Defining a Dhoti

Ever wondered how you would define a dhoti to a person who has never heard of the term before? I tried to look up the definition on the internet and surprisingly, found more results than I had expected. The shortest definition I found was "a long loincloth worn by Hindu men". Wikipedia has defined it quite aptly, as "the traditional garment of men's wear in India, which is a rectangular piece of unstitched cloth, usually around 7 yards long, wrapped around the waist and the legs, and knotted at the waist."

You may wonder how I ended up writing a blog on defining a dhoti. I was reading this book named Shantaram. The author, a convict from Australia who escaped from prison and fled to India, has described his experiences while he lived in the slums of Mumbai; and amongst other things, made local friends, learnt Hindi and Marathi, joined the mafia, and fell in love. The book comprises nearly a thousand pages in small print and I have hardly completed a quarter of it. However, so far I have found it very captivating. He has expressed the communication gap between himself and his guide, and the culture shock he faced in an absolutely entertaining manner.

Of the many entertaining events he talks about, one describes his visit to a typical Indian village, so isolated that it receives no electric power and the water supply lasts just for an hour a day. In his attempt to describe the local farmer, he talks about the dhoti. Following are the words directly from the book. 'The dhoti is technically described as a loincloth, but the term robs the garment of its serene and graceful elegance. It can be gathered up to become work shorts for labour in the fields, or loosened to become pantaloon style trousers with the ankles free. The dhoti itself is always moving and it follows the human contour in every act from running to sitting still......' In the next couple of lines he has a few words of praise for the dhoti. But overall, I found this definition quite creative and amusing, and that led me to writing this.

One Lucky Rat!!

         This is an incident, that took place or rather is taking place in my home. My land lady or house mother as they refer to here, is a kind hearted, retired lady, in her fifties. I guess I would like to stress the term kind hearted, specially when applied to animals. She is extremely fond of animals and owns a cat. Now that I have set the background, let us proceed to the story.

        One afternoon, the cat was playing in the garden and found a small wild rat. The lady got annoyed with the cat for harassing the little creature and decided to rescue it. On picking it up, she discovered that it was a baby who had not even opened its eyes. Apparently, rat babies open their eyes after the age of 2 weeks. She left the rat in the open, to watch if any of its family members come looking for it. When this did not happen for the next few hours, she decided to adopt the rat.

        Now this was not an easy task. She called up a number of pet shops and animal rights organizations to find out about bringing up rats. For the first two weeks, she had to feed it every two hours, even through the night. Other important 'rat facts' that I learn't were, infant rats can’t regulate their own temperature, and can’t go to the bathroom by themselves. They’re stimulated to go only when rubbed around certain parts of their body. So, her routine now comprised of feeding it some special pet milk with a small dropper, rubbing and cleaning its body with tissues and cotton buds, re-heating the heating pad which was keeping it warm, maintaining a chart of the amount of food intake and waste discharge during each such session, and re-setting the alarm to ring after the next two hours!!

         Now, that is remarkable when you do it every 2 hours, for half a month!(comes to (24/2)*15 =210 times!) I agree that it is possible only because she is at home full time, but still!! Her life, and unfortunately all conversations in our home now revolved around the little rat and its developments. Not being an animal lover myself, I did not really find that entertaining. However, I must agree that I have learnt quite a few interesting facts about these little creatures, and discovered what a host of information the internet has in store for rat lovers.

        This evening, while I was waiting in queue at the checkout of a supermarket, I was wondering what 'rat news' to expect when I get home. It was then that I suddenly noticed, that the lady in front of me was holding a box of rat killing poison! Wow! One mans' meat can certainly be another mans' poison! At this point, I also remembered that, this was the same kind of rat, for killing which the Indian government had announced monetary rewards, a few years back. Now that is certainly one lucky rat to have reached the right house!

Discomgoogolation

        I recently read this article online, on a news website. That was when I got introduced to this term 'discomgoogolation'. I found it pretty amusing and hence decided to make a mention of it here.

        Apparently, this is a condition that you may suspect yourself to be suffering from if you feel stressed when you cant get online. The article says that 'discomgoogolation is a feeling of distress or anxiety when unable to gain immediate information access'; and that the condition could considerably increase brain activity and blood pressure level. In certain cases, the stress of being disconnected could be equated to that of running late for an important appointment, being about to sit an exam or even being sacked. In simple terms, one could refer to it as 'internet addiction'.

        This kind of web addiction has been attributed to the widespread use of broadband, and a culture of 'instant answers', where a host of information is just a mouse click away.

        Ummm.... am, I suffering from 'discomgoogolation'?

Cheers to Vede Lok

        'Vede Lok'. What a name!! I don't remember where it originated from. What I do remember is the great time we had together... meeting in the breaks, gazebo time, night walks, midnight badminton, weekend outings, dinners in the city, the birthday celebrations, the new years' dance, the mysterious wake-up calls on a Sunday morning, forwarding emails during class and of course studying together for the exams and projects.

        We came together at Mysore, where most of us commenced our first job. After training was over, we got split across the DC's (development centres) and ended up in different cities. Sad though it was, I must admit that it has given us the wonderful memories of the Hyderabad get-together. What is notable is that even as we have moved across continents today, we are still in touch on a day to day basis. Hats off to Mugdha for being so punctual in sending the group GM mails! What I mean is, I have friends from school, college, work etc; but I am not in touch with any of them on a daily basis. Cheers to JD for the vedelok community on orkut and the compiled video on you tube, to Madhura for the innumerable photos, to Nikhil for the efficient arrangements of all our trips, to Pranab for all the entertainment that his constant jokes provide, to Hitesh for his 'fundas' and arguments, to Mayur for the timely updates on all relevant matters,and to Arati for just being there with us. Lastly, and most importantly, cheers to Jyoti for bringing all of us together, in the first place.

        I should not forget to make a mention of the 'DQ' (Dhamki Queen) title I have been conferred upon. Thanks to Vede Lok, I am now the proud (!!??!!) holder of a unique title!

Memories from Mysore

        It began on the 18th of September 2005, a day before the first day of my first job. The first couple of months were allotted to training and we had to stay on campus. Although, by then I had already stayed at three different hostels for six years, this was the first time I had the chance to choose my room partner and it was decided that I would be sharing a room with Madhura, one of my closest friends. I remember the excitement of the beginning of this journey, which was further elevated by the grandeur of the campus.

        The extensive campus that could host around 4000 trainees at a time was an epitome of organisation and cleanliness. The strikingly clean roads, well maintained gardens, three star rooms with service and the world class sports and entertainment facilities are amongst the most commonly noticed elements, by all visitors to the campus. However, what I, as a short term resident appreciated most, was the security that the well lit streets and the guards positioned at every intersection provided. Till date, this is the only place where I have been able to walk the streets alone and unafraid at 3am in the night.

        Then there were those innumerable rules to be followed. I remember being fined for not wearing a helmet while riding behind a friend, within the campus. The best solution here was to walk or cycle to the gate and then get on the bike once outside. Another memory I have is of guards whistling at us for not walking on the footpath in an area that allowed only cycles and service vehicles. Now is that supposed to be what is called 'perfection personified' or something?

        It was in this environment that I made long lasting friendships. I think it is best to write a separate blog as a tribute to my friends rather than cramping something in here, considering that I am currently determined at keeping the length of my blogs small.

Bubbles!

         The winter break had just begun. It was pouring heavily. The low temperatures, together with the rain provided extremely favourable conditions for a morning sleep in. So we had a lazy morning and an early lunch. However, even past noon, it refused to clear up and we decided not to venture out into what was now almost resembling a storm.

         I was still putting things away after lunch, when my friends disappeared. Very shortly I could hear them call out to me from the veranda (which is covered). So I opened the door to step out and I was welcomed in the most unexpected manner. The three of them were blowing bubbles of soap at me! Yeah, you’ve got it right if that reminded you of the ‘soap bubbles’ game from your school days. What followed was two hours of playing with bubbles. One of the girls had her camera ready. We photographed bubbles of varying sizes and shapes, tried to blow twin bubbles and competed on blowing the largest bubble and keeping it in air for the longest time. All in all, we enjoyed ourselves.

          As I was thinking of it later that evening, I realised that exactly one week from that day I would be turning twenty five. Ever imagined playing with soap bubbles at 25! Well, someone has rightly said, “Growing old is unavoidable; but growing up is optional.“

Realization, A Reason Enough….

    It has been years since blogging gained popularity, and for some reason or the other; I have not yet tried my hand at it.

    Thinking back, I was really passionate about writing during my good old school days. I remember spending free time writing random essays, articles for the school magazine and maintaining detailed dairies of travel experiences. Later however, when I moved to hostel, my writing became limited to a few letters to friends and family back home; and finally by the time I was into engineering, I had forgotten all about it! There could be many reasons for this; perhaps it was the change in priorities, perhaps it was the moving out from a protected environment at home, perhaps it was the influence of my companions, perhaps I was just lazy or perhaps I was busy with other activities. (like studying! ;-) )

    This loss of touch, is majorly what has kept me away from blogging. Moreover, during the short span when I was working, before commencing my masters course, I had developed this wrong notion that blogs were written by people who had plenty of free time at hand. This is because, I came across a number of colleagues writing blogs during office hours. They were the unfortunate ones who were officially ‘on bench’ (in the I.T. industry, bench is a concept that applies to companies that recruit extra employees to increase the head count or as back up staff) and were looking for ways to kill time. However, more recently I have had the chance to read some good blogs and have come to the conclusion that blogs are written by people who are passionate about writing. I think, this realisation, in itself is a reason enough to start blogging. Better late than never!

    Thanks to all the my friends who write blogs, my desire to write seems to have resurfaced and I have found a new place to pen down my thoughts. What remains to be seen now, is how long my enthusiasm at this is going to last!