watch them grow
They'll learn much more than I'll ever know
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world
Yes, I think to myself, what a wonderful world
Oh yeah

I can hear anything as long as it is melodious or has a good beat. I would put a new song everyday on my blog :)

This is one time I will take great pleasure in tagging some people. And these are a few of my favorite men err..I mean tagees :p

Alexis, Mind Curry, Jiby, Mathew (if the Germans allow you to blog), Ganja Turtle, Fleiger and Emmanuel. And a very eloquent and elegant gal blogger...Quills!

Reminiscences ...

Yesterday was my brother M’s birthday. Last year I wrote this post in his honor on a dare ( I was richer by Rs 1000/- the kanjoos!!!). While going over my old stuff I found a Slam Book that was such a rage when I was in school. Here are some excerpts from his entry in a as is where is basis. He was 12 or 13 years old I think.

My name: wuts ur prob
My address: da moon
My phone no: 091-get-out-of-my-face.
My Sunsign: Heat
My biggest asset: Myself.
I’m sad about: Writing this stuff
My most memorable moment: 4 minutes back (before I started writing this duh!!!!)
Biggest Strength: Not u (Ha! Ha! Ha!)
My hobbies: notin u like
My favorite Singer: Myself
A girl/boy I like most and why: Myself (duh!!!)
A girl/boy I hate most and why: u cos u r a pest
I love wearing: Clothes (duh!!!)
My best teacher (Male): MAHATMA GANDHI (Ha! Ha! Ha!)
My favorite movie: Silverine shuts up!
What annoys me: U!! (duh!)
What bores me: Writing this!
My ambition: Millionaire
My dearest pal: My dog (that’s actually my dog)
My dream lover: Me
Love to me is: Mum
Person I respect : Dad
What I feel for you: U dont want to know( Ha! Ha! Ha!)

Signed
M
(I am da greatest…not you!)

Of course I cried and almost tore the paper up because my friends sister's had written such sweet stuff. Thank god, my mom kept it safe till I cooled down. I now have something to show his future wife, in case she needs solid evidence of insanity in court!! :p
On second thoughts I will sell it to the highest bidder muahaHAHAHA

Life is good!!!

I would describe a perfect day as...opening my blog and seeing two tiny asterix next to a name on my Blog Roll, which indicates that someone has published a new post.

The last two weeks was reading heaven for me. Jiby came out with some posts in quick succession. I won’t even attempt to describe his posts; each one is so perfect and interesting.

Kusum came out with some brilliant posts that left me gawping at it’s sheer spunkiness and subtle sense of humor.

My old pal If I tell ya, I'll have to kill ya resurfaced and put up a rib tickling piece in a way only she can write.

Mind Curry’s latest post on the Cola ban, has me chuckling at the sheer stupidity of some commenters and I can almost visualize MC trying his best to reply to the comments with a straight face. At this present moment I wonder if he behaving like AA in my latest post :p I sincerely hope he is not and that he will continue his crusade to resurrect the land of the zombies. His posts and comments at Save Kerala should be made compulsory study for Anthropologists trying to decipher the Malayaleee psyche. You won’t get such a rich source of study material anywhere. No need to cut open a Malayalee brain to see what make them tick and go BOOM, just read the comments at Save Kerala and you can say goodbye to those tomes and volumes that thousands have consulted in vain to decipher the Malayalees.

Alexis came up with a mega bumper post and lord in heaven… I am laughing hysterically as I type this …it is so howlarious that I am going to get into serious trouble at the office. My new team members who are not used to seeing me giggling into a monitor like my last team, think that I am crazy!!!

Ganja Turtle came up with, not one but four posts with astonishing speed. I would describe his recent posts as watching the New York Philharmonic Orchestra playing at the Grand Canyon to an exclusive audience consisting only of Mother Earth , the orchestra reaching a crescendo as the Sun sinks into the canyon in grand applause.

Matter of Choice …a blogger whose command over English and maturity of thought I admire, wrote about Shine Garments. Every post of his is a satisfying read for me. I simply admire the richness of his language and the mix of wisdom and wit that has prompted me to tell him many times in the past that he should blog more often.

Angel Doc’s posts, in which she describes the elements is second to none. One of those few people who can weave a beautiful tapestry of visuals describing Nature using mere words …her latest post on Dasappa and her description of the rain lashing near the Vellayani lake left me awestruck.

Jeremy the jewel….I call him that because each of his post is like a gem, short and sweet but beautiful and precious and sooo refreshing.

Thank you Sarah for making each day something to look forward to with your story...a complusive read for me.

And last but not the least the very hilarious professor of Iyer Education…he reminds me of Tom the cat. Recently he attempted a story and I realized to my horror that I am a compulsive ‘twist in the tale’ girl. Of course I realized this when I wrote Acid Rain and Silent Killer, but I guess my tendencies are resurfacing again...because when I saw this story by Iyer Education I went into a trance and redid the story…with a twisted twist in the tale. And Sir Iyer fortunately let me off without an imposition!

What to do? I am like this only. I love to read the blogs of a few people...and when they oblige me with a post, I can only say thank you. Blogging is no fun if your favorite bloggers don’t post, but blogging has to be natural too….and so I wait patiently till one of them has to say something. Right now I am in blogger heaven. If I have missed out anyone then I am sorry, I will add an addendum as I remember.

Thank you all you wonderful people!!!

To the one I love...

To my itsy bitsy chweety pie of a doggie woggie!

I fell in love with you the moment I saw you
You were my baby from the time I set my eyes on you
I carried you home in the palm of my hand
You were so tiny
And then you entered my house
and conquered my home and my family
You became the most important thing for everyone
Suddenly everyone wanted to carry you
cuddle you
put you on their bed and even sleep with you
There was a tug of war and I was left questioning whether you
were my dog or theirs
But I realized that sweetness such as yours was to be shared.

You cried when I am sick
Went off food
and hung around morosely under my bed
or curled yourself into a tight ball...
now and then looking up to see if I was alright
Whined in the morning if I slept late
Scared lest I am not alive
And I always put out a hand
to reassure you before falling back to sleep

You are the first thing I see in the morning
And the last face I behold at night
I have no choice as you…
Hang around me like a shadow

You are my angel that God sent down
To tell me I am special
Happy B'day chweety pie, lollypop, sugar plum, honey bunch, doggylee, fur face, love of my love and all the other things mushy that I call you
except your name.

I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!!!!!!!

Of human perversions

"I was with this girl the other night and from the way she was responding to my skillful caresses, you would have sworn that she was conscious from the top of her head to the tag on her toes."

Emo Philips

If you understood that, then you are among the urban group who have grown up on a steady diet of American books and understand a lot about western society. Any other Indian on the other hand would not understand this joke, because necrophilia is unknown to him. In the US where everything and anything is possible, jokes like these are laughed off. In India it would be treated with shock. And therein lies a tale that is spine chilling and very disquieting.

I got a forward recently sent to me by my cousin in UK. He is a father of two young boys aged 3 and 7. The email was a petition against leniency to two teenage boys who tortured and then killed a five year old by pushing him under a train. The boy was tortured for hours before he found reprieve in death. During the ordeal he cried for his mother. He was apparently picked up from a store when his mom looked away for an instant.

I followed a link in the mail and was soon confronted with sites, which chronicled crime in the West. What I read was horrifying. Apparently crime in the West is not as straightforward as it is in India. In the West you have people taking perverse pleasure in inflicting harm on another human being, sadism and torture of human beings and creative killing and people who take intense pleasure in these acts. Even babies are not spared. Sophisticated weaponry also makes sure that the victims have no chance to put up a fight. The type of the crimes are mind boggling, scary and very very perverse.

I wonder how or what makes people do such things? It cannot be just manic behavior because most of these criminals were educated people who were as sane as you and me. A friend and senior in college, who is a Clinical Psychologist tells me that childhood abuse, violence and neglect is what makes criminals like these. In which case a parent or a guardian who has mistreated a kid should have also, logically been mistreated as a kid! Which raises the question, as to where it all began.

My cousins in US tell me that so many kids go missing in the US and are never traced. Many of them are abused and killed and their bodies disposed off. In fact there was a movie or a book that tried to get to the bottom of missing children.

Why does a society turn against it’s young, it’s very foundation? It is against all natural logic. And if the young were treated thus, then it wouldn’t be too far fetched to surmise that the West maybe, is a nation of troubled adults…would it?

( I am listening to Your Tenderness by Naveen J Anthraper , the rocker from Kochi who is making waves worldwide. This song is an all time favorite of mine. Please wait for the video to load.)

Leaders in thought and action

Yesterday, as I was sitting at my comp, working, my colleague M, an foreigner dropped by. He had been to some village during the weekend and was amazed at it's primitiveness. He remarked that he felt like he was going back in time.

His remarks left me thinking. Here was a man from the Caucasian stock, a race of people who went through the same process of evolution as us. But look at them!!! Almost every advancement in modern day world can be credited to them.

As I looked around my office floor, I could not spot a single item except the Zero’s written on my notepad that was either discovered or invented by an Oriental. Even the concept of justice and equality is borrowed from them and our Constitution comprises of the salient features from many western countrie's Constitutions.

The computer I work on, the software I was using, the chair and table, the pen and paper I used, my mobile everything, directly or indirectly was made by the white man. What is it that sets apart them from us, as both the western and eastern civilizations went through the same process of evolution from primitive beings?

While we evolved culturally, they evolved and progressed on all fronts. We send droves of Software Engineers to the US, while they discovered Computers and Software Engineering. In fact even the fertilizer used in the village, which my colleague visited, would have been invented by someone in the western civilization. Almost every enhancement in our life, from birth to death can be attributed to them.

Overlooking the obvious criticisms of the western society, I must admit that they are definitely superior to us in intellect. We excel in everything they invent, but rarely invent or discover anything new on our own, even today, when we have IISCs and IITs.

I still wonder what sets them apart from the other races on this planet.

The young and the bold and sometimes foolish

When I joined my first job, my designation was Marketing Communication and Public Relations (PR). I had zilch experience in PR, except for the usual college projects on drafting Press Release etc. I got to write my first Press Release in the first week that I joined. It was a small press release about someone joining our company in some capacity. So I dutifully wrote it, got it approved etc. Now this company had a PR agency, but the PR manager wanted me to have experience of disseminating the Press Release the real way, i.e making a database of Journos and then mailing them individually after calling them up and then following the story as it broke in papers worldwide. During the week that I sent out the Press Releases I learnt some big lesson made some huge gaffes and became a minor celebrity in the PR department.

Case number one:

I call this all-supreme journo in a prominent newspaper and tell him of the Press Release. He grunts when he hears the subject of the release and tells me to mail to him. Next day I see that the news has not come in the paper. So I promptly call him. He tells me that it is not such an important news and that he will publish it on Friday. So I mull over that information and call him again and ask him if he could publish it on a Thursday as Friday is followed by the weekend and people who miss the news on Friday may miss it altogether. He is livid. He asks me my name, when I have joined and enquires if I know who he was etc. I told him that I knew nothing about him and why he is acting so difficult? I heard sputtering and choking noises on the other end as he tried to control the indignation of being spoken to with such irreverence. To his credit he calmed down and gave me an impromptu lesson on talking to senior journalist while trying to get your matter published etc. In my inexperience I missed the point totally. And so I again reiterated that I wanted the news on Thursday, to which he replied that he would speak to my boss the PR manager. I don’t know what transpired between them, but the news got published on a Thursday and my PR manager was suddenly smiling at me. I got a couple of calls from our PR agency people too, all of them chuckling that I had called a spade a spade, i.e called the senior journo ‘difficult’.

Case number two:

I call this very important Business magazine for the same press release. The person I am directed to is the top journo, a business and technology writer who thinks that people should read his bio-data and research his articles before even speaking to him. Not knowing him from Jack I called him and told him that I was mailing him the press release and please may I know when it would be published. There was pin drop silence. Then he quietly asked me if I knew who he was. I honestly told him ‘no’. He suggested I find out and call him again and then he slammed the phone down. I hate rude people and any act of rudeness only makes me bold. So I promptly called him again and told him that it was not nice of him to be so rude. He must have been taken aback but he said mildly “Oh really and what do you expect me to do? Take orders from a rookie PR like you who doesn’t even know how to talk to a senior journalist?” I told him that I was sorry if he felt I was ordering him around and that all I wanted was my press release published. He told me to mail it in and kept the phone down. The news got published and when he dropped by our office to interview my MD, I was called to meet him. When I walked into the conference room he exclaimed “So this is the kid who was talking so boldly to me?” He was a distinguished old man and we took and instant liking for each other and remain friends to this day. He is still Mr. High and Mighty and I am no more in PR.

After joining this new company, as is the usual practice I called up all the journos and informed them of the change and I happened to speak to these two gentlemen. They of course, took lot of pleasure in reminding me of my first Press Release and I was left very red faced at my naiveté.

Today when I see the new PR gals shivering at the thought of speaking to a senior journo, I realize that it was my total lack of awe, bought on my complete lack of knowledge of PR practices that pulled off that coup.

And my PR manager…she just played her cards ( a wet behind the ears PR gal) very well. Kudos Ms SS !!

Cashing in on the poor

I was passing by one of those seedy movies theaters that you see in the seedier parts of Bangalore. This one too was festooned with streamers and serial lights, which seem to be ever present in these theaters. This time I saw a giant poster of the Kamalahaasan movie Indian. The “I” in Indian was the picture of the ‘older’ Kamalahaasan in Khaakhi. This movie is about an old man who became a killer after the some tragic circumstances in his life bought about by politicians and people in authority. The movie was a huge hit. Kamalahaasan acted as the old man, the wife and the son in a triple role. The poster was signed by a string of names from the Kamalahaasan Fan Club.

During the time this movie was released, a slew of similar productions hit the floor, all with the same theme. Man gets abused by politician, or his daughter/wife/sister raped by a politician or his son/father/brother killed by a politician, and spineless cops etc etc. These themes were sure fire hits and made many a producer rich.

Someone left a comment on Poomanam sometime back that “movies reflect life”. How true. And movie makers who are willing to harvest current sentiments always win. It is evident by the popularity of these movies that there is a great deal of resentment against the all powerful rich politicians. And it is this aspect about our people that puzzles me. If this is the case then ‘why oh why’ do the crowd that watch these movies elect them?????

When I was staying in the city last year to cut back on commute time, we had a maid doing top work in our house. During the local corporation election time I asked her who she would vote for. She named a really corrupt Corporator of our Ward. The reason? Because he got her a seat for her child in school. Now this man was the epitome of corruption and would demand money even if you were putting up a garage in your house. He would ride to power on the votes of the people in the Ejipura slum and the slum adjacent to Games Village and then lord over the Koramangala residents. I looked at my maid and realized that it was she who selected rulers for me and not me the educated and hence ‘better informed’ voter. The fact is it is my maid, the corporation sweeper on the road, the workshop man, the housepainter, the tea coffee delivery boy etc who make the choices of our leaders and not you and me. It was a depressing thought.

And it is these people who throng the theater and whistle when the baddie gets bashed up, usually a goonda protected by a politician. And by the reaction of the masses to these scenes in the movie, one would think that they are aware of the corruption and hence would vote responsibly. But that rarely happens, doesn't it?

And the politicians have never had it so good. Muscle power, Investments flows, a powerless educated electorate makes them the omnipotent class in this country today. Which is why Bangalore the Hi Tech City had dust tracks instead of roads for the past four years and looked like a ghost town.

A Corporate Onam

Today was our office Onam celebration. This year a lot of malayalees could not go to Kerala for Onam due to project deadlines. So we decided that we would try and give them a semblance of the Onam celebration as it is celebrated in Kerala.

A committee was formed on the spur of the moment and lightening decisions with the help of all concerned including department heads meant that we had an elaborate Onam Celebration in our hands. And it turned out to be a grand celebration indeed with everyone pitching in.

An elaborate Onasadhya was arranged with a caterer who specializes in the same. Nowadays these caterers are in demand as most companies have Onasadhya on Onam day. So we were lucky to get this caterer. We had a Pookolam competition last year, but this year decided against it and we instead settled for a large Pookolam in the Cafeteria.

We started with the Pookolam first thing in the morning. It was a combined effort with the guys doing a much better job than the girls. They came complete with a highly technical chart of the Pookolam design and then went about the whole Pookolam design in a systematic ‘engineer’ kinda way. They cut ropes of various sizes and put them on the outline, then filled the space in between with the petals. Not very intricate like Mind Curry's but neat and clean, looked just like our glass fronted building. Someone incorporated the logo too to complete the picture…and we had the most corporate Pookolam ever :p

Me and my pal Trish, did the small Pookolam in the reception area. What it lacked in precision, it made up in design. A lamp in the centre bathed the Pookolam with it’s soft golden light. The expats in our company were the most enthusiastic lot and it was so nice to see their blond heads bent in concentration arranging the Pookolam.

A Swedish colleague Stefan came and helped me and Trish with our Pookolam and he wouldn’t get up till he felt it was picture perfect.Most memorable moment was watching Stefan cleaning up the surounding area with a broom and dust pan and shooing anyone who came within 5 feet of the Pookolam.

What stood out today was the camaraderie among the people who organized the day. There was a determination to make it as memorable as possible. The Department heads too chipped in by giving the day off for the members of the organizing committee.

Lunch was very traditional with everyone coming into the cafeteria getting the traditional sandalwood paste smeared on their forehead. One of the Teams bought mundus (lungi) for everyone in their team including the expats and it was so nice to see the full gang in traditional Kerala outfits. First time in my life I saw blond mallus. :))

As is the tradition we, i.e. mallus helped serve lunch on banana leaves as we were the hosts of the day. Our CTO an American, wore a mundu, Kerala style and served the Kaalan at the Onasadhya. It was hilarious watching him tie up his tongue into knots trying to say 'Onashamsakal’. He didn’t give up and finally managed to say it with reasonable accuracy.

There were 34 items in the Onasadhya and I think I may eat my next meal for the next Onam, I am so stuffed. By the time we sat down for our Lunch it was already 3. But that was the best part of the day. It felt really good to finish feeding the hordes and then sit down for a well deserved Onam lunch with some Malayalam songs playing in the background. It was a sight to see, a sea of people in white and gold.

This months Intranet articles was all about Onam, (cos the Intranet in Charge, me is mallu of course) and it sort of helped kick start the programme.

Unlike other festivals arranged by the Corp Comm Team, this one was very different because it had a personal touch with all of us Malayalees and some non mallus too involved in every stage. A first in the company. Our Country Head sent out a mail in the evening, saying that this was the first time that a festival had everyone in it’s grip with it’s fervour and color. Today I felt proud to be a Mallu.

Happy Onam everyone :)

My Super Ex-Girlfriend

Warning: Do not read if you are planning to watch the movie.

I saw My Super Ex-Girlfriend yesterday night at the Symphony. It is a nice movie to watch if you want to give your brain a vacation of two hours to recuperate from being your brain.

The story line is unbelievable…literally. Luke Wilson and his nerdy needy pal Rainn Wilson are traveling by train when Rainn spots Uma Thurman. She looks spectacularly boring like most train commuters but then hey… she is Uma Thurman and you got to pick her up from the crowd to get the movie going. Apart from that there is no convincing reason why Rainn spots her with her brown toupee, spectacles and makeup less mousy face. Rainn convinces Luke to ask her out which he does quite charmingly only to be met with a ‘No’. Just when you are telling yourself ‘cant a guy take a hint?’ the movie takes a bollywood kinda turn. A bag snatcher snatches Uma’s hand bag and runs out of the stationery train. It was moving I swear, when Uma said ‘No’.

Most of the plot that provides the twists and turns in this movie are unbelievable.

Luke Wilson for one, looks good and definitely not the kind of guy who has no love life and hence is desperate enough to pick up a dull looking Uma Thurman in a suburban train.

Uma Thurman acts like a neurotic, jumpy, crazy woman on their first date, scaring the living daylights out of Luke and the audience. Besides this, the scriptwriter gives Luke enough hints as large as a mental asylum, that Uma Thurman is cuckoo, but he still asks her out for a second time, and you kinda say “he deserved it’ when things turn really bad for him.

Luke’s plan was to get laid and move on, but he makes the cardinal mistake of asking her out again, and Uma promptly falls in love with him. When he tells her that he is not in love with her, she literally hits the roof and makes a hole in the ceiling. She vows to make him pay for the rejection and flies away in a rage through the hole in the ceiling. This, of course happens on the second date.

Uma's character is full of holes, which is good actually as she does a lot of flying around in the air at supersonic speed. Adds to her aerodynamic character. She is sensible enough to appear like Superman and save the city from the stupid catastrophes thought up by the Stunt Director, but she is absolutely stupid otherwise. Perhaps the Stunt Director could have directed the entire film, as the only scenes that make sense are the Supergirl exploits of Uma Thurman. She also looks good only in the movie posters and in her G-girl avataar, losing the brown toupee and spectacles. The stunt director has taste I must say.

Then Luke realizes that he is in love with his sweet colleague Anna Faris, whose nice boyfriend conveniently gets himself caught in bed with three girls to clear the way for Luke. She promptly falls in love with him and they make love. (See didn’t I tell you that Luke doesn’t look needy?). Uma throws a live shark into their bedroom scene…the shark fortunately has better tastes and bites off huge chunks of the furniture in a feeding frenzy. Due to some personal ethics not divulged by the scriptwriter, Uma doesn’t go after Anna even though she should… logically.

Finally an ex boyfriend of Uma devices a glowing rock, similar to the one which made Uma super powerful and makes her walk into a trap set by Luke. Of course he forgets to tell girlfriend Anna not to barge in making a huge scene, which leads to the explosion of the rock making Anna also a Supergirl.

The theater was packed with nine people, out of which two were the ushers, one was a guy who kept gazing into his cellpone, besides five girls...out of whom one kept looking around thinking “I will blog about this”, another kept giggling at everything including the 'Please take care of your belongings in the theater’ slide and the ‘Nokia ad’, and another who was watching the movie like she is watching the 'Schindler’s List’ and another who kept exclaiming “The cheese popcorn is soggy, chat popcorn is spicy and the masala popcorn is too bland” etc. The fifth one is still missing.

Oh yes... before I end this rather long review, please avoid the Ice cream in the theater. It is very good actually, but not advisable to be eaten in the air-conditioned theater or you will end up writing movie reviews on a Saturday night sniffling with cold, cough and fever.

Have a nice weekend everyone.

awwwwww

Marvin by Tom Armstrong

(So true isn't it? Got this from the newspaper. Couldn't resist posting it.)

Little big doubts

Yesterday my cousin sister left her three and a half year old daughter with me in the evening as she had to go to her doctor for a tetanus shot. She is in the eight month of her pregnancy. I took little Neetu for a walk in the evening. She comes over regularly after playschool and her mom picks her up in the afternoon. As we walked she asked me very casually if I would love her the same way as now after the new baby comes. I have seen this situation many times. So I answered equally casually that I don’t care about the new baby as I care only about her. Then she asked the same about my mom and I replied that my Mom, Dad and brothers, sister in law and dogs all love her and we are not taking some new baby we don’t even know and replacing her. She smiled slowly, a satisfied smile and then skipped ahead happily.

It looked like the conversation had taken away some worry that was eating into her for some time. I could not help feel a stab of anger against the parents. It didn’t look like they had prepared her for the arrival of the new baby. It was evident that the child had a lot of fears that were not addressed. Over dinner my Mom told them about the conversation and advised them that they should sit with her and talk to her about it. Neetu was evidently thinking that she was going to be replaced by a new baby. She didn’t look at the arrival of the new baby as a natural event as she was too small to understand it.

My Mom told them of a similar situation when I was born. My second brother apparently took it really hard and our neighbor, a child counselor helped a lot in repairing the damage caused by the fact that my parents didn’t prepare him for the event. They naturally assumed that like my eldest brother my second brother too would accept the new arrival without much ado. Anyways things turned out for the best as he realized that he had a little fan following er….crawling and the fan was quite harmless (:p)and his parents loved him the same.

Neetu’s parents were a bit taken aback by the conversation. As they left for home I hoped they would talk to Neetu and allay her fears.

Today Neetu’s Dad called up and thanked my Mom and me. Apparently the little tyke had an enormous amount of doubts, fears and some false notions about the impending arrival of the sibling and the parents were amazed at the fact that beneath the calm exterior lay a bubbling volcano of insecurity betrayed only by temper tantrums now and then.

I have decided that I am not even looking at the new baby…and I know from experience that the new baby wouldn’t care, at least not now. At present Neetu has our undivided attention :)

The business of education

A comment by Alexis on the last post triggered this post. In the last post I described a typical working day anecdote. Small events that sometimes make you laugh. But behind this particular event lies a sad truth that is going unnoticed by the students and parents of today.

When I joined my first job in an IT MNC purely on the merit of my track record as a copywriter, there was a rush of girls in my family in Kerala to do English, Journalism and Mass Communication. Everyone thought that my present professional status was due to me taking English. Thank god for some frantic phone calls from me, which made them change their minds.

What a lot of people didn’t realize was that I have years of reading behind me that embellished my English. I am sure most people who write English have been through the same evolution. Copywriting, Content Writing, Creative Writing like Fine Arts is a talent-based profession. And the people who are now working in the communications arena are people who can pull it off. I mean make boring technical manuals into attractive and readable brochures, make website content appealing so that a potential customer goes through it and enquires about your services leading to sales. But there are thousands of students pursuing a course in Mass Communications, English and Journalism without even knowing what it entails.

Consider this. The other day a Journalism trainee was working with the Corporate Communications team as part of her College Project. The poor girl had never read any notable authors, nor could she write a line of English properly. She was near to tears when told to make a simple bulleted ppt presentation on a PR exercise done by the Corp Comm team. Over coffee I chatted up with her. She is graduating next year from a high profile private university. What she told me appalled me. She, like many others were ‘counseled’ about the scope of taking up a ‘Journalism Course’ without even checking if this girl could write English well. She is one among the 90 odd students doing this course paying almost 2 lakhs.

Another incident: My friend runs a small design studio. When she advertised for Graphic Designers, a lot of freshers turned up. All of them had been through the Multimedia course and knew the mandatory Photoshop, Corel Draw, Dream weaver etc. As I went through the process of testing them I stumbled upon another startling fact. None of these guys were artists. All of them were regular graduates who were attracted by the thought of becoming hotshot 'Art Directors’. What they didn’t realize was that Graphic Design is for artists and these softwares is just another means to transfer their art onto the computer monitor. What’s the point of giving a paintbrush in the hand of a guy who does not even know how to draw??? These poor kids knew how to operate the software but did not know how to ‘create works of art’ with it. And they too had shelled out 50 K apiece for their courses. In companies like mine only Chithra Kala Parishad or Art graduates with a Multimedia Course are allowed in as Graphic Designers. Which leaves scores of ‘Multimedia’ students out in the cold.


Students in the non-technical streams need thorough counseling so that they take up courses suited to their skills. Regular colleges don’t bother and the private universities and institutes entice students with visions of promising careers only to fill their coffers. The result, a large amount of money wasted in useless courses. These Institutes promise placement too, which is a clever arrangement with certain companies. For example students who pass out Travel and Ticketing courses are placed with small travel agencies for a pittance. The institutes have thus honored their promise, the travel agency gets cheap labor and the student soon quits, due to the abysmally low pay.

Once my Dad remarked sarcastically looking at the mushrooming institutes, that if car washing was a paying job then we would have an “ABC Car Washing Institute, 100% placements guaranteed!”

Vocational courses are big bucks now. And no one is bothered whether you have the vocation or inclination for the course.

Proof checking?

Today I got a mail from the new trainee in our team, a bright girl, fresh out of college : It said…

Hi,

Just wanted to let you know that I have completed proff chekcing of the mailers. See attachmnet.

Regards,

PM

I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

A quiver of quills

I was tagged by Jina thought I mistakenly thought it was Quills after reading her tag. Apologies Jina :) Wot to do, am growing old :p So here my tag dedicated to both of you lovely ladies :)

I am a very confident person and care two hoots about what others think except my family

I said be happy with what you have yet do not stop giving your best to everything in life

I want a world devoid of hunger

I wish that every child and dog have a loving home

I miss childhood

I hear “song sung blue”

I wonder and hence I Google

I regret nothing…yet!

I am deeply affected by human tragedies like the Tsunami, I lashed out at God and asked “Why?!” I lost a little faith when it happened. Then regained it back all over again.

I dance very well

I sing all the time

I cry at the drop of the hat. I am an expressive and demonstrative person

I am not a person who beats around the bush, am brutally frank

I write for my bread and butter and clothes, shoes, cosmetics and perfumes… :p

I confuse between Kannada and Tamil. I tend to use both while talking.

I need to have my family around.

I should stop being so friendly and open with people I meet for the first time.

I finish what I have started ...never leave things undone

I pass this on to anyone who wants to take it up.

Down under to Vailankanni and Point Calimere

Every year we go to Vailankanni in January. It is a sort of a New Year pilgrimage. My parents came here soon after they were married and then with each one of us, as we arrived. Since then we have been coming here every January. I must confess that I am addicted to this place. Apart from the visit to the shrine this place is an amazing world in itself. The whole family looks forward to the trip.

Since the beginning we have always driven down to Vailankanni as having your own transport is ideal for a family like ours, that likes to explore. The drive till Trichy is uneventful. From Trichy the sights change suddenly, as banana plantations line the road on either side of the way. Somewhere along the way, the river Kaveri joins you. It flows calmly and steadily along the way and the sight is beautiful. We always take the bypass from Trichy, which means narrow well-maintained roads via green paddy fields and more banana plantations. After you reach Thanjavur, the rice bowl of India, you enter a sea of green paddy field broken only by the narrow road. The drive is sheer pleasure and you feel you are going back in time as you rapidly leave civilization and enter a very sparsely populated agrarian region.

As you near Vailankanni, the geography changes. You can smell the sea air and the earth looks like a lumpy green blanket dotted with lots of small ponds. The bird population too changes and you see a lot of fish eating birds. The land is empty save for a few cattle grazing here and there.

There is a variety of accommodation here, our favorite is the MGM Resort bounded on three sides with green paddy fields and the main road in the front. The view from the room is breathtaking. The IT boom can be seen here too. Air Conditioned busloads of families from Kerala coming in by the hour. Last year a big family joined us as we sat with our drinks on the lawns and it became a big pot luck party. They were a group of techies from Bangalore who had joined together and taken their families from Kerala and come here. And you know when Achayans get together what happens!! Some serious vellam adi :p

An hour of driving towards the south of Vailankanni takes you to Kodikkarai also known as Point Calimere. It is bounded by Bay of Bengal on the East and Palk Straits on the South. The wildlife sanctuary here is home to bluebuck, spotted deer, wild boar, semi wild ponies, bonnet macaque, water birds like flamingoes, ibises, herons and spoonbills. Also some of the endangered reptiles like olive ridley turtles, starred tortoise, vipers and marsh crocodiles. If you go around the evening, you can see the birds returning to the beaches and scrub forests to their nests. A truly wonderful sight, and they are quite tolerant of humans.

The drive itself is a delight. You drive through a forest road with an occasional village in between and on the way you suddenly come across clearings, with the sea on both sides. The sudden appearance of the sea takes your breath away. There is intense security checking here due to the proximity to Sri Lanka. You also get to see a rock with Rama's footprint, as he is suposed to have traversed these forests during his Vanvaas.

What strikes you about this place is the silence...save for bird calls and the sounds of the sea. We stopped near a scrub forest to photograph some birds and saw an old man patiently catching small fishes for dinner in the backwater. He caught about five fishes and then folded his net and walked away. My brother who was talking to him gave him ten rupees, which he declined politely. With a straight face he told my brother that if accepts the ten rupee he will drink and hence reach home late with the fish and then his wife would beat him up :)) If you know Tamil, then you get to enjoy yet another aspect of this land…Tamil humor :)

All around you see birds, that you get to see only on Animal Planet or Discovery Channel… and silence, blessed silence all around. You feel like you are the only people on the planet.

We take the hour-long drive to Point Calimere every year. The year of the Tsunami devastation was the only time we didn’t visit Vailankanni as it was not advisable due to the outbreak of diseases. Somehow down the years, going to Vailankanni has become more than a pilgrimage. It is a time of family bonding and having our otherwise busy Dad all to ourselves. Nothing like walking with him on the beaches of Kodikkarai, listening to his gyan or just being one with Nature’s silence.

(Ideal time of year to visit:December and January)

The Sivakasi of the West

I have heard a lot of derisive comments about India and the Indian IT scene by relations who are settled in the US and are US citizens. They scoff the so-called development saying that we are the sweatshop of the West. Do I smell a hint of uneasiness or are they aware of another reality, something that I don’t see?

We have foreigners arriving at our office everyday. They are picked up from the hotel by the taxis and bought to the office. Some are our US counterparts, some are customers, some are stake holders. Sometimes the Taxis come via a circuitous route to avoid the traffic on the main road. This means going via lower class neighborhoods. Over the years I see less exclamations on the level of poverty and a more accepting attitude. As soon as they land, they are at the office and work systematically to finish their business so that they can go back as soon as possible. There is visible relief at the thought of going back. I don’t blame them. The level of pollution in the air is exhausting and the dust and grime outside can sap even the hardiest among these people. They plow through each day with methodical efficiency so that they can pack as much work as possible during their stay and go back in time. They side step dirt, overflowing sewage lines and crap like practiced veterans, ignore the filth and squalor stolidly and go back the same way they came.

Which is what makes me wonder if we really are a sweat shop of the west. I am not talking of the IT companies and the scores of people working there. I am talking of the whole set up. The rush of investments to Bangalore inspite of poor infrastructure and the resultant overcrowding, lack of basic amenities. Bangalore now reminds me of the Sivakasi, where maximum work would be extracted out of cheap labor with minimum resources. While we enjoy the firecrackers and watch the sparklers as it lights our nights with a thousand stars, we blissfully ignore the filth and squalor in which it was made. And the little children working there and their parents thank their lucky stars for the blessing of a job.

Yes, it definitely reminds me of Bangalore.

Happy Independence Day to all who stumble here...

Peddler of woes

There seems to be a war declared on humanity, by terrorists. The recent uncovering of the mass annihilation plot doesn’t surprise or shock me. What do you expect when you arm and breed terrorists for your selfish purposes and even promote terrorism in some places to meet your economic agenda? And then they express surprise when the snake they have kept as a pet bites them!!

During the US invasion of Afghanistan, the TV footage showed the terrorists handling some very sophisticated regulation army weaponry. How did arms like these and that too in such huge quantities reach these people? There is obviously a munitions industry that makes and supplies arms. Why aren’t they regulated? Why aren’t the raw material used to make arms and ammunitions regulated? If a strict worldwide embargo on Nuclear weapons can be positioned successfully, then why not for munitions?

Instead of the exhausting and costly task of using the army to fight terror why, can’t the countries of the world get together and lay down strict regulations for arms production and sales? Guess that would shut down a lot of arms factories and be a big blow to the western economies.

If an alien were observing us from up above, he would perhaps be befuddled by the species called ‘Humans’. Always fighting, killing, scheming and aggressive over territory, water, religion and just about everything. We seem to thrive on conflicts.

From what I see, it is possible to stop escalating terror if the Western democracies have the political will to do so. You can’t peddle peace and arms in the same shop.

Untouchable

Last week I had to go to Chennai for a day. I took the morning flight and got back by the evening flight. On the way back, the flight was crowded. I had an aisle seat, seated next to me was an elderly lady and on the window seat, sat a foreigner, a white gentleman in saffron robes. As soon as we had boarded the flight and taken our seats, the white man called for the hostess and told her in no uncertain terms that he could not sit next to a woman as it was against his dharma. He had apparently checked in late and couldn’t get a seat of his choice. He asked the hostess to either find a place for him elsewhere or shift the lady to another seat. The helpless girl looked around and could not find any seat for him nor was she able to convince any male passenger to change the seat …maybe because it was a middle seat.

The white man became rather rude and told the hostess that he could not possibly sit next to the woman. I found his behavior appalling. Then he turned to the lady in the middle seat and told her that she should respect his ‘dharma’ and find a seat elsewhere. He went on to admonish her that as an Indian she should respect his ‘brahmacharya’. The poor lady was perplexed, as she was clearly not a regular traveler and got up. By this time I had had enough and told her to sit down. But she was clearly intimidated by the white man who was looking at her like she was a worm. So I told her to sit on my seat and with vicarious glee, I took the middle seat. The sight of the young and hence more ‘sinful’ woman moving next to him incensed the white man, but my don’t-mess-with-me attitude was very evident and he refrained from making anymore noises. I had planned to ‘accidentally’ touch him if he didn’t behave himself. I put my hand on the arm rest deliberately and he shrank away from me as though I was an untouchable. He remained in that position till we landed, cowering against the window like a trapped animal. He even refused the food given because it was offered by a woman and not prepared according to his strict vegetarian beliefs. Throughout the flight he kept his gaze stolidly out of the window.

When the plane landed and came to a halt, he remained seated and waited for people to disembark lest he touch a woman while disembarking I guess. He finally got up, took his cloth bag and walked out from the front exit, ignoring the hostess who stood smiling and wishing people on the way out.

I have met some of the strangest people while flying, but this guy takes the cake er …eggless cake.

Not an ad mad world anymore

This week we had advertising agencies ‘pitching’ for our product launch in some markets abroad.

Going through each presentation, I noticed something striking. Most of the creatives presented were similar. The thoughts were similar and the approach was similar. Not a single agency impressed me. There was not a single out-of-the-box kind of thinking anywhere. I cursed the time I had wasted sitting through the patronizing presentations, the loud laughs at the weakest joke that my boss made and the ingratiating attitude to please.

Nothing much has changed I realized. People still trying to pass off shitty work with well worn platitudes and hyped up PPT presentations. In fact the hype is so arranged that when they reach the part where they show the creatives or the ads, you feel so let down…..like when you open those promisingly puffy Lays packet and find two and a half pieces of potato wafers. In plain words, crap packaged in glitzy materials.

Where have all the copywriters gone? In my team of seven, all seven of us are ex-copywriters. Someone rightly called the drain of advertising talent to IT companies as, ‘talent hemorrhage’.

At present there is no panacea to stop the hemorrhage. Hope the morrow brings better news for the Indian advertising scene. Till then the 'talent hemorrhage' will go on unabated.

The ‘returning’ Malayalees

There is something I have noticed amongst us Malayalees, right from the time I was as a kid. Something strange, that perplexed me very much. On our regular visits to Kerala, we would inevitably bump into a lot of NRK’s who were also down for the vacations like us. Whether it was the usual meeting at Church, weddings or visits, what struck me as strange was a refrain that was said very eagerly the moment you met an NRK. And this was “We are going back in 10 days” or a week or some number. This was perhaps the most common thing you heard from these people. It was said very eagerly, almost as if they were reassuring themselves. The reason it perplexed me was because I knew that all NRKs looked forward to visiting Kerala.

Perhaps the visit sparks off memories of realities that were theirs not so long ago and the thought of returning back to their place of employment is kind of reassuring. I don’t know. I found an interesting article today in
The Hindu. It answers my query somewhat. Any other plausible explanations?

Teachers

Today I saw a couple of lovelorn earthworms, wriggling together in the throes of passion near the kitchen. I picked them up with a dustpan and placed them gently in one of the pots to carry on with whatever they were doing. Hope they give me lots of babies for my pots. Earthworms are good for the earth as they aerate the soil. My maid always looks at me oddly when I do things like these.

It was much later that it struck me that what I had done was a direct result of a lesson taken by a science teacher long time ago in school. I guess all of us have gone through the ‘earthworms are farmers friends’ kind of lessons. What is amazing is that these lessons taught to us during our school days impact our lives even today. And Teachers made a big impression on most of us.

I remember being told regularly to brush my teeth in the night, without much effect. But the day teacher started a lesson on dental hygiene I was more regular at brushing my teeth than the clock. And then lessons in Nutrition...and I finally started taking an interest in vegetables. The lesson on intestinal worms and how they are contracted, made me rabidly fanatic about washing my hands. I still do it religiously. Taking baths daily, combing hair, eating right et al…everything was influenced by lessons and teachers than by a million lectures from my Mom. Such is the power that teachers wield.

I was lucky to have some really good teachers in school. Many of them were unmarried spinsters, totally dedicated to their profession. Many are still serving, the last of the genuine teachers left in the city.

Teaching is a Penguin act. Teachers have to understand complex subjects and regurgitate it so that students understand it. Therefore it is imperative that people with the right aptitude and attitude for the profession be selected for the post. Children emulate teachers sub consciously. Good teachers make for good students and I am not talking about the subject knowledge of the teacher but other subtle things, like the way the teacher interacts with students, the respect or dignity with which he/she handless his/her students.

And lessons in matters like respect for girls etc in school, will go a long way in shaping the way young boys look at girls and women in general. Teaching and school curriculum is a huge opportunity for the government to bring in radical social changes, but how many governments are using that opportunity? Not many I am afraid.