"Don't "

 " Don't get tomatoes, brinjals, and potatoes, get coconuts, beans, and cauliflower ". With these orders I was off to the market, gaily waving to the kids and others on the way.

Was back in nearly an hour, as gay and jovial as at the start. ( the grin was a bit wider)

Getting ready to leave for work, I realised something was amiss, " Something wrong ? did I forget something ?".

My lady looked from the bag stand, "you have got the whole list, the ones I wanted, and the ones, not wanted."

Nature has got strange ways of infusing things into us, and one of them is blocking, the negative "do not".

The next time you make requests, you know how you will phrase to get things done right, right?

When travelling on the highway you notice many a large vehicle with a slogan, " Do not drink and drive" Now you know why many a driver stops at a liquor pub, before continuing the journey.

And the children always make it a point to do what you tell them not to do.

Let us change our orders, before we blame the orderlies.

P. S.

Please make comments.

Krishna came to town without his flute

 We have all been promised by our religious and cultural standing, that we would get a visit by our spiritual Diety or Prophet, as a prophecy, at a time of critical peak in the world.

If the prophecy is to be fulfilled, and the critical peak is at its height, the time is now.

Keeping with the era and the fashion, it would be stupid of our Gods and Masters, to come in the garb of those days and accessories, now.

So if they all landed up at various destinations,

Christ without his long hair style and flowing robe.

Krishna without his peacock feather and flute.

Gautam Bhuddha walking around in sports shoes.

Guru Govind, neatly shaved and perfumed.

I am sure they would finally spot each other, and the rest of us would miss them.


Will we ever be able to feel and find them, in disguise, if not we are no different than any atheist.


If they happen to break chappathi, and drink mushrooms soup from a peace bowl, at Guptha sweets, do u think we would go to see them? , and understand that they could be friends.


It is time we drop their outer marks, and see and feel their consciousness, or else they will always be amongst us, but invisible.

Insecure insurances

 I have never had an understanding of the word  insurance.

Is insurance and compensation the same?

There are insurance companies offering insurance for life, health, fire, other calamities and vehicles.


They come out with so many things in small prints, big explanations, confusing texts to get your money.

The corporate involved do not come into the picture to keep us safe, eat right, stay fit, drive carefully, yet they offer insurances  ?

Insurances are outrightlies.

After the damage is done, they are there, with the big book of rules, articles, sub divisions, to see what they can offer for your loss.

Maybe they will compensate, you will take, or your family will accept, whatever is offered.

We are the only ones who can be a sureity to ourselves, and all our belongings.

Naughty ones will even go to a level of swindling the swindler with, death, arson, accident and Sherlock crimes.

In the end, the crook will gain.

It is time the insurances realise, they give ideas to some to save, others to rob.

Which category are we in   !

Father of modern medicine

 Hippocrates lived 2500 years ago, dragging him back, to posthumously hand him a title of "Father of Modern Medicine", sure needs a look over.

In his days, medicines were native, natural, individualised and personal with no intermediaries.


Now things are different, practically ulta. (pronounced wool ta)


His terms were first do no harm, ( the fear created lasts a lifetime) let food be thy medicine, things which are practically impossible now, then patient was of initial and only importance.


Now a days patient is secondary, primary is the pharmacy, corporate, and anyone else who can come, and win the heart, mind, soul and anything else of the medical doctor.


So who could be given the honour  ?


There was an, Abraham Flexner, and his report ( medical education in the United States and Canada)  done in 1910, through the Carnegie foundation, and John D Rockefeller, who changed the medical system, then available to the one in vogue.



The real honour should be bestowed on one of these, as it would be apt than the original Greek, who was more of an alternative medicine man, than what we now have.


Am sure He would agree, and rightfully hand over the title, to the one who would accept.



P. S.
It all started, when a relative called on me, if I would teach a local villager without work, the art of medicine  !


Hippocrates looked from one of the volumes in my shelf, which housed his oath.


I agreed on one condition, " You and your family receive treatment only from my student."


He left.

 

ReplyForward

Open your mouth...... Ha ha ha

 None of us can forget the nursery rhyme, about eating sugar, but we sure have forgotten it's effect, and implicating lessons.

One of my friends Kalingarayer, arranged for a medical camp in Chennai, St Ursulas churchpark convent, a time ago when my lady was studying there.

We were there for two days, and every child was physically well, but when asked to open their mouth, there were no exceptions, everyone had dental problems, thanks to the effects of sugar.

How is it that nothing could be done from then till now?

The gates have been open to the market and we all are addicted, white sugar, country sugar and all sugars, high fructose corn syrup, added into all packed and displayed confectionery goods.

No lessons are for the general public, every lesson is only for the personal individual.

There are specific organisms in the mouth who are capable of permanently destroying our strong teeth with their secretions, in the presence of the sticky sugary goods.

Beware if you want your teeth strong, and a lovely natural smile, with your original teeth.

Avoid the sweet sticky goodies first, then with time we could move on to other things, if I can survive your hate, and u my insistence.  

Cruelty to animals

 Some habits start very early, one of them is throwing stones at street dogs.

In the village streets, in the mating season of the dogs, we can see a bitch with a large following going across the roads, a normal biological act of the animal kind.

How can they be a disturbance to you, unless you are the owner of the bitch, and she brings her admirers to your compound.

For the street urchins, the dogs are a shooting practice, for their homing skills, and no one admonishes them for it.

Last morning I noticed a stern looking administrative officer, throw an aluminium rod at a dog, going around at a play all alone, which happens to be within his range of boundry.

The rod found it's target.

It was a miserable sight, which if retaliated by me, could have been an embarrassing situation, and a physical assault and a bite, if done by the canine.

Maybe Nature and the canine street dog, would have a lesson taught to the grown up urchin with a post, somewhere, some day.

P. S.
I am an admirer of canines.

If u hit, it is an entertainment and a game, if it reacts..... and snarls and barks..... Dogs are bad.  

An obligation turns into a demand..... With time.

 "Yooovvv"      Was the call from across the street, when I had just started from a domestic store, purchasing some eats for my non talkative friends, who chirp, crow, and bark, but do not bite, peck, or chase, and are innocently quiet.

I turned to see, who could have addressed me like that, it was a senior citizen, who had received a lift to a tea shop in my two wheeler, a few days back.


I continued on my way,  somehow my mind refused to accept, a replay of a lift again.

Some acts of an obligation, with time turns into an involved act of a habit, a commitment, a routine, and then an advantage, finally, Demand.

Be it a simple act of sharing food, a donation to a beggar, a smile, a lift, and if very close and personal, a touch of a hand shake.

Just because you had offered once does it mean, it has to be always.

Do we also expect it   ?

Every moment is unique, no replay, or repetition, or else, we are all in for a surprise, both ways.

"Now take a deep breath..... "

 There is practically only one place we hear it,  yes, at the check up when visiting a medical doctor.

When it is not executed audible enough, you are given a demonstration.

Early lesson from across the stethoscope, it gets carried on for a life time, let us see if it can get altered  !

The Hindu festival celebrating the Elephant God's birthday has just passed, no one could have missed it, irrespective of the religious affiliation, small, big, bigger, Big, models have been on display in sitting, standing, lying down postures, all over the town, but there is one thing common in all.

A Big prosperous tummy.

It may be, his big portions of ladoos, kollukattais, sundal, pongal and more metabolic syndrome causing food, but the religious ancestors must have had their reasons  ? No Stupidity there.

See anybody asleep, watch the breathing, notice a child, now watch yourself reading this.

If u are involved, it would be the stomach going up and down, not the chest with every breath taken.

The seat of the breath is in the stomach, it is lower and deeper than the chest.

We took it for granted, the way we are breathing is right, now consciously start breathing from the stomach, slowly it will become natural.

The refreshed feeling of awakening would be present all through the day.

See your life change for the better, the seat of Life itself is in the stomach.

Now take a deep breath.....

A tilt of the neck, and an upturned nose

 For many a girl child, it starts at home, when her father starts to pamper her, with trinkets and dolls, later on her first boy friend, with books, flowers, chocolates and movies.

To get that tilt back, many an industry has come on with jewelry, chocolates, perfumes, make up kits, fancy footwear, stuffed animal dolls, silk sarees, and the list goes on, with the latest being mobile toys .



Trying to level it could bring down empires, think of Julius and his ache for Queen Cleopatra s  smile, if only he eyed the continent across the Atlantic, the Roman empire would have streatched and survived.

It is this spinning around the other, that keeps the world spinning and the economy flourishing, and many a creative profession and trade initiated.

This is a genetic carry over with the genes, some build on it, others just save it for the future generations.

It is never a quality for the "Y" Chromosome.

God save you from your inherited wealth, or the one you intend to create, seeing the upturned nose.

Till you get to realise this, enjoy the tilt, the game, and the running around to bring it down.

P. S.

In our culture, we trained the girls to see the floor, and be in the present, but with the coming of the colonists, things have started to change, for the better, and sometimes for the worse.  

A corporate owns a professional

 In these days of on-line purchasing, and selling yourself to a customer, many a professional is being owned by those who have the money, zooming in we see professional players, being owned like gladiators in a gamble to hurt, a shame.

Are we any different from the Romans and their colosseum horrors.

Professional caterers, ordered to bring on dishes lost of nutrition, newspaper barons tell their reporters what to report and how, and if there is no news, to make news.

IT cadres run by business magnets, loosing all sense of time, space and ruining their health, scientists whose inventions are stolen, by people looking for political gains, to bring on destruction than creation, medical centers run by tycoons, who look at patients like money bags, and bio engineering machines, as printers of the green and multi colour papers, of the valuable kind.

Unless we get to accept what we are, and refuse to be treated as slaves, and become entrepreneurs, we who have the power to create, will be made to produce to order.

We do not have to, unless our experience and professional skill is lost to all those around us.

No one can save us, but ourselves. 

Story telling

 I was always aware of my story telling, not that it was always new every time, but I honestly believed in them myself, and find it easy to make friends, with those who listen.

I remember there were times, when my son and his mother will listen carefully to my bed time stories to him.

It would sometimes bring me to my senses, with their laughter, as I would have gone off to sleep listening to myself, pulling out a big imaginative story.

Then there was this modern krishna, who loved his "two minute noodles". ( notice the blend of the singular with the plural, yet right  !) Lunch feed times.

Maybe that is how I feel I could take up another part time profession of baby sitting for toddlers, to keep them quiet with my yarns. ( bigger ones would walk away, young ones would look questioningly with rapt attention.)

P. S.

We have heard of old ones talking, and calling them senile, maybe this is in words, expressing the same thing   !  

ReplyForward

It was a small wave, but a large tide.

 Following the previous late evening, and early night rains, it was miserably cold, had to check on my warmth to prevent chillness, inspite of that, had to seek a hot brew, with the shivering.

( I even went to confirm if I was in the plains)

Early morning, thought of cancelling the walk, but the habit won over, along with a halt at tender coconut vendor.

With a dash of a few drops of eucalyptus oil in the hot bucket of water, the bath was a refresher, but inspite of it all, the weather made this morning gloomy.

It was in this mood I was on the way to work, through a short cut between village farms.

There at a distance I saw a child, of three, walking along with his grand ma holding his hand, nearing them I waved to the child, the response was a movement at the wrist, a shy smile, bringing on a larger smile from his granny.

It cleared my gloom, and there I was off to continue on my way to work, carried by the tide of a wave from the child.

With trust and respects to a man and senior citizen

 A public transport is a big box full of strangers, travelling together through the wind, some alighting and others getting down, at strange stations and destinations.

It was into one such bus I got into ,and found myself a window seat, somewhere in the middle, on the return journey home from a function.

The bus got filled, and a family who boarded together got split, each finding strangers as co- seaters.

A bossy concerned parent was asking my seatmate to request me to shift to another place to get them together.

The response was only a gesture from my seatmate, but it said all. Everything stayed put.

The rest of the journey was silence, then small talk, finally, a pointing to an Institute of study.

Maybe the person would turn out to be a future CEO,  an entrepreneur, or a principal, whatever she becomes,  she would win respect, and bring out the best from those around her.

With gratitude and respects to a junior, a future to the world of trust and honour.  

These days we think of a temple, and off we go.

 I remember seeing an elderly country cousin once years ago, his beard flowing, his hair unruly and unable to be kept.

Those were days with quite a few saloons already, price for a cutting, (as it was called) was kept at par with petrol, and a shave was a pittance, or a pisuku, (for the price of one the other was free, or little offer)

I asked him why  ? He said he was saving the style for an offering to his favorite diety, and he was waiting for a call   !

These days we think of a temple, and off we go.

Those days, a pilgrimage was an event, saving money, time off from work, preparations with on the way food, no reservation of anykind, no special darshan tickets to jump ques.

And a wait for a call, in dreams or omens.

The darshans were intimate, individual, and memorable, and slow paced, no pictures, no vedios, with just an offering of a little special prasadams on return. (Am sure you can smell the ghee, and see the cashews, or the pancha amirthams)

Most noticeable difference was a tonsure of someone special, or someone who would not retaliate, and ask questions.

Said and done, today was a pilgrimage, a call through omens, a wedding function, mention of the temple, from a passing colleague, and the rest is a travel, and a prayer in gratitude, for the grace offered.

At Srirangam, Trichy.

P. S.
No tonsure, I nearly am already bald.  

Your garbage in my compound

 Many a domestic or international trouble starts at the border, either encroaching with settlements, or infiltrating people, and putting ideas to cause disturbances.

In a village, a small thing which causes a big trouble in a household, is dumping garbage into anothers space, before it gets collected by the scavengers, or left to rot with the monsoon rains.

Who does not like their place neat and clean  ? but where to dump the dirt of the house.....! Certainly at a place, whose occupant is a passive kind, and recieves the garbage as fertilizer.


( Those days village muck was collected by the farms around, in their bullock carts to be spread on their crop lands as fertilizer, until plastics got added, and roadside dump yard was spilling to clog drains)

City and town garbage is multifold.

Another modern garbage is through social media, it does not rot, but takes space, ( as GB s and thought forms) may we become very responsible, to see if we are sharing creativity or social garbage, to our large number of contacts.

Are we going to be spreaders or deleters, to the modern garbage   !

One mans art, is another mans scrap.

Many a passing acquaintance wins, with a drop of my guard.

 My pugilist teacher said, whatever your stance, and your moves, never let down your guard.

I am a flirt, an extrovert, a loud mouth and more to my credit, except when someone dampens the enthusiasm, to be revived again, when I forget. (I have a bad memory)


Today it was a bus conductor, who somehow found me a window seat in a crowded bus, to win my appreciation and win back a lovely smile, even though he stood all through the travel time with his duty, walking to and fro.


( Have you ever seen or heard a long distance bus conductor, smile and talk  ?)

Next it was a college teacher and a friend, sharing her students antics, and comparing them with hers, in the temple bench waiting for the lines to move.

Further up the line was a sandal paste, tonsured elderly farmer at a que for darshan, who helped alleviate the monotony of a shuffling gait to the Grabha Graham, with his farm tales, and a hide and seeking child at play, outside the lines.


How can I forget the cashier at lunch in Hotel  Gurukrupa, who exchanged much with enquiries, to let me share my studies and flood experience, four and a half decades back, in the same town.


Better to drop your guard and win hearts, than to be guarded and win a fight. ( have given up boxing)

 

Kambung koolu oru sombhu

 It was another of those hot, humid, mid summer mornings, the medical students had just finished their session of seeing cases, at a satellite, an allotted primary health care centre, away from the nearest town, and were heading back to the parent institution.

There was a talk about going to find a restaurant or a juice kadai, when it came to pass, we sighted a cart o restaurant, under the shade of a tamarind tree.

Stopping the vehicle, and the twenty of us descended, to make friends with the elderly vendor in turban.

It was a kambung koolu cart, with a large clay pot in the center, and all the paraphernalia accessories around, onions, a variety of chillies, fryums, and buttermilk, and drinking water.

For some it was a homely ritual, for others it was a first time drink of the village, with no other alternative kind.

The elderly ruffian gentlemen was way too kind, to see students in the age of his grand children around his cart, he was boistrously delighted to be of service, and shared moments of his family function in the evening.

Paying and bidding farewell we alighted to be on our way.

P. S.
The next halt was a sugar cane kiosk, under a banyan tree, a kilometre away.

Same story, this time an aunt.

A surgeon at home

 It was a large dark dot on the right thumb, an hindrance to my writing, riding, and eating, a bit of a nuisance, for the last four days.

I remember a small thorn pricking while walking down the hillock the other evening, from a pathway bush.

The evening before I asked for a safety pin on thought, my lady normally has them, being offered, I showed her my thumb.

The hold was firm, painless, but stable, with the safety pin a few simple nicks were made, and an opening done.

With deft strokes, the content from the dot was taken out, and the surgery finished, no anaesthetics, no pre or post operative medications, I was showing off.

The surgeon was not thanked, it was taken for granted, an act from a surgeon at home, one of the many roles she plays.

P. S.
The same hands which brought on the peanut ladoos.  

Look alike Grandma....

 My Grandma passed away more than three decades ago, but she still lives in my memory.

She was the first of a large family of nine, and the second wife to my Grand Dad, with two kids already ahead, of six of her own.

My granny was with those big ear studs, heavy enough to draw her ear lobes down, to make a large gap to fill her jewelry.

She was short, dark, wrinkled, and a beauty with her kindness, and grace.

She wore no spectacles, nor any hearing aids, she sat in a corner at her meals, her back to the family, she was up when awake, let it be anytime of the night.

She ran the household, while grandpa walked with the panchayat and set to govern the village at his thinnai darbar.

The family rose to her sounds in the kitchen than to the rays of the sun, in her home.

I was reminded of her, seeing a lookalike in the campus, my respects to my Granny then, was kiddish, and mischievous, if she was here now.....!
Maybe a few words of concern, some time to listen to her woes, maybe a passing smile, and a wave.

Maybe someone else do see me as an image of their own, at an angle, or gesture.
(Am mistaken for an another, in strange places)

Ours is a big World, but small in our circle.


P. S.
The reasons for that generation to be called Grand, must have been many, and Great with the previous ones, We better live to our best to follow the tradition.

From instant insanity to Natural slowness

 Nature is vast, and we have restricted her, with our haste and limitations.

Trying to control and better Nature, is where trouble starts.

Whatever be our failures, our pitfalls, our sadness, there is a connection to our tiff with Nature. (N)

Going along, finding out the path of N, brings on a cheer, energy to live, to a day of fulfillment, and satisfaction.

Future generations will seek out professions to go along with N.

In agriculture, health, communication, and all other trades, to slow down the haste of madness to sanity.

Even coffee, we are in a hurry, not waiting for it to brew well, where will we let other things with time. ( two minutes noodles, we are all hooked)

May we all get to understand and let N take us along, and show us her secrets, far deeper and beyond our imagination.

Today is a world happy husband day.

 Happy and Husband... See again.

If it is a day of celebration, because of a rarity, I agree, we can celebrate, for a husband to be happy, he should change the relationship called husband.

Take a minute to think, this would come on only with, a lot of sacrifice, bearing a still silence, and finally a realisation, that happiness is not with the other.

If u can think of the other as a friend, easy, think of the other as a stranger, difficult but ok.
See the other as a second cousin, but best is a family friend.

With growing age, the other seems like a daughter, or with the looks, a beautiful aunt.

It is then, that the husband could have happiness, no expectations, little or no rules, happiness is limitless.

Whoever came up with this word husband, a spillover from animal husbandry.

Expanded.... Husbandry is control and management of...

Who likes to be controlled and managed ?

Maybe with time, the term would die a natural death, and other ways of expression would surface, with dignity and respect. ( father of the child)

Till then happy.... Yes, with the partner as a friend.  

ReplyForward

An innocent poori on the chopping block

 A loving mom prepared two sets of poories and potato masala gravy, for her son on his History exam morning.

Papa knew how much his child loved poories, and with how much love it was prepared, but he knew otherwise.

Not enough, his mom also got for him a large glass of milk, to go along with it.

Somehow he got every thing packed, giving some excuse, that they would have it in the park on the way, while discussing history lessons.

He got the child a glass of fresh orange juice and two bananas, at a kiosk nearby, opening the packed breakfast in the park he let the child give away the food to a less fortunate, while interacting his subject.

The child did well in his exams, not that he could not have done well with his poories, but would have been poor in comparison.

Certainly diet during exams days should be carefully selected.

Fried foods, regurgitate back after a few hours, creating a nauseating feeling, also causes dullness, drowsiness, preventing awareness and relaxed concentration, necessary for an exam situation.

Lines on poori can go on but we all love poories, as golgappas, and it's various names, for its taste, spicy accessories, and the  sleepiness following it.  

CDC eats it's own words.

 The CDC in a press release last week says, the agency has streamlined it's covid -19 guidance, so the public can better protect itself.

"Come on how can u let us down, after we were speaking your lines to each and every one around us"   !

Well if it is you today, tomorrow it will be the FDA, then later WHO, later all the other abbreviations to follow.

Why do u people wanted to help us first, and now say, go help yourself.

Anyway, thank you agency, for shoving that thick towel into your mouth yourself.  

A Holy day on calender, turns into a holiday on wheels.

 It all started last evening, when a colleague enquired, " Are you going to work, tomorrow ? ".

For those who feel work is worship, they would be sure to be at work on a holy day.

A diety on his birthday, do u think he likes to sit, being locked up in his altar of worship, with all the delicacies prepared in his name, or do u think he would pay a visit to see his disciple, at his place of work ?

In reality on such days extra work should be done, in rememberance of his Holiness.

The word holiday emnated, when people started freaking out to a picnic on Holy Days.


Take extra care today, who knows your favorite deity may walk in as your client, or customer, to give you his blessings.

P. S.
Every day is special and Holy, to someone, somewhere, it should be celebrated wisely.