Yesterday as an eventful day.
I got up reluctantly to go play badminton. I like playing
but I also realsie that if I don’t get enough seep I should be sleeping nd not
playing sport. I think sacrificing sleep and going for fitness is a recepie for
disaster. So I always try and get my sleep first and play later. But hell,
Jispa also takes the opportunity to go to the gym when I go for badminton.
Those are the alternate days on which they don’thave their swim and so it works
out really well.
I took her to the gymkhana and suddenly while stepping out
of the car she was in severe pain. What happened? She jammed the door on
herself. Huh? Ya. Only Jispa can do that. She jammed the car close on her own
finger. Oh dear, it was bad and the finger was blue. We ran up to the ice
machine and got her finger in a glass full of ice. Now the eternal question –
should I fuss over her and take her home or should I play the game while she
waits on the sidelines with her finger.
The father in me wanted to play the gaem but the husband in
me knew, that would be trouble when I get home. Jasmine would have fired me for
letting her daughter hang around in pain while I played badminton. I told Jispa
that we can go home. She was ok to let me play but still, I have been more
years a husband than a father. I have been trained well on what to do. I went
back.
In the afternoon another incident happened. I got free lunch
at the restaurant SodaBottleOpenerwala. Yup. That is a name of restaurant. It serves
Parsi cuisine. I called up Jasmine and told her – “you know there is good news.
I got free lunch today”. “Why” she asked. Err… “That’s the bad news.”. She then
guessed “they served you lactose food”. “no, Because they served me prawn curry”.
“and you ate it?”. “Yes” I replied. “I ordered for the veg Parsi curry and the
waiter got the curry. I started eating it and I was thinking about the fact
that it has no vegetables but only chewy soya bullets. (I am still cringing). I
even offered it to my friend who is also a vegetarian and she also ate it thinking
its soya. Then I saw the distinctive shape of the prawn and I asked the waiter –
what is this? He looked at it and pat came the reply – its prawns. And then he
freezes for a second and looks at me and says – you ordered veg. Then he runs
into the kitchen and comes back and tells me that I had ordered veg but the
cook screwed up and he is getting the manager. The manager came and apologized.”
Ok. I ate what I thought was an ugly prawn dish. I was
holding my head in my hand. What would my reaction be? Should I scream and
shout? Should I break his head, should I demand a free meal... for life? Should
I throw a fit? I just looked at my friend and we looked at each other and were
wondering what to do. I simply told him, that go away for a minute and I just
took stock of all the thoughts that were racing in my mind. Ok. I had the prawns.
It’s not that I have a huge issue with non veg. I have no religion that went
kaput, I had no belief that were altered. It’s ok. It’s a human mistake. It’s
just that prawns look yucky and they feel yucky to eat. It’s a full body that
went inside my mouth and I can feel the crunchy chewy feeling.
So I simply called the guy and asked him to take the food
away. He wanted to replace the food. I was in no mood to eat anything else. I asked
for fresh lime to wash the feeling. Hahah… now that I say it, fresh lime juice,
sweet and salty, less sweet is my ganga jal which washed away the sins of
eating it. Haha. What to do with the waiter. Its human error. Can really fault
him for this. That’s why some of my friends and their parents who have huge issues
eating non veg even accidently don’t go to the places that serve non veg. that’s
why they go to vegetarian only restaurants.
In Mumbai there is a huge market for veg only places and the
same is replicated across India. Veg only is a big thing that is extremely
important to the vegetarians. Such risks are something they are not happy
taking. So now when I look at them and wonder and ask them – why… I know the
answer. It’s a question of risk which is unacceptable. Like I was explaining to
my friends in office. Its ok to get this once in a while. I go to non veg
joints and order veg food. I get the pleasure of eating at different places. In
all these years it’s only normal and very very statistically probable that I would
get one instance of non veg in error. The world doesn’t work with six sigma
efficiency, which also allows of 3.4 defects per million. And with India having
1.3 billion people and also many trying to be vegetarian and a subset of them
eating veg at non veg places, the odds are that you will get prawns in your
lifetime. Now that I got it and the waiter and the manager as well the cook
skipped a heartbeat, they will be more careful the next time – the follow up
odds of them screwing up are lesser and then will have to wait for one more
million people to eat from their hands for another 3.4 errros to creep in –
that is if they are at 6 sigma.
If they are working at less then, more will happen. So why
get angry at them. They were only trying to do their job. Possibly the cook
needs glasses and is not rich enough or educated enough to get them. Possibly the
waiter should be trained for checking the food against the order. Possibly the
manager must make checklist of the food every time. The management must
constantly train for this and every time this happens a root cause analysis must
be done and the process must be fixed. Possibly all of this must happen and I am
100% sure that none of this happens and yet I eat… continue to eat here. And
hence IT IS ME WHO IS TO BLAME FOR THE CONSEQUENCES. Why should I then scold
the guy? Why?
