Oh, Those Coloured Bits Of Paper!

Stamp collecting is dying a slow painful death, or for all I know, already dead, as the world made a total shift from snail mail to electronic email. I do agree that the convenience of email is a million times more than the older system but oh, my mind so wistfully wanders to the days of snail mail and the joys of stamp collecting when I see the occasional envelope with the inevitable stamps pasted on it, a rarity these days.
The only way to expand your stamp collection these days is to subscribe to your postal service's philatelic bureau or buy them straight from a shop which may not be stamps in the true sense really, just some postal service of some exotic country trying to make some money by printing bits of paper and placing a careful seal on it.
I remember the first shot in the arm to my stamp collection when my uncle who was a store supervisor at the Matsusthita Electric (now called Panasonic Corporation), himself an avid stamp collector in his heydays, handed me all the stamps from his collection of a thousand, of which he had more than one copy. The store he worked at was an intermediary ware house of electronic goods from Japan from where they were shipped to all corners of the world mostly in South, South East and South West Asia. Naturally they had a lot of snail mail, and it was from these that he extracted the colourful bits of paper that reflected so much a country's culture and heritage not to speak of it's history and natural resources.
The next big boost came when I requested one of my uncles in the Sultanate of Oman who was a teacher at the governmental ministry of education, to send me some Omani stamps if he had any. Much to my joy, he went one step further and requested the students in his class to contribute any stamps they could get hold on, for his nephew. The oil boom in full swing, the students who were from all parts in the middle east from Syria to Lebanon, and from Pakistan to Qatar, diligently collected stamps and handed them over to my uncle.
My uncle took the pain to stuff all these in an envelope once in three months and posted them to me; and I had the additional bonus of getting hold of some really grand Omani stamps on the outer envelopes too.
Mind you, stamp collecting is not just tearing stamps off the cover and putting them in an album. For starters, let me explain. You first soak the stamp attached to the piece of envelope to which it is still stuck, in lukewarm water for about five minutes. By the time the gum loosens itself and the stamp comes loose. You need to dry the stamp by pressing them between two water absorbing paper sheets and apply light pressure on them at the same time.(This prevents the stamps from shrivelling as they dry). At the same time you need to make sure that the stamps that you have just peeled do not get stuck to the paper you have placed on which to dry, by shifting them to another paper pad in a reasonable time period. Since I didn't have access to blotting paper this task was the most challenging. And the golden rule: wash your hands with soap before handling stamps, they do have a tendency to attract a lot of dust, especially when wet.
I hope you now appreciate the effort that goes into building a decent stamp collection!
I have a particular grouse againt stamps from the USA, the problem being that the US postal systems use very strong adhesive and this causes the stamp to tear when you try to separate from the envelope. And since mutilated stamps lower the total value of your collection, I mostly discarded them.
And one more tip - if you wanted your stamp collection to increase manifold in a reasonable time, God's own land, Kerala, the land of expatriates was the place to be. Here almost every household had at least one or two bread winners working in some alien land; Indians being attached to their homeland, they frequently communicated with their family by air mail.
I remember, as a child of ten, going to random houses, asking puzzled householders whether they had any letters from abroad, with those precious bits of coloured paper stuck on them, that I could add to my collection.
Some grandmothers/ grandparents who were sometimes the only residents of the palatial expatriate houses , became suspicious of my request and wondering whether stamps were actually worth real money, started refusing to part with stamps, envelope and all!
I still have my treasured stamp collection, a bit less in number, countlessly pilfered by enthusiastic kids who visit our house after glancing through my collection, but all the same, more or less intact.

The Joy Of 'R' and 'R' without the agony of the third 'R'

As a young child, I had a lot of reading material available. I gorged on every written word, from the child's magical world of Enid Blyton (I pronounced her Gnid Blyton those days coz of the strange way she signed her name and also thought she was a man), to adult stuff such as "The Blitz" and "The Illustrated Weekly" (then edited by the venerable Khushwant Singh - now defunct). The Phantom and Mandrake comics in The Times of India were a daily treat. I even remember my father trying to explain the wit behind the "I don't know Son!" cartoon series that appeared in the Blitz but it didn't make much sense to me at that time.
Spurred on by these wonderful writings and the magical world they created, I too was induced to try my hand at writing. I wrote a notebook full of stuff about a hero who was much like Tarzan except that he had a wife called Viola (my father suggested me that name when I bugged him to name the heroine of my story - Viola is a tropical flower and my father being a Post Graduate in Botany what better name could he suggest?). For my youngest brother who was seven years younger than me, I created a fictional character called "Supremo" who had a lot of magical powers at his behest and was more powerful than Mandrake and Phantom put together.
Another interesting thing I remember doing was writing general knowlege tests for my younger brother and our unsuspecting friend, Shishir, who was our neighbour as well as classmate. After that, like a real life teacher I would correct the answer papers and assign grades, till one day both my "subjects" got fed up of it and that was that.
We read Enid Blyton, Dr. Dolittle, Freddie and Flossie and then graduated to Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew books. I remember carrying a load of books as high as my head from the school library to my home during the summer vacations.
Once the school librarian decided that he would not issue books on summer holidays. But we snubbed him by approaching the school principal who gave us special permission to get books issued from the school library, holiday or not.
So enchanted was I with mysteries that once I begged my father to give me a mystery to solve. Non plussed he told me he had lost a bunch of keys, could I solve that mystery? Going by the book, I asked him to give me for some clues. When none came, I decided it was not much of a mystery after all.
Asterix and Tintin comics were such a glorious treat(as it is still now), that every time I re-read one, I found something I had missed in an earlier reading.
All this took place in my early primary school years.
As I passed on to higher classes, my interests shifted to encyclopedia, science books - especially the "Understanding Science" Series.
But I whipped up a masterpiece just before my final Secondary School Board Exams. I wrote a short story about two teenagers who solve the mystery of their kidnapped professor by alien forces. The story was printed in the childrens's section of a popular Central Indian magazine in serial form and I would have won instant fame, if just half the adults/ children who resided in our housing colony read magazines/ books.
In later years I was reduced to writing just an occasional letter to the editor of local newspapers. Now, after discovering blogging I find the a new found joy in penning all the mundane thoughts that come to my mind.

Denial of Death and the Recurring Spiral

Ever wondered why obese people prefer to to eat unhealthy food inspite of being warned of the dangers by a myriad of scientific reports?
Why people buy still more cars and fuel guzzling vehicles even as climate change is now a scientific fact?
Why sugary fizz drinks sell like hot cakes when diabetes is now a common modern malady?
Why people(including me) sit glued to their computer screens addicted to social networking sites when we all know that our modern sedentary lifestyle is bringing us one step closer to death?
Why alcohol addicts don't care a bit to where their broken life is heading to?
Why we deny ourselves the little bit of exercise that is needed to keep us healthy other than the fact that we are too lazy or find it stressful?
Why the majority of smokers and tobacco consumers in India still stick to their habits inspite of the products now being adorned by law with images of diseased lungs, ulcerous mouths, snake and scorpion logos?
Ernest Becker proposed an interesting theory.
To quote from an article:

In 1973 the cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker proposed that the fear of death drives us to protect ourselves with "vital lies' or 'the armour of character." We defend ourselves from the ultimate terror by engaging in immortality projects, which boost our self-esteem and grant us meaning that extends beyond death. More than 300 studies conducted in 15 countries appear to confirm Becker’s thesis. When people are confronted with images or words or questions that remind them of death they respond by shoring up their worldview, rejecting people and ideas that threaten it, and increasing their striving for self-esteem.
One of the most arresting findings is that immortality projects can bring death closer. In seeking to defend the symbolic, heroic self that we create to suppress thoughts of death, we might expose the physical self to greater danger. For example, researchers at Bar-Ilan University in Israel found that people who reported that driving boosted their self-esteem drove faster and took greater risks after they had been exposed to reminders of death.
...
A recent paper by the biologist Janis L. Dickinson, published in the Journal Ecology and Society, proposes that constant news and discussion about global warming makes it difficult to repress thoughts of death, and that people might respond to the terrifying prospect of climate breakdown in ways that strengthen their character armour but diminish our chances of survival.
There is already experimental evidence that some people respond to reminders of death by increasing consumption.
...
If Dickinson is correct, is it fanciful to suppose that those who are closer to the end of their lives might react more strongly against reminders of death?
...
And could it be that the rapid growth of climate change denial over the last two years is actually a response to the hardening of scientific evidence? If so, how the hell do we confront it?

The whole article, though it deals in length with climate change denial, could in a way explain many of mankind's "deviant" behavior and can be read here:
http://beta.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/article42833.ece
I don't say this is a proven scientific theory but a plausible hypothesis worth giving a thought to.

Hilarious story of an inter-state marriage by Chetan Bhagat

Well, here's another review of a Chetan Bhagat Book. Excuse me, but I never get tired of writing on him. This time it is "2 states", a possibly semi autobiographical part-fiction novel about an inter-state marriage - Punjabi vs Tamil.
The fact that the book is about the contrast between two states and not two religions is something that could well have avoided Chetan from being in the midst of a controvery and the probability of his book being banned -a la Taslima.
Chetan takes a hard dig at South Indians - in particular Tamil Brahmins, their traditions and their mentality, but I find it not a least bit offended, inspite of me being South Indianer. He balances this by making fun of Punjabis too - he has a Punjabi background.
You can of course take his opinions expressed through the book in good spirit, as he makes it known that he himself is married to a Tamil ex-classmate and expects his writings to be taken that way.
That Punjabi women come in two sizes - the overweight, obese elderly Pujabi women who tend to push wads of notes down their cleavage; and the young anaemic Punjabi girls who go for the zero size salwar kameez, is funny to read.
The strange rituals of Tamils, and South Indians in general is sometimes really weird, I agree, for I myself had the experience of being served water poured from a tumbler into a glass reserved for visitors, when I visited a Tamil Brahmin friend's house - to prevent the home from being desecrated by a non-Brahmin, probably a meat eating one too!
Chetan says South Indians have a love for rules, and feel safe when there rules to adhere too. I agree to that, but I also want to note that North Indians in general have a disdain for not only rules, but also the law and experience strange satisfaction in bending them, even breaking them.
That elderly south Indians tend to speak in monosyllables while addressing the not so old, and their great love for newspapers that they read from end to end, is a non-dispuatable fact. In fact Malayalees, be it the auto rickshaw driver or the filthy rich, go for the newspaper and do some heavy duty reading on local politics first thing in the morning.
And in fact I have several uncles, who when I go a visiting, say "sit", "come", "eat" - as if they were addressing an alsatian dog!
In all, a very wholesome book, that would satisfy a regular reader as well as an occasional one, thanks to the simple way in which he writes, and the fact that he writes not for a global audience, but an Indian one, who can relate well to what he writes, and have a good laugh at his black humor too - he claims he has sex with his wife for the sake of national integration! He brings out pretty well the contrast between South Indian vs North Indian culture and the mutual disdain these two groups have for each other.
Chetan is a man to watch out for, particulary after "5 point someone" was made into a box office hit, recently.

On Cerelac(R)(TM)

I feel a slight tinge of embarassment as I write this.
The whole of last week I was plagued with an intestinal infection that kept me away from work and made life in general miserable for me. My diet was restricted to bland food; any experiments with the more spicy foods resulted in a bad case of diarrhoea.
I thought I had managed well when all of a sudden a state wide hartal(non-Keralites: this is general term for a full fledged strike when every damned business puts down shutters and life comes to a total standstill).
Normally I would have been at my company office on such a day and it would have been business as usual. The office environs allow for meals, morning, night or day, hartal or no hartal.
Unfortunately I was holed up in my bachelors quarters far away from office when this particular hartal played out.
I had arranged for cigarettes the previous night, betting that the good old Anand Hotel would be open next day even if there was a bandh as they normally do(under police protection of course).
But my luck ran out. The hartal had been called by the party in power in the state, and that meant it was severe than usual.
I got up morning to find that even Hotel Anand had not dared to open up.
Now, I had these courses of strong antibotics to take, three times a day for my stomach agonies. Normally I can go without food for an entire day without getting any more tired or fatigued.
But that day before I took those damned antibiotics I had to get something into my stomach: I knew that, otherwise there would be serious trouble.
I went out, did some investigating and found that not even a tea shop had opened. The only shops that were open were medical shops. It seems the strike organizers at least had some pity for the sick.
I browsed through the contents of one such medical shop searching for something edible. They had cornflakes. I thought I could give that a shot. But when I asked for condensed milk to go with it, they said they didn't have any in stock.
That was when I noticed Cerelac (R) (TM) for infants 12 to 24 months. The blurb said this was stage 3 baby food and included vegetable extracts- "to encourage the child to chew". I decided to go for it, especially when the label read that it already contained powdered milk.
So anyways, I was passing a lot of baby like poo for the past few days, so I thought some more of it would do no harm.
I bought one for a hefty price, wondering how could neo mothers spend so much on baby food. :-)
Took it to my room, mixed it with sterilized water till it was thick and gooey(no, I could not arrange for any lukewarm water as the instructions demanded).
And the only thing that came to my mind as I consumed it was whether any of those doting mothers who so dutifully fed this stuff to their kids had ever tried tasting it!
Jeez, what things life makes you go through!

A Black Christmas For A Black

Long before I got into the high-tech business when I got to visit foreign countries and video-conferenced with White clientèle, I still had contacts with foreigners - yes, blacks, in Nagpur - who stayed in the same lodge where I had taken shelter during my college days.
I had one particular friend called Roy Nyale, a Kenyan, who I am afraid was not a very bright guy (hope he forgives me if he is reading this), but jovial, witty and fun-loving that made up for it. I often went over to his room and he gladly prepared a cup of black coffee spiked with lime juice and occasionally shared his meal of boiled potatoes and cabbage which was usually was all that he had for meals.
He also had a tendency to lose his cool once he had one too many, and one for the road, which I am afraid was quite often.
One experience I can't brush off from my mind happened several decades ago on Christmas eve.
Roy had a very muscular build not unlike Ben Johnson, the guy who doped his way to the Olympics gold medal around that time.
One night, after having visited the bar, Roy returned fully sodden and very uncool. He had an ongoing spite with a couple of Bihari students who shared the same lodgings, which was run by a Nagpur settled Rajasthani Rajput called Tomar. Roy went to this Bihari group's room and demanded the keys to the bike which belonged to one in this group. When they refused, not without reason considering that he was drunk beyond coherence, he started lambasting them in English. They locked themselves in and shouted obscenties at him in Hindi, which only enraged him further.
Roy got into a rage, grabbed hold of a window frame and with his immense strength pulled the frame right out of its hinges. The verbal harangue continued for another half an hour, till the venerable but loose tempered, short, but heavy weight Tomar arrived from his business. He tooks stock of the situation and when he saw that the bulky Roy had damaged his property (one window lacked a frame), he went into battle mode. He awoke his older brother, who ran the other half of the lodge, and their children who were just past their teens but who were brawny all the same.
Together they tied Roy to a electric post with leather belts and proceeded to lash out at him with belts and an iron rod, till poor Roy was crying out in pain and begging for mercy.
But I guess mercy is not in the dictionary of an angry Rajput and the group of young and old Tomars hit him again and again the more Roy cried out. The landlord Tomar threatened Roy that he would throw Roy into the compound well with his hands and legs tried.
I watched all this with horrow and believed that Tomar would very well carry out his threat and that Roy would end up in the well.
An hour of beating later, Roy was released and he unsteadily stumbled off and we all onlookers returned to our rooms discussing that night's happenings with animosity.
I had a Manipuri friend at that time and we toyed with the idea of reporting the incident to the police station, but later gave it up considering that the Tomars were not too all in the wrong.
Next day we went to have a look at Roy in his room and he proudly showed off the red welts that had sprung all over his back from the beatings. He nursed a black eye as well and limped a litte. Anyway we were glad that at least he was alive after that horrific beating.
Roy, however learnt nothing; he went back to his old ways and was involved in a brawl at at bar where we went together not many days later on New Year's eve. But I will leave that for another post if I dare recall what happened that black day.

The Sinful Penance

A major slice of my life was spent in a factory colony. The person with the highest resident post on campus was that of the Joint Vice President, held by an obese gentleman named Bordia. He was know to indulge in the most unhealthy of habits and hence the couple of extra kilos.
At a certain time of the year, anually, he took a ritualistic fast. It was supposed to be a religious affair, to wash him of all his past sins, which I suppose he really did need.
During the two week period he only had water and lemon juice to drink and a diet of dried grapes, almonds, walnuts, pistachio, cashews and exotic fruits and nuts which would surely make him a bit more ship shape.
We always knew when his fasting began, because precisely at that moment, the factory provision stores were in short supply of all the available fruits and nuts they kept. The big man is going on a fast was the rumor. I guess that period of sacrifice did him a lot of good and extended his blessed life for a few more years.
Once the fast was over he went back to his usual ways until the period of cleansing the next year!