Digested, Discarded....

Just a little time back a small news item made its way into local magazines. Reader's Digest was filing for bankruptcy and was on the verge of closure. It just made my eyebrows a little but I was not really surprised. Read it here.
Reader's Digest was my favorite reading material for a long time. It always motivated you, inspired you and made you think. It was not exactly a self help mag but what could rather be called a reality guide. It didn't ask you to do things to do better in life or even live a happier life, but told inspiring stories of those people who fought impossible odds and achieved all these.
I was so fanatic about RD that when I was in college I collected all past issues of RD dating back to the 60's from roadside book stalls selling second hand books. And I didn't regret spending my meagre pocket money on that.
Once I got hold of a copy there was no putting it down till I was through. The stories of other people in far away lands seemed to happen right in front of my eyes, so mesmerising the language was.
There were stories of people who had insufferable physical disabilities and how they beat the odds, ordinary people who achieved great feats or performed amazing tasks with just hidden inner strength as armor. There was entertainment too, with lots of word games, quizzes and puzzles and the inevitable jokes sections.
If anyone of you is/was a fan of RD I need not describe more.
Then I sensed the quality of RD declining. It was as if there was nothing more for them to write, or as if all the good writers had left RD lock, stock and barrel. The only stories they ever told was of people lost in some blizzard or some person fighting some animal in the Arctic wilderness, or surviving a dangerous avalanche or snowstorm. These stories I could not relate to, but RD kept repeating the theme again and again till you got dead bored.
I have never seen snow in my life and I could not visualize what agonies some person was undergoing in sub zero temperature. But what piqued me was that RD started having little variety from then on.
Late into my twenties I stopped reading RD completedy save for a copy or two a year, and even then I felt I was not missing anything much. RD had already dug its own grave.
And finally came the story of the collapse of the great RD.

Serpentine Tales

My Dad has been catching snakes for as long as I know. Not the usual snakes, but the more venomous types like the Krait, Viper and the occasional Cobra.
If you think he's the equivalent of the typical village snake catcher who is called when a snake is spotted in the village, then you are wrong. With a Masters in Zoology he knows the in and out of snakes, or for that matter most animals, birds, flora and fauna found in the Indian wilderness.
I remember during my childhood, his field trips to the jungles with school students whom he taught and I was totally awed when he returned with a catch of a venomous snake at times.
The unfortunate reptile would then most probably end up preserved in formalin solution, its jaws kept wide open with a pair of clips exposing evil fangs; or be skinned of its shiny hide and stretched out on pins hammered into a wooden plank.
He caught a lot of snakes, and surprisingly was never bitten by one.
Fearing that I too might have the idea of following his footsteps, he told me once, to never attempt to try to catch a snake, venomous or not.
As for me I am frightened of snakes, to tell the truth. The sight of a mere rat snake sends shivers through my spine and I can't distinguish a rat snake from a cobra!
Snake catchers are rare, and the fame of my Dad's snake catching skills spread far and wide wherever we stayed especially since we lived in snake infested areas. He was on call whenever a snake was spotted, but Dad only watched out for the poisonous sort. Armed with just sticks, he would incapacitate a snake with one hit behind the head and with another stick kept the snake's tail from flailing back at him in a whip like action.
Though I watched him several times doing this(mostly in semi darkness), the action was too quick for my eyes to discern so I cannot divulge the exact snake catching technique to would-be snake catchers who might be encouraged.
Once I had a talk with Dad about this snake catching business. I told him that snakes, venomous or not never attacked unless provoked (which was of course what I learnt from my schoolbooks :-D ). But Dad was adamant about one thing: snakes were not welcome where humans dwelled; they had to be got rid off.
One hilarious occasion occured on a Nag panchami day. This is the day when snakes are worshipped in many parts of North India and some parts of the South.
A King Cobra was spotted near the front door of our local Doctor's residence. My Dad was on a visit to a nearby house and on coming to know of the perilous discovery, prepared himself for one more serpentine encounter.
When he reached the doctor's house, a strange sight met his eyes. The Doctor's wife (who was also a teacher at the local school) was standing in front of the upright cobra, her hands folded in prayer, and a platter with vermillion and milk on the ready. No, she told my Dad, she wouldn't allow him to catch or kill the snake. It was Nag Panchami day and the appearance of the snake was a miracle!
Later, Dad told this story many a time to his friends,and us, and had a good laugh at the poor lady's expense. Superstition still held, even though the person was a teacher, and that too a Doctor's wife!

The Medicine Man

Venu was one of the three compounders of the hospital in the industrial colony where I spent most of my life. This unassuming guy had a very special skill when it came to medical knowledge. He knew exactly which medicine treated which ailment best; what could be the possible side effects; and his encyclopedic knowledge far exceeded those of any of the doctors who served at the hospital.
I would say his way with medicine and illness came from a gut instinct and not from any medical course of study since he was not even a matriculate.
It was rumored that he once practised as a "doctor" (cum midwife) in some remote village in the hinterlands and it was there he brushed up his medical skills to finesse.
Venu was also my close friend. By some strange coincidence he always happened to be on night duty at the hospital, the nights before I had my crucial graduate exams. Those days I used to stay up late at nights and to break the montony made a casual visit to the dispensary. Venu played the genial host by pilfering some of the resident doctor's imported filter tipped cigarettes from the locked drawer in the consultation room (which was a welcome change from my cheap filterless cigarettes that I offered him).
Once in a while, he brought out some antacid pep fizz from the dispensary store and we both had our equivalent of pepsi at hospital cost of course!
While we both puffed guiltily at the cigarette sticks, Venu, more at ease, would recount the latest rumor in the colony. Working in a colony hospital exposes you to all sorts of people and you get to hear the strangest tales from the myriad of people who come in daily. Many of those who reported ill were hypochondriacs. It seems their unhappiness with life gave them all kinds of imaginary ills ranging from stomachaches and backaches to chronic headaches, and Venu realised that rather than seeing a shrink they would feign physical ills. He would try to lighten their load asking some inquisitive question that he could later share with some other visitor for a few laughs. Most of these guys poured out the woes to the patient Venu; and the grouses they had against their superiors, their wives or the guy next door.
So Venu was a walking encyclopaedia of not only medicine, but the who's who and what and when of the colony!
The doctor who served at the hospital was one of the greedy types and he had a special arrangement with the private medical store that was just a short walk away from the hospital. The doc had a habit of prescribing costly antibiotics or anti-virals for the most common of ills, which would not be available at the dispensary and for which the poor patient would have to shell out a good amount of money at the medical store. Of course, it was Venu who spread the rumor(from reliable sources) that the good Doctor took heavy commissions from the medical store keeper in return for the favor. Venu even told patients to first see the doctor, then see him. He would then reduce the long list of medicines on the doctor's prescription to a shorter list and add some of his own. He sure had guts! But he was never wrong.
His treatment was highly effective and some of the patients came to the hospital only when Venu was around. Pregnant women made a beeline to him and he would dispense the best he knew of the do's and dont's of pregnancy.
For me, he was almost like the medicine men of lore for his treatment of illness had a magic touch to it. If it was just gut instinct, well then the voodoo men had that too!

Ulta Pulta Down South!

I copy below two separate snippets from two different female white bloggers on Kerala and its attire, that I chanced to come a long time ago, which I rediscovered today, which just proves how useful a photographic memory and GOOGLE can be! I apologise to these writers for anonymously harvesting their creativity but I am too greedy to let this opportunity pass :-)
The first one:

<chenoa>
I become more and more jealous of the men, who wear lungis, a long piece of cloth that is wrapped around the waist and worn as a long skirt. They usually fold up the bottom and tuck it into the waist, though, which provides a nice breeze. So while the women are wearing churidars (the pants and long shirts and shawls), the men wear lungis and show their legs. A bit different than the United States.
So have a good weekend and write if you have any questions!
</chenoa>


<sharell>
Ah, Kerala, the land of meeshas (moustaches) and mundus (sarong type cloth wrapped around the waist and worn like a skirt, similar to a dhoti).
The men of Kerala are constantly readjusting their mundus — folding them, draping them, and refolding them.
The mundu is particularly practical when walking through water during the monsoon season. No need to worry about getting the bottoms of your pants wet, just do a quick fold-up of the mundu, and you’re good to go!
However, in hot weather, the length of the mundu often becomes quite short, as the men folk aim to get some air flow to their nether regions.
While I was down Kerala way recently, I heard a joke. How do you know when the temperature is going to be extremely hot in Kerala? When the government issues a ban on the wearing of mundus. Hardy har har.
</sharell>

The original posts here, in case you are interested->

http://www.pcusa.org/missionconnections/letters/yav/yav_stockc_0411.htm
http://www.whiteindianhousewife.com/2009/06/india-photo-you-know-its-hot-in-kerala-when/

I would advise anybody to read the entire articles linked above, and yes, go through the commentary if you please!

Innocence Lost??

I always wondered what differentiates the offspring of Indian diaspora who opt to make a living in such far flung places as the Middle East; countries in unstable but oil rich countries in Africa such as Nigeria and Sierra Leone. I suspect one of the subconscious goals of expatriate Indians is to secure the future of their children.
Who else, but the son of an expatriate NRI can boast of driving an imported car by the time he is just out of his teens, or secure a prized seat in a prestigious college?
But what are the long term effects on the children? I don't think their parents gave much thought to this when they opted to fly off to alien lands.
The children confined to the airconditioned rooms of their flats miss out on the innocent pleasures of childhood. I know of children reared up in the middle east afraid of letting their feet touch sand! It is anathema to them, used as they are to the smooth floors of their dwellings, the carpeted cars that transport them to wherever they wish to and the marbled schooling institutions where they spend much of their time.
No playing with sand, no experiments with water and clay, no breath of fresh air outside their confined spaces!
Innocence lost!
Everyman poses an interesting observation - one he made on his sojourn to Saudi Arabia a few years back-
<quote>
The times arent changing, we are just getting smarter at an earlier age. But would that make us duller at an earlier age too? I wonder...
</quote>
The full post here
http://everymansdiary.blogspot.com/2007/02/just-kidding.html

Validating the sex field- FUN at work

It was a boring day at the office. We were doing some validation stuff on a couple of web pages. The team clown was doing some UI work on a page that had a textfield asking the user to enter his/ her sex. The valid options were Male, Female, Not Applicable.
The validation stuff done, the clown was trying to come up with an error message to display to the user on invalid entry.
"Sex is required", he muttered to himself.
The team wit laughed out loud and repeated, "Of course, SEX is required!".
The clown then said, how about "Sex is mandatory?"
"Yeah", echoed the wit, "SEX is mandatory."
Now we were all in splits.
Suddenly the team whiz came running into the cubicle with breaking news. "The requirements have changed. Sex is no longer mandatory, it is optional."
We all cried out loud in unision. "Of course, SEX is not required, it is optional."
So much for boring work hours.

Passport to Gaol

It was during my last month at my gig in Germany that I got an urgent mail from my brother saying that my father wanted to talk to me on an important issue.
A bit puzzled, I called India after work, from the office phone (the money for phone calls was deducted from my salary by the shrewd German overseer).
The first thing my father wanted to know was whether I had applied for my passport twice. I was bewildered. No, I replied. My father went on to inform me that the local police had come a-visting twice to my home in Kerala wanting to know whether I had committed the crime of applying twice for a passport.
I didn't take the matter too seriously at that moment. I was convinced it was a routine blunder by the police which they are so bound to make. I told my father I was sure this was some bureaucratic blunder and would sort itself out.
When I returned home to India, the police came visiting again. I was not at home. They informed my father that I had applied for a passport twice and they wanted to investigate. My father called me on my mobile and I talked to the police person who quizzed me on my passport number and other details. With a straight face I told him all I could. Then, a bit annoyed, I retorted, saying they were the people who had my passport details on their records and that I found it strange them asking me about it.
The policeperson was not impressed.
A few weeks later I got a letter from the regional passport office saying that they would have to confiscate my existing passport since I had committed the crime of applying for a passport twice. I made two trips all the way to the passport office at the State headquarters and met the passport officer in charge who said that the police had reported that two attempts were made to secure passports and the law would follow course. I even showed him a copy of the application letter that I had written out for the passport and tried to make him understand that I had no interest and no valid reason for filling out a second application. All this fell on deaf ears.
The next time the police came a hunting (again I was out) my Dad shelled out a couple of hundred rupees. The policeman realising that nothing more could be gained from this venerable looking gentleman quietly took the money and left.
There ended the mystery of the double passport applications.
The strange tale did not end there.
While waiting for my train home at Kochi railway station I found myself sitting next to a middle aged man. He was just on his way back from the regional passport office at Kochi. And he had a tale to tell similar to mine. He had been in the middle east for a good many years and when his passport was about to expire, applied for a fresh one. But he was now charged with illegally applying for a passport twice. And he faced the same punishment - confiscation of his passport.
But he said with determination - "I am ready to go to court on this matter, but I shall not bribe a policeman to get things sorted out." Brave words from an Indian, in a land where court cases are prolonged to no end and are a waste of both time energy and will power.
what other ways would these goons come up with, I wondered, to make a few extra bucks?