The power of 10

True, there was so much to admire in Odisha. Konark and Puri were magnificent and seeing them had been a dream come true. Nature and some fascinating history  (think Samrat Ashoka) too. But the general air of dirt, neglect and backwardness were a bit overwhelming and diluted the delight. Being an NRI had very little to do with it. Maybe, having grown up in a more developed part of the subcontinent had more to do with it.

Whatever the reason, she wasn’t very sad to leave Bhubaneshwar for the more cosmopolitan delights of Kolkata.

Now, she was at the train station trying to keep pace with the wiry porter who would deposit her luggage at the right place on the Kolkata train. An uncle, who could speak Oriya, but had to be next to the Chennai train to upload other family members, had fixed the rate with the porter and then told her, “You need to pay him Rs 30, and he will put you on the Kolkata train, so just go with him.”

So she did. After what seemed to be a fairly long time and distance traversing a few flights of stairs, they reached the correct platform. The train to Kolkata originated at Puri and would reach Bhubaneshwar station in a few minutes. But it would halt there for just about 5 to 10 minutes. So, feeling queasy at the thought of pushing her way into a crowded train carriage, while jostling with all the others who wanted to do exactly the same thing, she waited restlessly, walking up and down the platform.

The train thundered in shortly afterwards and the porter was immediately at her side with the luggage. They started speed walking towards her compartment. She hurriedly jumped in and started looking at seat numbers. Horrors, her seat was already occupied. The porter had already lowered her luggage to the ground. 

Then she found out that this wasn’t the correct compartment. Her one was still a few more bogies away. Bracing herself for a verbal onslaught, she informed the porter (via broken Hindi and vigorous gestures), that they had to search for her compartment as this wasn’t the right one.

But there was no onslaught. He just picked up the luggage and started walking at a furious pace. She understood that he was almost as scared as she was that the train would depart any minute.

Thankfully, they reached her compartment - and she found that her seat was vacant too. She heaved a sigh of relief. The porter unloaded the luggage, propping it under her seat.

She opened her wallet and then paused briefly. Rs 30 seemed too less to pay him, never mind what the uncle had said. The platform had been a long way off. And any porter who didn’t grumble about a wrong compartment and use that as a lever to higher earnings surely deserved more. She pulled out all the small notes in her wallet, and it came to Rs 40. She pushed the jumble of notes into his hand. He namaste’d her and went away.

She heaved a sigh of relief. No altercation with the porter. She was in her right seat and Kolkata was only a night away. She prepared to relax, waiting in anticipation.

But – the porter was back. He was waving the wad of notes she had given him. What now, she wondered. He hadn’t asked for anything, surely, he should be happy with she had paid him?

 The train tooted briefly and started inching its way out of Bhubaneshwar.

She didn’t know Oriya, that was true. But she understood what the porter was saying anyway. “The rate we fixed was only Rs 30, madam, you’ve given me ten more. Here is your Rs 10”.

Puri Jagannath,the Konark Sun temple and the power of ten - enduring thoughts that would from now on epitomise the essence of Odisha for her.

Tag - you're it

My set of 11 questions from Shyam.

1. Which city did you visit during your first visit abroad?

Easy, Wellington. Although we had to first land in Christchurch, and then Auckland (due to bad weather), before finally arriving in Wlg,

2. What was your first impression of it?

Clean, green, empty and WINDY!

3. Your most favourite mode of transportation, and your least?

No real preferences. But probably the answer to both would be airplanes. Love them for the convenience and speed, and hate them for everything else.

4. If you could ask God one question, what would it be?

Why not me?

5. Good or bad, what memory from your childhood stands out the most in your mind?

The night my Dad died.

6. Do you like soft pillows or firm ones?

Firm

7. Did you like school?

Overall, yes. But not always.

8. What would you tell your least favourite teacher, if you were to meet him/her
now?

English teacher, whom we nicknamed Teddy. It was bad enough that she used to give her favourites good grades, but it was worse that she would mark some of the good students down, if they were not her favourites. As you can guess, I wasn’t. I would like to tell her that she almost ruined my future and career because of her partiality. Thankfully, I am pretty resilient.

9. Do you like your name? If not, what name would you give yourself?

Used to hate it intensely, as it was so common and old-fashioned, but not any more.

10. Your opinion of fund-raising balls/parties/dinners organised for/by
celebrities?

Waste of time: theirs and mine.

and finally

11. Got any advice for me? :)

None, because you were always wiser than me:-)

And here’s my set of questions for you, Shyam and Umm. I don’t want you two to play the game again, as you’ve already been there and done that. But just to humour me, answer my lot, please:-)

Shyam, Umm
1. Who is the guy who makes you go ‘what a hunk’ today?
2. The last book you read completely?
3. Will Akhilesh Yadav make or break UP?
4. What comes to mind when I say NZ?
5. It’s just not done to talk in Tamil in all the happening’ places in Chennai nowdays. Cool or uncool? And why?
6. Would you ever go back to live permanently in India? Why/why not?
7. Do you believe in global warming? It is just part of the Earth’s routine cycle of climate change or is it man made?
8. If you think it would make a difference to global warming, would you turn vegan?
9. What would you spend on a million bucks on, without regretting it?
10. What is your favourite perfume?
11. What is the one thing that always makes you happy?

Star gazing

There are many other worse things that I could do. But not too many.

I have been guilty of using most of my blog writing, Fb viewing and other pursuits’ time for watching Hindi serials on Star Plus.

Yes, I admit it. Publicly. Can this be the same person who used to scorn daily serials and rage at reality shows? This is still me. But how have I changed so much?

I don’t know. But it might have something to do with the fact that the shows nowadays are a far cry from the pathetic offerings that were being dished out a few years ago on DD, before I left India, ie, 1990s.

The ones nowadays are almost always well-written and extremely well-presented. They are the movies of the small screen – they have the grandeur and maturity that was so far associated only with full-length feature films. Exotic locales, great costumes and sets, authentic (although only Hindi) accents, lovely large families that celebrate all the Hindu festivals, good strong characters played by talented actors and even dishum-dishum.

So, it’s not surprising that I am trying to assuage my pangs of homesickness or movie-sickness with Star Plus.

Of course, not all the serials or shows are great. The reality shows, although very well presented, will still be reality shows, ie, totally fake. And there will always be serials where the only focus is the maamiyar-marumagal (or to give it the Hindi equivalent of saas-bahu) relationship and both the storyline and characters are more negative and stereotyped than required.

But I give these a wide berth.

And then, there are also the serials that change tack mid-way. From perfect watchable ones, they suddenly become completely unbearable. The characters become flawed, weakened and unbelievable. I switch off.

Earlier, not knowing Hindi could have been a possible drawback (not for me, though). But now, there are sub-titles for all the shows, full of horrible translations, grammatical errors and wrongly spelt names (eg, ‘Sudha bhabhi’ becomes ‘sister-in-law Sudha’ , Akshara is Aksha, etc*shudder*) . Even so, good enough to let you know what is happening.

My only grouse is that Star gazing takes up too much precious time and leaves me with next to no time for my other activities, as I’ve already said.

So what do I do? Of course, being a woman, I multitask (*sigh of relief* at least I have that choice). Fb + StarPlus or housework + Star Plus or Skype + Star Plus and sometimes even reading + Star Plus.

There aren’t possibly many other worse things that I could do to while away my non-existent free time. But at least, I am relaxed doing this.

I almost shed tears of joy when Akshara’s saas praises her. I hold back my tears when Khushi shivers in the cold, while doing her arrogant boss’s bidding. But since I know that they are going to fall in love with each other, I forgive him. I pity Devyani, who has to hide the secret that her son is gay, from her philandering husband. etc etc.

Aaaah, show me an Indian who doesn’t love a spicy sentimental story, and I will show you a freak!