My friend Dubey!

ये बात बहुत पुरानी यादों की है जब मैं college में पढ़ता था। a friend from those days called today to wish us a very happy Diwali. As we chatted happily about those wonderful bygone years, he mentioned the name of another dear friend, Dubey whom I had neither met or spoken to for more than last fifty years. I learnt that he lives in Indore, a city in MP. He was doing well with his family, children and grandchildren. I asked for his phone number which this friend gave me and I just could not wait to call him!

To give you some idea of my friendship with Dubey, let me admit that he, myself and one more guy formed a sort of troika given to the addiction of missing class of one particularly boring professor. (As if others were not!) We and the professor simply riled each other for no particular reason. So, as soon as his class used to start after the due attendance call, we will sneak out from the rear. You see, we took care of sitting in the last row, close to the getaway stairs! And the best part was that the sporting professor knew about this;after the attendance, he will often murmur, 'Dubey to dubega, Rajput ko bhi le kar dubega'!

More about Dubey! He was simply crazy about getting himself photographed. In those days, I had the privilege of owning a small brownie camera which took those now forgotten black and white film rolls. If we wanted Dubey to do something for us, we simply bribed him with a promise of clicking his picture. For this, we could ask him to take any pose, even the most ridiculous! And he will oblige only after quickly combing his luxurious hair for which he had a small pocket comb always handy in his back pocket. He used to be such a simple guy, never doubting that we sometimes made fun of him behind his back!

Dubey was such a soft spoken person, he never picked up even a moderate discussion about anything. He was the least aggressive in our group. He always carried that trademark side hanging bag commonly carried by many students. We made use of his bag while going to the town, for keeping our small things as if it was common property. But he never minded!

All these memories came flooding back to my mind as I started dialling his number. As he answered and asked as to who was calling, I told him that it was one of his very old friends. When he asked me to give my name, I in turn asked him to make three guesses of his very close, old friends from college days. He waited for a few seconds and then said, 'is it Basant Kumar Rajput?'! Need I say that he made my day!

Marital happiness!

What is on my mind, the Facebook wants to know! Well, this has been on my mind for a long time, really long, almost for the last thirty years when I suppose there was no Facebook. A tricky subject, certainly not for the faint hearted as far as men are concerned. And it is, how come no one thought of designing a meter to measure marital happiness!

There are meters galore, the commonest being the thermometer which is used to read your body temperature. But that is a wrong example, I know. It deals with the physical thing. We are talking about something abstract but very vital for the married folks, especially those who are into this great, even if fading institution (in the west), matrimony for let us say more than ten years. How does one measure or grade a happy marriage!

Of course, in all popular magazines for men and women, almost in every issue, there will be some article, questionnaire or a quiz which deals with this subject, it's challenges and gives out some guidelines if not solutions, to all married couples. What I have in mind is a little different, a set of questions which you need to ask yourself and answer honestly after every social get together you take part in at your own home or outside. These are as follows:-

1. Do you openly support your spouse in any discussion if you agreed with him/ her?

2. If you do not agree, do you go out of your way to oppose and criticise to make it uncomfortable?

3. Do you appreciate your spouse the way he/she was dressed in a gathering?

4. Or do you mentally compare him/her with others and and make your disappointment obvious?

5. If the party is held at your own house, do you make it a point to express your appreciation for doing his/her part so well?

6. Or you show your exasperation for something which did not go as planned?

7. We all have our handicaps, some obvious, some hidden. Do you consciously make an effort not to draw others' attention to his/her such thing?

8. Or just because you were a bit cheesed off with something, you do exactly the opposite?

9. Do you feel happy that he/she gets more attention in a gathering because of some strong point or reason? Especially if it is from the other sex!

10. Or does it make you a bit jealous and unhappy even if it is very fleeting?

If you get positive answers to all the above questions, I feel you will get a reading of a 100 % meaning a very, very happy marriage. But that will be too optimistic. So let us settle for three positive answers and declare it a happy marriage! 

Regardless, I am very happily married;just ask my dear wife!

Shopping groceries for the wife!

I wish to share some of my woos with my friends, other husbands, those like me who have to deal with the daily chore of going out to buy vegetables and groceries. Why me you may wonder! This happens with me very often, just because my dear wife is too busy with work at home or may be because it is time for her to watch her favourite TV serial. So she very amiably asks me to write down a list of things to be purchased. And she gives me the precise items and quantities so that I do not get confused. Yes, she is very considerate knowing how dull or dumb I am even now after years of doing this ever since I retired from my main job!

With all the preventive measures she takes, I nevertheless still manage to make a few mistakes and then have to face her music. You understand what I mean?!

You see, this seemingly simple chore of buying vegetables and groceries is full of many pitfalls. If let us say, bananas are on the list, it is very easy. I know my bananas and how many to buy. But if the fruit happens to be a papaya, then it is a bit complicated for me. One papaya, but how big? And it has to be ripe enough but not too ripe! How do I know that in the face of the determined seller who assures me, 'Saab, ekdum theek hai'. In good faith, I buy it and sure enough, my wife rejects the item when I return home!

Generally, I do not make mistakes while buying vegetables;I mean take one or two. I know the tomatoes, onions and potatoes so simple to buy and also my favourites. But walk in brinjals or eggplants and I am tormented by their different sizes, shapes and colours. I simply love palak that is spinach and I am flawless with it. But others in the group like methi or dhania, coriander make me a bit tense. I recognise them but am not sure about their quality!

I am generally clueless about other vegetables like beans and rest of the stuff. I am OK with cabbage and cauliflower  but can survive without them. I also do not care about the popular bhindi that is ladies fingers which my son-in law Neeraj simply loves. When he visited us soon after he and my daughter Savita got married, he accompanied me to buy vegetables. To my dismay, the first item he chose was bhindi. I told the seller to weigh a quarter of a kilo of the stuff. Neeraj was baffled! Why so little he asked and then quickly raised the quantity to one kilo! This reminds me of my son Mahesh who is so much like me! He and I keep things simple;we are staunch non-veggies! We have this conviction that vegetables make life complicated for no reason!

Today, my shopping list contained peanuts with which I am quite familiar. I came home with with three bags full of shopping, very confident that I have missed nothing, slipped nowhere! My wife opened the bags, looked quite satisfied till she noticed the packet of peanuts. 'You have brought the wrong peanuts. I asked you bring plain peanuts and you got the salted ones' she remarked haughtily!

Buying rice is really tough for me. A few days back,  my wife asked me to buy basmati rice, one kilo, along with some other items. Till some years back, it was easy to buy basmati. Now, there are so many varieties of this brand, I am pretty nervous about it if my if my wife forgets to mention the exact brand!

By now, you must have realised that one can not be too complacent even in such innocuous activities like shopping vegetables and groceries. You need to be on guard, eternally vigilant  lest you meet your Waterloo with some peas!

With this aim in view and also to placate my most annoyed wife, I suggested a sort of truce with a simple system;every time I return from such shopping, she should examine the things I bought and then grade me. Like they do in schools and colleges! If I got nine things right out of ten, she should award me 90% marks which would be like outstanding! If I get eight things right, I get 80% marks which is equivalent to excellent. And if I manage to get seven items right, I get 70% which is still a first class!

What do you say folks? If you are with me on this, please pass on this system to your wives and let me know their feedback. As far as my wife is concerned, she gave me a look meaning 'have you lost your mind?' Or something like that!

My country, my children!

Now that I am old, really old, I often wonder whom do I love most! Do not get me wrong, I am not thinking about romantic attachments though they meant a lot to me when I was a teenager and then in my twenties. It was ages back when my heart went racing at the very thought of the very idea of love at first sight. Will it happen, when will it happen? It did happen but was not first in the real sense. So many such 'firsts' followed, I have lost count of them. And mostly these encounters were one sided, you know what I mean!

I am talking about my thoughts of today, Jan 26. It gave me real goosebumps when I witnessed the Republic Day parade on the TV. My country India, my people, the majestic tricolour, our marching soldiers, I simply loved them. I know we have our faults like the rest of the world. But I am sure we will overcome!

The very thought of India including the crowds, the bustling day to day activity, the noise and even the dirt makes me long for it. Morning walks with friends, meeting neighbours on the staircase and be able to have a conversation, talking politics, cricket and Bollywood, or just walk down to the society shops to buy vegetables and groceries has it's own pleasures! People have enough time for such mundane things and a morning seems to have more hours there than here, in the west. Maybe, I have spent too much time in the sterile and antiseptic world of America and it is time for me to go back because all said and done, I love my country!

Easier said than done though because after my country, I love my grandkids the most. 

Jan 26 also happens to be my youngest grandkid Akshay 's birthday. We cut the birthday cake early this morning. A party will follow on the weekend.

This also reminds me of my grand daughter Mallika and my eldest grandson Avinash who are as dear to me. Only, I suppose Akshay has that extra edge just because his birthday coincides with that of the Republic of India. 

God bless my dear grandchildren!

It is a different matter that they have barely any time for me. Koi baat nahin, I forgive them!

College days!

A few years back, after I had retired from the army, my son presented me with a set of three books by the well known writer, James Herriot. All three books are about his life as a veterinary doctor, the most famous is titled 'All things bright and beautiful'. He wrote about animals in a gentle, wise and humorous way. His deep compassion and love of life shines out in his writings as described in Wikipedia. If you love animals, I strongly recommend  reading his books!

This post is about my early days and my brush with veterinary science as a student. (Yes sir, I was a veterinarian before I joined the army!) But it has nothing to do with the profession itself;you can relax and follow what I was up to, if so inclined. And I do seriously hope, we will still be friends!

In the first place, I joined the veterinary college at Osmania University, Hyderabad because I just could not make it to a medical college. Biology being my main subject, I had no other option in those days. It so happened that we had a wing of medical college right next to our college which was a big problem. Let me explain! In our veterinary college, we had no girls, not even one. On the other hand, this medical college had several which made us acutely conscious of our disadvantage so to speak!

As a result, a few of us bunked our morning classes with some regularity and sat in the university canteen which overlooked the road leading to the medical college just to watch the medical girls walking up to their building. A harmless but painfuL activity you will agree!

On some mornings, we had practical anatomy classes in the open where our teachers had a horse or a bullock depending upon the 'subject', explaining various part of the animal to us, we standing in a semicircle. And invariably, these medical girls would be walking up with their white aprons on their arms, on the road right next to us, completely distracting our gaze and attention from the animal under our observation to themselves, thus affecting our grades. Most unfair, you will agree again!

The two professors most affected by our rather indisciplined behaviour, I still remember their names, were one Dr Reddy and the other, Dr Takkiuddin. (I hope and wish, they are fine wherever they are!). Whenever, they happened to meet us outside the classes, they will unfailingly express their sympathy and concern for our futures. And to be fair to their emotions, we did change our ways and graduated as veterinarians in time. Except one guy by the name Pande;he simply loved the college and the whole works! We understand, he took full 7 years to complete that 4 year course and was elected twice as president of the college students union before he graduated. With full honours I will say!

Technology Era.

What and which technology will rule 2016!

According to Wall Street Journal, entering 2016, the future never felt more within reach. 'Science fiction will become science fact this year when you take virtual-reality vacations and your dish washer reorders it's own soap' it adds! It emphasises on two themes, one is liberation from day to day chores like charging phones. The other it claims, is intelligence:our machines and services will become more efficient. Life will become very easy and uncomplicated!

Well, I am not so sure! Machines may become more capable assuming that they are in capable hands. Like our smart phones where the whole world is in the palm of your hands. Messenger, what's up and the most popular:Facebook! Cameras have become redundant, texting and messaging across the world has become child's play. Only one has to be smart enough to make use of all the features. 

By the way, I consider myself to be reasonably smart but sometimes not enough! There is one thing I have yet to master is the elementary task of retrieving missed calls and voice mails. Therefore, when someone meets me and complains that he or she called, then left a message too, but still I have not responded to the same, I feel really very guilty for causing an avoidable misunderstanding. I have said sorry to quite a few. But how long this will help, I asked myself!

So as a sensible step, I decided to take my daughter's help to understand how to look for missed calls and voice messages. She patiently explained how to go about it. Now, I have mastered it and every few hours, I check my smart phone for the same. It is a different matter that most of the time there are none. Maybe, some of my friends have unfriended me! 

Could it be that the world is communicating more by other devices like the Facebook, messenger or what's up? With so much of communication, one can not be too alert! One of my close friends whom I initiated into simple mails just an year back is now merrily sending me videos and images and I am finding it difficult to keep pace with him and with the constantly evolving technology!

But the best illustration of technology going really berserk was when I overheard my wife talking actually on the phone with one of her close friends. They were having an argument. My wife had planned a get together at the last minute and this friend of hers had failed to show up. The friend was explaining that she did not know about it. My wife asked her, did you see the messenger? Did you check your what's up? No, no, the friend said again and again. Why didn't you, my wife bitterly complained. To this, the friend was livid and in utter exasperation screamed, I could hear her, 'for God's sake, why did you not simply phone?'

Let me close this communication with best wishes to all my friends for a very happy new year of 2016!

Hoping you will see this blog. If you do not respond, I will call. Do not miss my call!

SAVE THE EARTH, SAVE THE WORLD!

.'Everybody wants to save the earth;nobody wants to help Mom do the dishes' says a quote. How true!

The other day, my friends and I decided to meet over lunch at an Indian restaurant, our fortnightly activity. During such meetings, besides food, our main concerns about India and the world at large take most of our time in our animated discussions. Let it be Obama, Modi, Gandhis, kejariwal or even the Yadav duo from Bihar, Laloo and Nitish, we do not spare anyone!

We have perfect solutions for all the problems and sometimes, in my quieter moments, I wonder if we should not seriously take up matters with these guys! The main hurdle in this plan of action is how to approach them. There must be millions of well wishers like us wanting to do the same. How many of them got through to them? I have no clue! It is not like you just send an email to friends to get together in a restaurant for lunch. I have tried signing up petitions but those people just have no idea about the enormity of issues like we have! Can I start a petition of my own? Not sure really!

So I came back to the quote about helping my wife doing the dishes. Let me start at home with small gestures, I thought! The first thing I noticed in the kitchen was the sink full of dishes, plates, cups and spoons, all lying haphazardly. I decided to suggest to my wife that she should keep all these items separately, systematically to make it easier to load the dish washer. When I did that, she came back saying that is my problem, why don't I do it myself? She can do it only her way, she added!

Observant as I am, I noticed another thing in the kitchen, the refrigerator. It is always overloaded with leftover food. Why do you cook so much, I asked her. Try making limited quantity which we can finish the same day, I suggested. 'So you want me to cook every day and forget my cards sessions!' she retorted. And sure enough, she said why don't I take over cooking? 'You are retired now and have nothing much to do!' In an moment of insanity, I said, 'OK, I will cook one meal at least, every day starting coming Monday'.

The day of the reckoning was just three days away. On week ends in any case, we mostly go out to eat. So I had enough time to prepare myself. In the past, just for fun, I had learnt to make a couple of dishes from my wife. I rehearsed them in my mind. And I could always ask her if I forget some important point like how much salt to add! Can't I? She is a sport, I know! Monday arrived rather too quickly. I was going to cook the evening meal. But I started developing cold feet in the morning itself. 

I took my own time to return home from my morning walk when my wife, looking rather happy, announced, ' your cooking in the evening is cancelled!' Though her words warmed the cockles of my heart, I tried to look belligerent. No, she said, I can not cook today or for the next one month. What happened, I asked. 'My mother is visiting us for a month. I just got a call from her. Now get ready in time to go to the airport. Her flight arrives at eleven'.

My mother in law was coming and that too for a month! For the first time in my life, I was so happy with such a devastating news. It was a real windfall, you will agree with me!