Groomside view

Owing to some eccentricity in our ancestral genes, there was no female birth in our family for almost a century. The only women additions were through the entry of daughters-in law. This meant that the behaviour pattern among the males tended to be towards a degree of arrogance. It is a regular refrain from the incoming spouses that men in our family seem to be excessively independent and tend to do ‘their own thing’. This mismatch also meant that we were always representing the groom’s side at all family marriages and were automatically upgraded to ‘preferred guest’ status. 

I decided to correct this anomaly and last month offered to be the Chief-of-Staff for the wedding of my classmate’s daughter. He readily accepted my suggestion. I had no clue on how to be a bride’s party member so I went for advice to my colleague who had successfully married off three daughters. Ignore the bridegroom’s parents and concentrate on his aunts and uncles, was his advice. According to him trouble starts from there. Also, make sure the coffee is hot. That is the trigger point for all complaints, he added.

It was now time to take the bridegroom for his trousseau. I suggested we go to a venerable tailoring establishment on Commercial Street who had stitched my wedding suit. It was nixed as being old fashioned. We then went to a designer store on Lavelle Road. The design as well as the cost made me cringe but I was not the final authority on this, so I let it pass.

I later paid a visit to the groom’s family to get their suggestions on the catering. The boy’s mother told me that vada and payasam should be a compulsory part of the menu. This put me in a fix. They were from one of the neighbouring states where these items were the norm on all auspicious occasions, but in my family vadas were prepared and served only during not-so- happy occasions. The caterer used his ingenuity to overcome this hiccup by suggesting that the item be in the shape of a bonda.

As the wedding day neared I was running ragged. The bride’s father had conveniently gone on a foreign tour and I was literally left holding his baby. One day I got a call from the groom’s sister wanting to know where the sangeet was going to be held. What sangeet, I asked? The phone went dead. A few minutes later the bride’s mother called me and said that the groom’s family was very upset and had felt insulted? I defended myself by saying that nobody had informed me about any sangeet being organized. Luckily the bride and her pals took care of all the arrangements. My job was to use influence with my service officer friends to get ‘hot’ beverages at a concession for the function.

My travails are too long to be recorded. However, after packing off the newlyweds  to Macau, here I am sitting on my La-Z-Boy feeling proud of my achievement and ready to offer my expertise, gratis to parents of prospective brides. Any takers?

My Flop Shows

I had never performed on the stage while in school. However, in the first year of my engineering course I was persuaded to participate in a Tamil play as part of the college annual day. My prowess in that language was pretty limited but the enterprising scriptwriter made me an NRI so the problem was solved. I got rave reviews for my act.

This whetted my appetite for more time under the arc lights. But offers did not exactly pour in. I even joined a well known theatre group in Bangalore presuming I would get a chance to exhibit my talent. No such luck. The only role I was given was to stand behind the wings holding a tray with some of the props required by the main actors.

I was not the one to give up so easily. A few of my acquaintances had got into television. This time the poor quality of my Kannada was my undoing. Also there were enough actors available to speak with an American accent so even the role of a US returned Kannadiga was out of reach. Finally, I got my moment in the sun. It was a party scene and I was asked to come in a suit. I was finally going to become a star. Not exactly. When the episode was released, there I was on the periphery of the scene with a tumbler full of amber liquid in my hand watching with rapt attention the hero singing a song after being ditched by his girlfriend. It was quite painful trying to stand still holding a glass with a silly smile on my face, take after take. After this I got rather busy with my career and my acting career was put on the back burner.

 A few years back in Hyderabad my neighbour’s daughter qualified for KBC and was invited to Mumbai for the next round. She had a high opinion of my general knowledge level so she gave my telephone number for “Phone a Friend”. I felt as if my acting career was resurrected, though I was not really going to appear before the camera. My bathroom mirror became the Big B and I practiced how I was going to answer the phone when HE called. My tone varied from supreme indifference, to prove that this was an everyday occurrence for me; to one of ecstasy for being called by Mr.Bachchan himself. I also brought it to the notice of my neighbours that the megastar’s parental home was next door to ours in the tony Chanakyapuri area of New Delhi in our younger days. My dream was once again shattered when the girl did not get through the “Fastest Finger First” round.

But I am not ready to call it curtains as yet. My hope lies with a young cousin of mine who, though a Kannadiga, is a well respected star in Kerala. I am expectantly waiting for a call from her producer asking me to rush to Trivandrum for a shooting. Meanwhile I am taking lessons in Malayalam. One can never be too careful.

Romancing the rail.

Rail travel has become rather sterile and unromantic with the advent of air-conditioned Rajdhanis and Shatabdis. Rarely do we get to see the green countryside or the towns whizzing by. I have had my share of lovely train journeys that have left an indelible mark.

It was a biennial feature to catch the Grand Trunk express from New Delhi to Madras (now Chennai) on the way to Bangalore for my school summer vacation. Preparation would start well in advance and my dad would go early morning to the railway station to book our tickets. Those days it was not always possible to get confirmation for onward journeys from intermediate stations. Till we reached Madras Central we would not know whether we had confirmed berths on the Bangalore Mail.

The journey would be in peak summer so our first class compartment would become pretty warm half way through. At Nagpur station we would order for a large block of ice that would be kept under the seat to bring down the temperature. As a standard practice my mother would also buy a box full of delicious Nagpur oranges. Invariably on these journeys I would somehow end up falling sick by the time we reached Bangalore .In successive years I had measles, chicken pox and mumps respectively.

It was an interesting experience to go to Srinagar those days. We would catch the train to Pathankot and then take the Dakota flight to Srinagar. That aircraft did not have the power to fly over the mountains so it was a scary experience flying through the valley till we landed. Our return journey was by bus from Srinagar to Jammu. I ate curd rice at one of the highest altitudes at a dhaba in a place called Rambhan. At Jammu we caught the train to Delhi .The sleeper berths were different than what we have now. They were comparatively wide ones along the two sides of the compartment.

With apologies to the supporters of the Darjeeling and Nilgiri toy trains, the most scenic rail journey I have been on in India is from Kalka to Simla.  After hogging on freshly made puri and sabzi at the station platform I caught the Railcar which was slightly bigger than a bus. Half way through we stopped at one of the quaintest railway stations at Barog. It was very British in its architecture and we had a delicious breakfast in the dining hall served by a bearer in an all white livery complete with turban. As the train neared Simla, it started to snow. I managed to reach my hotel before the road got blocked.

Internationally, I would put right on top the train journey my wife and I took from Interlaken to Jungfraujoch, the highest railway station in Europe. It is a unique cogwheel train that passes through the Eiger tunnel and gives a beautiful view of several glaciers.

I have not been on an overnight train journey for several years now, what with airlines offering more attractive fares for long journeys. But, the experience is not the same.

My quest for quick money.

My father bought one lottery ticket every month. He would then inform us on the proposed distribution of the winnings after the draw. Unfortunately our dreams on what we would do with the wealth would always remain in the realms of speculation.

Some of his genes rubbed off on me. I graduated to buying five tickets every month distributed over different state lotteries. I expanded this to ten tickets after one of my wife’s relatives read my palm and confidently informed me that I would win a big lottery. Unfortunately, my total winnings over the years stood at Rs. 5. Luckily for me, my salary did not get frittered away as there was a ban on many of the lotteries some years back.

I more or less gave up my quest for easy wealth after that. But there was always a sense of regret every time I saw people going around in their swanky German limousines or hosting barbecue parties in their garden, with a bartender from a well-known lounge bar churning out exotic cocktails.

A few years later I was on a work visit to Pune where I stayed in a new five star hotel. The room had a brochure where I had to answer three simple questions and also write a slogan in one sentence about the hotel to win a prize. While checking out I dropped the filled-in form in the designated box. From past experience I completely forgot about this. Some six months later I received a phone call from the hotel informing me that I had won the contest. I thought it was some friend kidding me so I rang up my Pune office and requested them to verify the news. Yes, it was true they confirmed.

Soon my wife and I landed in Pune to collect our prize. It was a car. All decked up with balloons and streamers. The press was invited for the function where I was ceremonially handed over the keys. Photographs of my wife and I standing next to the car were splashed on the front page of local dailies the next day. Unfortunately, the income tax department played party-pooper and collected a considerable sum in advance before the car could be handed over to me.

There are times my eyes light up when I receive polite emails from total strangers informing me that I have won $1000, 000 thanks to my mobile number matching the winning draw in some foreign country. I get tempted to send the person a small sum in advance to reimburse the processing cost. However, my prudent, if not unadventurous wife dissuades me and points out the news about some Nigerian citizens being arrested for similar scams, including duping a former senior police official.

Even now I never miss a chance to buy a product where all I need to do is to scratch a card and win exotic gifts. Our dustbin is testimony to my efforts.

The Great School Chase.

Two days after my granddaughter was born I found my son and daughter-in-law in intense discussion. I asked them whether I could be of any help. I was stumped when my son said that they were worried as they had to think of a suitable school for their child. Here were the two set of grandparents still debating about which genes baby Janvi had inherited and it seemed it was already time for her to pack her tiffin box and head to school.

To my wife’s dismay her school, a rather prestigious one on St. Mark’s Road, was vetoed immediately. Next was my daughter-in-law’s school on Palace Road. Finally, it was decided that the most suitable one would be a third one where the maternal grandmother had high level influence.

When Janvi was a little over fifteen months old the hunt for a play school started. School A was great but too expensive. School B looked a bit tacky. I did not realize that even play schools had a pecking order and there was a selection process. As the only one in the family who generally had a lot of idle time I was the designated training manager to prepare Janvi for her play school interview.

On Day 1 I began with the obvious question. “What is your name?” The fact that her nanny watched TV on the sly in the parents’ absence became obvious when Janvi struck a pose and lisped in a sing song voice, “My name is Sheila, Sheila...”Debriefing her was time consuming and exhausting. Then it was time for nursery rhymes. I took out my iPad and logged in to YouTube. It was an education for me that long familiar nursery rhymes could be sung or recited in so many different ways depending on who had uploaded them. I stuck to the UK versions in preference to the American ones.

Meanwhile my son and daughter-in -law were doing some background research work on the likely questions that would be asked at the interview. I am sure even an IIT-JEE aspirant would not be going through all this. Does Janvi know where her father works? Janvi, show your left toe…

At the age of two Janvi is now ensconced happily in her play school. But this is only the beginning. In another two years her real test will come when she has to move to a regular school. A strategy has already been put in place. Janvi’s parents have bought an apartment in the geographical vicinity of the targeted school so that there is no last minute hitch in her eligibility.

A similar drama is being acted out in London where my other daughter-in -law is traipsing from play school to play school to register my grandson for selection for the next academic year. Shantanu is all of eight months old.

Who says the younger generation has life on a platt

A hot cup of Java,anyone?

Every morning I drink one large mug of coffee. I make it exactly as I like it - extra strong and I savour it over the four daily newspapers I read. Page-to-page.

I was brought up watching my grandfather filtering coffee using a muslin cloth. He had one old black cast iron coffee grinder which was used every day to grind freshly roasted coffee seeds. At my parents’ home in Delhi we used a conventional stainless steel coffee filter. The coffee powder would be from Madras Stores, the saviour of all south Indians in the north. We then graduated to a coffee pot filter with spout launched by Coffee Board. However in Assam we faced a major problem as the only coffee powder available was tinned Polson’s French Coffee.

Much later, at Mysore I was told that the ideal coffee powder should be a blend of Peaberry and Plantation A. This to me was all Greek till I worked on a brochure for Coffee Board where I learnt all about Bababudan, Arabica and Robusta, stem borer, advantages of high range coffee, and Coorg coffee versus Chikmagalur coffee. One thing I definitely know, though it may sound blasphemous to some. I hate chicory in my coffee.

Thanks to my long stint in the IT industry which entailed international travel, my discovery of coffee strains encompassed the world. Though Brazil was the largest producer, the coffee aficionado swore by Colombian coffee. In fact, to me it came closest to Indian taste buds. I then explored coffee from Costa Rica and Nicaragua. Though the taste was uniformly good I couldn’t feel the ‘body’. A colleague suggested Kenyan coffee. Yes, it had a certain life but no patch on the strong Ethiopian one.

By now I had almost become a coffee fanatic. I read up everything one needed to know about coffee. From Starbucks I bought an electric coffee seed grinder. At Harrods in London I managed to get a hand grinder. I acquired an electric coffee maker, an espresso machine, a French Press and even a traditional Italian coffee percolator. 

By now my coffee seed stock included Sulawesi, a pretty strong one. My relatives and friends thought I was one of those mad scientists one reads about. They humoured me by bringing me gifts of coffee powder from various places. I had a Breakfast Blend, an Evening Blend and a Continental Blend. Dark Roast. Medium Roast. My wife complained that the whole house smelt of coffee (and she, poor misguided soul, is a tea drinker!)

There are times my reputation is a strain on me as friends drop in unannounced and expect me to serve them some exotic brew. But, whenever I want to get away from it all I walk across to the nearest Darshini where a coffee is a coffee!

Food for thought

I am a true blue Kannadiga with my ancestors hailing from a hamlet called Sosale in the heartland of the erstwhile Mysore state. The gastronomical inputs in my growing years were such Mysore delicacies like Maavinakaai Chitranna, Nuchina Unde, Hulitove Majjigehuli with a reward of Gasgase Payasa on festival days.

I presumed that one day I would marry a pretty damsel from T Narsipur or Arsikere and my food preferences would be taken care of in the manner I was accustomed to. In fact I would have encouraged my bride to add Gojju Avalakki to the menu.

However, fate had something else in store for me. I ended up marrying an Iyer girl from Palghat. Since then the dining table is full of dishes with tongue twisting names like Keerai Moologootal, Maangai Araitchukalakki, Vazhakkai Mezhukkuvaratti, Nendrapazham Pulissery, et al. In fact my wife goes gaga over something call Olan. Once she made light brown chutney which I sort of liked. She quickly corrected me that it was Parippu Thogayal and not chutney. I retorted that I knew chutney when I saw one. This argument went on for several years till the well known writer V. Gangadhar (also from Palghat) wrote in his column, “Slice of Life” that Thogayal and chutney were two different items. That newspaper cutting, now yellowed occupies pride of place on our fridge door under a magnet.

However, being an eternal optimist I put all my hopes on my two sons marrying dainty girls from Narasimharajapura or Hosagrahara. I was confident that our dining fare would be become a cheerful congregation of delicious Hurli Saaru, Kosambari and Kayi Hollige.

Thanks to the machinations of my wife and her crony my elder son married an Iyengar. Now the dining table repertoire includes Kandathippili Sathamudu, Vazhaikai Kariamudu and

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Akkaravadesil .It was rather confusing in the beginning when my daughter-in-law referred to something called Thirumadapalli. I later found out that was the Iyengar reference to the kitchen.

To rub salt on my wounds I had to utter et tu Brute when my younger son somehow persuaded a Gujarathi girl from Kutch to marry him. With the addition of Bajra no rotlo, Guvar nu Shaak and Dal Dhokli our household menu reads something like the one in the Indian cuisine restaurant at the Taj.

I have somehow survived my sacrifices over the years. Unfortunately my culinary skills are limited to heating food in the microwave so I could not really overcome the deficiencies in my diet. Driving all the way to Malleswaram to eat Akki Roti at New Krishna Bhavan is not practical. It is particularly stressful for me when the Avarekai season arrives. Imagine a life without Avarekai Uppitu or Saaru…..

The Real Big Bull

By S V L Narayan

My father was so scared of losing his meagre savings through banks collapsing that he divided the amount equally among five nationalized banks. I inherited his genes of financial conservatism.

In my early career I was invited to a lot of soirees at five star hotels. I was quite a misfit among the chiffon-clad, diamond dripping society women and the Christian Dior suited men. I was happy standing at a corner nursing my tomato juice till it was time to make a quiet exit. One day I saw an ad in the newspaper for a course in “The Art of Small Talk”. I went through sessions on how to integrate with people whom I thought were more sophisticated than me. I was taught to read up on a subject just enough to start and hold a conversation. My focus was on some person called Harshad Mehta who was referred to as The Big Bull.

I devoured all the information available on the financial pages of dailies and magazines and was soon ready to be let loose on an unsuspecting P3 crowd. At the next party I joined a group of five people who were discussing the stock market. One worthy was talking about FMCG stocks. I butted in and said, “The future is in banking stocks. Harshad is very positive on SBI.”This immediately had the attention of the group. As the evening progressed I harped on the profits to be made on stocks in the metals and pharma fields. By now my audience had swelled to half the guests.

This continued for the next few years long after the worthy Mr. Mehta. By now I was clued in about Futures & Options, too. Invitations to parties increased manifold. At one gathering I distinctly heard a Hugo Boss suited gentleman whispering, “There goes Bangalore’s Big Bull.”Thanks to the new TV Business channels and the Internet, information was spouting out of both my ears and I switched over to another flavour of the season. At the next party a Neiman Marcus clad gentleman asked my opinion about shipping stocks. As if on cue I pontificated, “Stocks are passé. The direction to go is Commodities. The Rain Forests in Paraguay are being denuded. There will be a global shortage of Mentha Oil. There are millions to be made trading on that.”

My wife is paranoid about speculators sending goons after me to recover their losses. I have not put in a paisa of my own in any of these activities all these years. I still live in my modest apartment in Jayanagar. And, yes whatever little money I have saved is safe and sound in State Banks of Hyderabad and Mysore.

Weddin chow-chow

When I was a kid I remember my parents talking about their wedding that was spread over four days.
I could never imagine how the guests spent their time for such a long period and also the strain that
must have been on the hosts.By the time it was my turn to wed the whole process took just over a
day.That was more or less the norm for south indian marriages during that era.

However, of late the saas-bahu serials and surfeit of Bollywood films extolling the ceremonial virtues
of north indian weddings seem to have penetrated the mindset of people in the south, too. Thus,
Mehendi, Sangeet and Bidaai seem to have become an integral part of most nuptials that I have
attended in Bangalore.

Recently, not realizing the enormity of the situation, I agreed to be part of the baraat at the wedding
of my friend’s son.I was ordered to come for dance practice at his house.We were met by a
professional choreographer imported from tamil films.The briefing given to us was that we
were to beat the bride’s family in the dance face-off at the Sangeet. The next few days revealed
to me the number of disused muscles in my body.Some of us oldies had a tough time keeping
steps with the younger members.Meanwhile, my wife was busy as she was part of the mehendi
group.Unfortunately, we were trounced at the dance competition as the opposition had younger
and more energetic members, plus they wore matching costumes.

The other custom imported from the north is the practice of the bride’s side hiding the groom’s
footwear and then selling it back to him at a price.At my nephew’s marriage in Mysore,in their
innocence the bride’s family,who had been raised in the north did just that.Unfortunately,they
had not reckoned on my sister-in-law’s reaction.When she got the the information of the filching
she marched purposefully to the bridal party’s room and in a no-nonsense tone demanded the
chappals back.Taken aback,the other side meekly returned the footwear.

With many NRIs holding their weddings in India, some of the western procedures have also
been adopted. One such is the Toast, normally delivered at the reception or Sangeet. Thanks
to having raised Toasts a couple of times at my Rotary inaugural functions, I seem to have been
targeted by friends and relatives to write one for them. In most cases, depending on whether one
is from the bride’s side or the groom’s the idea is to pass light-hearted comments about the pitfalls
of marriage and the opposite sex. Thanks to online bookstores I have a large collection of quotations
to draw from. Without a qualm I pilfer liberally from them. Needless to say, some of the quotes could
be termed chauvinist.

Overall,these weddings are great fun for the guests but pretty tiring for the hosts.But one regret that
I have is that I have never been invited for a ‘Destination Wedding’ where guests are flown in
chartered flights to exotic islands. Maybe someday…

Taxi,Taxi!

It was heartening to read in the press that our very own Ambassador was voted the best taxi in the world. Over the years, I have travelled in taxis in several countries right from a Maruti 800 to an obscenely ostentatious Lincoln stretch limo. The experience varied from place to place.

I love getting in to conversation with taxi drivers. Unfortunately, my pseudo "Burra Sahib” ego stops me from sitting in the front passenger seat. However, this does not prevent me from holding unfettered discussions with the cabbie. I suppose that being cooped up in the front seat the whole day, the driver also craves for some banter.

Taxi drivers in Singapore do not encourage idle gossip. The distances are short and they are already looking for the next passenger. They return your change exactly and are on their way. So is the average London cab driver. He is polite but the way the taxi is designed, there is no way one can have a proper dialogue. The private taxis in the UK are slightly different from the London cabs. On my first visit, there was this smart guy in a black suit with a board with my name. I presumed that he was a senior executive or the owner of the taxi company. I later found out that this was the standard uniform for these drivers.

The China cabs are a bit funny. The driver sits inside a fibreglass cage. I was quite puzzled until I was told that it was to protect the driver from a possible car-jack. Apart from this, of course, is the language barrier. At the airport, they help you with a diagram to your destination that you hand over to the driver. So, until the destination there is no conversation.

In the US, things are a bit different. It is not in every city that you get a proper city cab. New York is a good example to chat with drivers as they are invariably from the Punjab (it does not matter from which side of the border).I have had a tête-à-tête in my poor Hindi about Bollywood films, the popular stars and their personal lives.

In Detroit, I had a Pakistani driver. He was a qualified doctor from a proper medical college in Lahore. His was an arranged marriage with a US citizen and so relocated. Poor guy could not practice in his new country. He revealed to me that unlike Asian doctors, the US medics would never come to a quick diagnosis, in spite of clear symptoms, for fear of medical malpractice suits. There were times when the local doctors consulted him for his opinion.

However, in India itself there are varieties of taxis. The most “dented-but-not -painted” ones are in Kolkata. In the seventies right in Park Street, my driver parked his car, got out and joined a morcha that was passing by. I looked silly sitting in the back seat not knowing when I would reach my destination.

One danger of becoming too familiar with the cabbie is that you end up being morally bound to be generous with the tip. Nevertheless, that is a small price to pay in return for some verbal stimulation.

Queen of the road

QUEEN OF THE ROAD

In the early nineties though we had a car for several years my wife did not show much interest in driving. However, one morning out of the blue she insisted that I should teach her to drive.

We set off from home off MG Road and reached Cubbon Road. I showed her the various controls. She immediately wanted to take over. That was the exact moment when I started greying. The car took two jerks and the engine stalled. The stop and go routine continued for several days. At the cricket stadium we would turn left and on to MG Road and then back home. Every time I gave her advice on braking or releasing the clutch she told me not to distract her. Each day once we reached home it was recriminations from both sides which ended by her accusing me of not wanting her to drive. This situation was resolved when she joined a well-known driving school. Soon she flaunted her driving licence and promptly stopped wanting to be mobile.

After we shifted to Hyderabad she again had the urge to drive. But now she claimed that the traffic in that city was disorganized (this coming from a Banglorean!).So off she went and joined a driving school near our home. Pretty soon I had to buy a second car(a brand new bright red Santro) to satisfy her wanderlust. Every time there was a scratch or a dent the fault was always the other person’s. “I had the right turn signal on and also put my hand out, but still that fool kept coming straight and hit the side”, was a constant travail. But soon she got used to this love-hate relationship with Hyderabad traffic and the roads and it was quite peaceful for the next few years. Meanwhile, she had also managed to renew her licence, courtesy her best friend’s uncle.

We then returned to Bangalore in 2005. By now she was older, wiser and more patient so she did not crib about the Bangalore traffic. She happily drove around handling her chores or visiting relatives and friends. One day she found that her licence had expired four months earlier. Further, as we had shifted cities there was the issue of change of address, and NOC. There was panic all around. One tout offered to get a new one for her for Rs 4000.My wife being rather prudent with her purse strings refused. She found a better solution, in which she had past experience. She discovered a driving school in our neighbourhood and immediately registered with them. Every morning she would drive to their office in her  new Hyundai i10 and then get in to their training car. She soon graduated from her Learner’s licence to the real one. Every now and then the Bangalore Traffic Police smartphone spews out her misdemeanours. But she has reached a point of no concern. After all I am always there to pay up the fine.

Now she has ambitions to drive my pristine white,unscratched SUV.Like hell!