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Dinner Plate

In today’s busy lifestyle workaholics prefers take-away meals to spare a little time for supposedly better/productive activities they believe so. Eating on commute to work has become norm in metropolitan cities like New York. Ham & cheese sandwich in one hand and other hand occupied with large coffee to kick start the day OR a slice of pizza & soda-can before calling it a day. Fascinating stuff! How people have developed habit of eating On The Go.

I remember going to community hall as a child for marriages and other community occasions and functions where food was also served. So 500 to 1000 people would enjoy feast in a traditional Indian way of eating called Pangat. It contains… Sitting down on floor with your legs crossed inwards and overlaying each other in front of your plate(Thali) & then you eat your meal using only one hand. Right hand preferred. using Left hand for eating consider as Bad-Manner for many orthodox Indians. (I can talk about its benefits and disadvantages, but that’s for another post.) Sadly pangat tradition is fading away rapidly because Amazon is always having dining table sets on crazy sale price.

As the time changed buffet dinning replaced pangat tradition but one thing still remain same, eating with single hand! In an usual Indian marriage reception you would notice hundreds of people standing on their feets, carrying 8 inch large dinner plate in one hand and roaming around whole venue – one counter to another, lining up in long queues to collect different food items ranging from salads, breads, curries, sweets, daal, rice and fries. These guys be having four course meal on single plate with little to no cutlery. All of these proves that pangat is still partly alive in Buffet.

United States is credited for Fast Food eating culture but despite its popularity and following among citizens, It’s highly unlikely that you spot an American eating lunch/dinner on their feet at weddings. Similarly It’s hard to see an Indian eating while commuting on public transport. Both the world have their own way of practicing “Eating On the Go” habit.

Yellow Card

I played game of soccer as a defender(Center Back) today at my work place, but only Metaphorically. Saving goal is essential part of play for a defender. What I had to defend today was my basic need for survival – Food.

Here is what happened…

None of the employees are allow to order any food online to office address Or go out during work hours because of covid prevention policy. I had not prepared lunch today because it was genuinely not possible for me to even cook at least a meggie noodle. If I had ask for permission to order food, management would have straight away denied it for sure (Talking with Previous Experience). So there were only 2 possibilities in front of me, either I follow company norms and stay hungry till evening OR I order food anyway and face consequences what so ever.

A good defender will dive for an offensive tackle If there is no other option to stop potential goal build up. Doing so defender knows he will be booked with Yellow Card but in that moment stopping opponent from scoring goal matters the most.

30 minutes to go for my Lunch Break. Playing by the rules would put me to starve until shift gets over. Although it is an offence to order a meal but I know Company won’t fire me for that matter (Or metaphorically speaking, they won’t RED Card me and send me off the pitch). After calculating potential risk factors I had no choice but to play my yellow card move to save myself from hunger. So I placed the order & food arrived. I was called by HR(Referee) for justification of my action. I gave a silly excuse to cut off the conversation, in return I received “This won’t be tolerated next time, this is your last warning”(My Yellow Card). Life is a Jungle and some time you have to take offence in order to meet your survival needs.

It felt victorious and that meal was not lesser than a Champions League trophy.

Travel + Findingyourself.

Most of us like self discovery stories don’t we! Box Office collection says so. These feel good movies are best to have relaxing evenings with family and friends. Let me name some of my favorite movies of same genre. Into the Wild, Wild, The Darjeeling Limited, Eat Pray Love & some Bollywood flicks: Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani, Tamasha, Jab We Met. That’s all I can think of right now but surely there are a lot more to add into list. These films follow one cliche plot, guy/girl confused with life goes on a vacation, meet new people, indulge in adventure, exchange conversation with completely dreamy person who says stuff like: “live your passion, break the monotony, there is no tomorrow.” And our guy figures out his life. He suddenly realize what is his calling! his passion.

End of the movie. Credit Roll.

…I don’t completely disagree with such movies but problem lies with romanticizing and glorifying travel as the ultimate cure for your mundane problems to the deepest trauma you been carrying with you. For someone who is in his young age & not stepped out of his hometown ever, these movies will build unreal impression about life and how to deal with its complex nature. This young boy will blame his lack of exposer of world for his inability of figuring out what is best for him, “his passion, his calling”. But because he have watched so much of these films and developed emotional bond with protagonist, upon facing bad consequences he will also plan an adventurous holiday with friends or even better, SOLO Trip!!, why? because he have learnt from movies that one has to go on holiday “break out of the comfort zone” to truly understand himself and purpose of his existence.

..If you want to find yourself put yourself in slightly awkward, unfamiliar, uncomfortable situation the whole point of solo travelling is that only. So you don’t have to seek out for an adventurous holiday or road trip to find yourself start a business, meet new people, learn a skill, that will give same experience and exposer to you as it would have given you by travelling.

Chappal Experience.

For those who don’t know, a chappal is a pair of footwear.

I was about to leave for an event, it was one of the marriage functions of a close friend. I got dressed up in a traditional Indian kurta-pajama outfit. But I had no suitable pair of footwear to go along with the look so I decided to buy a new one on the way to venue.
I rarely wear kurtas or attend such event so it was clear that this new purchase of mine will be used exclusively just for a single night. And because of that I wasn’t too choosy about the style, color and quality of chappal I was about to purchase. I knew exactly what I needed – a pair looking just pleasing enough and as cheap as I can get. I begin scanning down all the shops while driving to the venue and there I saw Paragon(footwear brand) store. Right upon entering through the door my eyes caught attention of Black & Brown colored chappal which was kept right in front of the door, looked good enough for the occasion so immediately I tried them on, Perfect Fit.
I Asked, How much?
The guy said 300!
-WOW.
it’s an amazing feeling when your budget & quality of product matches the price. I said please take my money. I kept them on and got the old pair packed.
In just under 2 minutes or less I was out of the store and headed to event.
As long as I can recall this was the quickest shopping experience I have had. Before making any new purchase usually we go through comparing other similar products, read reviews, inquire tons of questions. All of that in a hope that, what we are getting(the product) will last long enough to return back its value, service or usability.
Chappal which was bought for a single use, got stuck with me for a year now and using them every now and then. I could never though this will last this long, I wasn’t prepared. I have made many purchases after researching, reviewing, trying different variants. But in most cases things don’t work as expected. I think for some occasion keeping your critical thinking aside helps in best purchase decision. Believe in your snap judgments and gut feeling will surprise you.

अंग्रेजी इतिहास in English!

If you can read the title of this blog you are among a big chunk of the population who have proficiency in Hindi & English. India has a list full of a regional languages. Many of the people speaks 1 regional language (mother tongue) with English as a second language. Rooting back, India had Sanskrit as a major language of its time. Our ancestors have recorded a plethora of their knowledge in the form of Vedas and other Itihas – Puran books. Today that same language spoken only by a handful of people, mostly by Pundits or Pujari. The English considered as a foreign language, If English is foreign than Sanskrit is from another galaxy for me. I can understand and speak better English than any regional languages of India (except one that I speak).

Britishers landed upon ports of India in the early 1600s. They came to trade business & ended up running government in the country for two centuries. They required people to work in their administration and help them rule Indians. East Indian Company built institutes for teaching English to learned communities of India. In 1776 Calcutta Supreme Court started using English as their primary language. Therefore, it became the language of education, administration, and judiciary. EIC implanted ‘English Education Act’ in 1835 which helped the language to penetrate into Indian culture. In few decades English got its reputation of new élite because it was limited to royal and rich families of India & people who were associate with British Raj. Having good command on English reflected that a person belongs to better culture, education & has better intellect than non English speaker. You would get a higher status in the society and respect just by knowing a language. Indians were divided by languages and English played vital role as bridge for people across different cultural background to communicate. In 1947 when independent Indian government came into picture they tried to end & replace English with Hindi but India could never established any regional language as a ‘National Language’ till today because not every region/county speaks Hindi other than northern and central India. After 72 years of independence India have embraced English with open arms. 400 Million Indians uses it for daily correspondence. We cover English with our local languages and created new type of lingo such as Hinglish (Hindi-English), Tanglish (Tamil-English) and so on. Depending on social situations we switch from Local to English. Knowing English has become very important over the years. You know people judge you if you are expected to speak English but fail to deliver. Its Important for getting a good job, for getting university degree, to get business projects, to mingle and socialize with others.

In perseverance of this foreign language we have lost command on our native languages. Just like Sanskrit we will forget Hindi in centuries to come. Future generations would not understand the richness of Hindi literature if they will lost ability to read Hindi. There will be English translated versions available like we have English translated Sanskrit scripts like Vedas, Mahabharata, Ramayana, etc. But translation only ruins its purity and fails to convey its true message just how Hindi dubbed Hollywood movies messes up with its meaning.

Reference – https://shod hganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/237338/7/07_chapter%204.pdf

Pardon my grammar🙏