Multitasking man

Women are more often called multitaskers
Today I saw a man multitasking. I was pleasantly surprised.

I usually thought that I had no patience to become a shopkeeper or even a teacher. Especially shopkeepers seemed to be doing nothing, except endlessly waiting for the customer to come and buy. Their work made me want to go to sleep. I would rather become a labour in a factory where I continuously worked each cell in my body. Being still is so lethargic!!

Now, this man, is the owner of a shop which sells nick nacks, like chips chocolates small items basically.

It was right in the middle of a hot afternoon and I looked at either side of his shop, there were shops like his which had no customers and the keepers were either just staring out into the street in anticipation of spotting a customer, or idlying and almost dozing off.

Why am I so impressed with him? What was he doing? He was basically utilising his free time. A man who had ability to value time and perhaps a sense of time management. He may not hold a degree to get good jobs in a higher office. He may be slow in getting rich because perhaps his expenditure was at par or more to his income for whatever reason (likely a big family). But, I think WOW what efficiency! If I owned a company, I would look out for people who value time and people like him just fit the bill!

He was a bit surprised when my daughter went right up to his shop and took this picture. You can see he is staring right back into the camera!! :P

Please note he is not ironing his own clothes, he takes clothes like a dhobi does to iron them and return to the owners in order to get paid for his services. He is running a two in shop and offering his services and goods via the same outlet.
Ironman plus shopman! isnt it wonderful time management? I don't mind shopkeeping any more. He has shown me that it can be made much more enjoyable!

I found this cartoon picture and I couldn't help relating to enjoying work even if you hate it.

nine pins game, only the ball is the head which is chopped off!! :P

(sorry for those who get offended, but the choppers also need to enjoy their work!!)

Reliving Realities

Perhaps I was born at the right time or I was lucky enough to have stayed in 100% real places for most of my childhood holidays. Yes, my maternal grandparents stayed at the smallest of villages in North India, and I would look forward to spending my vacations there.

I was from Calcutta, a big city, with not much open spaces and though there are a lot many parks, they don't have trees with mangoes or litchis hanging on them!!

My grandparents lived in a sprawling if not very grand, house with a shed for cows and goats for milk. Some of my cousins and my sister sat around the milk giving cow and opened their mouths for the milkman who pulled at the udder and directed the flow towards them who relished the warm milk, much to my chagrin!! A coop full of cocks and hens for eggs and a back orchard for all kinds of trees from jackfruit, litchis, falsa, guava and not to forget the mango trees. Usually we were joined by other cousins for the vacations and we had a field time climbing on the trees of whichever fruit we wanted to eat and racing to the top to see who climbed the highest!

playing with the goat kid in the orchard.

During summer vacations the day started at the crack of dawn and the crowing of the cocks which seemed to go on crowing like an alarm bell refusing to stop. Grandpa wouldn't let us sleep and nudge all of us out of bed. We would straight away go into the orchard and start to play and climb and swing on branches which were low enough for us to sit. Sometimes we went beyond the orchard into the fields and trample on the sown soft earth (for which we would be admonished later on). I even ploughed the ground once and did the mud feel like velvety carpet? There is so much activity in the ploughing to sowing that each muscle is exercised and toned!

mango laden tree

I have to say that there are special ways to get to the highest ripe mango. Either risk your life and climb to the top without falling off or take this, a curved blade tied at the end of a long stick with which the mango is cut from its branch and it falls down. The third makes you quite a marksman, you aim at the mango and throw a stone to shake it off!! The mangoes ooze a fluid when it falls fresh from the tree, so we kept a bucketful of water and dropped those mangoes in it. When there was enough for everybody and the bucket was full, we would sit down to peel it and not with a knife but with a special peeler which was also 100% natural and made from a seashell. (wish I had one of them to show). The taste and smell of the mangoes is something I can never get even from the best alphonso mangoes!

There was a special guava tree. There was two things which made it special, first, it was our neighbours and secondly it had no seed!! Have you eaten a seedless guava? I have yet to buy one from the market. It was tasty as hell and we had to sneak and steal and run for our dear lives for the neighbour was a typical thief hater even if they were little children!!!

earthern stove

We only went back inside the house to eat our meals and get ready and be back in the orchard as soon as we finished. The house itself had small rooms and there was open space called aangan in the middle and a big kitchen beyond where women helpers came to assist in the cooking. Two or three of them would sit with a mill (hand grinder) to ground the wheat into flour. Curious that I was and wanting to try them all, I also tried my hands in grounding the wheat. Watching them change from grain to powder somehow seemed like magic to my young eyes. There was always two women grinding the spices together. And if you all think that the cooking was as easy as clicking a lighter on a gas stove then you have to get your imaginations to work again. There was an earthen kiln with 3 holes on top of different sizes. There was an opening in the front from where we stuffed the dried branches of fallen trees (this was yet again stored in a hut behind the house) which had to be fired with so much huffing and puffing till your lungs had all the exercises it needed in a day!! But it was fun and somehow the food cooked on it was the best and most delicious I have ever had in my entire life!!

handpump

There was no tap, only a hand pump. So, when I really had to rush to the toilet (and considering the amount of mangoes I ate, there was always a rush), pumping the water made the rush into a power rush and god helped if the only toilet was occupied. I had no option but to go to the fields and hide behind a tree and relieve myself!! Last year I had gone on a road trip with my kids there was a tyre puncture and we were not close to civilisation. I got the urge and I promptly went behind a tree with a bottle of mineral water and relieved myself. My kids were aghast!! Oh! they don't know what they have missed while growing up!

train just yonder the fields :)

Did I forget to mention the train tracks? Well, they were just beyond the fields and we laid 5 paise and 10 paise coins on the tracks and wait for the train to come. The train flattened the little aluminium coins and once I repeatedly put my 5 paise till it was absolutely flat as a blade and bigger than the old 20 paise. Interestingly we were quite small, with all of us not even teenagers, yet we were never stopped much and we could go and roam about the entire village. Playing hide and seek was never so much fun and I have even hidden inside the haystacks which is so perfect for this game. We had real mud to knead and make stuff out of it unlike the toxic clays of today! We made round balls and dried them in the sun and later used them as missiles to strike our cousins, which was so much fun!

 I forgot to say there was lots of insects and flies which came out in the dark and I especially couldn't no matter what sleep with them buzzing around me. So it came upon me to burn the dried cow dung which gave out thick smoke to ward the flies away.

rope bed

Could I have had a better relation with nature had I been to exotic locales each vacation? I think not, I cant say how much I miss those vacations. Although when I returned I was burnt black and my paternal uncles teased me for days on end that I lose my complexion whenever I come back from the village and that it was no fun to go. There is nobody who lives there and all maternal uncles have moved to cities and the house is almost beyond use. We cousins have plans to go back and relive some of our moments again with our kids to show them where we spent our vacations, but it hasn't materialised yet. Maybe some day I will.... I miss my village too much.


Pictures from here (mango tree), here (earthern stove), here (hand pump) and here (ropebed).

This post was written for The Kissan 100% real blogger contest at Indiblogger.

Potty and God

I have a year old toddler. Naturally the wonder bundles come with their pros and cons. One of the cons is, they are always doing potty in their pants, since they cant say when they want to do it. If I miss to make them sit on the pot they do it right in their pants and go on playing as if nothing has happened. Of course by the time I notice it, it is already spread to the thighs and I have the dirty work of washing the baby and the pants.

And I have a friend who particularly takes huge pleasure in teasing me whenever I tell him I was busy with potty. As usual today he came out with a smart one, "I am glad that mothers have to do it and not fathers." So I smartly replied, "men have to clean the potty of their bosses, at least we are cleaning our kids!"

The same friend, due to the respect I give him, often thinks that whenever I exclaim Oh god! it is him I am calling. He always replies, "yes, you called me?" One day, he asked me, why do I always call him God?"
I replied, " because I am an atheist!"

Smart answers no?

Kicking or Buried

Recently I had a chat with a cousin. She is a very fiery, impulsive and a spontaneous girl. If I asked her how was life? She would likely reply,"great or good." The last time however she said, "life is fine, going with the flow." It sounded like a death knell to me. So I couldn't help myself and said to her," only dead fish go with the flow of the stream." Then she smiled and said true.

I have known some people who seem dead to the world, bereft of fun, self secluded from the crowd. These are people who disagree with the world. They have a mind of their own. They may not follow or lead, but are the best of friends who know them closely enough. These people seem to me to be swimming against the flow.
Quality people who don't care for the quantity. If everyone is doing it, they probably wont do it.

We think they are snobs, dead to the world, loners....

Now who would you say are alive and kicking and who would you term dead and buried?

The (fun loving seemingly) fish swimming with the flow of the stream or these rare (seemingly sad) fishes who dare to swim upstream, even if it means swimming alone?

Picture from here

hi-society blues!

Last weekend, there was a party at the most affluent relative in our circle of relatives!

Needless to say, there was a lot of fuss on dress! My mil was specifically concerned that I wore a presentable dress. Reason? Of late, I have taken a fancy to sanyaas, meaning I don't care if my horoscope says, that I will never be contented, I want to contradict that and be contented. As a result of which I have stopped buying and instead have tried to recycle and mix n match, sometimes even borrow to wear!

At the party, a it usually happens, everybody is busy flaunting their expensive dresses and artificial smiles.. Each one is trying to outdo the other in respect of anything, be it foreign holidays, expensive jewellery or even number of servants!

Following is an excerpt of my conversation with her.. ( I added some zing to the morbid conversation to make it funny and readable!)

One lady said; "Nowadays, a cook is a necessity and almost each household must have one!

Me; "Err? I beg to differ, so what do you do? perhaps teach kids?"

She; "Oh no, I cant teach my kids, I send them for tuition, they are such brats, dont listen to me at all!"

Me; "Ok, so perhaps you are working?"

She; "Me work? Why would I work? My husband works, I dont need to work."

Me; "hmm, so its a good life for you, no work, just eat sleep and be merry."

She; "Oh no, cant be eating and sleeping, I have got to watch my weight, I only drink, liquid diet, you see. Then I have to go to the gym and workout!" (FYI: she was as thin as a stick)
Me; "I see, gymming must tire you?

She; "Yes, it does, its very tiring, so I go alternate days."

Me; "What do you do on the days you dont go to the gym?

She; "Oh lots of things, sometimes I have to go to the market, sometimes to the beauty parlor, sometimes to the tailor." She went on, "market reminds me of the new lip color launched by Lakme, have you seen it? I bought it last time, it was such a nice new mauve, with a hint of purple and pink both. Now I am on the lookout for a dress to match that lip color, I hope I find it soon, otherwise I will have to order for it in the boutique. Then of course buy a mauve pair of sandals to go with it, and a host of other accessories!

Me, "WOW! that is such an intimidating task. When I get my daughter married I will ask you to do her wardrobe!" ;))

She was pleased and I was pleased to leave her! whew!

Picture from here