And here we go again

Yet another terror attack, yet another eyewash of expression of "grief" by our leaders. Scores dead, many more wounded, some perhaps scarred for life. Yet I don't see any change in the response from the government or opposition. I watched our Prime minister addressing the nation and promising that a federal agency would be set up to combat terror, saying that those who did this would be caught and punished.

Really Mr. Prime Minister ? Who the heck cares if a central agency is going to be set up at a time like this ? Are you completely incapable of speaking with passion and emotion even in a time like this ? Don't you feel the pain that brave folks like Sandeep Unnikrishnan and Hemant Karkare died trying to capture these terrorists ? Terrorists who should have never got in if we had strong anti-terror laws and border protection systems in place. Don't you spend sleepless nights tossing around in your bed that in-spite of repeated attacks, we still do not have a semblance of emergency response systems in place ?

What gives you or anyone the right to treat our lives with so little value ?

They are telling Sandeep Unnikrishnan always wanted to join the army, even from a very young age. For what ?  To die like this ??

I know that this is a democracy. I read somewhere that we get the government we deserve, we get the media we deserve and we get the judiciary we deserve. Fair enough...But what did we ever do to deserve all this ?

Hey, but we are Indians. We don't have any national pride, do we ? In two weeks no one will remember this, till the story again repeats. Maybe this time in Bangalore.

And then the show can start again ........

A punjabi wedding : Part-4

Finally around 11 p.m there is a murmur around the place that the bride has arrived. Sure enough I see my friend covered in a dark maroon dress [ I don't know what it is called ;), I think it is a Lehanga ], making a very slow progression towards the side of the stage for a photography section.

Why so slow , you might ask ?

For starters, I am told that the dress weighed around 8 kilos. The dress is also long, so it sort of flows below her feet. Somebody has to lift the dress a bit for her to walk . The third factor is of course the absurdly tall heels , which she was wearing in a desperate attempt to hide the fact that she is vertically challenged :-). After the photo session, she proceeded to hide a room in the farm.

Meanwhile we heard some excitement on the road outside, time was around 11.45 pm . The baraat party was just about visible on the road now. We could hear the loud music and see the bright lights. I could see lot of colored umbrellas also as part of the baraat. There was of-course the customary horse driven chariot too. We were not allowed to see it in too much detail as all the bride's party were asked to scoot inside the farm and stand behind a tape drawn across the entrance. Again the fear of doing something wrong and sparking off an inter-caste bloodbath made the three of us scamper behind the tape in double quick time ;)

You know why I think a horseback ride to a wedding is a good idea ? It gives you the first feel for a bumpy and painful ride :-))

The temperatures were quite low outside and we resorted to hiding inside one of the halls to escape from the incessant chilly breeze and continuously falling dew.

The procession headed towards us at a painful pace. In fact there was a moment when we thought it was actually heading backwards !! Near the tape at the entrance there seemed to be some negotiations going on between the groom's and the bride's side. I could see lot of people laughing, so must have been fairly entertaining conversation. [ Hope it was not a dowry negotiation ;) ]

Finally the groom and his party got in and proceeded towards the stage. Shortly after that the bride emerged from her hideout and did her "penguin walk" towards the stage and joined the groom. She was taken right till the stage by her family and then the groom took her hand and welcomed her.  Pretty romantic stuff !! :). For some bizarre reason, there was an engagement function then followed by a reception. It was new to me on 2 counts

• Never heard of a couple having reception before the actual wedding takes place
• What is the point of the engagement ceremony when marriage happens 2 hours later ??

Anyway due to the lateness of the hour, hardly 50 folks were around, mostly family members. One thing I did find hilarious during the entire ceremony was my friend's attempt to act like a shy bride. She was very consciously not looking up or laughing. It was so against the natural personality that I just had to laugh out from time to time :).

The engaged couple proceeded for a photo session , followed by a brief dance on the disco floor ( !!) and then proceeded to have their dinner at the tender time of around 1.30-2 am !!

Mixture of cold weather and sleep deprivation had caused me to puff away happily on my inhaler. I swear that I had enough steroids in my system that day to fail any dope test :((

And finally on the mini-stage for the actual marriage. By this time only the close family and the three bakras from Bangalore were around. The customary fire was lit , an the couple were seated next to it as was the Panditji. Weather was so cold that I was sorely tempted to push away the Pandit and sit in front of the fire myself. Using loads of self control ( which you naturally acquire after a few years of marriage ) , I restrained myself.

The ceremony itself was bit of an anti climax. We started around 3-3.30 am and it hardly lasted an hour. The bride [ who had to be helped to get to her feet because of the heavy dress :) ] and groom did 7 rounds around the fire, Panditji extracted some pretty heavy promises from the groom on what he is supposed to do after the marriage and we were done !! [ Let me say if he intends to keep all of those promises, he is a dead man :-) ]

So at 4.30 am we headed back to our rooms. Was chilled to the bone, tired and on the verge of getting an asthma attack .

As I reflected on the entire ceremony, I can't help admit I've never seen something as grand in my life !! Only feeling that lingered in my mind was that the delays are a bit un-necessary . A wedding held on-time just has to be so much more enjoyable for everyone concerned.

But hey, I attended a Punjabi wedding, made a trip to North India, sampled some awesome food, all without speaking a single word of hindi !! Not bad at all.

So what is next ? A Kashmiri wedding, perhaps ?

A punjabi wedding : Part 3

And finally we got ready for the wedding.

We were asked be ready by around 5 p.m . Off went the three off us dressed sharply in our suits to the Karnal community hall. The groom and his party arrived there around 6, they were greeted with a quite delightful array of sweets and hot snacks inside. Groom's side all dressed in traditional dhoti-turban attire, except for groom who looked sharp in a shiny black suit.

I must say the three of us felt a bit over-dressed for the occasion. It looked exactly as if an Oriya, a tamilian and a malayali had gone for a Punjabi wedding :-)))

Then there was some function involving the groom, bride's family and groom's family. Did not quite understand what the purpose of the function was, it was called "Sagaayi", looked more like a mutual hand-over of gifts to me !!

While the groom's side were having snacks, we decided to rest for a while and sat on some chairs. Immediately we were surrounded by videographers with all sorts of equipment and bright lights. I guess we were looking pretty impressive in our suits. Then the realization dawned that we weren't really supposed to sit there, those seats were meant for the groom side folks :)

We did a quick protocol check with bride's family before we ate anything, did not want to spark of riots just because we ate when weren't supposed to !! Customs and nature of people are quite different from South to north. [I am not implying one is better over the other]

In case you are wondering where the bride is, she is not present for this function. She was packed for the beauty parlor to get ready a while earlier. And knowing her, I was a touch surprised she had not gone there to get ready the previous night itself . It takes that long usually .... :-))

From there we proceeded to the ESS-ESS farm house [ yes, it is spelt that way, don't ask me why !! ]   where the actual reception and wedding was going to take place. A walk through into the farmhouse can be seen below as can be the Stage and some lighting arrangements. The entire place looked awesome!!

ESS ESS Farms- Walk in

And here is a shot of the stage

Stage view

According to the standard misinformation we were fed, wedding was supposed start around 8-8.30. Again the three idiots reached there at 8.15 only to be welcomed by waiters and photographers. Not a guest or family member in sight, let alone the bride and groom !!

We walked around for a while and sampled some of the food. Food was just amongst the best I've ever had, hats off to North-Indians for that :-).

It was getting pretty cold outside. Rather disastrously, we had not anticipated that the function would be held outdoors. Though we were dressed in suits, we had no head or throat protection. This would really come back to bite us later on in the night.

Finally around 9.30 some of the bride and groom's family started to turn up. People had already started to stream in and there was quite a big crowd by then.

But where are the two most important people ? 10 pm and still no sign of them !!!

And it is 11.55 pm while I am writing all this and I am sleepy. So you can meet the bride and groom tomorrow :-)

A punjabi wedding : Part-2

So after reaching the would-be-bride's house on Friday evening, we were led to our respective rooms in houses nearby. there were 3 of us and we were put up in two rooms in two different houses. Mine had an attached bathroom , but no hot water. My other colleague had a bathroom with hot water, but it was inside the main house with no easy access . The relevance of this will be clear to you soon :)

We got back to her house for dinner and a dance party on the terrace. Apparently this is customary on the night before the wedding. Bride-to-be was undoubtedly the most enthusiastic dancer. Repeated attempts to coax yours truly into dancing was met with a stonewall response of NO. [ I don't dance, not now, not ever. No particular reason, I am just very un-comfortable about it and it is a non-negotiable item :) ]

It was pretty cold and I was beginning to get the initial rumble of asthma, so I retired to my room around 11.

Saturday morning arrived with the complex problem of how to take bath in the cold weather. My other colleague with hot water access got locked out of the room , he had to come over to our place to take bath:-) I decided to take the the first step. In an act which deserves nothing less than the national bravery award, I opened out the shower to full blast , closed my eyes  and stood underneath it.

Curiously I could hear water falling, but none hitting my body . Was my body going into denial ?

A quick glance up, revealed a massive leak in the shower head which was pushing water sideways rather than down . Had to remove the shower head and stand underneath what can only be described as an icy waterfall. I guess my body went into severe thermal shock after the first 5 seconds, so rest of the bath was not such a big ordeal. In fact once I was done with the bath, I was feeling quite nice and warm :-)

We got dressed and went to her house for the morning function. At 8.00 am sharp I was at her door step. Apparently the mis-information continued here as people had not even woken up then !! I know people always call IST as Indian Stretchable Time, there seems to be and extra stretch when you are in the north !!

Anyway we hung around till the Panditji arrived and did some pooja. There was quite funny moment when Panditji was reciting something and his cell phone went off and he coolly attended the call in between the recital. No one seemed unduly bothered by this . Good for them, as I would have for sure made a racket if someone did that to me :)

We had nothing else to do whole day as the wedding was in the evening, so decided to go shopping in Karnal for some authentic north indian clothes for spouses and kids. Which is when we saw these cycle rickshaws and decided to take them to get back home from shopping.

Cycle Rickshaw ride in Karnal

I have never got on one and the experience was quite hairy to say the least. There was one stretch in which he had to stop and cross a highway through which vehicles were zipping past at break-neck speeds. [ And yeah, the driving is a lot rasher in the North too ]. I could see my life flash in front of my eyes right there. How he got me over the highway, I'll never know. My eyes were shut tight when he made his suicidal dash across the road. Thankfully we reached the other side in one piece !!

On to the marriage in the next episode tomorrow :)

Travel log : A punjabi wedding part-1

So off to Karnal I went to attend a close friend's wedding. Have to add couple of things before I start.

• This is probably only the second friend's wedding that I am attending
• I understand hindi, I can't speak it very well. In fact I rarely speak it other than to say save my own life
• The marriage is an inter-caste marriage, so any misplaced comment made by the hindi-challenged yours truly could spark of riots and honor killings
• I have never been to North India other than for a visa interview 2 years back

So naturally I was a bit tense. Journey started off on the wrong note with the Friday ( 21st November) morning flight to delhi being delayed by an hour. Had only a skimpy breakfast before I started from home ( around 7 am) , so had to have one more round at the airport. Boy, don't they rip you off with the food prices there. After eating one of the costliest idly-vadas ( 90 Rs !! ) , I proceeded to board the aircraft. Flight was un-eventful and I reached Delhi at around 2 pm.

From there my friend had asked me take a cab to ISBT and then catch a bus to Karnal. The cab ride was quite interesting. First my driver had a pure female voice, which I found quite hilarious. Second , the car ( Maruti Omni) was so run down that it would shake violently at lower speeds !! After about an hour of intense tossing around , I managed to reach ISBT. Couple of Sardar's greeted me as soon as I stepped out of the cab, they wanted to whisk me away to their cab which was going to Chandigarh !! :) I politely declined their offer and went inside the bus terminal.

Scandalous is the only way to describe ISBT. Rarely have I seen a more filthy and run down place in my life !! According to my friend (who is the same as the on-shore consultant and new driver described earlier :) ) , buses depart from there to Karnal every 5 minutes. Well, I stood there for 40 minutes waiting for another friend to arrive and I saw only one bus depart from there. Little was I to know that this was just one in the long series of mis-informations we would be fed over the next couple of days .........

Finally we managed to scramble into a bus. Seating was pretty cramped, though not as cramped as you would find in a flight !! Bus driver drove fast and we reached Karnal by around 7 pm in night. Roads were very wide and in excellent condition for most parts. We were picked up from the bus stop and deposited in her house by her brother. The bride-to-be was bubbling with enthusiasm and showed no signs of nervousness. Please note this point, I will come back to refer this in a later blog :).

Unfortunately that is all I have time for today, will continue tomorrow ....

Dilbert

Here is another one that I like. Source :http://dilbert.com/fast/2008-11-01/

More cooking tips

It is advisable not to rub your eyes after chopping green chillies :-)

Now why was I chopping them ? Nope, not for an omlette. Turned out yesterday that I had incorrectly assumed I had some eggs in my fridge. All I had was a cracked one, which looked suspiciously  empty, almost as if a chick had hatched and escaped Quick survey of my fridge and house did not reveal the chick though :)

As usual I am digressing from the matter in hand of green chillies. I like to add finely chopped green chillies to Dal, gives it a bit of punch. I have no clue if this is a standard practice or not :). Will be trying Rice-dal-pappad-pickle combo for  a couple of days now.

Had a topsy turvy night yesterday because my inhaler got over and I got some mild wheezing. By the time I noticed, medical stores had downed shutters. So had to spend the night with mild poly phonic sounds while breathing :). I was ironing my shirt in the morning  when I noticed my spare inhaler right behind the pile of un-ironed clothes. Guess there is more than one benefit in keeping things neat and tidy at home :-))

I am off to Karnal, Haryana in couple of days to attend a close friend's wedding. Never been to the north apart from a visa interview couple of years back in Delhi. I guess my hindi skills ( or lack of it ) will be severely tested. As long as they don't mistake my hindi for abuse, I guess I should be fine ...

Stay tuned to see if I survive :-))

Christmas gift

The ideal Christmas  gift for me, the picture says it all :-)

Friendship ...

Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow.
Don't walk behind me, I may not lead.
Just walk beside me and be my friend - Albert Camus

But what if the friend tells you I do not trust you to even walk near you , let alone beside you ?

Today I have realized that one such friendship has reached the point of no return. IMO A friendship which completely erodes your self-worth is not worth pursuing.

So here is wishing good luck to the un-named friend. Maybe our paths will cross in the future. Will I will look the other way if that happens ? Today I might say yes, who knows what tomorrow holds in store ...

Catch them young

First start with the un-borns. Eat them whichever way you want. They are un-borns, they can't speak. Then graduate slowly to parents, kill them one by one. Use your experience in cooking the un-borns to good use here.

I am just talking about cooking Egg and Chicken, what were you thinking ? :-)

My attempts at chicken curry are still continuing. Unable to get small quantities of chicken. I tried buying the Real Good chicken, somehow the stores are stocking only the 1 kg ones now, they used to have a boneless 300 gms version earlier.

What makes you happy ?

Albert Schweitzer says : 'Happiness is nothing more than good health and a bad memory'

Then there is this line from the song Affirmation by Savage Garden :'I believe that forgiveness is the key to your unhappiness'.

Which one of the above two would you pick ? :)

I prefer the first quote. Partly because I have had pretty bad health problems growing up and partly because I have experienced that way too much hurt and pain is suffered because you cannot let go or forgive someone. I'm not implying I am going to be more forgiving ;-), just an observation.

Speaking of happiness, what are some of the small things that really make you happy ? Ever tried putting together a list ? Here are some that come to my mind

• Chatting with friends and family,face to face or over phone
• Reading a nice book
• Hearing a nice joke or cracking a nice one. I can be quite a pain with jokes once I am in the mood :)
• Playing with my daughter, especially tickling her and listening to her burst out in peals of laughter.
• Seeing the sun shine on wet greenery immediately after a rain
• Eating good food with good friends . Actually good friends is the important part, food can be average too :)
• A call from any one of my past students
• Watching a good sports match on TV , preferably football, pool or F1. Not too crazy about cricket these days
• Experimenting with cooking and actually coming out with something that is edible :)

I guess there could be lots more , refer my favorite happiness quote above to understand why I cant remember those :-))

Indian wedding cost

I was reading some articles on the net when I stumbled across this. "Average cost of Indian wedding is as high as $34,000"[Link].In today's exchange rates, that is almost 17 lakhs !!You know, you can buy a Honda Civic and a top end Suzuki Swift in the same amount of money .

Now why is this a tough choice to make ? :)