Bone Cutter

And Finally ..., Diary 2 Responses »
Aug 012010

Was at the dentist yesterday. To have extracted a molar in the lower jaw that had been killed by the wisdom that grew in a strange way.

The dentist took out a particularly mean looking instrument.
“what is that”, i mumbled – the jaw and lips numb & heavy with local anesthetic.
“a bone cutter’, replied the dentist – without missing a beat.
He then smiled and said “don’t ask me any questions”

after that, I didn’t.

Am I the only one with visions of Laurence Olivier and Dustin Hoffman in the Marathon Man – when sitting in a dentist’s chair, I wonder !

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Posted by gargi at 9:02 am Tagged with:

A Near Miss ...

And Finally ..., Diary 5 Responses »
Jul 302010

…. this morning.
It was a normal Friday morning. Got up bright and early to get to college. Finished lectures. Began driving from Sophia College to Bandra.
Just as soon as you get out of the main gate at Sophia, you drive down a narrow winding road to get to Warden Road – then Worli, then Bandra. Usually it is fairly smooth driving.

When i got to the end of the narrow road, the road had narrowed to 1.5 lanes. there were trucks parked on the right of the road – construction trucks – that were brining building material. Some of the old bunglows on this road are making way for high rises.

There was a signal, a few cars ahead of me, and I was waiting for the lights to turn to green. In the side view mirror I saw a truck rolling back. There was no place to move. The only place to go was ahead, and there were vehicles there. I pulled the hand brake. And waited.

Crunch. I heard glass go crunch. Trust me, it is a scary audio effect. The video was worse. A few tons coming down slowly against your car. And suddenly it stopped rolling. Someone had obviously pulled the hand brake on the truck. I could hear my heart thumping, my hands shaking and my brain slightly off kilter.

The lights changed to green. I moved out. Turned onto Warden Road, pulled over and checked for damage. The body of my car is fine but for a dent. The rear lights on the drivers side, and the tiny window on the rear were shattered. The truck was coming down at an angle -would have probably hit the driver. Was terribly lucky.

The shakes came later. I drove for a bit. pulled over at worli sea face and sat in the car for around 20 minutes till i came back to normal. Then i drove home to leave the car and get to work !

Sometimes, it doesn’t help just being a good driver, or even a safe one. It’s also a matter of luck…. Today I got lucky.

p.s. it is a good job that the Tata’s build their cars like tanks. :) the Indigo Marina (that i drive) is a battle vehicle. we should possibly send it to the front !

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Posted by gargi at 4:03 pm Tagged with:

Gems from Students 2010

And Finally ..., Desi Pundit, Diary, India 27 Responses »
May 222010

Every year, at around this time, I trudge down to Mumbai University – Kalina to correct/moderate papers.

I, for my sins, am the chairperson for one of the papers. When asked the first time what does the chairperson do – I was told, quite seriously, ‘woh na, paper submit karta hai, aur reciept leta hai‘ .

As usually, the papers were a mixed bag – some good, some pass mark quality, some that have you chuckling, and some that have you shaking your head in sheer wonderment and asking ‘who taught this’. When you have paper after paper that spouts out the same garbage – you know that it is not student error, but teacher error !!

In any case, here are some of the best responses:

a) Educated people in India live in the cities and speak and read English. We (as in these) watch English channels. The rest of India that is illiterate speak their mother tongue or vernacular languages. They watch regional language channels because they don’t understand English because they are illiterate.

b) Hindi is the mother tongue of India. Over 99% of India understands and speaks Hindi except South India which speaks Dravidian and North East that speaks Chinese.

c) Rajiv Gandhi is the grandfather of Rahul Gandhi and is the farmer prime minister of India

d) Indira Gandhi’s daughter Sonia Gandhi is the chief of the Congress Party

e) The British started the AIR in 1757 and DD a few years later to keep the Indian people subjugated

f) The Gandhi family fought for India’s Independence – Mahatma Gandhi, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi all went to jail when the British wanted to stop them from attaining independence

g) Hindi is the National Language of India.

h) People who don’t understand Hindi are anti National

i) Hindus speak Hindi. the non Hindus speak other languages

j) People in villages are poor and illiterate

h) villagers like to watch music, dance and soaps. City people like to watch news and IPL

k) the BBC was used by the British to keep Africa and India under control. That saved the expense of having a big army

l) People who are poor do not have television sets and hence do not know what is happening

m) poor and illiterate people in villages cannot afford DTH and do not know what is happening in IPL

I can see these nameless, faceless students anchoring news – not very long for now….

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Posted by gargi at 10:41 am Tagged with: , , ,

A Nightmare

And Finally ..., Caste, Desi Pundit, Diary, India 6 Responses »
Nov 122009

Sometimes, the mind is a dangerous place to get lost in.it is a place where time & space are elastic and past, present and future co-exist without any issue.And it is even more scary when that manifests itself as an almost lifelike, real event.

Amma had a nightmare a few days ago. She, appa and her kids (all 3 of us) are hauled up before a caste court, which wants to annul my parents marriage. Her father and brother (both are no more) are part of the nightmare – and speak for the caste panchayat against my parents and us. My parents and the 3 of us are in current avtaars – current age etal. My grandfather is from 30 years ago (when he died) and my uncle from a decade ago. The caste panchayat – in her nightmare – wants to try us as a family and pass judgement on our caste transgressions. My mother was shaking and visibly upset when she told us the nightmare.

When my parents got married – 1965 – they broke caste rules. They belonged to the same gotra - and they decided to get married. This according to caste rules is a strict no no. The mildest punishment was excommunication – essentially being made outcaste – and the most stringent punishment is death for the offending couple.

Thankfully, both my parents came from enlightened families. My maternal grandfather (my dada had passed away 3 years earlier), and my father’s elder brother – stood by the couple and ensured their marriage went off without a hitch. A large chunk of the family boycotted the wedding – because it wasn’t the kind of thing that was done. But, given the minor scandal that it caused – my folks got their marriage registered – because, technically – at least according to orthodoxy – the marriage was not valid !

44 years later, my mother wakes up to a nightmare that her family was going to be hurt because she broke caste rules.

Everytime there is a news report on couples getting burnt for breaking caste laws – my mother goes quiet. It never bothered her earlier – but then, she wasn’t an avid news viewer then. But for the last 5 years or so, she has been getting affected by this. One morning, about 5 years ago, i woke up and went to the kitchen to pour myself a cup of coffee – mom was talking to dad about a couple who got burnt alive in Haryana for getting married within the gotra - mom was telling dad ‘it could have been us’.

I wonder about caste at times. I wonder about its hold on people, despite its call to murder and burn alive people – because they broke some rules that lost relevance 3 millennia ago. I am curious about the kind of people who defend caste – saying it is part of our cultural heritage. I am fascinated by the power that caste bodies – panchayats – wield that gets a woman approaching 70, to have nightmares 44 years after she and the man of her choice broke the rules !

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Posted by gargi at 10:39 pm Tagged with:

Unexplained Stuff

And Finally ..., Desi Pundit, Diary, India 17 Responses »
Jun 042009

stuff i have no answers to …

a) what is it about the male of the species and their fascination for nose snort, ear wax and other assorted stuff … a few days ago i overheard two building boys having an animated conversation about how much goo they sneezed out… JD tells me that it tastes salty …SR pointed me out a kid in a rick who was eating the damn thing .. i sometimes have very suzy like reactions to some very calvin like behavior from the men in my life!

b) are there less people in restaurants because of the smoking ban or because of the recession?

c) when will the market realise that credit card companies have too many ‘sub prime’ outstandings ?

d) if people vote for a famous name, is it still dynasty ?

e) are Hindi news channels, regional news channels ?

f) Is Hindi a regional language ?

g) Do Libertarians grow up to live in a Positive world? or would they be for ever stuck in their Normative universe.

h) If Communists took themselves less seriously, would they get more work done ? Starting point, sirs, the 1800′s are over, please move to the 1900′s. the next step would be to slowly move you to the current period :)

i) Is the Pakistani Government Retarded ? someone needs to tell them about letting out a rabid viper into their midst. We will survive him, will they ?

if you know the answers to this, do reply. would love a civil conversation about these and other mysteries in my universe :)

And Finally, if you are going to write in to tell me that the headline should read inexplicable :) don’t bother :) i changed it to unexplained for ease of understanding:)

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Posted by gargi at 9:12 am Tagged with: , , ,

Gems from Students - 2009

And Finally ..., Desi Pundit, Diary 12 Responses »
Apr 192009

It is that time of the year again. i trudge down to Kalina and correct papers. The students who finish this course go on to become journalists .. and they come up with some gems. .

The University is still in the last century. Rows of table and plastic chairs, high ceilings and background chatter. It feels more like an assembly line – at some NGO making papads – than the University :)

The monotony of correction is broken by some gems from students :) gems that i meticulously note down and reproduce here…. The winner is:

On CNN’s success – Ronald Reagan was to travel in space through the Space Shuttle Challenger. There were however, rumours of his assassination !!

The runner up is
CNN effect – CNN coverage of second world war was very good. Because of this people didn’t go out shopping.

a) on community radio – In the US and Canada, Community Radio is also called Pirate Radio :) This wasn’t one student but a whole bunch of them … leading me to wonder if this is what they were taught ….

b) In India, Community Radio is used by a Community to make the community work

c) DD is functioned by a satellite called Aryabhatta

d) If any minister has died, the death ceremony is shown very nicely on Doordarshan

e) During Vijay Diwas of Kargil war the PM visits at the Delhi and gives obituary to our Jawarns and this is telecasted very nicely

f) FM is community radio with commercial radio

g) Ted Turner had started CNN with the thinking that conflict is news and news is conflic

h) This is to raise the value of TRP in society – on news sensationalism .

i) Rakhee Sawant and Mika kissing, increased the level of vulgarity in society

j) During Vietnam war every news channel telecasted it 24/7

k) On the Press Registration Act – an example – to illustrate registering name. Sachin P thinks of the name “kyonki saas bhi kabhi bahu thi. But that name Ekta Kapoor want for herself. Therefore she request to Sachin about to give her the name. He gave her. She broadcast the serial in that name……”
seriously !!

that’s all for now. keep watching for the next edition of gems from students

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Posted by gargi at 8:28 pm Tagged with: , ,

we miss you

Diary, India No Responses »
Apr 082009

I got a mail today. There is nothing unusual about that – i get mails on most days…It’s the content of the mail that cracked me up :

with a subject matter that read we miss you, the mail read as follows :

We hope you have had many memorable moments using your xxxxx Bank Credit Card.

However, we have observed that you are not using your xxxxx Bank Credit Card XXXX XXXX XXXX xxxx for the last two months. We miss you and would love to see you using our Card. Regular use of your xxxxx Bank Credit Card will not only ensure that you get the maximum benefits but also earn reward points that can be redeemed for attractive gifts.

tho thweeth … i miss you too… but at 45% it is very expensive knowing you … i need to pay for my pleasures in cash :)

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Posted by gargi at 8:56 pm

Eye of the Beholder !

And Finally ..., Diary, Photographs 4 Responses »
Mar 292009

mornings ...

Good Morning !

Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark unfathom’d caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
– thomas gray – elegy written in a country church yard

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Posted by gargi at 11:31 am

Freedom....

And Finally ..., Diary, Photographs 1 Response »
Mar 262009

PC265399

standing at the edge of the ocean, dancing…
that woman was….
I wish sometimes that i can drop all caution and just do mad stuff –
not necessarily dance at the edge of the ocean …
but ….

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Posted by gargi at 11:01 am

The Crow !

And Finally ..., Diary, Passing On, Photographs 4 Responses »
Mar 242009

the lone crow

and here is something surreal to go with it : Ted Hughes on why the Crow is Black futility :(

The Crow’s Fall
When Crow was white he decided the sun was too white.
He decided it glared much too whitely.
He decided to attack it and defeat it.

He got his strength up flush and in full glitter.
He clawed and fluffed his rage up.
He aimed his beak direct at the sun’s centre.

He laughed himself to the centre of himself

And attacked.

At his battle cry trees grew suddenly old,
Shadows flattened.

But the sun brightened—
It brightened, and Crow returned charred black.

He opened his mouth but what came out was charred black.

“Up there,” he managed,
“Where white is black and black is white, I won.”

(on the day his son with Slvyia Plath decided to call it quits )

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Posted by gargi at 9:56 pm Tagged with: , , ,
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