Saturday, August 6, 2011 at 9:46pm
It rained last night. It drizzled this morning. It has been raining since late evening. I have always loved the rain. In Texas, the rain is distinctly masculine. Monotonous pouring peppered with a few thundering expletives.
The monsoon here, however, is feminine. She teases. She taunts. She has a much richer vocabulary. Even when she is furious, she invokes a whole spectrum of memories with her subtle tones. Raindrops of different weights on the different types of tree leaves...it’s a splendid symphony!
During the one year death anniversary memorial service of our neighbor, breakfast was served: cutlets, appams, chicken curry and rice halwa.
The rest of the day mostly involved sitting in a Toyota Innova (much like scaled down Honda Odyssey) and going to different homes in the villages in the outskirts of Thiruvananthapuram to invite folks for the wedding. And listening to Amma on the way.
I am no longer surprised about the quick disappearance of traditional family values and relationships in this IT age in this country. It is very clear to me that 100% of the human brain capacity is required to navigate the labyrinthine force field of desi relationships. And, you see, modern India demands that some portion of the brain be applied at work. The utter loss of relationship is inevitable!
Relationships here are not a matter of simple binary emotions. They are a rich historical thread packed with emotional power punches associated with selective event and dialog memories. No relationship is straightforward. They undulate, vacillate, oscillate, transmigrate and regenerate. So my question of “are we friends with so and so?” makes absolutely no sense to Amma. She will answer with an epic narration of the evolution of the entire relationship that always ends with a pregnant pause.
“So?” I ask. “So,” she says.
Thankfully, the villages haven’t changed much. That is not entirely true. If it is the skyscraper construction that dominate the city, it is home building that is the soundtrack of these villages.
In between the dark green rubber estates, with assembled rows of plastic skirted trees uniformly bend to the consistent urging of monsoon winds, rise magnificent mansions frequently painted in garish colors: violet, purple, fluorescent yellow!
Some of them even have smooth drive ways featuring rubberized tarring. Open garages house Mercs, VW Jettas, Skodas, BMWs…always more than one.
The contrast with the narrow, damaged, pot-hole ridden, muddied, godforsaken streets on which these mansions stand couldn’t be starker. Is there a stage in evolution of societies where individual showing off transforms into some kind of collective civic sense?
Visiting backyards of some of the village homes was delightful. Well, these backyards are more than a few yards, more like an acre of all kinds of trees and plants. Saw a majestic old tamarind tree and realized why tamar-i-hind (fruit of India) might have left an impression on Arab traders to secure such a name besides the mouthwatering taste of the fruit. Guavas, jackfruits, karaka (no idea what the English name is) and nellika (amla) formed the rest of the bounty we hauled back home from the backyard raids of the day. Not to forget the tapioca stems which were brought as part of our own ‘backyard veggie garden’ project soon to commence.
My cousin sister had ground home-grown turmeric and coriander into curry powder form. I spent several minutes taking in the aromas. Turmeric has a wholesome healthy scent, a mix of musk and sandalwood with a tinge of pepper…sort of. Coriander powder is a sharp, potent assault on the nostrils. The store-bought stuff I had used all these years in the USA is, to put it mildly, shit!
Despite it being a Saturday evening, got caught up in traffic jams while trying to come back into the city. On several unnecessary locations, there are new roads, fly-overs and underpasses. Places that truly require such changes are left hanging for perpetual milking by the politicians.
At one point in the national highway close to the city, a team was trying to repair what appeared to be the only speed camera in the district. Noticed quite a few speed limit boards with numbers 30 and 50 on them. At no point around these signs did our driver slow down below 60. And they say America is the land of freedom!
Evening markets flourish on the side of the highway with women thronging. Men queue, with uncharacteristic discipline, in front of the Beverages Corporation outlets for buying drinks. Right next to the outlet a snacks shop aptly named ‘Touchingzz’!
Late into the evening, back home, chatting with my nephew who is in 4th grade:
The TV was running in the background set to a Tamil songs channel. When a song featuring a prominent star showed up, the little dude asked me, “Do you know that he is a Christian?”
“Really?! Does it matter?” I feigned ignorance.
“Yea, he doesn’t look like one but he is,” the little dude was excited to let me in on the ‘secret’.
“Is there a certain Christian look?”
“Of course, they look different!”
“I see…”
“Their faces are different from ours.”
“Us and Them, eh? Interesting!”
“They have round faces. My face is oval.” (Talk about "Intelligent Design", somebody tell the Tea Party!)
“Who has been telling you all these nonsense?”
“My friend told me how it is,” he sensed my unease and displeasure.
“May be you should not pay attention to him”
This society: one step forward, two steps backward!
Rain continues. At least she has no recognizable religion and caste…..yet!
It rained last night. It drizzled this morning. It has been raining since late evening. I have always loved the rain. In Texas, the rain is distinctly masculine. Monotonous pouring peppered with a few thundering expletives.
The monsoon here, however, is feminine. She teases. She taunts. She has a much richer vocabulary. Even when she is furious, she invokes a whole spectrum of memories with her subtle tones. Raindrops of different weights on the different types of tree leaves...it’s a splendid symphony!
During the one year death anniversary memorial service of our neighbor, breakfast was served: cutlets, appams, chicken curry and rice halwa.
The rest of the day mostly involved sitting in a Toyota Innova (much like scaled down Honda Odyssey) and going to different homes in the villages in the outskirts of Thiruvananthapuram to invite folks for the wedding. And listening to Amma on the way.
I am no longer surprised about the quick disappearance of traditional family values and relationships in this IT age in this country. It is very clear to me that 100% of the human brain capacity is required to navigate the labyrinthine force field of desi relationships. And, you see, modern India demands that some portion of the brain be applied at work. The utter loss of relationship is inevitable!
Relationships here are not a matter of simple binary emotions. They are a rich historical thread packed with emotional power punches associated with selective event and dialog memories. No relationship is straightforward. They undulate, vacillate, oscillate, transmigrate and regenerate. So my question of “are we friends with so and so?” makes absolutely no sense to Amma. She will answer with an epic narration of the evolution of the entire relationship that always ends with a pregnant pause.
“So?” I ask. “So,” she says.
Thankfully, the villages haven’t changed much. That is not entirely true. If it is the skyscraper construction that dominate the city, it is home building that is the soundtrack of these villages.
In between the dark green rubber estates, with assembled rows of plastic skirted trees uniformly bend to the consistent urging of monsoon winds, rise magnificent mansions frequently painted in garish colors: violet, purple, fluorescent yellow!
Some of them even have smooth drive ways featuring rubberized tarring. Open garages house Mercs, VW Jettas, Skodas, BMWs…always more than one.
The contrast with the narrow, damaged, pot-hole ridden, muddied, godforsaken streets on which these mansions stand couldn’t be starker. Is there a stage in evolution of societies where individual showing off transforms into some kind of collective civic sense?
Visiting backyards of some of the village homes was delightful. Well, these backyards are more than a few yards, more like an acre of all kinds of trees and plants. Saw a majestic old tamarind tree and realized why tamar-i-hind (fruit of India) might have left an impression on Arab traders to secure such a name besides the mouthwatering taste of the fruit. Guavas, jackfruits, karaka (no idea what the English name is) and nellika (amla) formed the rest of the bounty we hauled back home from the backyard raids of the day. Not to forget the tapioca stems which were brought as part of our own ‘backyard veggie garden’ project soon to commence.
My cousin sister had ground home-grown turmeric and coriander into curry powder form. I spent several minutes taking in the aromas. Turmeric has a wholesome healthy scent, a mix of musk and sandalwood with a tinge of pepper…sort of. Coriander powder is a sharp, potent assault on the nostrils. The store-bought stuff I had used all these years in the USA is, to put it mildly, shit!
Despite it being a Saturday evening, got caught up in traffic jams while trying to come back into the city. On several unnecessary locations, there are new roads, fly-overs and underpasses. Places that truly require such changes are left hanging for perpetual milking by the politicians.
At one point in the national highway close to the city, a team was trying to repair what appeared to be the only speed camera in the district. Noticed quite a few speed limit boards with numbers 30 and 50 on them. At no point around these signs did our driver slow down below 60. And they say America is the land of freedom!
Evening markets flourish on the side of the highway with women thronging. Men queue, with uncharacteristic discipline, in front of the Beverages Corporation outlets for buying drinks. Right next to the outlet a snacks shop aptly named ‘Touchingzz’!
Late into the evening, back home, chatting with my nephew who is in 4th grade:
The TV was running in the background set to a Tamil songs channel. When a song featuring a prominent star showed up, the little dude asked me, “Do you know that he is a Christian?”
“Really?! Does it matter?” I feigned ignorance.
“Yea, he doesn’t look like one but he is,” the little dude was excited to let me in on the ‘secret’.
“Is there a certain Christian look?”
“Of course, they look different!”
“I see…”
“Their faces are different from ours.”
“Us and Them, eh? Interesting!”
“They have round faces. My face is oval.” (Talk about "Intelligent Design", somebody tell the Tea Party!)
“Who has been telling you all these nonsense?”
“My friend told me how it is,” he sensed my unease and displeasure.
“May be you should not pay attention to him”
This society: one step forward, two steps backward!
Rain continues. At least she has no recognizable religion and caste…..yet!
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