Sunrise

Sunrise is not just a time of day. It's an experience.

This poem describes a beautiful sunrise to a blind person.

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Dear Friend,

For me the darkness never ends,

Pray, what does the sunrise look like today?

Stand facing the East and listen carefully,

A myriad birds are up so early.

The 'dawn chorus' has just begun

Of white-throated sparrows and insects that hum.

Each in its way, ushers in a new day,

A majestic sunrise is on its way!

Do you feel the touch of a gentle breeze,

As it blows from the land to the sea?

Mother Nature is paving the way

For a brilliant sunrise

Again today!

A small speck of fire lights up the horizon,

Rising oh-so-slowly from the depth of the ocean,

Spurting gentle tongues of flame -

Until, with a soft splash of the waves,

The majestic sun showers us with his grace!

The sound of a conch shell in the distance,

An alaap in Raag Lalit, melodious sitar strings.

The heavens above break into a frenzy,

Scattering gold dust into the horizon.

Palm trees bow down as if in salutation,

Dew drops lie low, heavy with expectation.

Far in the distance seagulls at play

A resplendant sunrise

Heralds a new day!

I turn my face up, up to the sky,

I raise my arms wide in a wish to fly,

Soft rays of sunlight gently brush my fingers,

Their warmth I touch as they linger,

O mighty Sun, O wondrous light,

My darkness you dispel

With your magnificent might!

Lonliness

She sifted through the photographs

Black, white and grey

Feeling the stark, damp, concrete walls,

From reality, fade away.

The taste of stale bread

The bland soup now cold,

The smell of dead flowers,

A grim reminder…….

“Now you are OLD!”

The Mango Dilemma

Come summers and my mango dilemma begins!

I have fond memories of many a summer afternoon in my childhood, gorging on deliciously sweet and luscious mangoes together with my siblings and sometimes even my cousins, in the City of Mangoes, Salem. We would sit on the floor with lots of old newspapers spread out before us and literally lick the mango juice as it fell onto our hands while digging into sinfully sweet and thick flesh! More often than naught, for days on end, this would be our lunch too!

I remember Ma once remarking that we should enjoy the mangoes in summer and eat to our heart’s content because once the monsoons set in, mangoes would disappear completely from our dining table. She said that mangoes consumed during and after the rains were a sure shot to diarrhea, ameobiasis and dysentery. And so the mangoes remained all through the hot summers and disappeared completely on the advent of the monsoon, to return again the following summer.

So, what’s the dilemma then?

It’s now, now that I’m married and have been married for almost 35 years and have lived in North India all these years. Mangoes begin to appear here from March itself but they don’t excite me at all. One look and I turn away in disgust – they’re yellow on the outside alright but synthetically ripened and oh-so-tasteless and sour! So, I just don’t buy them. By May, the markets are flooded –green on the outside and pale yellow inside – again I move away from these nameless, not-so-tempting, so-called-mangoes!

 But then, hubby dear seems quite interested!! He buys a few (just to try them out, he says) but I refuse to touch them. Our conversation goes something like this –

Me:                 You call these mangoes?

He:                  Arre, you don’t know anything about mangoes….wait till the dusheris and langdas come……have you ever tasted anything like them?....what about, chausa…?  And….and…..the fozli of Malda? (the loyal Bengali, after all)…nothing in comparison…..

Me (bristling up like a porcupine):

Ah..ha..ha…dusheri, langda, fozli!! My foot! You’re telling ME about mangoes! ME, who was brought up in the City of Mangoes – Salem…having grown up on Gundu, Malcova, Salem-Benglura….you’ve never seen the likes of them, ever! What do YOU know? 

He:                  Umphh!  Gundu, indeed!

And, so on……while I sulk like a gundu myself!

The rains bring down the temperature in the city (and at home also) and the gleam in my husband’s eyes are quite visible as the streets get flooded with water and fruit vendors are found every 10 metres with their carts overloaded with his favourite dusheri, langda and chausa!

There’s a tussle every day as he goes to the market to buy fresh fruits. I always tell him NOT to buy mangoes but he invariably returns with a kilo or so. My argument is that I don’t eat mangoes once the monsoon sets in and he says that his favourites appear only during and after the monsoons! So, the mangoes shall and will come to our dining table!

Being a Salem mango loyalist, I won’t ever switch sides although I hardly ever get to eating my favourites here in Delhi, and the ‘not-to- eat-mangoes-during-the-monsoons’ is still a predominant factor.

But, sometimes, just to prove I’m still humane, I do take a bite off the langda or chausa, albeit with a don’t-care attitude while weeping inside for those gundu mambalams!

…..and surprisingly, my tummy is still OK!!

Blast To the Past

The other day I read three news items in the paper –

(i) Sweet shops are finding it difficult to price their wares based on the latest GST because of individual tax rates on different ingredients (cocoa powder, cashewnuts, saffron, pista etc), so sweets are likely to get very expensive.

(ii) The Railway Ministry is encouraging passengers to carry home-cooked food as of late, there have been a lot of complaints regarding the quality of food being served.  (iii) The Railway Ministry is considering doing away with bedding in AC coaches.

Now this has got me thinking .....It's BLAST TO THE PAST ……..

When we were young, very rarely did we buy sweets from the market; they were always prepared at home - and therefore, they were pure, they were delicious and they had the most important ingredient - love (grandmother's/mother's), although they were anything but fancy looking! I still crave for those unadulterated kaju barfis that my mother used to make, the golden brown pedas covered lightly with powdered sugar, coconut barfis and the-most-difficult-to -make-at-home Karachi Halwa!! Then there were rosogollas, puran poli, patisapta and sandesh...everything was home-made!

Train journeys were great fun because of the goodies that were packed in the food basket for those 'picnics on wheels'...for long journeys there was always something special for every meal! I marvel at my mother's innovative culinary ideas that made sure nothing got spoiled during these journeys!

The highlight of our train journey was of course the quintessential HOLDALL - a canvas rectangular roll with large pockets on either side that could hold pillows, bedsheets, blankets, footwear...anything and everything that couldn’t fit into our suitcases. This would then be rolled up and strapped with leather straps! Sometimes this roll would end up being so big that it required all of us siblings to sit on it to flatten it out a bit so the straps could be buckled. Oh, how much we used to laugh when Aloka, the eldest, being a little on the heavy side would make the final and successful attempt !

Now, thanks to the woes of sweet shops and the Railway Ministry, our children and grandchildren will finally get a taste of OUR golden years! 

PS: If one of my artistic friends can add a sketch of a holdall, it will complete this write-up!

25 April 2012 
It seems so ominous now that the book of memoirs of dear Suneel that Aunty wanted compiled for his 50^th birthday would turn out to be a tribute in memory of him within just two years!

  

                                              Rest in peace dear Suneel…..

                                                   We’ll miss you here.

                          Thanks for all the fun and laughter we shared in Salem.

14 May 2010

A few days back Aloka received a call from Nirmala Aunty in Hyderabad requesting her & Papu to pen down their memories of Suneel as a young boy, to make a befitting book of memoirs on his fiftieth birthday. It opened up a floodgate of memories of our childhood together in a small, then non-descript sleepy town of Salem, in Tamilnadu.

The following reminiscences (in third person) are a joint effort of both Papu & Aloka, for, more than just Suneel, it was a bonding of the Purkayasthas and the Lakshmans as a family!

            The time period is between 1969 and 1973.

            Aloka-Papu-Suneel-Babloo-Bachoo-Praneel, that is how the gang looked when put in descending order. Ever since Aloka and Papu can remember, Nirmala aunty and Lakshman uncle were just there and with them was their package of two extremely naughty, roly-poly boys. While Suneel & Praneel took great pride in calling Aloka ‘Fatty’, they accepted the nickname for themselves with equal élan too! And so it was that we were in and out of each others’ houses in Fairlands almost every day, laughing at silly jokes, poking fun of neighbours just as all youngsters do (remember Paddu?), playing rough games trying to act ‘tough’ and generally having fun.

Suneel & Praneel went to Holy Cross School like Babloo and Bachoo; they wore identical clothes and looked more like identical twins except that they were five years apart in age. Both aunty and uncle pampered us –we were like the daughters they never had I think, and uncle always invariably made Papu giggle for anything and everything! She was his ‘girlfriend’ as he so affectionately called her. Aunty’s tasty food was always at par with Ma’s cooking –the taste of her soufflés, cakes, biryani, kesari and ice cream still lingers fresh on our palettes!

Ma, Baba, Uncle and Aunty were great friends too. We went on picnics to Yercaud and Mettur Dam and also saw many a movie together. Birthdays were good fun also. Since aunty and Papu share the same birthday (19 Feb), it was always a double celebration. Every birthday Suneel would be at our place early in the morning with a beautiful gift from the family for the birthday girl/boy. On one birthday, Aloka   got a beautiful yellow ‘top’ while Papu got a set of classics by Emily Bronte, and Suneel promptly told Papu, “Well, serves you right; you read so much so you get only books!”

Another time, uncle and aunty went out of their way to hunt for and gift an LP record of the film ‘Hum Dono’, to Baba, since he was so fond of the song “Abhi na jao chodd kar”. Baba was ecstatic and enjoyed listening to his favourite song for years thereafter!

Babloo & Bachoo left for a stint in Rishi Valley school and it was decided that all of us would drive down to drop them the first time. And so it was that all the children were packed in one car while the adults were in the second one. What fun we had! We cracked jokes, teased each other, stealthily ate up the delicious coconut barfi that was meant for Babloo and Bachoo and played games. In one of the games, we divided ourselves into two groups –‘Tata’ and ‘Fargo’ and for every vehicle of these two brands that passed by, we gave ourselves a point. Praneel, Bachoo and Aloka were in the ‘Fargo’ team while Suneel, Papu and Babloo were ‘Tata’. Now, when Suneel decided to call every ‘Fargo’ truck as ‘Aloka’ or ‘Praneel’ because of their humongous size, it was hilarious for us but nothing short of murder for the poor victims!

The fun was short lived for, very soon, Uncle went on a transfer to Madurai. We missed them greatly and kept in touch. One morning we learnt that uncle had suffered a heart attack and so we rushed to Madurai to look him up. Praneel very gravely told us that Suneel was the cause of his father’s heart attack. When we asked him why, he said, “Suneel is very naughty. He never listens to Daddy. When Daddy tells him to close the windows, he doesn’t do it. That’s why Daddy’s got a heart attack”. We promptly advised Suneel to please close the windows whenever his father told him to do so and save his father any further attacks!

On two occasions both Aloka and Papu spent their summer vacations with aunty and uncle in Madurai. When the family shifted to Hyderabad, they spent a few days there too.

Thanks aunty and uncle for everything you did for us especially taking the responsibility of looking after the four of us when Baba and Ma went to Delhi for the Asia ‘72 Trade Fair. We remember it was you who persuaded Ma to join Baba since his company was putting up an exhibit at the Fair. It was quite a responsibility cooking for six perpetually hungry children!

Today, Aloka is 52, Papu & Suneel are 50, Babloo, Bachoo and Praneel a few years younger – those beautiful memories of a fun-filled childhood are frozen in time. Whenever we speak to Suneel we always imagine him as he was as a young lad of 10, with impeccable manners in front of the elders but a brat behind their back, a bundle of mischief and pranks!

There’s still so much more to write but it’s just impossible to describe the affection and bonding that we shared. Life in Salem indeed would have been dull without our cherished friends. It still remains a mystery to us that amongst ourselves, the six of us never, ever fought or even argued! It was laughter and fun all the way!

Well, here’s wishing Suneel many, many more years of good health and happiness!

           

Ammu’s blessings to her first grandchild Aanya on her first birthday.

Aanu, dear Aanu,

What makes you smile so?

Eyes dancing with merriment,

Feet raring to go?

Tread great paths, little one,

Wealth, wisdom to share

Do great deeds, little one,

Have courage to dare.

Speak great words, little one,

And always speak right,

Think great thoughts, little one

As you ascend Great Heights!

May your tinkling laughter

Fill oceans, rivers and streams,

May your boundless energy

Enthuse your dreams!

Aanu, dear Aanu,

Open your arms out wide,

There’s a whole world waiting,

Embrace It, Embrace Life!

God Bless!
Love,
Ammu

21 April 2012