The unfinished house - waiting for an owner who will never come.

Just adjacent to our home in Kerala lay a vacant piece of land measuring close to an acre.
For as long as I can remember it remained vacant with overgrown shrubs. A year or so ago, someone I know bought the land and built a superb house for himself on 1/4th of the land.
This snap shows the side-view of the home as seen from the terrace of our home - the front
of the home looks even better. I did have a snap of the front, but unable to locate it now.



He marked out another 1/4th of the land for his brother (to build a house in the future) and
put up the remaining land for sale - he happens to be in the real-estate business. A family
living some 2kms away bought 5 cents (100 cents = 1 acre) of this land to build a home, since
their current home is quite off the main road and not exactly very accessible.

Since the parents were working in North India, it was their young son (21 years old) who was supervising the construction activity. The work was progressing fast and the foundation was done. Since monsoon set in, he decided to wait a bit before going further with putting up the walls and doing the roof concreting.

A view of the construction with the foundation complete, as seen from our yard.


The young guy had just finished his Diploma and had recently joined work some months ago.
I am sure he must have been eagerly waiting for the house to be completed as early as possible and to move in into the new residence. However, fate had other plans in mind. While riding pillion with a friend on a motorbike, they were hit by a bus, leading to the young man's death. The friend riding the bike has serious injuries, but atleast lucky to be alive.

I don't know about other countries, but in most parts of India, such a sequence of events
would immediately lead to the plot being labelled unlucky/jinxed, which is what happened
in this case also. Construction activity has been abandoned & over the past many months, plants/weeds have grown all over the place to such an extent that from our yard, it is no
longer possible to see the foundation.

I was talking to a friend last week and he was telling that the family plans to dispose of the
plot as-is, since they have no intention to setup home in a plot that they consider jinxed &
which brought them misfortune. And since others would also consider the plot as ill-fated,
I don't see anyone turning up to buy it either.

The quirks of fate are strange and unexplainable. Till one fine day, the place was bustling
with activity, a dream was in the making and then things change so fast that no one wants
to have anything to do with the whole thing.

To hold on and stifle or to let go and worry ?

It's a nice Saturday evening and I am playing with my son in our room. We are racing a r/c Ferrari that I recently bought for my son though I am the one who usually ends up playing
with it. He is kinda afraid of it because it moves by itself (when I use the remote). He likes
to just roll it around with his hands or bang it hard on the floor - already the tiny rear-view mirror on one side is gone. I tried to teach him to use the remote, but he either did not understand it or did not like running the car with the remote.

My wife has finished her kitchen chores and joins us. She watches us play for some time and
then pops a question which seems out-of-context to me.

Wife : If our son desires to join the Indian Army when he grows up, would you let him ?

I am surprised at the question. Our son is not even 2 years old and she is asking about a
decision he might take when he is 18 or more.

Me : Well, if that is his wish, why not ?

Wife : You mean you don't have any issues with his joining the Army ?

Me : Yes. And what is wrong about joining the Army ? When I was growing up, I really
wanted to join the Army, but since it was not a serious interest, I just outgrew it.

Wife : I won't let him join the Army.

Me : Well, that depends on whether he would abide by your decision. Anyway this is
something that is so much into the future. We will deal with it when we come to it.

Why my wife brought up this discussion became clear to me only yesterday when I watched
the DVD of the Tamil movie "Vaaranam Aayiram". She had watched it last week and in the movie the protagonist tells his parents that he intends to join the Army. Like it happened in
our case, the Dad was sort of OK with it, while the Mom was all against it, due to the danger involved in the profession. Ofcourse the son goes ahead with his decision.

I think my wife expected me to have the same viewpoint as her because some weeks ago
when we were discussing something else related to our son, both of us had the same view.

Wife : What do you think about sending our son to all these school outings ?

Me : You mean the kind where the kids and a couple of teachers go visit places either on a
day trip or for 3-7 days ?

Wife : Yes. Will you let him go ?

Me : No way. If at all he insists, either both of us or atleast one of us will accompany him.

Wife : Me too. I would be worried if he were to go alone on such trips. Every other day there
is some news in the papers about how a kid or two drowned somewhere or had some other
fatal accident when on such trips.

Me : Yeah. That is my worry also. Ofcourse that is not going to go down well with him. Kids
hate it when their parents don't let them go on such trips with their friends.

Wife : Tell me about it. My parents would not allow me to go and I hated it.

Me : Still you are going to do the same when it comes to your kid. :-)

Wife : Well, that is because I love him and worry about him.

Me : Hmm. As if at that age, he is going to understand this logic. He is going to hate us for this.

Wife : I don't care if he were to hate me, but there is no way on earth I am going to let him
go to outings where I cannot be sure of his personal safety.

I know we are being too paranoid, but like they say, you only understand a parent's fears and feelings when you yourself become one. I just hope we don't overdo the concern thing & make our son feel stifled.

P.S. : No idea what career our son will opt for when he grows up, but I am sure he would find it loads of fun to read years later about how his parents worried about such silly stuff:-)

The lost childhood.

Growing up as a kid, I remember many instances when I cribbed about not having this or not
having that. For eg. I remember the time when we were staying in Assam, where it used to get
really cold during winters, and my friend & classmate Dheeraj had a snazzy black jacket. From
the time I set my eyes on it, I needed one myself. Ofcourse I had enough warm clothing like
sweaters, school coat etc, but just that it was not as hep as this black jacket.

Started pestering my Dad for weeks and finally he consented to get me a jacket. I was on
cloud nine dreaming about the jacket. Little did I know that my Dad's idea of a jacket was
way off from what I had in mind. He did get me a jacket, but while it did the job of keeping
me warm well, it was not what I wanted. Just the fact that I remember something that happened more than 20 years ago should give you an indication of how disappointed I was.

Other disappointments/cribs were about the motor-bike I lusted for, but which he never got
me or the Sony walkman that I desired, but never got. Ofcourse it was not that money was
an issue, just that he did not think it priority enough. And guess what, when my sisters asked
for a bike and walkman, he promptly got it for them. That hurt me even more. And oh yes,
to be fair to him, Dad did get me 2 bicycles, both spanking new, during my childhood, which
was a perfect gift at the perfect time.

But as I grew up, I understood that the fun is in giving, not in receiving. Especially to those
who cannot afford it. What use is giving a Merc to your wife who earns more than enough to
buy one herself ? Instead, if you get a toy for a kid whose parents are not getting it for them,
their joy is boundless, which makes you also happy.

Inspite of these small disappointments, my childhood was fairly happy and content. We never
had to worry about food, clothing, shelter or study material. These are stuff that most of us
take for granted. But there are so many kids out there in India (and the world) for whom
these basic things are a luxury. They have no time to crib about a jacket that they desire,
because the growling stomach is aching for food. And all their thoughts are on how to find
something to eat to ward of hunger.

Last Friday I was (as usual) on the train to Kerala. Had taken the 4PM train since I did not
get tickets in the 8PM train from Chennai. Around 6PM, the train was nearing Katpadi
station and I was reading the newspaper, when I come across this scene.

A young boy who must be just about 3 years old (1 year older than my son) is leading a blind
man (his father ?) along the aisle of the train compartment. With one hand he is holding the
man's walking stick and in the other hand is a small plastic satchet of salted/fried peanuts.
They stop at each coupe and people drop coins into the tin that the blind man is having in his
other hand.

The kid looks hungry and wants to have a go at the peanuts, but he has only one hand free &
he needs both hands to rip open the plastic satchet. I don't know whether it was because his patience wore thin or because he was unable to control his hunger, but whatever was the
motivation, he comes up with another plan. He uses his teeth to rip off the plastic seal, while
holding the satchet in his one free hand. After a few bites, he now has access to the peanuts
in the satchet and starts eating them.

They pass me and some moments later, I become engrossed in my newspaper again. After
an hour or so, they return. Again the kid is leading the man by the walking stick, but there
is nothing in his hand - I guess he finished eating the peanuts. But what shocked/surprised
me was that the kid was asleep. Yes, even though walking along the aisle, leading a blind
man, the poor kid had gone to sleep, due to either exhaustion or hunger. He was kind of in
auto-pilot mode, walking along even though asleep.

It was shocking. More so because ever since I became a parent, any kid on the street reminds
me of my son. And to know that there are so many such young boys/girls everywhere who
lead a life that has no place for what we took for granted - a happy childhood. The kid is just 3 years old and is already earning and contributing to the family kitty. What about his lost childhood ? Life is just not fair.

The temple trip, couple of serpents and an elephant.

Another day on the road, another elephant ambling along the highway. This time my son was wide awake. However, even though we tried to show him the elephant, he could not see it - maybe the car was a bit too fast for his eyes to focus on the animal.

Decided that it is best to take him up close to an elephant. There is a temple near my wife's
home which I know has an elephant. I had been there earlier to photograph/videograph the animal taking a leisurely bath. So, last Saturday evening, me, my wife, son & my sister-in-law
(SIL) set out for the temple.

I have been to countless Hindu temples in my life - to admire the old architecture, to just
look around, to just sit near the ambala-kulam (temple pond), etc. However, as things stand today in India, religion is increasingly being used to spread hatred against people practicing
other religions. While most religions teach us to live in harmony with all, politicians in India
are using it as a tool to invoke hatred, in an attempt to increase their vote-bank.

It is an unwritten rule in most temples that non-Hindus should not enter the temple. In some
temples, they even have it clearly written at the entrance itself. The sanctum-sanctorum is
especially out-of-bounds for non-Hindus. However, the 4 of us have nothing on us that visibly identifies us as Christians and so we walk into the temple premises. Ofcourse, we decide not
to enter the sanctum-sanctorum - why take an unnecessary risk ?

We remove our footwear outside the compound (as instructed on a notice board there) and
walk inside. First stop is the serpent shrine - where there are two idols representing the
serpent gods (one male and another female). We walk around the temple taking in the sights
and reach the place where the elephant is tethered.

There is a steel gate at the entrance to the elephant's area, but it is left open. Maybe because
the elephant is anyway chained to a huge concrete pillar and because that flimsy steel gate
won't be any hindrance for such a big animal anyway.

A view of the huge animal with the gate in the foreground.



There is a huge pile of coconut tree leaves in front of it, which it is munching on.



It takes one of the long leafy stems, strips and eats all the green on it and with its trunk uses
the long stem to scratch its back. While my wife and her sister stay a little away, I walk to the gate with my son in my arms. As he takes in the sight of this big animal that he has never seen before, I look at his face. His eyes are wide as he tries to make sense of what is just some 15 metres away. He is captivated by the sight of the animal eating, scratching its back etc.

Suddenly, the animal turns sideways to face us, stops eating and just looks at the four of us.



This does not look good and my wife is now a little terrified and urges us to move away. I think
it is better to be safe, lest something about our presence irritates the animal. I know that those chains will be broken in a jiffy if the animal puts its mind to it and the iron gate will be history
if the animal just about nudges it with its trunk.

So, we move to the adjacent temple pond, which was good because from there we could still
have a good view of the animal, yet be at a safe distance.



We spend some more time watching the animal. It still seems to be looking at us. Time for a close-up of the animal. After all there should be some use for the 15x optical zoom that I paid through my nose for. Looks menacing up-close.


Visit done, we return home and on the way, my SIL points out a 20-metre section of damaged wall of the temple. Result of another elephant gone beserk - no wonder my wife & SIL maintain
a respectable distance from the animal.

What's with bikes and women ?

Against my usual practice of hitting the snooze button, today I woke up when the alarm-clock rang at 6AM in the morning. And this inspite of the fact that I slept late yesterday night since
I had gone out for a couple of drinks with a friend from the neighborhood, whom I had met
after a long time. It was an interesting conversation we had - actually a monologue because he was the one talking and I was just listening. Interesting enough to qualify for a blogpost here. Anyway, that's for later.

Since I woke up early, I did some warm-up exercises followed by some workouts for toning
the abs. Is it just me or do all men get more conscious about their waist as they get older ? Workout done, I hit the bath, get dressed and started for work around 30 mins earlier than
my usual time of 8AM.

Even though summer has started in Chennai, this week was kinda nice weather and today
was no exception. I am feeling good for various reasons - some stuff at work, the morning workout which I think does something to your feel-good hormones, the good weather & the
fact that driving is such a pleasure at this time since the roads are almost empty.

I have covered around 2/3rd of my commute and am waiting at the TIDEL park signal,
waiting for the light to turn green. Suchi, the RJ of Radio-One FM station, is on air and is
talking in her oh-so-cute-n-sexy voice and her voice adds to my happiness. And then I
hear a mild Vrooooom that slowly turns louder.

I look into my rear-view mirror and see a SuperBike (SBK) zoom past me and come to a
stop in the space just before my car. Seated on the pillion is a young girl. I don't know
whether it is the high seating position of the SBK or her way of dressing, but her denim
pants are riding low exposing her innerwear. Like those kids in the US where it seems its
a fashion to wear pants a size or two more than your normal size, just so that the underwear
is visible.

The guy riding the bike must be one lucky bloke. Not only do you have a SBK to have absolute
riding nirvana, but also a pretty girlfriend to share the ride. Must be having a super-rich Dad because the retail price of these bikes can range close to a million rupees in India. Anyway,
he is revving the bike every now and then, which I am guessing is to gain the attention / admiration of those around. After all, what use is a 1-million rupee bike, if you don't get
atleast a few envious or admiring looks ?

Looks like he was getting impatient waiting for the signal to turn green and decides to take
the free left turn instead of going straight and zoooooms off. A few seconds after they left,
the signal turns green and I drive on to work. As I near my office, a bike advt comes up on
the radio. It is for a newly released Suzuki 150cc bike which has a girl seductively saying,
"Drive me crazy".

Huh! Drive her crazy with a puny 150cc bike costing about 60K rupees ? Even if girls get impressed by bikes, I am sure most girls today would not even bother looking at guys riding such a bike. So where is the question of her being driven crazy by it ? Ofcourse if it were a
SBK, that would be something else.

That brings me to the bike I test-rode last weekend. A funky looking Apache 160. Liked the bike, but am keeping my options open till I also test-ride the Yamaha FZ16 also. After the
test-ride, the dealer gave me a brochure of the bike, which had this tagline, "Now women will have to try extra hard to hitch a ride". Try hard for what ? A ride on a 65K 160cc bike ?
Looks like the advertisers have completely lost it.

When I was in college, guys seriously believed that to get a girl, one of the important things
to have was a bike. Ofcourse we don't know what women thought about this. I did not have
a bike when I was dating my first girlfriend. She fell for me inspite of my not having a bike.
Ofcourse it is a different thing that we parted ways (amicably) in just about 6 months because we understood that our idea of life was diametrically opposite - she loved America and wanted
to be there ASAP, I loved India and wanted to be here all my life. For her life was about affluence and material things like big home, big car etc. For me, while money is important to
live, it was not the most important thing.

Anyway, coming back to topic, the best example I know of is a friend from my neighborhood
who was sure that all he needed to get a girl was a nice bike. He saved, scrimped & borrowed money to acquire a Yamaha RX100 (a rage then), but the girl part did not happen. He then decided that it could be because all the girls moved from being bike-crazy to car-crazy. :-)

I knew this was coming.

I had written here about the big Brangelina family and wondered how Brad & Angelina
managed to remain sane with 6 kids in the house. There are times when our only son
drives us up the wall and when my wife gets angry with him, I make it a point to tell her
why her idea of wanting another kid is not really a brilliant idea since she can't handle
even one without getting angry.

And as if Angie herself read my post on her, comes this latest news which says she is feeling depressed/stressed and needs time out from her 6 children and Brad Pitt. I knew this was
coming. Bringing kids into the world is the simple part. The tough part is taking care of them
and giving them the required time and attention. A kid is a human being that needs not only
food, clothing and shelter, but also looks for love, attention, time and companionship.

Having a brood of kids is not like having a few cars in the garage. With cars, you could just let
them stay in the garage for a long time without giving them any attention. But that is not the
case with kids. They need your attention and time. And just because you have a brood of 6
kids, you don't get any more than the 24 hours in a day that others get. Add to this your role
as an actor and the travel and stuff you need to do for that and it gets tough.

The articles also mentioned another reason for Angie getting depressed. It seems recently
Brad had been going out on too many boy's nights out which was not exactly making Angie
happy. I can understand him going out in his situation. With 6 small kids in the house, any
man would want to get out for a drink or two with friends. But since he is as much a party
to the whole idea of having as many kids as possible, it was not fair on his part to go out with
friends leaving Angie to cope up with the kids.

No wonder Angie is stressed out. I hope she comes out of it soon and is back to taking care of
the kids. And I really, really hope that they stop at the 6 kids they have instead of going about
bringing more kids into the world to whom they cannot give the required attention.

Changing face of the city. The streets actually.

This happened a couple of days ago. It is 8PM and I am on my way home from work. I am on
the road that runs around the Loyola college campus - the straight section on to which the front gates of the college lead. I am driving slowly as I am trying to extract the maximum FE (Fuel Efficiency) out of my car.

An experiment that I started a couple of months ago and which has been yielding splendid results. From the normal 12kmpl, I have managed to up the FE to 14kmpl, which is not bad
for a 1-ton car with a 1.6l engine having 91 horses under the hood. Ofcourse, it takes lot of
self-restraint to avoid hitting the A-pedal and to putter around town at a very sedate 40-45 kmph.

This particular road has a well designed raised footpath for pedestrians, unlike most of the
other roads in the city. Some 100 metres in front of me, I can see a girl/woman walking along. She is wearing a knee-length tight denim pant and a matching tight top. The dress is a good fit for her slender figure. Since this is near the college campus, it is not an odd sight because there always are good-looking girls in the vicinty of colleges. Only odd thing that registers in my mind is the wee extra bit of sway of the hips. Hmm.

As I pass her, curiousity gets the better of me and my head turns briefly to the left to get a glimpse of her face. Looks pretty too, I say to myself. I notice that she also looks at me, which might be just a coincidence, except for the fact that her gaze lingers on me for more than a cursory glance. Hmm.

I drive on only to be interrupted by my cellphone ringing. Since I don't have the handsfree
with me in the car, I pull over to the side and take the call. It is my younger sister calling up
to talk about her daughter Ann's birthday that is coming up.

As we are talking, the girl has by now walked up to where I am parked. As she nears my car,
she again looks into the car at me and then steps down onto the road from the footpath in front of the car. All this time she is looking at me. I return the look even while talking on the phone. The girl continues walking on the road.

Now this is no cursory look. And however much I love my car, I know that it does not have
the snob value of a Merc for a girl to admire either the car or its owner. I was able to see her
face clearly this time around and she definitely cannot be called a girl. Woman would be more like it. Early thirties, but the face looks kinda aged.

By this time, my mind has completed analysing all the data and arrived at a conclusion. The uninhibited stare is typical of the streetwalkers that have become a common sight in Chennai over the past year or so. Open solicitation on the streets that make you wonder how they can
get away with it inspite of the cops being all over the place. So different from even few years
ago when it would be tough to spot even one streetwalker.

And due to some strange reason, the whole "Nungambakkam High Road - Sterling Road -
Loyola College road" stretch is a favourite with streetwalkers. You can see them standing by
the side of the road and talking on their mobiles, while their eyes are on the lookout for cars
that pass by - prospective customers. Or they would just cross the road to attract attention.

And for the benefit of those that stumble upon them, a small note of warning. Not all these are 'women', if you get my drift. Some of them are transgenders who look exactly like women in looks, body structure etc and getting fooled would be easy.

So, don't say that I did not warn you. That is, unless they are your type. :-)

Another year, another Kumbha Bharani at Chettikulangara

In 2007, around this time of the year, I had written a detailed blog-post about the annual
Kumbha Bharani function that happens at the Chettikulangara Devi Kshetram (temple)
near my home in Kerala. The link to that article is
http://indiandream.blogspot.com/2007_03_01_archive.html

Since every year the rituals are the same, no point in repeating the whole thing. The above
link gives a detailed view into what this is all about. The date for the function is based on the
Malayalam calendar and varies from year to year. This year the function falls on 2-Mar-09
ie. today. Will just repost one of the pictures here.

Yesterday, when I was at Kerala, they were decorating the deity that belongs to our area,

which is Bheem/Bhim/Bheeman, who is one of the 5 famed Pandava brothers in the Hindu

epic Mahabharata.

In Feb 2008, my son was too small to understand or make any sense of this function. But at

17 months today, he is pretty observant and curious. So, I thought it made sense for me to

take him and give him a dekko at a diety who comes out only once a year for 1 week, of which

6 days are spent in getting him ready, while the actual function is only for 1 day. The rest of

the year, he lies in a small 1-room home located on a plot measuring 2-cents (100 cents make

an acre) that shares its boundary wall with my home.

So, yesterday afternoon I take him to the place where Bhiman is being readied for his big day.

This is like 200 metres from my home and I walk down carrying my son. It is too hot & humid

to make him walk and anyway, he is not old enough to walk that far at one stretch. We see the

experts layering the wooden torso of Bhiman with lots of clothes to give it a human-esque

shape. And ofcourse there are lots of curious bystanders.

From the big fingers of Bhima's hands are hanging whole sheafs of plantains which have been

offered as offerings by devotees. These would be auctioned off after the whole function is

over and the proceeds go to the temple. My son is all eyes as he takes in the spectacle of a

big man sitting on a kind of chariot, with a well made-up face. I take him around so that he

gets a detailed view and then we walk back home.

As I open the gate to our home, I can hear him sleeping - must have got exhausted by the

heat and humidity. I tuck him into bed for his usual afternoon nap.