The Doctor's word.

Practice of medicine is the most respected of all professions. For all I know, they worked so hard, really very hard to get that degree to their name and it is not a joke. Well, they are also placed on the top of the status tier ,and most deservedly so, as no one can do without them. A doctor’s learning phase doesn't end with the last day of their final year examination. They need to keep themselves updated each and every single day of their existence because that is the pace at which medical science grows. A good doctor is one who is passionate about what he does,  and not one who was sent to medical school because it was his grandpa’s last wish.

There are however, few morons who spoil it for the entire medical fraternity. Fake and unqualified ‘doctors’. Yesterday as I was watching TV, I came across this appalling piece of news, which reported that there are thousands of unqualified people practicing medicine across the state. That too, in full public view with placards outside their fake clinics. Amusingly enough, they even have an association for themselves, something called the All Kerala Unqualified Doctors. Unqualified-Doctor is a laughable oxymoron. A so-called ‘physician’ prescribed an unsuitable medicine for a child, was caught red-handed and thus was unraveled the shocking story of an entire community of medical frauds in the underbelly of the state, earning status and money to their credit since decades. Steroids, and expired medicines which were regularly prescribed, were caught from their pharmacies.

We are all laymen when it comes to medicine. When we get a headache we pop a paracetamol and get temporary relief. When there is a stomach upset we have something else ready. In short we have a whole medicine box to ourselves. Don’t we? Any self-respecting doctor may tell you not to prescribe medicines to yourself. If that headache persists even after you slept for 12 hours and ate enough food, then it is ideal to get a doctor’s opinion. Instead we eat paracetamol three times a day for a week to get rid of it. It may disappear for some time, but the suppressed symptom may be back with a bang later. Its better to be safe than sorry isn't it? But no, we do not get an appointment with a doctor, because, they are expensive, it takes an entire day to get a token, wait, buy medicines and come back home. Moreover, fake doctors are in town. Who knows their background and what if we end up eating steroids? I am a nobody as far as medicine is concerned, and I will go to a hospital only when something strikes real hard and a sick leave certificate is required from a doctor. Now with the fake doctor news, we are most likely to think twice and the value of qualified and lifesaving medical professionals go down. 

It doesn't stop there. There are another category of qualified doctors who are determined to slander reputed and sincere ones.  We had a a family friend-doctor, to whom my parents went flocking to when they sneezed or had hair fall. This person, who dint have many patients to his credit was proficient to prescribe antibiotics for the smallest ailment. But who are we to judge? 'He is an MBBS!' defended Papa ever since I could remember. A month ago, my mother had this incessant tiredness, sore arms and fever and high body temperature that wouldn't come down. The doctor prescribed antibiotics, repeatedly, which further worsened the condition of my mother, whose arms got red and had rashes after ten days of treatment. When the doctor understood that things were going beyond his expectations, he said that this was a confirmed case of measles and that she had to shift to a different hospital. When my parents met with an experienced doctor from a reputed hospital in the city, he admitted her immediately in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) as this was a severe case of Dengue fever and shouted at Papa for not bringing her earlier. The platelet count in her blood had gone way down from normal and in the next two weeks, she had to be infused with six bottles of blood. My mother, who later recovered, battled with fatigue and body pain for more than a month. Now tell me, everyone makes mistakes, but can doctors wait so long until they come to a conclusion in the diagnosis of a person? Shouldn't he have checked the blood when fever persisted so long, given that dengue is like a plague nowadays?

I have another example for you. Once when my husband was about to leave after his appointment at a hospital, the doctor casually asked how our son was. My husband replied that he was fine, but had a slight cold which was manageable. Immediately the doctor tore a paper from his pad, wrote the names of three syrups and handed it over to him, saying that these would ease the cold. My son was four months old at that time. All three syrups had in their leaflets, dosages and warnings which said that it is not for kids under the age of two. I am not judging anyone, but I am educated enough to know, that without seeing, touching or knowing about any allergies or medical history, is it not okay to prescribe medicines for an infant, or anyone for that matter. My son was not there with my husband then, and so it sounds really wrong to me. Nevertheless we did not give those medicines to our son. We met a qualified pediatrician who suggested that no medicines are required and to consult him again if it does not subside in a week.

Both the examples above are my bad experiences with doctors in general. The doctor we meet with now is a qualified person, who listens, educates us about what is wrong and prescribes medicines only if it is necessary. He doesn't write down big names in illegible letters just because we visited him. And we trust him blindly because he is right all the time. I wish all doctors were like him. Most of them are, I know, but I hope the unqualified ones and others who lack experience, does not meddle with the lives of people. I hope as many people wake up to realize that there are fake doctors out there, waiting to make money out of our misery. 

Good doctors are found not only in plush multi-specialty hospitals alone; they are everywhere. You just need to identify them. The minute you stop placing your trust on that fancy placard outside, and go that extra mile to do adequate search and gather opinions, it is worth each day you take out for an appointment. Because healing comes from God; real doctors are His messengers.  And his, is the final word, the answer to your question of health, of life.

In my defense...

In my childhood I dreaded to say ‘I forgot’ to anyone.

 For one, I was enrolled into a Convent school where the nuns considered wearing nail polish as a severe crime. Forgetting to bring a book or an assignment was blown up into an act worthy to be reported at the nearest Police Station. When they distributed books for the academic year, they gave us two notebooks just for composition writing. One for English, and the other for second language, Malayalam in my case. So composition notebooks looked alike for everyone from first grade to the twelfth. Which also means that if you dint bring it, you cannot take another notebook and pretend like it is the composition book and save yourself a visit to the Principal’s room. Composition books were specially made to punish annoyingly forgetful students like me. However in a classroom of around 50 students there always were a couple of other miserable souls who were also brave enough to admit the same and followed me as the teacher escorted us to the Principal’s room.

Principal: ‘Hello Anita Jeyan. And others’.

(I am special you see)

Me: Good Morning Ma’am. *bowed head and held the ends of my skirt wide*

Principal, obviously not impressed by the show with the skirt, puts on a grim tone.

‘What did you do now?’

The teacher who escorted us to her room explained that according to the timetable one hour was assigned for composition writing and still we had not brought the composition book, with an expression as if she caught guns from our school bags. Principal started further interrogation.

 ‘How could you do this?’

‘I forgot, Ma’am’. I explained meekly.

‘How can you forget? Did you forget to comb your hair today? DID YOU?  DID YOU?’

I touched my head to check if my hair is okay, because she seemed to have thought I dint comb it.

‘Anita!” she screamed. ‘I am trying to tell you, that if you dint forget to comb your hair, but forgot your book, then you should reset your priorities’

Ohh. That’s what she meant. Hair is okay only. For a second she scared me.Why cant people convey properly what they want to say and stop acting like Shakespeare? I can expect some sort of straight-forwardness from a Principal, no? Anyway. The frustrated Principal sent us back to class with instructions that composition for that day could be written in the rough note (which I had forgotten, but who cares) and copied in the composition from home. The next day she wanted to see these composition books first thing when she comes to her office. She had way too much free time .

Thats my past. I continue to dwell in amnesia. When hubby drives back from the mall, I remember the most important item which was the reason I sent him to the grocery in the first place. From his animosity to any explanation of forgetfulness, I usually keep mum. Or if he finds out, I am tempted to lie in highly animated tones like, ‘ Dint you buy that? Omg what were you thinking?’

My Mom writes a Things-to-buy list and sticks them on the refrigerator with a magnet. Papa notes them down in a tiny yellow pad, in a much smaller and illegible handwriting, so that even if someone pickpockets him, they don’t crack the code of what secret vegetables he is going to buy:-/

By the way, the Principal is nothing compared to how my parents react if I told them I forgot something.

What I am trying to say is, when I forget, I want to say that I forgot. If it is not taken gently, I will be tempted to lie. If you tempt me to lie, then you are answerable to God. ;-)

Writing my way in 2013...

Hello dear folks who noticed that I was not here over a month! Others who dint, miss me next time, okay? ;-)

2012 December was one incredible vacation. Details later, but I can tell you it was nothing less than pure bliss. Except the part that I suffered a splitting headache on Christmas eve, that I spent more time lying down on the back seat of the car , parked in the church premises with a toddler dancing on my head, when the choir happily sang, ‘Joy to the world!’. Sarcastic singers, I say.

Later December 16^th happened. The wretched night of Delhi gang rape. The aftermath of riots, chaos, tears and ultimately her passing in glory to the land where rape is unknown. Been following all news and articles written on the same. However some people who blame women to have done the heinous crime of “provoking” men seems to be determined to show off the deepest low of stupidity they can stoop to. Honestly.

December 28^th. It was our wedding anniversary. I celebrated it in Trivandrum, and hubby at Cochin. Well as per our schedule it was preplanned according to the layout of a larger plan. Well we live together and work at the same office all 365 days- being geographically separated on anniversary is not a big deal. All the other days are.

So recently I was filling out a few forms, and realized that with time, I am losing my ability to write. Writing my full name using a pen on a piece of paper has become so tedious that I am sure in a few years I will not be able to do it anymore. My son will grow up to call me illiterate. Or he will think I passed Engineering through online multiple choice exams. Did I answer those five essays, four pages each and 20 short answer questions all in three hours? I mean ideally I’d take a week to do that.

 My papa saves some handwritten letters of his father and his uncle. These are some of his invaluable possessions. Those words in custom handwriting speak a lot more than what Microsoft word does. Handwritten letters have that quality of intense personal communication, achieved by the handwriting, aroma and an invisible attribute which actually makes the reader feel that the sender is actually speaking just to him. These letters are also physically saved and read over the years, just for that aroma, handwriting and a personal touch, unlike the emails we archive and never read a second time. Also, a handwritten letter is usually unique. There are no copies, and it has a single receiver, unlike the Cc’s and worse, the BCc’s of standard email.  This makes it priceless. Letters written on paper with fountain pens are really memoirs, or little personal tokens of eternal worth.  I do not know how authors of today write. I know that JK Rowling writes in her Macbook Air. So the authors of the yesteryears must have taken so much effort to write those timeless classics. Imagine the passion which went into those books, when there was no google and availability for reference was scarce.

Every year, my employer gives me a diary and calendar in the first week of January, and I routinely donate it to my parents who have the habit of writing down expenses, recipes or important dates. This year, I am keeping it to myself, and will try to note down something on it. I will not write a summary of my day to day activities, but when I go to meetings I will carry this diary and a pen instead of my laptop. I will draw those instant pictures, or reinvent my signature or do something with it, but I will see to it that I use my fingers to write, and not just to type. My idea is to draft blog posts or write ideas for a short story in it, which may not be possible, but I am determined to use it. Well that is my resolution for 2013.

During my days with my parents last month, I spent some time in my room, which is still decorated with stickers and greeting cards from my teenage years. The handwritten Archies cards of the 90’s. One of them had a black and white picture of five little girls sitting on a wall, and the caption says ‘Friends like us paint the town red!’.  I lay on my bed and looked at the innumerable cards stuck on the walls. Those were the days. Even today I can identify the handwriting of each one of my friends. The personal letters written on the cards are still fresh and real. When was the last time I received or sent a card through post? I think it was a long time ago. My son will never know what birthday and Christmas cards were… or what it was worth. He is likely to think of it as a waste of time and paper. Oh I feel sorry for him; he will never experience the joy of a greeting card.

Secret Christmas deals !

Christmas is basically the time of the year my Mom gives Santa a tough competition, in terms of hyper activeness. Baking cakes, making cutlets, distributing wine, setting up the Christmas tree and managing guests. But this time around, God decided to give her some rest and let the others run. My Mom was diagnosed with Dengue and is in the hospital now, but she is better and almost ready to be discharged. You know the hangover of a viral fever, or a flu attack, when all you want to do is just sleep. Like a log. She will go through that phase next, that is mostly around Christmas time. To know that my mother is in hospital and be an ocean apart from her is no simple deal either. Sometimes all one can do is to hold on to positivism and top that up with prayers. It works, I know it. So her daughters, my sister and I will visit and brighten Christmas day for her, yay!

Other news around here is that my son turned one and a half – and it was time for his vaccination. It happened yesterday, and by evening he became very warm with fever and it continues. Whatever happened to my plea to the scientists worldwide to make this damn thing oral?

 In other news, all my footwear are either broken or looks historic so need to pile up on that. Now that’s got to be frustrating for someone at home. Guess who ;-)

We are taking off to India (Kerala, to be precise) coming Thursday, and yes I will be going dutifully to Cochin, his place first. The silver lining is, it is also the best place for shoe and accessories shopping! Talk about perfect timing for rear and tear: D

Now here is a secret. I got this email today. I am sure, going by the subject line, my husband is not going to be too happy. 

 I opened the mail secretly, when he was not around, and found this:

No, but thanks !

Merry Christmas, everyone !

My best friend's delusions!

The fact that I am unable to hide the excitement of going home in December on a month long vacation is no news to my neighbors or the housemaid. I discussed this over and over again whenever they innocently asked me ‘What’s up?’ that now they want to get rid of me and wishes that I never came back. But who cares?  I am celebrating New Year at home..yoohoo!

I remember the days at my college hostel when I used to be slightly superstitious. Slightly. I mean not so bad enough to believe what they say about the black cat. For one, it was something about vacation planning and getting excited. My best friend always told me never to plan a vacation or a function way ahead and get too excited about it. If I did, it was most likely to end in disappointment. Initially I thought it was a joke, but she threatened me with it by her soft voice and big eyes that I believed it instantly. 
Atleast when she was around ;-)

Almost a year after graduation, I remember her verbal marriage invitation as soon as the dates were known to her. During the same call, she also banned any further discussions about it. Because the last thing she wanted was to miss me on her big day. Many times I started conversations with…’hey that hopeless tailor may mess up my blouse for your wedding…’ or sometimes ‘ my damn sandals broke…what will I wear on…”and she stopped me at that point and told me to shut the hell up. In anger, she also added that she dint care what I wore. Well I was pretty sure about that, you know.

I was a fresher who landed my first job and was at least eight months into it when her marriage was announced. A week after she announced her wedding dates, my boss called me and certain others to his cabin and discussed about an onsite assignment, which was to be at the client office in Mumbai. He said he will let us know the dates later. I went back to my seat only to churn out intelligent excuses to get out of this project. Then a brilliant idea struck me, one which most male bosses are known to comply. I made mental notes, prepared further believable lies and scripted an entire drama to perform at the boss’s cabin the next time he calls me to discuss the project.

Two days later, he called four of us again. In these two days, I was so thorough and confident about the excuse I was about to say, that I almost started believing my own lie. So we marched into the cabin, got seated and listened through the blue print and other technical stuff. Well to be honest I wasn’t listening because I am not going, no? I smirked at the three other excuse-retarded poor fellows who were going to Mumbai and toil at the client site. Then the boss stood up and gave us a verbal itinerary which had the earth shattering dates- we were to fly on the 16^th of May at 6:00 am, and it was the day of my best friend’s wedding.

Well my excuse could not be expressed when the other three project mates were present because of reasons pertaining to my ego and self-respect. I waited for them to leave the cabin. When the door closed behind me, the boss looked up and asked, ‘Yes?’

I continued. “Sir.. I have few problems back home due to which I am afraid I won’t be able to travel on the specified project dates”

The boss who was expected to be surprised and taken aback (according to my imaginary script), leaned back on his plush chair and asked, ‘May I know if it is not personal?’

I continued my robotic well-tailored speech. “Sir, actually my parents are growing old and they are searching a suitable alliance for me. In fact a guy is coming from Pune to meet me on the same day”

Boss was amused at this. He asked, "oh so is he coming on the 16^th?"

"No Sir, on the 18^th"

Long pause.

It was the time for me to use all my grey cells. I had prepared only so much, because as per the script, the boss then chose another candidate and excused me from the project and wished me a blissful wedded life.

The boss continued in a deeper voice, “Okay may be I can convince your parents to call that guy and tell him to come 4 weeks later. What is your landline number?” and picked up the receiver. 

I sweated down my shirt. My hands shivered like that of a chronic alcoholic. I stammered a lot to finally come up with, “Sir, my parents are at work now, I will ask them this, Thank you very much sir”

I got the hell out of the cabin before he asked their work numbers. When I closed the door behind me, I couldn’t feel my legs anymore and almost heard the boss banging his head in laughter.

However that was when the actual problem began to unravel itself.  I couldn’t possibly show up at the wedding which mattered more than anything else. The blouse was also being stitched for no apparent reason. I did not dare to call my bestie and break this news. I spent the next few days in a pensive mood. I am now guessing that could be when my parents actually realized that they should start the groom hunting for me, because I appeared heartbroken most of the time. Well little did they know that I had second thoughts about the design of the blouse I gave the tailor.

 Days passed and the wedding came closer. I had still not broken the news to her that I will not be there. It was just a week to go and I had my project documents and other stuff in place. I dint call her, even though she called me several times in the day and disclosed some stuff her fiancée said and we giggled.

The countdown came closer and there were just three days to go. I was at office, attending meetings back to back. I couldn’t bring myself to reality. Suddenly the boss walked in, and announced:

“Guys, slight change of plans. You will be travelling on the 20^th and not on 16^th. Tickets will be issued shortly”

I was numb by happiness for some time. However I stayed nonchalant, as expressing happiness will give the boss a different picture considering the excuse I said.

Finally I attended THE marriage, and we had the time of our lives. I flew to Mumbai three days later. The colleagues on the adjacent seats briefed me about the project during the flight, since I wasn’t mentally present over the week.

Coming to think of it, everything was co incidental. What difference would it have made if I , as opposed to the superstition, got too excited and made plans about the wedding? I may have called her every single day to discuss that. Oh and a disastrous phone bill. May be that’s what she meant by disappointment.

Men will be men will be men !

Recently hubby and I received a gift voucher each as a token of appreciation on the success of an endeavor at office. It was quite a reasonable amount, and since the firm we work for is a leading retailer, the voucher could be used at any of our own outlets, which included department stores as well as sophisticated lifestyle stores. The Lifestyle outlet featured brands like Swarovski, Chanel, Nikon, Fizzler, Samsonite, Moulinex, and the like. On receipt of the voucher, I started weaving dreams.

Do I want Chanel eye liner or a handbag? Handbag –no. I don’t carry them to office, as I use a laptop  backpack. Over the weekend I have a toddler to carry or run around so the handbag will not be of much use. Most importantly the handbag will stay in the car and I will not get a chance to show it off. However the eye liner can be used on all the above scenarios as well. Okay so Chanel eye liner it is. It would be great if I could carry the eyeliner in a Chanel handbag…...but let’s get real. Oh my God, I cant wait to go to my friends in India and start the cheap show offs.

 Hubby interrupted my day dreams, held his voucher and said ‘Wow so the company is paying for Aaron’s pampers this month! hahaha’.

I jumped up in horror. ‘What?! Pampers ?’

‘Then what’? Asked he.

My dreams about the Chanel eyeliner shook vigorously but refused to shatter. It still stood a chance. I shook my head hiding the horror of buying diapers with that voucher and dint spill my ideas immediately -Four years of marriage and seven years of knowing him gave me an idea about what to say and when ;-). So we forgot about the vouchers until we were reminded again by some colleagues that it came with an expiry date. We ditched the Lifestyle store which had the Swarovski and Chanel, and headed straight to the department store, from where we got gifts for family and friends for Christmas and also the pampers. We spent much more than what the voucher was worth, but the vouchers covered up a major portion of the disaster of Christmas expenditure.

 At the cash counter, I told him how I had planned to buy Chanel eyeliner earlier but it felt a lot better this way.

On our way back, hubby was amused at my Chanel idea and said…

 ‘This time we can be extra lavish about pampers …hahaha..If I had not intervened you’d have gone to lifestyle and got that…  ‘

Pause.

‘Got that….Chanel…. ‘

‘Umm…’

‘Chanel…’

‘Eye… whats that… eye-opener?’

:-\

We, the Laptop Generation.

To be perfectly honest, I have a problem with the  previous generation who claim that with technology which advanced in leaps and bounds over the last two decades, everything has suddenly become easy for the new age woman. They may have rolled the rocks manually for grinding and blending, or washed those heap of clothes bare handed, but do they remember the members of the extended family who tended to their kids while they were doing the above? Parents of today and their efforts to make ends meet and at the same time bringing up children are overlooked and underestimated under the pretext of owning mixers and grinders at home.

If you take into consideration our grandparents, the minimum number of offspring they had was four. That is the minimum, I mean, bare minimum. The rule was you should have enough children that when someone asks, you have a decent number to quote.Double digits were considered to be an excellent feat. And, they enjoyed the fruits of grudging and gossiping in a joint family because the cooking, child rearing and household chores were shared. And yes, only the single breadwinner went out of the house, the rest stayed at home, with only a radio for entertainment. The other forms of entertainment were cold wars, unpleasant judgments, sleazy potshots, pretensions, boasting, saas-bahu sagas and other epical showdowns. Gone are the days.

Next came my Mummy’s generation, wherein the general trend of their parents coming down to take care of the kids (mostly two and sometimes three, but not more) was followed extensively. Maternal or paternal grandparents of the baby came down and cared for them, when our Moms went to work with the peaceful assurance that their children were taken care of by blood relatives and that no harm can come to them. This service was a wholesome package with FREE finger pointing, saas bahu confrontations, accusations about working women and the like.

Things changed suddenly. Now the families are nuclear. The term ‘nuclear’ can also hold true considering the state of affairs at home or the mood of the couple. A husband and wife set up home continents apart from their parents, and have children of their own. Without parents or kind relatives around, the wife either has to let go of her career or be stretched between home and work consistently under anxiety about the baby who is being looked after by a stranger at a daycare or at home. Not to mention the cooking and cleaning that awaits us at the end of the day, with a child weeping at our feet and a hot pot in our hands. It definitely helps if the husband understands, and even if the chores are shared, it doesn't seem to get any lesser. A friend says that her husband prepares bed coffee for her, and as we sighed in admiration of that guy, she continued to reveal that he uses at least 20 vessels for the same and the sink is full after two cups of coffee are made.

The tricky part is when there is a baby, or a toddler. In today’s world where one rarely gets any good feedback about nanny’s or daycare  and horrific news of child abuse fills the news channels, a parent simply cannot be at ease at any point of time. Come vacation, we fly to our hometowns and all we get to hear are questions about when the ‘next baby’ will come, yes, shamelessly, or about how the existing one is unhealthy as per their standards (which are usually mental images of those bloated kids from cerelac ads) and unfriendly statements that we are starving them. The hours we spend at the child’s high chair at meal times, staring relentlessly at his mouth and sighing after every handful is swallowed are just myths for them. All they know and choose to believe is that we, the laptop generation spend our days happily in air conditioned rooms and evenings at malls or bowling alleys. No, that’s not how it works.

Parenthood has become the most difficult one in today’s times. Children are being exposed to what they should not, at a very tender age through TV and internet, so handling them emotionally is not an unassuming task. From my own experience where my 17 month old is being taken care at home by a housemaid, it breaks my heart every time I wave him goodbye, and the elevator closes its doors dutifully as he looks on, teary eyed, and both hands calling out to me to come back. I wave him back, and cried during the initial days, but the tears dried up with time. I understood that I should not spoil him. Soon he will join a nursery, and it is painful to think that he is not at home anymore. But I have only myself to console and reassure. I get the wildest thoughts about him missing me and crying, or being bullied by other kids. Then I go through the nursery’s website and read the positive feedback they got from various insecure parents like me. Then the fire of anguish extinguishes partly, but remains dormant only to be ignited again in the next vulnerable moment. As a mother, I can tell you that it takes a lot of guts, patience and strength from within to endure the pain of leaving the child at someone’s care.

It is going to be a passing phase. It passes, but the phase doesn't get any easier with that line. But life is all about these little moments. The moments we realize how a child can be a part of ourselves and how they control our hearts and eventually our lives. That a child is God’s gift and parenting them is a divine task we are entrusted with, and that we need to endure the highs and lows that comes with it.

Career Vs Canine.

I live in Muscat, Oman, a place where generally people are not very fond of pets. Hardly does one find a stray dog or cat walking down the streets. Unlike India, where a cow comes and settles down in the middle of the road and people touch and pray to it instead of clearing the animal so that the blaring ambulance can pass, it is very different in Muscat where even finding a camel is scarce. To be frank, the only animals you see are the ones in human form (which can be spotted at workplace).

Mom and I were fond of dogs, whereas Papa was totally against any four legged creatures. My sister still seems to have some kind of an innate aversion to non-humans and thus even lost puppies were treated like terrorists in our house. I don’t know somewhere in the course of time I got this idea that pets are okay but giving them too much importance or spending money over them is too extravagant and dog-shows were conducted for those golf playing old gentlemen and their sophisticated wives for time pass. However I was married to a home where there is a dog for security purposes and it has its place – the animal is well fed, played with outdoors and taken care, but no one ever combed its hair or took it to the vet because it had a ‘cough’. So my idea that a dog should be treated like a dog took a stronger grip.

Recently, a very close friend once said to me, that his friend is moving to Muscat as her husband got a job here. Her resume was sent to me with a request that it be forwarded to my employer on priority. I did that promptly. Next day I got a facebook friend request from this girl whose resume I forwarded. She was working in India, and now that she is moving to Muscat she also wants to continue to work. Finding a job in Muscat is not very easy due to the industry and IT in an early budding stage. There are not too many opportunities to choose from. Sometimes one may want to go out of their areas of expertise to land a well-paying job. The maid at my house who now does the cooking cleaning and babysitting for us, is a qualified nurse in India who couldn't match the standards of expertise required in hospitals at Muscat and is hence doing this job to make ends meet. Her two sons are studying in CBSE School in Kerala. Their fees, medical charges, and house loans - she could not afford to sit idle with the ever increasing liabilities that gaped wide at her. Hence she was ready to forgo her education just to support her husband financially.  Not just her, I know many qualified women who have taken to babysitting, tuition for primary and junior school kids, stitching and lots of other activities to support their families and to stand on their own.

I rarely accept friend requests on facebook from strangers. But this lady seemed to be really working on the job front, so I added her just in case she needed any information on that, since she will eventually be settling down here. The next day after I added her, she pinged me. The conversation went something like this:

She: Hi Anita!

Me: Hi. How are you?

She: All well. I wanted to talk to you, since we are moving to Muscat soon.

Me: No problem. I have forwarded your resume already. They will contact you when there is a vacancy. Meanwhile check other options and upload resume in the job portals of Oman as well.

She: Okay actually I wanted to ask you something else.

Me: Yes, please.

She: Do you have any pets at home? Actually my husband’s employer will give accommodation as well, but I am worried whether it will be a dog friendly apartment, you know. Do you know about any dog friendly apartments in your area?

Me: I don’t know even one person who owns a pet here. In fact I recently moved to a bigger apartment after a lot of exhaustive efforts, for my child who now needs more space.

She: So is your home dog friendly?

Me: I guess it is child friendly.

She: Okay. How is the climate there as of now?

Me: The summer has almost died down, now the heat is bearable and evenings are pleasant.

She: Oh so the dog will have no problems…I guess. Do you know the formality of bringing the pet in international flight?

Me: I honestly have no idea about pet rules on airlines.

**By now I am at my wits end ***

She: Oh okay. I hope I find something soon.

Me: Yeah wish you luck on the job front.

She: Yes. I meant for finding the right apartment.

Me: Okay, bye.

What do you say about this woman? I mean, on one side, my educated maid’s woes of working in my kitchen to pay off her loans, and another female who cares only about housing her canines and whose job hunt comes second. I don’t blame the latter, but I really think that at least while relocating to another country one should reset their priorities and also get themselves a reality check once in a while. 

P.S: I love dogs. I do not disrespect any dog lovers with this post.

The e-wardrobe !

Write like no one is reading, they say. 

So I am going to do just that by declaring, I have problems with my wardrobe. Many times I tried folding everything up to the smallest piece of clothing, but the very next day I find myself searching for that stuff which I haven’t worn in the last decade and thus end up wrecking the whole thing. I’ve got to see kitchens and living rooms of others, dirtier than the adjacent slip road, and patted my own back for the spotless living room I own. But rarely do we get to see another person’s wardrobe. My friend in Bangalore has one which showers clothes as she opens it, and her attitude is my inspiration ever since. I know many of you must be making designs on your foreheads with all the tweaking of eyebrows, but that’s what I am, folks. You can stare or laugh at me all you like. I am writing like no one is reading, remember?

So being a programmer myself I have a wonderful idea for an application. It’s nothing but a wardrobe, which is driven by software, so let’s call it an e-wardrobe.

Here is the blueprint:

·         It folds clothes, categorizes them and places them neatly. This is performed by default.

·         If I try to put a used dress into it, it beeps and shines a red bulb with a message that the dress in question is to be put in laundry.

·         The application should have a dress sense. I mean early morning when I put on black pants with a black shirt, the application should tell me diplomatically, I repeat, diplomatically, that the brown trouser goes better with that shirt. The app should, by no means, use the words ‘suck’ or ‘ugly’ while saying these things which may make the user want to trash it immediately.

·         When clothes are back from the laundry and kept randomly inside the wardrobe, it should fold them neatly and categorize them and the most recently used should go to the bottom.

·         When a dress is picked on Friday which was worn on Monday of the same week, the app should diplomatically, I repeat, diplomatically, remind the user that it was worn few days back and gently ask ‘Are you sure’?

·         The app should be user friendly. In the sense, if a combination of kurti with leggings or a trouser and top is well matched, it can pass a compliment or two which sounds moderate, something like , ‘ Omg you look so pretty!’ or, ‘Noone can make a better combination’, or,  ‘That girl at your office is not even competition to you’. Of course, the compliments should be very gentle and precise, like the above.

·         If a combination made by the user is not apt, the app should either keep quiet or make subtle suggestions but NEVER comment on what is already worn.

·         Again there is a twist. The app should check the time first. If the user has ample time to choose and wear the above suggestions and compliments are welcome. If not, and the user has just a few minutes left, e-wardrobe should shut the hell up and close the wardrobe promptly when the user is done.

·         The wardrobe cleans, disinfects itself.

·         The wardrobe should detect the mood of the user. For example, early morning if I am in a bad mood, the wardrobe should just open and close and should not do any of the talking, even if there is ample time. The mood detection can be done by measuring the force applied to open the wardrobe or closing it.

·         If the user enters the e-wardrobe room humming a tune, the wardrobe greets her by the time of the day, and when she is done, says ‘Bubye Gorgeous!’ or few lines from a good poem, or something which is as subtle as that.

·         Additional functions: The wardrobe can have an add-on, which is a dry cleaner which occupies negligible space. This also irons the clothes based on fabric and thus adjusting the temperature.

I personally think if such a wardrobe, once implemented, will be the best seller gadget of all times and solve half of the world’s problems. This also reduces the pressure some women put on their husbands by asking about their look or dress about which the latter has absolutely no idea. I mean in some ways the e-wardrobe provides excellent emotional companionship and boosts one’s self confidence to supremely high levels.

P.S: My billion dollar idea is copyright protected.

Disclaimer: If any woman buys an e-wardrobe and then decides to ditch her husband, then it is her personal choice and e-wardrobe has nothing to do with it.

A hate chronicle.

Ten years ago. It was the last session for the day at college, and time seemed to stagnate. My yawns got heavier and longer, cheek muscles stretched out. Neither did the repeated glaring at the watch prove useless, vigorously shaking it to make it go faster invited attention from the teacher as well. The rest of the pupils who were at their acting best were bored too, but they controlled the yawns that kept coming. The teacher pretentiously went on with the lecture, totally aware of the plight of students who were at the verge of falling into a slumber. Finally the bell rang, which came like music to our ears.

As usual, the boys who had to board trains and college buses pushed their way out sooner than us, while we had all the time in the world to stroll peacefully to the hostel which thankfully or not was in the same campus as the college. I closed my book, opened my purse and put the unused pen in it, and got up just to see a gang of boys coming towards me. The one who led the group had a stack of cards, which by appearance looked like invitation cards. I stood at the edge of my bench, facing them, and the rest of my bench mates farther away from the fast approaching bunch of guys. The gang leader announced that it was his sister’s marriage, and that he wanted to hand over personalized invitation cards. He started with the last girl in my bench, called her by name, leaned forward in front of me and extended the card to her. This continued until it was my turn. I waited, with expecting eyes, and to this day I curse that moment. To my surprise, he acted like he was completely oblivious of my presence, overlooked me purposely and kept distributing to the next row of girls and to everyone but me. I noticed the smirk on his lips and the evil in his eyes. The other boys in the gang, who were just behind their leader, booed and howled at me, when one guy, Sai, pointed at me and laughed humiliatingly. I realized the intention, and walked out of the classroom burning with anger and disgust of the highest degree.

When I went back to the hostel the girls were already talking about the royal wedding. Many of them were aware of how I was ruthlessly uninvited, but I guess girls in college get some sadistic pleasure from such incidents and only pretend to be sympathetic. If you ask me, yes I was genuinely shattered for a moment or two especially the laughter of Sai which kept ringing in my ears a little longer than it should have.

Thankfully, I had a couple of genuine friends who blasted me for even feeling bad, as the guy who did this was a pest of sorts. He dint even deserve our time, I was told and was not allowed to talk about this incident. However I secretly nurtured hatred towards Sai.

Let me explain why they did this to me. These guys were like an isolated entity by themselves in our class. They never interacted with anyone but themselves. They scored negligible or no marks at all, and boycotted University exams with ease. They were a pain to any teacher. To top this, they dressed like goons. The month before this catastrophic incident, it was my sister’s marriage and I invited only a few of my friends from hostel and college to it. This supposedly triggered a revenge plan among them against me, and I don’t understand why on earth they could expect to be invited, given that none of them have ever talked to me or acknowledged my existence. So the marriage of the gang leader guy’s sister came like a blessing to them and they utilized the opportunity to perfection.

Days passed and it was exam time. One fine exam eve, around noon, I was walking in the corridor, daydreaming with a book held just for formality, when a friend came running towards me with panic in her eyes. She halted near me, and said…’ Your classmate…’ and gasped to take breaths….I asked.. ‘Who?’  She continued, suppressing breathlessness that ate into her words..  ‘your classmate, Sai, had been in a serious bike accident’. She continued to puff and pant, and I heedlessly exclaimed ‘Where!’..She continued, ‘He was going to another guy’s house for combined study... He wore a helmet as well, but he was hit by a lorry and the helmet dint help... he has a head injury and is in a coma now’. With that I almost dropped my book. I couldn't believe my ears. The news of the accident spread like wildfire and I was totally blank to think anything. 
I was surprised with my own mindset- I hated this guy to my very core but I never wished or cursed that anything bad should befall him. We sat together at my room in hostel, each of us silent and in our world of memories about him. None of us had anything good to say, but we just couldn't let go of a batch mate like that. No, nothing would happen, we wished.

The hostel did not look like an exam eve anymore. Usually the place would bustle with activity, group discussions and combined study, students looking very modest and intelligent all the way. However the news had fallen hard on us and we had stopped thinking about the examination. Nobody talked to each other.

Suddenly a phone call at the warden’s room stifled its way into our thoughts. It rang louder than usual as it echoed its way into the unusually silent corridors. The warden answered it, and talked for like 30 seconds and placed the receiver down. She looked at the corridor blankly and in a few seconds gestured to my friend to go to her room. They talked for at least five minutes and she walked back to us to say, ‘Sai passed away’.

Days passed.

I wondered about the lost time which could have been spent being friends, but was misused to hate each other. That sometimes an untimely demise of someone we know is what it takes to make us realize that the present is actually precious and the future, completely clueless.   

To mock a helpless bird..

I’d been the youngest in my maternal family for at least half a decade until another made his entry and those were the years I treasure; not just for the happy moments. The part wherein  a gross mischief committed exclusively by me was pardoned in a blink was definitely good. Those memories in which the older kids and sibling were blamed based on the degree of mischief and the fact that I always got away unscathed still makes me so happy! However it wasn’t a cakewalk, because I had to deal with the misery of never being taken seriously. A tooth pain, a random complaint, a blunder – instead of people consoling me, everybody considered those as jokes. I was laughed upon in those years I desperately needed moral support.

Unfortunately those were also the years I tried to speak in English, as insisted by my school management and I tried to combine words to make broken sentences. The relatives found my futile attempts so funny that I dreaded to speak in English at home. Just for your information I would like to mention that the so called relatives in question were not Oxford alumni themselves.

Once upon a time when I was approximately five years old, on a cold unfortunate Christmas Eve, the maternal house was jam packed with every other relative one can possibly think of - except one who was abroad and couldn’t join the festivities. An ISD call was made and each one was waiting in queue to wish him a merry Christmas. The fact that once the telephone bill for that month arrives none of these people waiting patiently for their turns in the queue would be available in the vicinity- and that is the key to all the extended wishes, small talk and local gossip that went on endlessly across continents. I was the last one in the queue and everyone was sitting around the black telephone like wolves on the prowl when my turn came. Then started the conversation, which was so faked that I responded with ‘mmm’ and ‘ok’ to whatever was said to me. I should admit that this was child abuse of the worse kind. The relatives were not pleased with my monosyllables. Finally the person at the other end wished me a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. To this, I exclaimed ‘Same!’ as the proficiency to say ‘wish you the same’ had not occurred to me and the fiercely anticipating relatives broke into a chorus of uncontrollable laughter. Quoting this incident became the prime hobby of certain morons that every time I visited, I was made a laughing stock citing this incident. I am not exaggerating this part, but it came as a surprise that once when I was doing my engineering and I visited my grandma, this same set of people repeated the ‘Same’ incident much to my horror and disbelief. Well was it so much of a joke that it should be remembered after fifteen years? Fifteen years ?!

Don’t get me wrong here; I am a light hearted person, who forgets the past quickly. I understand jokes and never take them seriously. However after all these years I cannot come to a logical reason as to why the ‘same’ episode needs to be revived every time I visit my grandma’s place. Not just revived it was remixed as well.

Yes I did retaliate in the best known way to make my point that I am not a fan of these jokes, especially the ‘same’ recitals. The illogical reasoning that followed was more appalling than that. It was said that I was a ‘small’ child, and my voice was ‘funny’ and that they ‘adored’ me, and hence the torture. I read that as 'We have no one else to humiliate, but you'.

 I went on to love English, read whatever Papa or my sister gave me, wrote articles in school and college magazines, started a blog, won prizes at my workplace and online competitions, and here I am. Whether the prolonged mockery helped me is not the point. The point is the importance of moral support and encouragement to a child. The levels of self confidence lost by a child once we mock them. I vowed never to laugh at a mistake or blunder made by my niece or my son, not only in English – but in whatever they come across in their academics or the world around them.

P.S: I did not borrow the above theme from Rudolph the red nosed reindeer. However I wonder whether someone stole my thoughts to make 'English Vinglish' :-|