Rules. Ruler. Rudest .

At one time, like decades ago,  people seriously followed rules. Now the rules are flouted, sometimes by those involved in making them, and as it happened recently with a lady traffic warden in Bandra (who insisted on the rule being followed, and got hauled  up by the cops because the rule breakers had more muscle power....).

These days some four letter words actually start behaving like their idiomatic alter ego.

Like "Rule" . As a noun.

As a verb,  there is nothing much happening , unless you are the "ruler".

 And so I only worry about the noun.

I worry, because I don't think it is doing me any good to understand the "rule".

Innovative interpretation rules. Sometimes innovation includes strong disobedience.

Rules. They sent out a rule about not keeping plants in your balcony, because when you watered them, the stuff kind of dripped outside disfiguring the outside color. In a matter of 20 minutes, rule abiding family entities emptied my balcony of a bamboo plant, bougainvillea, ajwain bush, hibiscus tree, several tusli plants and a neem plant, not to mention several tomato plants and a watermelon plant which suddenly appeared from thrown peels.  Stuff was carted to the compound, and I never saw it again.  I look up, and I still see various disobedient plants daringly enjoying the breeze in various balconies. It's the sign of the times. Rule followers are stupid.

Rules. Rickshaws think they are on a well deserved picnic in our area. With kilometres of straight undulating roads, they unfailingly park on a corner of two roads, so the person taking a left turn cannot see traffic coming from the left. Honking, gesticulating and finally rolling down the window, has the fellow menacingly getting out from his seat, questioning if I owned the road, and daring me to do whatever I wish. He will not move.  He is waiting for someone, the vehicle is already hired.  I stay put. Traffic piles up behind me. Honks. He curses with the confidence of someone who has all eventualities  covered , gets out and pushes his rickshaw around the left turn by two feet. I wonder why. And continue wondering. I leave.

Rules. We are a nation that drives on the left .  Some folks think they are in the US when they drive.  As per "rules"  , you overtake from the right, and slow movers keep to the left most , usually imaginary lane (never thought there would be cheating in quality of white paint).  However, bikers, whose heads probably spin at additional rpm's when they wear a helmet, consider it their duty to always overtake from the left, even though you've been showing a left turning signal for a kilometre. So blatant is the driving, that they even drive between a bus queue and the stopped bus, and a friend of mine was injured because a biker crashed into her. Gestures to slow down or stop, from passengers disembarking from a bus, are rewarded with impatient looks , and an outrage at being made to decelerate. A fellow I questioned even angrily told me he paid taxes, and I told him that I paid taxes too, (that too, without banging my vehicle into folks), and owned as much of the road as he did.

 Rules. Why just bikers and public transport,  rules are broken again and again at the top.  We have a serious issue about womens' security, a law and order and policing problem,  there is  sniping and shooting on the western border with an enemy country,  a committee urgently deliberates on the improvement to laws and asks for suggestions, and the premier law and order entity of the country whizzes off to BanglaDesh to announce some new  improved visa regimes with that country. Despite the fact that the steady influx from BanglaDesh  to India across porous borders doesn't happen with visas. When the ability to prioritize is missing, chaos results.    

Rules. The new rule about gas cylinders, said we could have 6 cylinders a year at subsidized rates, and the remaining at enhanced rates. As a rule, it isn't clear, when they start counting.  I recently ordered a refill, and paid the unsubsidized rate of nine hundred something. When I mentioned not having utilized my six  cylinders at subsidized rates, I was told that it is 3 cylinders  for every six month period.  I was on my fourth cylinder , hence full price. You go and try visiting the dealer, and his office is packed with people and you are unable to enter. Everyone interpreting the rule their own way, the government even deciding  how I should consume my quota, regardless of whether I live in a cold climate, whether I have many family members, and other factors that affect gas consumption rates, that might actually vary during a year.  Vote bank politics has now decreed the new subsidized cylinder limit as 9. I just wonder , if these rules are simply going to give rise to a new surreptitious business of counting cylinders in a "different" way.    

Folks still go the wrong way on one-way streets, I see so many folks driving and talking with one hand stuck to their ear, nicely observable through the not so tinted glass; massive cars blatantly park at an angle, using up two parking spaces, people inside treat you like dirt when you ask them to straighten up.

 At a six lane intersection, with only one lane at right angles, and all lanes with two way traffic, a speeding rickshaw cuts finely a cm away from my toe , the driver glares and whizzes away, even though the light indicates that pedestrians may walk then; and a police chowky bang in the intersection is locked from outside, no one policing the intersection, because so many are busy catching drivers, cars , bikes and tempos, down the road.

It is normally traditional to breathe a sigh of relief when someone introduces rules .

You think life is simplified. 

No.  At least not here.

We have come to a point, that everytime there is a rule specified, an alternative system gears up to counter it, for a price.  Those that can pay, pay. At some point soneone up there, notices, and initiates one more rule to counter this.

And this continues ad nauseum, in what people call a loop.

In my younger IT working days, something getting stuck in a loop was bad news.

I guess times have changed.  

The incredible meet ......

I've been to various blog meets. Some with 5 folks in 3 star hangouts, some with 200 people in 5 star places, and everything in between.

But this was different. Two  bloggers, who over the years, have become , sight unseen, great admirers of someone, who may be amongst Mumbai's leading blogging dogs, with his own blog. Of course.

Every photo tells a story.  And his just became a book.

He lives in Mumbai's most popular suburb , often called the Queen of the suburbs. The two bloggers reached a landmark, and were escorted from there by something like a pilot motorbike, which was much in the fitness of things because the head of the family where he lives, has connections to both pilots and bikes.

We entered  to an amazing welcome , of wagging tails, excitement, and a bunch of uncontrolled leaps; uncontrolled, because it was clear, that he knew who was coming, he was told earlier to go easy, but like any child who loves visitors, he kind of gave in to his impulses a few times.

Much indulgent nosing around with cool nostrils, a surreptitious lick thrown in quietly, a tentative jump to place his front legs on the blogger's shoulder,  and stretching his neck to be patted and spoken to, he would sit for a while, and then get up again , unable to contain his excitement. 

His eyes simply spoke volumes. The fellow is an excellent listener. When you said something to him, you could tell he understood. He also follows customs which would make any matriarch of any family proud.

Sits quietly by you, as you scratch his back or pat him. Teeth baring and cooing is not really his scene.  He does not threateningly hover around, smelling bags and purses. When the bloggers were offered Tilgul by the family matriarch, he may have wanted some, but did not make a song and a dance about it.

His choice of food would warm any one's heart. Chapati sabji, Kande pohe, Upma, and the like. And if you keep bread and Dosa equidistant from him, the Dosa clearly wins. No wonder his mentor in the family, is often found photographing the lovely traditional dishes cooked in his house.

While the bloggers were having a long chat,  he wandered around, went to his favourite spot in the balcony, to check out if he needed to shoo away any trespassing birds. There were some barks from somewhere outside. He answered back. The conversation continued a bit more. Maybe he told his friend ," No yaar, I cant come, we have some guests. Maybe in the evening . ...."

He has this uncanny ability to be part of the group, and listen, and participate in silent communion. Maybe he understands a lot more than things addressed to him alone. If you look into his eyes, you will agree.

The bloggers admired his natural coat, that hinted at some special DNA. Someone once made a film on 1001 of those.  And he sat quietly, under the divan, listening and probably being greatly tickled by all the praise being showered on him by the two elderly bloggers. Much like a kid, enjoying being praised for a good performance somewhere.

I think he also watches television news. Had he been able to talk and communicate , I am sure he would have made and excellent contributor, say , with Rajdeep Sardesai's discussions on CNN/IBN.

But he must make do with his expressions. Which his mentor, the family head, captures on film. And every week , they inspire a poem. Woof poetry.  

He surely had hunger pangs gnawing inside. He came out from his hiding place, as the bloggers got up to leave. Much loitering around their feet, with now, a side foray to an area where there was a tin of biscuits.  I've seen kids stamping feet and throwing their limbs around demanding sweets . Or else.  But here was this fellow, just with a hint of movement towards the tin, once in a while giving in to the impulse to leap and place front legs next o the tin, but yet, hesitating.

He has his days when he joyfully yelps, charges around, wags his tail furiously,  and thinks the house motorcycle is his enemy.  But he understands the occasion.  And  thinks in what one may say, is a very human way. 

 There were some photographs happening. One of the bloggers gave him a biscuit, which was devoured before the camera could focus.  He kind of hung around the visiting bloggers.

 Suddenly there was a flash.  And instantaneously, he barked an alert.  Someone had clicked. Flashes of  light were serious stuff.  And he had to act.  A responsible fellow, enjoying the adulation and love, but always aware of things around him.

The two bloggers waved goodbye to him, and left to go for lunch with the head of the family.

He stayed back. Grandma was alone. And he would give her company.   

The two bloggers returned home. Completely impressed and smitten.....

Requiem for a tree.....

My mother had very green fingers. She planted a coconut tree in our small garden in Pune, the year I was born.  And before I learned to spell “Kalpavruksha”,  I was living and learning coconuts. 

Like me,   green and smooth as a child, sheltered at the centre, under the generous maternal  palm leaves.  Like me, at puberty, away from the tree , an introduction to the world around. 

Being tough outside.   A rough  peeling of fake attitudes  and cleansing before learning to be useful  in the home.   The rough dried fibres  combed with a machete, like my fashionably dry hair, being combed by my mother, shaking her head, and proceeding with a great coconut oil massage.    The typical sound of a coconut being broken,  the clamour to get  a sweet sip of the coconut water.  

 The coconut  meat, shredded , sitting on a “vili”; some to be used for dal, subjees, and  chutneys, and some to extract sweetness in the form of coconut milk.  Like a busy young bitter-sweet life,  and you remained what your Mother Tree taught you.

Bath soaps  in our time were looked down upon.  Milk, Cream, or better still, Coconut milk,  mixed into a paste with Ambehaldi  , and  an ayurvedic herb like Ghavalakasri,  worked like magic.  Nothing to beat the mixed scents of a coal fired copper boiler,  and this paste slathered , rubbed and being washed off by the hot water, on a winter morning. 

A full active day in school/college,  and we would use the coir “shendis”  of the whole coconut, to clean our roughened toes and heels, and then  rub some coconut milk or even coconut oil on to them at night.  More milk for our faces.   The natural coconut fat worked itself on our skin, and fought early morning winter cycling winds for us, as we rushed for PT classes In college.

 It wasn’t really all about preserving  our, sometimes  non existent beauty.  There was a no-nonsense quality about the coconut.  Its life was not about appearing Page 3, but being comprehensively useful  to society.

Age affected the coconut tree, and sometimes the palm fronds fell off. I have seen folks sitting in the afternoons with sharp implements, and creating fine long sticks, that ultimately became a broom.   There was even some kind of oil extracted from the tough brown shell, that was used medicinally for discoloration on limbs, by older folks.   We used coconuts to honor elders, and God, breaking them in front of the latter  as a check on our egos.

I don't have a tree now,  but I have something the Parachute folks have introduced. Though I cannot understand  why they  spell "Advanced "  with an "S".

My mother gave me the unshelled coconut from “my” tree when I got married.  I still have the wrinkled shell.   Twenty five years later,  my mother passed away.    

Strangely,  the tree has never borne fruit after her , and later passed away itself.