#7-Delicate Darling Usha

One of my best friends-an epitome of femininity! She was best known as 'delicate darling' as she was everything a real girl ought to be. She was very delicate--she oohed and aahed at the smallest non-existent blemish on her skin, complained of a pain in the first one-third of her little finger( nursed it with ice-cubes and wet cloth)and generally took a lot of time dressing up! It was a fascination for us to watch her dress up, even for such a trivial chore as dinner. Every morning before going to college and every evening afterwards, most of us would line up in front of the huge mirrors at the end of the corridor in 'Narmada' hostel just to see her pamper her face.

Her routine(normal) was like this--she would first stare at herself in the mirror, trying to find newly-formed blemishes(to us, invisible). Then she would try to rub them off with a soft cloth. Then came the special--soap application. We did not have so many lotions, moisturisers, liquid soaps as we have now--but Ush made it a point to buy the best.She would carefully lather up her face and wash off with warm water so carefully that it took almost ten minutes for the entire ritual.Then slowly she'd pat dry her face.She'd then apply talcum powder to every mm of her face, and round it off with another long session of kajal and bindi.A bit more kajal in left eye, a bit less in the right--blow! The ritual would start off again from soap-wash!If the bindi was not round enough, again, and again.
Ush was by no standards a beauty queen,but she was never tired of beautifying herself.Her long hair got the beauty treatment every weekend( even when there was water-shortage)and all her clothes were neat and ironed.
She was always 'sssss'ing, ie complaining that someone shook her hand hard, or that someone patted her back hard. It was always--'ayyo, it's paining'. For her, her bed was too hard, or the chair too straight, the bus too bouncy or the fruit too sour. Her teeth pained, her hands pained, her feet pained and we were generally pained to see her pained!
Oh darling, darling Usha, delicate darling you are!!

Part#2: Dorakunaa Ituvanti Seva(i)?

It was not that I did not know any basics of cooking--we had a subject called Home-Science in school which had a lot of topics covering health, nutrition and cooking. As we were enthusiastic only about eating then(Isn't anybody, anytime?)we urged our teacher to only teach us recipes. We had a lot of terms to learn--frying, sauteing, roasting, broiling, blanching, etc. We were very eager about the practicals though and believe me, I played a major role in converting all our classes into only cookery-classes! We learnt to handle the dishes with care, decorate them and garnish them with the necessary ingredients. But alas, we learnt lots of sweet dishes--maida cake, Mysore Pak, kesari,etc and we just had a brush with sambhar,curry,roti,etc. Little did I know then that even with all this training, I wouldn't be able to please my husband easily.

My mother wasn't a bad cook either--only trouble was that Raju had a distinct marker on his tongue which never forgave anything slightly alien to what he felt was true Tamil cooking.

The first thing Raju asked me about my culinary skills was whether I knew how to make Sevai--rice noodles and 'Aavakkai'mango pickle. Then the readymade rice noodles were unavailable--everything had to be made at home.If this were the case these days, I would just have bought 'Concord' rice noodles and 'MTR' or 'Chinni's' pickles and made him believe that these were the ultimate in those items.

Firstly we had to borrow 'Sevai Naazhi'---a very robotic-looking instrument from someone we hardly knew. Actually the maid in our house then, Muniyamma, found one for us from some other house she worked in. She showed us which part of the 'naazhi' was static and which moved. Then we , that is amma and I had to ask some other maami how to go about making the 'Sevai'. I had seen this item being made with 'omappodi acchu'--the device used for making 'omappodi', but Raju wanted it done robotically--a robot operated manually.

All pitched in to make'Sevai'( I was all the while singing--Dorakunaa ituvanti Seva(i)!)--Muniyamma, amma, appa and me--Raju was the director of course! With lots of sweating,tips and tricks from appa, amma and Muniyamma, we managed to extract some passable uncooked sevai between us. Then we steamed the noodly thing and tried different forms of garnishing--everything on demand from the Director! We made somewhat edible lemon sevai and thengai sevai.

Whether we learnt to make Sevai in earnest or not, we did have a wonderful team-building exercise! Otherwise how can so many cooks(me, amma, appa, Muniyamma)not spoil the 'broth'? Raju must have felt sorry after all this for, he never asked us for 'Sevai' again!Good for all of us.

My Tryst with Thaligai(Samayal/Adige/Khaana banana)--Part #1

The way to a man's heart is through his stomach--I hear it being said always. But,..for a novice like me some twenty odd years ago, this was the most trying time--literally. My husband loves food! He is a pucca Thanjavur Tamilian and I was a poor Kannadiga girl. Though I did have Tamilian neighbors when I was young, I had not cared enough to learn their recipes. I knew all the terms and tastes of the myriad items my neighbor maamis used to serve us with whenever there was an opportunity....rasam, sambhar, kari/poriyal, kootu, pulianchatham, morekulambu, podimaas, vathakulambu, thogayal, vathal, vadaam, etc. Amma used to say that we had all those in Kannada cuisine too--saru, huli, palya, kootu/saagu,chitranna, majjigehuli, gojju, chutney, sandige, etc. She was careless enough to say that everything tasted similar, whether it was made in Madras or in Mysore. Little did she realise that she would have to serve a son-in-law who had an arm's-length tongue( Muzha neela naakku) and would never agree that the list of items in Madras and in Mysore matched.

Firstly I learned that 'Puli" or tamarind, 'Perungaayam' or asafoetida/hing are the basic necessities, not to forget lots of 'manjal' or turmeric. People in Karnataka , at least most of them cannot bear more than a dash of sourness in their cuisine. Most of them use jaggery to lessen the spice and add a slightly sweet taste to the dishes. This was the first big 'no no' from my husband, Raju. No sweet taste to the dishes--mom and I argued that it was only a small bit to adjust the spice--no, no, he nodded--let the spice be, don't do any 'himsa' to it! We said," Swalpa adjust maadi', meaning please adjust a bit--but he was not for any adjustments. So amma said, just add lots of tamarind, hing and turmeric to every dish and make it like we do at home--it should taste like he wants. Again, this too never worked. Raju argued that we were wasting precious ingredients and yet making no tasty food.

The funniest part of all this was that Raju did not know any recipes himself--but he knew how each one tasted at home. It was a pity that I did not have a mom-in-law to teach me the recipes that would tickle his taste-buds. He seemed to have gathered all the taste for good food(his type) from his relatives.

To be continued,..

#6---Miss you miss: Meenakshi Miss(you)

Mrs. Meenakshi was our Hindi teacher at school. She was great fun in class. She deliberately mispronounced our names to bring smiles on our faces. God! She really was a very talented and creative person. Whenever we had 'House Day' at school, or any others like 'Annual Day', she was one of the most sought after. Her Hindi plays were very thought-provoking and hilarious.

Once many, many of us acted in her 'circus' drama at school. And the play was a very huge success, thanks to her creativity. I still can't believe that we really enacted many 'circus' tricks up on the stage and it was such a grand experience. How she conjured up hilarious situations in every scene and still made the play thought-provoking is mind-blowing. Hats off to Meenakshi miss!

She was childless and loved all her students like her own children. She had a love for plants too--she had a good garden at home. We miss you, Meenakshi miss.

#5-Balram Naidu----The 'Rule'r

Well Balram Naidu was like no one we had seen before--I mean, teachers.He was a strict follower of rules, not only regarding the subject ( Mathematics ), but also in everything. His English was true British English, and he always used to ride on his scooter at 10km/hr right on the border between the road and the footpath, on the left end of the road. His favorite (unfortunately) expression 'you see, this one' was a headache! All his other expressions, sentences, etc were bookish and before long, we were tired of him. Even the tick marks or the crosses on our papers used to be on the left margin of each answer and we were also expected to follow all his rules! God alone knows that we learnt anything in Mathematics under him--a boring 'rule'r! Aaah! We did learn some other things though---sticking with rules is no fun! The more he emphasised rules, the more we broke them.

#4.....'Love'ly Tulasi.: "It's love, it's love that makes the world go round" she said.

Tulasi ---sweet girl. She's no more, but she remains in my memory. An avid reader of books--not any fiction, but only romantic fiction! I remember the times when she used to stack-pile at least half a dozen Mills and Boon romances under her desk and read them one after the other--she chose the last bench in the corner just so that she wouldn't be immediately reachable, should the teacher suspect her actions!

I don't know why only romance kindled her interest--maybe she was in her true elements reading M&Bs. She used to dog-ear some specific pages in the books and reread them. She must have thought that being in love with some 'tall, dark and handsome' man was simply awesome.

 Hmmmm, she's no more but she lives in my sweet memory and surfaces whenever I read anything 'romantic'.



"It's love, it's love that makes the world go round", she said.

Ugh! Reality Sucks.

I don't know--but I have a hatred for 'reality TV' shows--esp the ones with competition involved. Not to blame those that love 'reality TV', but I cannot understand how one can find pleasure in looking at others' miseries. Often we see the competitors crying, cribbing, back-stabbing, swearing and what not. Add to this the drama created by the judges themselves! The way some of them criticize the participants is disheartening for everyone....the height of sensationalism.
Hmmm, I must really be out of touch with 'reality'!!!!!!!!!!!

Such is Suchi : A penchant for cleaning!

S(h)uchitra----Well, she has an insatiable liking for cleaning, dusting, and anything remotely connected to spick and span! She's a spinster and this suits her--she can keep bossing over all the poor innocent kids that enter her house. She is always examining some kid's mouth to see if all her twenty-odd teeth are brushed properly, or looking deep into some kid's ears--ear-wax you see!! You can constantly hear her yelling at her nephews and nieces--"Hey, your left foot's outer corner has a brown spot--go wash it well" or "Don't scratch your head before cutting your nails" or " I can see 1/10th of a mm nail on your thumb, go and cut it off--oh! Wait! I shall do that for you".
Other than these personal grooming supervision of all the kids in the house and outside, she has other idiosyncrasies as well--she always wears her dresses at flood level--that's always a few inches much above her ankles--she says that this is to prevent any dirt from soiling the hemline!
She keeps sweeping off invisible dust from every surface atleast a hundred times a day! She must have microscope lenses fitted instead of ordinary human eyes. When she's around, we can forget our cleaning chores--she takes care...only problem is that she gives us too a once over everytime! Whether we pass muster is anyone's guess!!!!
She has to redo any cleaning after anyone does a job, just to be sure that the job has been done neatly--so why bother--we just dedicate all our brooms, dusters, washcloths, sponges and brushes to her cleaning prowess and delegate her to do all these important chores! Phew!! No sweat--it's unclean!

Singhing : ( #2)--Mr.Singh

Mr.Singh : Mr. Singh, a family friend of ours--a lot to be learnt from him. He is a selfless person. He has been visiting us every Sunday from the past many years. He does not demand anything of us--not even our time when he visits us. He just sits in his favorite chair and stays for some time, gives us an account of his kids, grandkids and also plays with any kids he sees around--and off he leaves. He has never complained that no one cares to visit him. He doesn't accuse anyone of any bad behavior. He always has something strange or sweet in his bag--just so that he can offer it to any kid he sees during his visits--he spends his weekend this way, visiting all his friends--probably just being in the company of friends gives him a high.
He never fails to remember birthdays, wedding days, and wishes every friend of his on all those days and during festivals. We, on the other hand pretend to be too busy to wish anyone any day!!
But if there is some day when it's our special day, or it's a Sunday, and there is no news from Mr. Singh, we feel his absence and say--Mr. Singh,...is MISS-Singh!!

A longer post..........Fascinations!

Snakes, elephants and monkeys--what do they have in common? Apart from the fact that they are all living creatures? They have a human-being fascinated by them! Yes, me. Add to these babies and flowers too!

Different people have different objects that fascinate them. I shall try to describe one person per day and what I found fascinating about them and their fascinations.
Names have been changed for my protection!

1. Radha: This character is very fascinating---she loves to read about all heinous crimes in newspapers--murders, rape, suicide, cheating, smuggling, death, automobile accidents, diseases and of course the obituary columns---mind you, all other news escape her crime-fascinated brain! She hardly knows what an ipod is or whether blueberries have anti-oxidants. She can't but help give detailed reports about what she reads to anyone who cares to listen to her---I call her 'The Criminal'

simple hobby

There was a time when there was no TV ---we used to just stand at crossroads, note down the reg.numbers of all the vehicles passing by--scooters, cars, buses, trucks....and time did fly! Never bothered about UV exposure either. No sunscreen lotions, not even 'fair and lovely'. :)

My first observation----not random of course

Scarlett O'Hara is the most true to life character I've seen--and an optimist at that. Her "tomorrow is another day" line is my favorite. :)