as good as it gets

One of my favourite bloggers put in a comment on the last post I had. She said that she felt my blog was reassuring, having just watched Blue Valentine and that she was also nervous about the future. Though she is nowhere near as dramatic, the post reminds me (though not directly) of a lot of young students that I meet while teaching as well as not so young turks at work (though all younger than me). When I talk about myself and Jasmine and the relationship I share, they go like – you guys are an inspiration or you guys are ‘IT’, you guys are so lucky to have found each other and many other such words.
While earlier when I was much younger I would beam with pride, as if Jasmine and I were Cupid’s special children. But as I got older and hopefully wiser, somehow these comments did not have the same reaction from me.
I have thought a lot about this many times. Jasmine and I are not the perfect couple. We are nowhere near the perfect couple. It’s not that we hold hands all the time or that we always agree on everything or that we don’t disagree on anything or by any metric you think of. We are as diverse a couple that can be. But we fight as hard as others, of course less than some others. The way she reacts to my anger irks me even more and my thought process is completely different from her. We have disagreements and everything else that normal couples have. We agree to a few basic things, such as parenting is the most important thing in our lives, thrift is a virtue to be celebrated, travel is an important objective, reading is the source of everything and we trust each other completely with spending. Everything else seems open to disagreement.
So we can’t be as blessed as Cupid would want us to be. So what’s it that makes us tick or I would put it – stand out. While I met a lot of younger folks and spoke to them, I think one theory kept popping into my mind. That’s it. It’s got to be the theory – it’s as simple as I started my college in 1991 and that was about the time I started going around with Jasmine.
What’s with that sexy date? That’s the year liberalisation started in India. We then started getting access to a lot of brands and products that were till then only found in the suitcases of foreign returned cousins. We watched foreign shows on video cassettes smuggled into India. Basically I thought and I have blogged about it, that pre 1991, we were a starved naked nation. English movies were being played in a handful of cinema halls such as Regal/ Sterling or Eros. A good movie with great reviews would be the destination for the family once or twice a year or at best four times a year. But to my mind the biggest thing was TV. Door Darshan was the state owned broadcaster who would have prime time of one hour everyday sandwiched between the Hindi and English news. It provided wholesome family entertainment, aimed at enhancing, maintain and strengthening family values and bonds.
I entered college with no brands and locally run cable TV and exited my studies in 98 with a proliferation of brands and channels. I saw MTV, Star and the rest entering with English dominated programming and quickly moving to the local language.
So what’s that got to do with my marriage? I think it’s pretty simple. Those days not too many couples would be going around. While the boys would have loved to, the girls were coy about accepting proposals and couples would generally keep their relationship largely secretive. The odds of being slapped if found out was very large. There would curbs on freedom, friends and pocket money. It was seen as a stupid distraction and was generally frowned upon. “I did not send you to college to have an affair young one”. So generally those days, couples were a rarity and they really had to fight all odds to keep the relationship alive. Nosey brothers, parents, neighbours and the lot who would look at the first chance to snitch and spoil your life. It was especially difficult for the girl’s side of the equation. Also catching private moments together was so difficult. There were no coffee shops to hang around and chat. We would have no access to cars to go for a long drive. Meeting each other would be only during the official stay out of house hours, which would mean – college hours. No cell phones and no internet would also mean absolute cut off when you say bye. You decided the next time and place well before you said your goodbyes. Hell I couldn’t even ever go to Jasmine’s house nor call her until our relationship was officially accepted. Four hard years of agonising. Jasmine would make random excuses and get friends to attribute my gifts to. Crazy man! Absolute nightmare.
We would live in the mortal fear of being found out. wow. Real tense days. Things eased up considerably after 91 for the rest of the batches. Batch after batch came in with different outlooks, a more modern sense of dressing and a progressive attitude. In my time, not many would wear jeans to college, with many wearing salwars and in traditional day the women would wear sarees. Today on traditional day the women wear salwars. To mind, the liberalisation brought about a change in attitude as Indians came increasingly aligned to the world. Cable and Satellite TV penetration (in one research) shows correlated strongly with the improvement of living standards of the women in India. At least a lot of metro India is now open to a whole host of things. Women working is one of them. It is considered lesser of a privilege and more of a right, which it should be.
The tension I felt in those days while courting jasmine is visibly missing. My THEORY and its only that MY THEORY is that when we of old were going around, there was no time to think about compatibility. You loved someone and it was for life. A woman could fall in love once and any more was not considered normal. A man would also commit largely forever. And when you were going around the external pressures were so high that I don’t think we ever looked inwards. What you mean by ‘making a relationship work’. Of course it worked. You said the ‘love’ word right. Done. Get married, have kids and carry on your life.
When my students come up to me and tell me that they are going around, I say great; so you getting married to the guy? I don’t know is the common reply. It took me some time to reconcile myself to this answer. What you mean you don’t know. You are going around right? Now I realise that people are tuned to a lot more things in the relationship. Things that I did not understand are basic stuff like compatibility, space, individuality. I did not understand it then and I am only able to understand it out of my context. For us, her friends are my friends and my friends are her friends. Whatever permission we got to stay out of home was used to stay with each other. What is private space? Each moment away I would be dying to talk or meet her as there was a complete cut off from each other.
I guess it’s something like adversity makes people come together, kind of thing. The world was against us and we had only each other. In times like that who can think of luxuries. And I feel lucky.
I entered college with one value system exited seeing another. Our relationship was born in a more conservative system that emphasised staying with each other more than anything else. I think I was able to see the transformation of India while I was between 15 to 23 years old. In Big Town India, the generation was the bridge between the have-nots and the haves. Crucially it gave me the glimpse into tradition and modern values, and allowed us to be imbibed in older values and not be threatened by the newer ones. Because we were in college in those times, we could look at the change and believe we were at the forefront of them and actually believe that it was us leading it. Truth be told, it would have happened irrespective of us. In fact I thought my generation was the soft wimpy one. In Mumbai – college politics were wiped out, drugs were a reduced menace, hip parties were boring and people were thinking getting jobs and getting married. Simple predictable people who just got swept in liberalisation and exited to a world that looked like a candy shop. I proudly bought my dad a pair of Reebok Sandals with my first pay. I had arrived.
So that’s my theory. We were too unsure about the future to be unsure about or relationships. That was the only sure thing we had. I could be wrong and possibly people are right – it is a cupid combination, but I think otherwise. I think both Jasmine and I did think there wasn’t another alternative. So when it has to work, then you don’t have options. You only focus on what works. Possibly if the world was more acceptable of teen relationships or forgiving of break ups, possibly then ... I could have accepted admiration.
When I was playing basketball, I was happy to have simple shoes. Not Reebok or Nike but just decent shoes. I remember my dad buying me a pair of good old ‘Power by Bata’ shoes. When all you needed were black shoes for school and canvas for days you have PE class, a specialised sneaker only to play was as good as it gets.
So I guess all it requires is a simple mindset that says there is no option, but I wouldn’t recommend it at all to Jispa. I would tell her to choose, to think through, to make a few mistakes and go ahead. It will come with its share of insecurities but I don’t think that as we get more ‘modern’ can we be less individualistic. It’s worth every bit of it. You might just miss the old fashioned romance, but you can catch on a few older movies. May I recommend one – it stars Aamir Khan and Madhuri Dixit – Dil. Or possibly the Salman Khan – Maine Pyaar Kiya. Then reassure yourself anew, that you are them and they are not you.

never forget...

A dozen years sounds quite a bit but it does pale in front of 21 years, especially when you are all of 35. Being young brave, foolish and over active hormones does have its advantages. The first words I ever uttered to Jasmine around 21 years ago were in the form of a proposal. Yup she refused but wanted to be friends nevertheless. She never admits to it, but I attribute her counter proposal to my charm and magnetism at the time. I chased her for more than a year (joined her college) and finally got her to agree to go out with me. Oh the perils of youth! Way back in those days a complain from her to her mom about this ‘stalker’ or ‘proposer’ or ‘dumb ass’ would got me kicked and beaten up by her folks and then mine. After 9 years of ups and downs, fights and reconciliations, promises and dreams later we got married. Yippee.
12 years ago we had no clue of the life facing us. All I wanted was 10 grand a month. I had no dream of my own house, or my child or anything. I thought I would do something good and make a honest life working hard. I thought life would be simple and uncomplicated. Relatively uncomplicated atleast. I might have been a bit naïve I guess. Life slapped me hard in the intervening years. Real hard. It also gave me many lessons, many that I have been proud to learn. But I guess I might have been happier never to have learnt. Life’s lessons are always costly. Whenever you learn something you give up your innocence and a part of your heart. Every time your brain increases you heart decreases.
But we do live in such a world don’t we. I never wondered why we do so. It has been our own creation.
Living and learning has taken an amazing toll on me. But it’s largely been my own doing, my own choices. Jasmine has never expected more from me. She has amazingly content and amazing non demanding where my career is concerned. Surely she has been as demanding of me as a family as I might have been of her. But I have never faced the issue of earning enough to keep up with my wife’s dreams. Today itself I was telling someone, Jasmine and I have been like chalk and cheese on many things. I am outgoing and loud and she is quiet and happy to hear. But funnily on so many other things we see to agree very well. Many times we keep thinking that whenever we have made a team to do anything, we generally end up doing it well. Her strengths and mine have been very very different. Also today I might be smart enough to not compete with her, but I think I was lucky that when I did not have that self confidence earlier, it was great that Jasmine never bothered to compete with me. It did not even occur to her. I liken her to a happy cow.
Middle class to the core, she abhors wastage and show of money; yet my biggest fight with respect to expensive things is that whenever I think of splurging on myself, she keeps nudging me to go ahead. I too am a carefull buyer. I like to spend less, not buy by brand tags and like to mull things over and almost covet stuff till I buy it. If I tell about it to Jasmine, she will keep nudging me to buy it and then I get influenced by it. I had to keep telling her not to poke me. I will be happiest if it hit the buy button on my own and not poked into it by her. But then that’s her and that’s me. 12 years of living together as man and wife. And till yesterday we almost forgot about it. A few years ago I genuinely forgot and my wife had to remind me and yesterday I reminded her that it tomorrow (i.e. today).
We are practical minded people who don’t really care about flowers or cakes or presents. We treat ourselves when we want to, where we want to and take buying decisions jointly. On almost everything. So then our surprise gifts are also few and far in between and stuff that we really want in any case. Like I have got perfumes, body wash and swimming googles as surprises and she has once got a towel form me. And all this too has been motivated by Jispa wanting to give something.
Pretty unromantic for ‘childhood sweethearts’? we are both pragmatists I guess.
I can’t close the post without mentioning my favorite line of hers. When I am stressed or worried her words of wisdom always has been ‘don’t take so much stress’. Just that. That’s her solution! Talk about an uncomplicated mind. And see me. A case of opposites reconciling, what say?

----
While courting I got a cassette recorded and presented it her. Our favorite song from that is still our favorite song of all time. The concert version especially. We love the part when the crowd sings along. You know it was priest from school who I was pretty close to who suggested that I put it in the cassette. He asked me love songs? Here is a love song! And he even gave me the cassette free of cost and I recorded it on his system. Father Ian Dolton. Thank you sir.

random noise generator

It’s easy to get used to a car in Mumbai. In Mumbai you have the option of getting jammed in a train or you can choose to get stuck in traffic in a bus. The train will kill you by an overdose of carbon dioxide from the stuffiness and the hordes of people crammed in and the bus will kill you by carbon monoxide from vehicular pollution. The single oxide bonding creates for a far more lethal gas and possibly the reason I prefer the train to the bus. While I was in nariman point, I happily took to the train as means of transport. Its frequency is better and it beats the vehicular pollution and the traffic jams. Travelling in bus is such a blackening experience.
Today the car went for servicing and Jasmine left me at Kings Circle for the bus. Waiting at the bus stop for the bus, all these years and nothing has changed. There still are no clear route maps explaining which bus will go through which route. The only thing that has changed is that the bus stops have gotten slightly better looking. This not necessarily better for the commuter, but better for the advertiser who uses the top of the bus stop as a hoarding. In my company we use them well and they sure are effective, but nowhere is the commuter brought into the equation. We could use the back of the bus stop as an effective communication tool about the bus routes. But in Mumbai, why bother? The technology to find out the route is as ancient as mankind. Ask the guy next to you or scramble around as the bus comes in to figure where the conductor is and shout ‘yeh worli jaayega’ (will it got o worli?). invariably the guy is in a tear away hurry and answers you as he rings the bell to signal the driver to move on. Today morning, it was especially difficult with all the windows closed as Mumbai is having a bit of a colder weather than usual. Nopes not cold, just colder than normal. So I was left at the bus stop with the knowledge than was ten years old. 85, 92 and 93 will go. I also remember a 90 numbered bus but that was no where to be seen. Possibly its discontinued or changed its route.
The roads are also supremely polluted and you can feel the pollution and dust hit you in the face as you wait at the bus stop. All it takes is a vehicle running past at full speed on the main road for it to sand blast your face with unburnt carbon. Luckily my bus came in soon enough and I was able to get a relatively empty looking bus. There seems to have been a spate of reservations done on the bus. Now there are around ten seats reserved for ladies and three for the handicapped and another six (I think) for the old. I was always fundamentally opposed to reservations for women and I feel they probably need to be treated on par with men. I understand old and handicapped for sure. But these reservations have also have more questions. When there are reservations, is it right for the women to sit in the non reserved seats. Shouldn’t the man insist on getting that seat? But those are simple practicalities and I probably should not really wonder too much about them. But what I do hate is what happened.
In the past I have sat unknowingly in the women’s seat when they were first introduced. It’s not like you can’t sit there. You just have to get up if a woman comes in and asks for her seat. But the women have been so rude and have demanded that you get up. First up. no request, no smile, just a rude ‘get up’. this tim ei was sitting in the senior citizens seat. One guy came in and to my luck asked the guy seated in front of me to get up. Again not too politely. He got up immediately. I too got up to ask him to sit at my seat but he sat in front in any case. I could hear the guy next to him (senior citizen) tell the newly seated guy that ‘see people just don’t understand’. What the hell yaar. It completely pissed me off. The poor guy got up without a fuss. You really expect the seat to be empty and people to stand while there is an empty seat. Soon enough a lady (oldish but not a senior citizen) was standing next to me. None of the women who were younger offered her a seat from the ladies seat. I got up and offered her mine. In any case I did not want to be berated by and older man who might come along. So I stood happily. It’s easier standing when you have to make the journey only once in a while. If you have to do it every day you might want to box some of the people’s head. I can still understand the older men. They tend to get cranky with age but I see no excuse with the women.
Impolite, disrespectful and full of themselves. Just a massive pain in the neck. Expecting preferential treatment and concern and then turning on their own ilk with ease. I have immense respect for the women workforce in the country. As I interview for people I see that women are much smarter and better than men. Possibly the huge pressure that they fight at home and at the workplace, makes for an efficient sieve, ensuring that only the very best survive. Whatever the cause, but I see them working brilliantly, shoulder to shoulder and not succumbing to pressure. Women have in them to be equal to men. Only if they rise above the condescending acts that society puts them through. Special considerations, reservations etc. They must fight them and actively resist them. Only by resisting them will they show the men that they are equal, that they cannot be discriminated against. I see it happening in India. At least I see it happening where I work. At least at these levels, middle management and lower, I see no discrimination in pay or work. They earn for their work done and are equal to any man at their level. I see India changing.
Girls are growing up to wear pants. I see this change even in small town India. Pants / jeans are a big leap for them. They will grow up to be more independent minded than what their mothers were. Slowly their fathers will grow accustomed to them being equal. Like some research that shows that cable and satellite penetration showed a big correlation to women welfare, I too believe that this impacts what women are “allowed” to wear and then it manifest in changing mindsets. For themselves and others. Also if they treat each other with a little more respect, in busses and in trains and treat others with confidence (I am assuming their rudeness towards men comes from insecurity), they would move a lot further than they are currently.
I have always wanted to treat Jispa as equal as a boy. In fact sometimes Jasmine thinks I am making her grow up as a boy. But I think that’s the way it must be. No special considerations as a girl. You fall down and if a boy is expected not to cry then a girl must not as well. She is going to grow up in a place where men and women will be treated the same, will be expected to be treated on par. Then why must she be any weaker? If you believe in yourself then the world be bend over and believe in you. No self doubt and no self pity. I was just explaining to Jispa the other day. I don’t remember what she said but I said. No self pity. No feeling sorry for yourself. Don’t think that shit is only happening to you. Stand up tall and deliver. Shit happens. Get up and no self pity. She got it at the time. She even used it in another context and asked me ‘isn’t that self pity’. Yup. That’s the way. When shit happens, as it will, you can’t get down and cry but you have to get up and see what you can do about it. At the very least laugh. Shit man.
On the singing bit – we told Jispa that of all the things we can’t teach her to sing. Sorry Jispa. And yesterday, she was obviously not selected for the singing contest. She was woefully out of tune. When I spoke to her in the night, she did not seem at all disappointed. That’s cool. At least I am relieved. Training her in something I have zilch expertise in was creating tremendous pressure on me. I could see her mistakes but under no circumstance could I have known how to correct her. Whoops.

connections

Sometimes it takes a simple strain in a chest to write a post. Huh? Well if you realise the reason I write and if you are familiar with my family’s medical history then you might better understand my thought process.
I write this as a note to my daughter who might be able to understand the choices I took and the fun I have had and the growing up I underwent while I had her as my daughter. Thats the ciomplicated part. The easy part is that in my family, we all males seem to be dying the day we are born. All the males from my dad’s side suffered cardiac arrests. They were all hale and hearty till the very end, suffering from no other complications like diabetes, blood pressure or other complications. Simple blocked arteries. My dad got his first attack while we were in Ahmedabad attending my cousin’s wedding. He was around 45 years old. He second and fatal attack came in 13 years later.
I have had a few long conversations with dad. I have hung on to every word he said. I have tried to understand his thought process and his value construct. It has helped shape me tremendously as a person. He was largely at home in those 13 years and they possibly gave rise to the opportunity to have these conversations. Who knows, if those 13 years would not have been granted then what would life have turned out. here I am not so worried about the financial/ practical implication but the more important philosophical implications. I learnt to read a lot from one boss – dharen, and I have had a few such important guiding forces, but I guess my dad for me has remained my moral compass, which is essentially on which everything else was slapped on.
Like when I listen to any one, it’s not what he says that interests me, it is the thought process. The authors of the blogs I read or the lecturers I go for. It’s always the thought process. Once the thought process is in place, the rest would follow. So when I meet smart people I am instinctively drawn to their way of thinking. How does she respond to issues? How does he raise issues, how does she identify issues etc? So when monkey follows, the monkey is slightly more evolved and smarter. That’s how I think I improve, not by merely imitating but by keenly following like a good detective tracking his target. Getting into the mind of the target. I guess I might do better if I do the same by getting into the mind of people who tend to piss me off. But then that’s too much of an effort. Wasted effort. I would rather concentrate and use my energies into people I admire rather than loathe. But ya the latter do give you insights into what not to do and what you definitely don’t want to become.
So these days I have been fairly busy but enough not to write a post. And one little chest niggle (probably indigestion) now and it made me reach out for the word processor and type furiously what came to my mind. While I was writing I also checked on the Google for symptoms during an attack to be doubly sure.
Here they are
If you have never been diagnosed with heart disease but develop any of the following symptoms, consider the possibility that you have angina. Make an appointment with your doctor, and arrange for a cardiac screening as soon as possible.
• Chest pain that comes with physical exertion and eases with rest.
• Chest pain that is brought on by emotional stress.
• New or unusual shortness of breath-if you suddenly find you're winded after climbing a flight of stairs when you used to be able to take the same flight of stairs in stride, for example.
• Indigestion, particularly if indigestion is unusual for you, if it does not respond to antacids, or if you do not associate its occurrence with eating.

Talk about being well prepared or simply put – paranoia. This paranoia drives me to be insured and fill in my mediclaim checks on time.
But write I must and it has given me more meaning. I hope someday it will give Jispa some meaning. Hopefully I live enough to have some ‘life chats’ with Jispa. Hopefully she likes them and doesn’t get bored of them. She is growing up fast and she is likely to get actively disinterested in her dad’s voice.
Just the other day I was at this new hair salon at king’s circle getting my hair cut for 99 bucks. I was trying this new place and I feel that at 99 itself I am overpaying but my good old men’s saloon I think is now losing it ... finally. Its getting sad by the day and the AC might not work or the guys cutting are really not up to mark. But at 99 this place called hair expresso by Javed Habibi (I think)is still better than some other salons in the area that charge more than this. So at this place I walked in to see a bare bone salon, nicely simple though. A middle aged guy around 45 plus or so was getting his hair cut along with a girl and another person. A decent mix. The girl was quite finicky and a little unsure about herself and the cut she was getting. Afterwards I realised that the guy was her dad and her dad was reassuring her ‘beta, it’s ok and trust the hair stylist. She knows her job’. I couldn’t help wondering, would I ever take Jispa when she older for a hair cut. Would she want me around? I guess not. The odds are way off. From my side and hers. And even if I am around to foot the bill, I am not likely (I hope not) to interfere in her conversation with her stylist. But it’s interesting how the city has moved. From an exclusive mens and womens domain which the salons used to be, now we can have daddy and beti getting a cut side by side. Some trivia – I think Jispa’s first hair cut was done while she was around two and she sat on my lap at the time.
I don’t know when the umbilical cord gets detached and by whom and in which respects / situations. Sometimes I like to be attached to my daughter and sometimes not. Ditto for her. These days Jispa is getting extra attached before sleeping. She insists that one of us puts her to sleep. Why is that? I have to sleep beside her and read or at least sit beside her with my legs on her bed and read or at the very least sit around the room. It funny. We wonder why she regresses into these demands from time to time. And I don’t know what to do. Be the doting father who agrees or be the guy who says ‘ grow up kid’. Jasmine has given up on trying to stop me. I always get up and give in. I like it myself, but I always bargain with her that tomorrow she would have to sleep. So yesterday she said that tomorrow I will sleep on my own.... she then added a line saying... I don’t know what will happen day after tomorrow. A daughter of a banker will always add a disclaimer I guess. Fine print!

the only song that i have found, ever since you....

Houston, we have a problem.
Jispa has been active on the ‘taking part in school activities’ circuit. We encourage her to take part in sports, elocution and everything else. We take her elocution seriously and decide eth poetry for Hindi and English elocutions well before the announcement. Typically the lead is always lower so jasmine and I figured it meant sense to be prepared at the start for the year. This way she can learn the poetry by heart and be ready with all the drama. Earlier in the year the English elocution was done and now she is ready for the Hindi elocution competition.
A few days back she comes in and says as a matter of fact, ‘hey, I gave my name for the singing competition in school.’ ‘huh? Singing. Errrr. Ok’. I looked at my wife in disbelief. Singing? I am prone to drama but singing has always been a no no. I have wanted to sing, I never knew how to sing. I can’t understand singing. I for sure can’t teach singing. “Why Jispa? Why did you give your name for singing?” I asked her. As sweet as I could muster up. “I thought you would be happy, she said”. “oh yes. We are happy. Very very happy.” What else could I say. IDIOT... I and your mom have NO CLUE on singing. We never sang ever. We ran away from simple picnic singing. When I open my mouth, I bray. You know there is this one singer or is it composer of eth yesteryears called Chandu Atma or something. Since he was a Sindhi and my college was a Sindhi college, he was called to college to take a lecture demonstration of singing. He came with his harmonium on a Sunday Afternoon for the class. Since I was one of the committee guys I too was there. He was teaching the guys to sing. Luckily as a whole group. I remember him looking at me when we were all singing. I think he was a bit amused that I came to the class. He singled me out from 30 kids singing together. I WAS that bad.
We are such a non singing household that we have one really cheap two in one for a music system at home. The servant puts it on while cleaning the vessels. When I am in for dinner at the time, I switch it off as it sounds pretty bad. Jasmine likes to sing in private, actually make that PRIVATE. I typically don’t know any wordings, nor any tune. I hum away most of the time to irritate people.
So in the background of all that “that’s great Jispa. Its a good thing you participated”. ‘yes dad, now you have to teach me for the competition.” “oh ok. will figure”. What on earth man. We have a problem. Jasmine is looking at me for ideas. Ok. ok. lets think simple songs. What is it that she can sing that is ridiculously simple. Simple words and simple tune. Any body singing it would sound good. A ha... do re me? Nopes not that says Jasmine. YES, I got it. There is another one. Queserasera, what ever will be will be, the future is not ours to see,.... that one is ridiculously simple. Real simple and easy. We download it on the computer, download the lyrics as well. now that wasn’t so tough.
Till yesterday when she comes back from school and says – no ‘do re mi’ and ‘queserasera’, those are tuning songs, not real songs. You have to sing a real song. Oh shit. They have obviously wisened up to us. Now what. So back to me thinking about real simple songs.. I jogged my memory to the days while I was in the fourth grade. We had once a week music class. There the brother would have a guitar and teach the whole class to sing. Now what were the songs we learnt. One was ‘we shall overcome’ and the other was ‘karma chameleon’ and one was ‘I just called to say I love you’. One was too slow, other too long or too difficult.
While I was at it, I learnt that ‘we shall overcome was a resistance song. I couldn’t but help thinking that for a song so anti establishment, the govt of India itself, converted the song into hindi ‘hum honge kamayab’ and blared it down the only government owned entertainment channel, while I was growing up. I guess they wanted to apportion it but before any other rebel could. Possibly the congress wanted to show itself as a rebel that was the establishment. Funny nah? It doesn’t make sense.
Then I tried to remember the good old days (around the fourth / fifth grade) we kids from the area had formed a club. A really nice idea that went crazy. We got together to organise activities, contests, contribute jointly for the bat and balls, annual plays etc etc. Simple cheap free stuff. We even all donated books towards the library. At the time we also had singing contests. I think the club membership swelled to a max strength of 40 kids ranging from 5 to 20 year olds. It ended when one guy came in and brought in a lot of rules, processes, wrote the manifesto or something, brought discipline and order, recorded minutes... I might be unfair and the club probably dissolved as the kids grew older, but the guy did try his best to ‘institutionalise’ the club.
At the singing competition I remember one song was particularly popular amongst the girls. Yes. That one was simple to sing as well. That one would do. A google search threw it up in youtube. The song I am referring to is ‘I am on top of the world, looking down on creation and the only....’. It’s a song by carpenters. I couldn’t care less. I downloaded it and now loaded it on my cell phone and on Jasmine’s music player. The lyrics are easy as well. When I made Jispa hear it, she was like’ ya sure. It’s simple. It’s like jingle bells’. Exactly. I can teach you jingle bells at best.
So now hopefully that’s the song she will sing and I will be done with this singing competition. What a real mess. Jasmine and I were talking to each other – well at least this shows that she likes going on stage and is not afraid. It’s a good thing. As Jispa later told me, she gave her name as she likes singing as well. Good. Do well. Making you listen to it on the car deck is as best as I can ever hope to do.
Here you listen to it as well. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crWGGy2oBT0

lead by not

Brrrr. The water is cold and it’s given me a brain freeze. I have no clue why I like to torture myself. I restarted swimming after a longish break. I thought I missed the cold winter by bunking swimming in December. Jispa’s vacations are a great excuse to sleep late, wake up late and bunk swimming. But by the time its over I am itching to get back into routine. One breakfast before going and one after swimming, in office. The more I eat the leaner I get. It’s quite a weird thing. Swimming barely ten minutes in the morning has amazing health benefits. Restarting today after a long time was tough but when you get in the pool you have no option but to continue swimming. It will take me a week or so to get back to rhythm. While I swim I sorely miss not having learnt any sport professionally. None.
Its one thing that we keep giving Jispa. A chance to learn as much as possible, professionally. It different from giving a chance to play. A lot of kids get a lot of chances to play a lot of sports, but I have learnt the huge benefits of learning properly. Techniques must be honed from start. Her swimming is infinitely better than mine and she beats the shot out of me already. We had started her badminton till the time came where it clashed with her swimming and she had to stop it. She learns guitar as well. And her school teaches her taekwondo. After all that she still wishes to learn more. Squash in the gymkhana has a long wait list, so we just entered her name for the training a year or so ago. Last week, she got a call for the Saturday Sunday class that was newly set up for beginners. Great. Jasmine asked me about it with a clear disclaimer that I was responsible for this one. She was not going to be the one ferrying Jispa on Saturday or Sunday. I was ok. I probably would use the chance to catch up on TV or possibly jog a bit on the tread mill. I am it. Its an odd 2 o clock time, but we’ll figure. Its not like we are going to be super regular on weekends. Also we figure if she picks it decent enough, squash is a game I could play with her afterwards as well. So there, one more class that’s started.
Sometimes we wonder what on earth is going one. Aren’t these too many classes? Too much for a little thing? I don’t know really. Jasmine’s thinking is simple; while she is still in the second grade and she has time, go for it... afterwards, there would be far too many pressures on her thanks to school and studies to really have multiple interests. For me, I don’t know. I have a simple metric. Is she enjoying it? Does she want o do it or does she complain about it. We don’t push her into being a super woman. We keep asking her and she keeps saying yes. Till that is happening all seems well. and it’s just a bit of sport. She is not competing professionally in these. Also the big thing that other people don’t realise is that, Jispa doesn’t have a TV. That’s the big one. Also her dad and mom don’t have a TV as well. So all that time that a family spends watching TV is being spent playing. And instead of playing outside, she is learning sports. What’s wrong with that?
Yesterday while she was at squash, I put on my trained blank look. I don’t smile at her or laugh at her antics or teach her anything while she is at the court. Sometimes when she does something she looks at us. Jasmine was smiling. I told Jasmine not to smile back. Just be blank. Sport is played inside the mind, internal. You have to have your game from inside and not play it for anyone else. Just focus on the ball and your technique. While the coach was teaching her to swing the racquet, I broke the cardinal rule. Jispa looked at me and I motioned her to correct her technique. She swung and looked back again. I became more animated in my swinging. Jasmine immediately asked me what I was doing. I mumbled some excuse, scientific sounding. But then immediately I saw he distracted. I apologised. That was wrong. Just shut up. Trust the coach. He knows what he is doing. Jispa knows what the coach is telling. It’s between her and the coach. The coach is far better than me and understands how to teach kids.
I am not even trained in squash, nor am I an expert in coaching. I only know Jispa from birth but it gives me no expertise in teaching her squash. So that’s’ a valuable lesson for me. Shut up and watch.
I think when put in a position of power we love to influence it. Even if we are not equipped to. Suddenly we start talking, correcting, coaching, motivating and the worst of all... leading. This is a malaise I have and I have to deal with it. I have tried many times to control it. I have many times now succeeded but I have far too many times, failed. Miserably. In cricket I try and not lead. I try and not coach. In office also I try to give way. But you know the flip of it. So many people want people in power to lead. They want you to motivate them. Give them direction. They want you to show them LIGHT. It’s funny. I have faced more resistance to not leading than to leading, or even equal, but never less. Is it because we are as a nation a bit still immature. We still have the highest deference to authority, we are always subjugated. From school itself, do our teachers brow beat us into ‘I told you so’. Or we as leaders have inculcated it. We cut off the heads of those that stand, make life difficult for them. There is a value to toeing one line, but before we all decide to toe it, do we think enough for ourselves. Do we add value to the conversation. Do we actively listen when someone lower in rank dissents? These are questions I ask of myself as much I ask of others. It has been tough for me. But somewhere I need to keep in mind that I must lead by actively ‘NOT LEADING’. That’s the best way, the only way. Power must not be misused is understood, what is less understood, is that power must not be used at all. That is true power. You merely feel the influence of it. Deep nah?

you have to live it to know it

Budha kaka fudina compound or fudina ark. The magic medicine that is essentially the essence of mint. A green coloured liquid with the heady taste of mint mixed with alcohol; it makes for a multipurpose medicine. It was introduced to us by my maternal granny. A few drops mixed with water were the simple solution for almost anything from cuts to stomach disorder.
I was a pretty weak kid with a fragile constitution. I would get the loosies or would vomit quite frequently. This was especially the case when we shifted to Mumbai from Dubai while I was in the fourth standard. It was always a part of the standard medical kit that my family carried on our vacations. I must in total, over my life guzzled litres of the medicine. A retching followed by the cool effect of the medicine. So far it has proved an able ally for our family over the years. Don’t bother searching for it on Google. This really invisible medicine guy is nowhere to be found on the internet. I find that really funny, for a medicine that had saved me from many a hardship.
There are two types of people, one that vomit without too much fuss, and the other that gets a violent shake while attempt to throw out what the body finds unwanted. Sadly I belong to the latter. My vomits have been a complete body shaking affair. My stomach cramps up and recoils in the act. I am thrown back and in case of a particularly bad case, I even fall down by the recoil. This happens in a bad attack of malaria, or a stomach disorder or even on a winding hill road. It’s crazy and one has to live it to understand it. I have had the misfortune of being on the wrong side on frequency and intensity. Quite a bad one.
As a child most of the time while I puked, my parents would constantly pat me on the back trying to ease the process. My legs would bang up and down and my body would move violently and my stomach would hurt as hell. They tried their best to comfort me. Come adulthood and I had to deal with this myself. This violent struggle would be my test of growing up. Would I be able to do it alone? Whenever Jasmine would be around, she would try to hang around, but blessed as she was with a decent constitution and a simple retch, I don’t think she ever understood what I went through. She’d be lost and wonder what was happening to me. The standard pat on the back would follow.
The other day I was in Delhi for an event and in the evening, at the airport, making my way back I had a bad case of food poisoning. Luckily the toilets have improved in the new terminals across India and while the feeling may not be great, at least you have clean toilets and tissue and water and soap. Luckily I had a colleague travelling with me as well, as nothing stayed in my tummy. Not even the water I had before takeoff. Vomiting in an air sickness bag, while being strapped to your seat, during takeoff was up there with my top ten worst situations to be in. The poor collegue next to me could help much except, yup, you guessed it right, pat on the back; while I shoved my head into the bag. I can vouch for the quality of the bags now for sure. Not a single leak. I got off at Mumbai to run to the loo and was sitting on the floor after the act.
Jispa has been pretty ok with her constitution as well. She hasn’t had the chance to retch too much. She doesn’t seem to get motion sickness and she by and large seems to have her mother’s health as of now. Yesterday night she woke us up at 3.45 am, urgently saying that she wanted to vomit. As she went to the loo, I woke up as well. I heard her and it did not sound too good. She was sounding similar to me. A bad cramp and a violent noise. I knew instantly what to do. So while she was sitting, I first got her water (that is the first essential), then I sat behind her and held her tight. One hand over her right shoulder and the other from under her left shoulder in a compact hold. When I throw up I have always found it difficult to focus my energies on staying up straight and not falling out. Typically all strength goes away from the hand and legs in an effort to control the stomach. This way I could firmly hold her steady while she throws up and comfort the stomach and back as well. and then give my head over the shoulder for her to lean her head against mine and relax her head as well. I knew exactly what she needed there.
Deed done, a dose of Budha kaka fudina ark and a glass of water and off you go to sleep. Oh I have been there many times. Enough to know what’s the feeling like. I asked Jispa if she liked how I held her. Yup. It was good, came the reply. Of course. Thats what fathers are meant for. We go though this shit many times in the hope that at the least, we can empathise when our kids go through it, try and blunt it and at best try and avoid a repeat. As I learnt from my childhood, puking is a good thing, body throws out the waste and it’s still better than most other diseases. There is little you can do except hold your muscles and bear it. Also going by my experience, this violence will last even into adulthood. I might not be there with her always but I hope if Jispa’s partner ever reads this post... something can learnt and used.
Last update – the medicine seemed to have held. Jispa is recovering. It might be a one off case.