An Approximate Life

Be approximately right rather than exactly wrong.

John W Tukey, a chemist, turned topologist turned statistician, absolutely hit the nail on the head when he said that. Which is kind of funny , because he was exactly right.

We, of the world's approximately oldest civilization, initiators of the exact concept of zero,  and  some time learners of a context sensitive ancient Panini Sanskrit Grammar so perfectly algebraic  for relating to computer programming structures, have unknowingly accepted approximations as a huge part of our lives.

Go on  road trip anywhere, and stop to ask directions. Many times, road signs are a one time effort performed by fatigued municipal office, and updating is ignored.   Regardless of the actual distance, with a fine disregard for the metric system  which actually took over in 1957, someone will always say ,"Oh, just 5 furlongs further down ."  After 5 furlongs, when nothing appears, and you check with someone , you get a similar answer, possibly qualified by sighting things like schools, cisterns and taking a left or right .

You get a notification from the income tax authorities mentioning your latest return, and it mentions an approximate general reason(s) you should see them immediately. There is nothing exactly mentioned regarding specifically you.  You take leave from work, and travel 40 kilometres to their office, out of respect for national laws which are exact. On reaching there, you move through a maze of folks who point you somewhere else approximately. The final person tells you , your return is fine, and the letters were sent to approximately 1 lakh  people including you, who fell into some category, as an exercise in random checking.

You go to your bank, to wire some money abroad as registration fee for a conference.  You would think the rules exist in black and white. But no.  I mean the rules exist, you specify the extra charges should be recovered from your normal savings account,  but the understanding is approximate, and so every head office en route on the wire gets its pound of flesh before the fee reaches the destination ,  reduced in value . You protest,  someone checks and apologizes, and something is returned to you.  This from a major bank that should know its procedures eyes closed. But there is a comfort level in being approximate, and a bit of a nose-turn-up in being called a service organization.      

The agency that really excels at approximation is the Weather Bureau or Meteorological Office as we call it.   The first approximation is about when the Monsoon will hit Kerala. Sometimes it does not keep appointments, and various reasons are given about winds, and depressions and so on. Which develop over a period of observable time, and nothing is instantly changing. Indications exist,  but we we are still approximate.  The 26th July cloudburst over Mumbai was never predicted. Rain clouds in mid February , are unusual, do not appear in an instant, movements can be followed, but someone thinks the clouds may approximately move on, and hey, who wants to make a wrong prediction ? (For that matter, a right prediction ? :-)  )

Law and Order issues being approximate is puzzling.  The approximation being done is by the authorities.  You get pulled up because you followed the traffic flow and turned left, when the signal was red.  You get pulled up when you obstinately wait for a signal to change color, and block all kinds of errant honking traffic behind you. The cop is approximately trying to figure out  what he should charge you under, as hundreds of bikers without helmets zip through disobeying an exact rule. You ask him about this, and he approximately deems you dangerous and lets you go.

Medicine is an exact science.  However , our Food and Drug authorities allow medicines , like Nimesulide , which are banned in other countries.  I mean, either something is beneficial to the body,  or it is harmful.  Dosages are specified . But we are beset with an approximate attitude.   We seem to follow a "maybe" system . Lead in Maggie noodles (where these noodles are not a life requirement, per se) is avidly investigated, retests ordered, but millions of fly-by-night ayurevdic manufacturers ignore proper procedures of preparing medications as specified, and market medications with unchecked harmful levels of lead.   The "Maybe" is intricately linked with a mindset that says, science may be exact, so what; but we deal in things approximately.

So many things that work like clockwork in other countries simply become "approximate" in India .  Cell phone service providers who must follow stringent service-to-consumers rules elsewhere , simply go approximately haywire in India. Like Vodafone.  ( I have personal experience).  Airlines which must provide certain facilities (else face penalties/actions) in other countries, quietly ignore things in India, and point to local airlines when you question them about things like wheelchairs. (Again I have personal  experience). Even food. They try and approximately do what they are supposed to , and it doesn't matter if  the consumer suffers.

Sometimes I think our flora today also live approximate lives, not knowing what the soils contain, thanks to indiscriminate landfills , putrefying stuff and increase in methane concentrations, and lack of water. Global warming is a nice approximate reason to publicize.

Many years ago, Germans were famous for perfection.  They still may be.  I haven't been there since 1991 when I lived there , with the kids , for a year.  There used to be  Herr Schmidt in our apartment  complex, who  always did the garden up keep, and became great friends with my daughter , who  then  5, liked to tag along with him, clearing weeds, raking soil, and watering , once the winter cold season got over. I would chat with him whenever I went to pick up my daughter, or thought she was being more of a nuisance than a help, and he once mentioned, that spring officially began on April 1, and so now was the time in late March, to do all this work in the garden.

My approximation laden mind was in a shocked tizzy over his statement about Spring beginning on April 1.  I mean, there were things you could be exact about, and there were things beyond your control.  Spring was not an aunt who called and said she was arriving by a certain train , and so on. 

You will not believe this, but right on the dot on April 1, I noticed buds  on the plants, some blooming, some just born,  on the garden border.  After a severe snowy winter , you could not miss this event when it happened.

Sometimes, I guess nature too learns  , where it must be exact , and where it cannot  be approximate....        

     

Brilliant coding .... and it is not about IT..

One exists the way one does,  because one's parents donated 23 chromosomes each , making one the proud holder of 46 chromosomes in the nucleus of every cell in one's body.

A chromosome consists of hundreds and thousands of genes, and , many personal traits  are determined  by sets of these genes.   The entire structure, and functioning of your body and possibly your mind is decided by the types and amounts of proteins your body synthesizes, and  genes are the managers  of the lives-and-times  of these proteins,  which actually contain coded instructions on how you will develop throughout your life.

You may have traits you inherit.  I  mean you may look like a spitting image of your father, but inherit the disposition of your mother.  You may even be predisposed towards a medical career, despite neither of your parents being so, simply due to a dominant gene from your grandmother, skipping a generation, and flowering within you. All those traits that have assorted aunts and folks say things like "You speak just like your Mom" or " This love for elocution is a gift of your Dad" are supposed to have come from dominant genes. Every time  someone shakes their head at your marks in Maths  and goes tsk tsk about how good your Dad was in maths, they are talking about your recessive gene.

The aforementioned coded instructions as protein strings in your genes,  are actually a kind of time table of your life.  How you will develop at what age, when will your height shoot up noticeably,  when will you start getting periods,  when will your musical abilities come to the fore, would you have a literary bent of mind , when will that develop, will you be one of those folks with a raging temper, and so on  . So many things. So many amino acid protein chains, folding and unfolding, so many enzymes and hormones quietly streaming around getting things done.

I have always wondered how time was coded into these instructions .

I mean, we humans live by the circadian time,  we have glands like pineal glands, little bitty smart things in our brains that sense that part of the 24 hours we are in, and trigger things like sleep,  idling down of various body systems, resting parts of the brain, waking up, feeling hungry etc etc .

Do these protein strings of the genes in our 46 chromosomes, sense time the same way we do at the macro level?  Clearly,  deep within our body, and in the cells, time would be sensed by a trigger of some enzyme or similar thing.  And the question can be asked, whether the well being of the body at that point, sickness/weakness etc, has any effect on the sensing of time by the cells at the micro level .

When we say that  some folks carry a certain cancer gene  what causes it to bide its "time" , before expressing itself in its gory glory ?  Does the environment around the cells, and general physiological condition of the body,  contract or dilate the time as far as the cell clock goes ?

But the real wonder is how these coded instructions influence thinking.

In my more than half a century of leading a fairly ordinary life, there have been several occasions when someone has remarked how I resemble my mother,  in the way I  express myself, and think.  So many people saying "you are your mother's daughter";  and post-some crisis situation, someone coming and saying, "Hmm. Independence... Shades of your mother .."   .  My father loved to write, and he ensured all those protein strings were there in his  23 chromosomes that he gifted me. Right from childhood , my parents encouraged this writing, which sometimes included poems.  All this right brain activity tangling every now and then with the algebraic unknowns of the left brain activity which was compulsory at times.

There was a huge gap in life,  like 30 years when this right brain activity took a back seat. Then all of a sudden , sometime in 2006 ,  I was inspired to write , both prose and poetry. 

While I agree with a lot of people's observations about me resembling my mother , it has become apparent to me , as I proceed well ahead on the wrong side of 60,  that I now tend to become a bit more like my father was in his old age.  In certain types of thinking, literary pursuits (which had remained hitherto dormant since the age of 25),  social interactions, a tendency to look inwards, and sometimes,  unexplained impulsive altruistic tendencies.  The basic maternal mould remains, but with these little  eruptions caused by certain hitherto dormant protein strings suddenly doing their stuff.

And I wonder , how thinking processes, and changes therein, can be coded into a protein string in your genes at birth , and how a tired  writing/poetry  gene,  one fine day ,  suddenly remembers how it expressed itself half a century ago, and is now all agitated to express itself once again.

I wonder how the cell senses what time of life it is . And what resources the body has at this point, struck as it is by shades of a metabolic syndrome. Surely, the quality of enzymes and hormones that tell the "cell-time"  have altered noticeably over the years, and the environment in the body is far from exemplary.

And  I often wonder about the Designer of this set up, who installs in us , all these coded strings at birth, that work with so much precision, co-operation with the vagaries caused by environmental effects on our bodies,  and manages to even have something to do with how we think at various points in our life.

No advertisements, no Apps, no festival deals, no false promises, no tom-tom-ing of foolishly named OS's  , no built in obsolescence.

Just some quiet updates, without announcements 

And you have ,  a quiet, robustly built, self correcting , real time  system of dedicated protein strings, remembering where they came from, and where they need to go, and when .....

The Designer Maker,  who some don't believe in, but continue to follow nevertheless ,  must be quietly smiling to himself.  
     

Proletarian and Posh Parking....

It seems University of California at Berkeley,  offers its Nobel Laureates something special.  Free Lifetime Parking  outside their department, where a board next to the reserved place actually says so.

The physics Department has 7 Nobel laureates , and so, seven parking spaces outside the department.

For all others, ordinary non-brilliant  slogging tax payer types , not only do they pay a hefty sum as a yearly parking fee, but they  join the hordes of folks who drive in everyday, as early as they can, so they find a parking space, close to where they work on campus.

It is , of course, entirely possible, but probably unlikely, that someone who did not own a car was awarded the Nobel.  He/ She  still gets a reserved parking space.  I also hear that similar stuff is followed at the  UC San Francisco campus.

There is also the need to renew these permits every year, Nobellian or not.  And the Berkeley Police penalize non renewal , Nobellian or not.

Mind you, no drivers, chauffeurs, beacon lights, or campus police riding in formation ahead of you.  Just someone trundling up, in, say, a beat up Volvo Wagon.

I just wondered how things would be if this kind of facility was offered in Mumbai, to some kind of international or even better, national  prize winners ,  say in Colaba, Dadar, and even Bandra, all upmarket areas where parking is so difficult to find.

For one thing,  you need to think of style.

They wouldn't tolerate such ordinary boards. It would have to be something spanning the width of the parking lot, with a photo of the prize winner, and assorted photos of well wishers across the bottom of the banner board.

Those owning cars , would of course be delighted, and would probably go in for a fancier model, and ask for a deferred customs duty  in case the new one is to be imported. Very clearly, a precedent exists in the form of Sachin Tendulkar. And you never know, you may even qualify for a Rajya Sabha Nomination.....

Those who did not own cars, would simply go in for vans and wagons that can carry many passengers. Probably under the advice from their son who wants to start a car hire business , and what can be better than a great daily waiting area from where to operate. 

Nothing fazes the Mumbai entrepreneur. Particularly the non-e type who mostly innovates on-the-spot  There will probably be some observant folks who will figure out a time, when the parking space would not be used.  They will observe the weekly frequency, timings etc. They may even make friends with the chauffeur, if the car has one. So many in Mumbai fear driving, and even small cars today have hired drivers.  

It would not be impossible to see a vendor of some sort, or a food cart occupy that place  during the car's non occupation. He might even name the food cart after the worthy who owns the parking space.

Then there will be folks who do not get discouraged by the presence of the car.  I mean what can be better than the trunk of the car for displaying ready made  children's clothes, trinkets, small toys, all displayed  in something that can be suddenly folded on a moment's notice. Sometimes , the bonnet of the car might be more useful, all depending on the make and model of the car. 

An event such as the prize winning individual being away  for a biggish length of time, with family and car , would be like a windfall.  Some opportunistic entrepreneur, would rent out that place by the half hour at preposterous rates, knowing that in Mumbai, there are always those who have more money than patience.  A fast food set up during late evenings would probably get the chap a percentage of the daily profit.

One might wonder where law enforcement came in, in all this.  Just imagine.  A passing cop  glances at the parking place, frowns at a couple of cars trying to double park, waves his hand around, nods at the prize winning gent getting into his car. He may even salute. Same place different time. The vendors are in full force.  Some quiet talk happens,  some stuff becomes invisible to law and order  and the cop rushes off to detain a biker riding without a helmet.

A new vendor lands up one evening. They try to shoo him away . There are arguments. Questions are asked about whose father owns the place in question. A typical Indian flavour to the conversation, doesn't allow politeness.  A direct question; "does this belong to your father ?  No ?  then stay out of this ...."

It's time for the prize winner parking lot grantee to return from wherever he has gone.  All the blatant trespassing signs disappear overnight.  He drives in; nay, he is driven in. And he stops.

There is someone languidly sitting , chewing away on some grass, looking at the four wheel contraption from under heavy lidded eyes.    A grand swish of the tail to swat a fly, a snort, possibly a superior sniff, and she continues her activities. The cow has just wandered over from the famous temple down the road, where devotees offer grass and greens to her.  She is full, and set out for a short walk.  And she amazingly saw this empty space and thanked her stars.  With all that  traffic, stalls and hawkers,  she would never find a place so lovely to relax for a while. 

And I would not be surprised at all,  if i heard about the Prize winner's offspring making an application in court or the government, to make the parking place an inheritable place, and going all the way up to the Supreme Court to ensure that it happens.    

Some things don't ever change in India.

I cannot see anything remotely similar happening in Berkeley. 

Gosh. All these law abiding citizens, driving past occasional empty Nobellian parking spaces outside various departments.  Not a single person deploring waste of space, and temporarily putting his/her car there, hazard lights on, bonnet up , trying to fool the cops, and not a single person looking up and asking the cops "Do you know who I am ?".

And , come to think of it, not a single cow .....    !    

(Things might change. Just heard about a Kenyan Lawyer offering  50 cow, 70 sheep, and 30 goats   to President Obama, for his daughter, Malia's hand in marriage.   Don't know about Berkeley, but Washington DC   needs to look out for its parking spaces. )
    

Fixing the Broken....

One comes across some interesting stuff on Facebook which one shares . Sometimes , these are quotes .   I came across this one , shared it, and was surprised at the many many "likes" that it continued to get, long after posting .

The comments often indicated the mind of the commenter.

To some, it was about perfection, grammar,  and acquiring an ability with a specified proficiency level.

To some others,  it was about  pulling down English Nazis a notch or so , in a world with so many other languages.

And to some others, it wasn't so much  about English, but about making fun of someone , or even abusing them,  sitting on their  pseudo lofty perch.

 This quote is by H. Jackson Brown , an author in the US,  and it made an appearance in the 90's when people there were averse to learning new languages , and refused to look beyond English. Very few bothered about the world outside America.  It was also a bit about being respectful of other cultures, and opening one's eyes to the world around.  (When I was studying in the US in the early seventies,  I was always asked how come my English was so good . And did I speak "Indian"  back home.  When they found I understood and spoke a bit of French , they couldn't believe it.  Although 2 years later a waiter on Champs Elysee did).......

In the middle of all this, we forget that language is a means of communication.   It may involve words, intonations, gestures and so on, but the idea is to get something useful across to another person.  You do not have to go abroad for this.  You can experience this in India,; why, in Mumbai itself, with its melting pot of people from all across India.

And if you can manage to convey whatever you wanted, you have been successful at communication. 

Broken English implies the existence of a perfect English.   The definition of "perfect" itself is hazy, because there is US English and UK English. And to tell the truth, there is actually an Indian English. Those who swear by Wren and Martin, and fancy pronunciation,  blithely ignore the fact that the US spells words pretty much the way it wants, ignoring the tenets of the Mother Language. It also makes variations in the way they use verbs, by introducing words like "gotten".  No one laughs at them or marks red lines through their written communication. Why ?  I guess power has something to do with it. 

And so making fun of those who speak broken languages, in this case, English, is more about the ability to look  down on someone from a position of power, or, in a sense, humiliate them. 

More trouble in this world has occurred because of the urge of  A to humiliate  B.

Because A and B are different.  Different in color, different in religion, different in social beliefs, different in intelligence, different in levels of prosperity, and different, even in interpretations of what each side might think is fun.

We in India are very adept at humiliating people. And the land.

On a social level, in India, we humiliate people as a show of power. It could be a boss at the office, it could be an in-law or husband in the home, it could be an appointed functionary in your school, it could even be the cops.  In rural India, humiliation is often colored by caste.  Those who purport to lead, often have innovative ways of publicising their ability to humiliate, like showing people tying their shoelaces for them as they stand  resplendent in so called power.  Humiliating the so called weaker sex, is justified  in the name of social custom.

The fear of humiliation amidst family on being unsuccessful in examinations is so huge, that today, it is a known psychological problem, being handled by trained counsellors.  Girls are humiliated for their looks, clothes and sometimes even for their independent thinking, and so on, often accompanied by forced disfiguring by throwing acid on faces.  Women are humiliated for their inability to beget sons,for their origin, for their size, for their color.

We humiliate our land  by throwing all kinds of dirt on it, often changing the nature of the soil. We humiliate our rivers, by soiling them with side products of industrial progress, and the dirt of humanity  , both in life and in death.  And we humiliate our mountains by not understanding why they stand the way they do, and by ravaging through them in the name of progress.  We humiliate our public transport by soiling it and stealing from it.

 We humiliate law as it exists, by following it in its breach.  We humiliate money by misusing it and degrading its value

So many of these things are local to our country.

The quotation above says "Never make fun of  anyone who speaks broken English. It means they know another language."

It is not really about language.   It is more about decent altruistic communication without running anyone down, and giving respect, and the fact that variety in humans exists.

And it is really about removing the word "humiliate" from your cerebral and social  dictionary.

Until then,   can A and B be friends ?



 

H, R, HR, and being your own FDA

It tells you something, when the headline of "Maggie noodles 2014 batches recalled by the FDA"  shares the front pages of newspapers   with the PM,  protests by farmers, planes landing on the Yamuna Expressway ,  black money,  and the Delhi quarrels between the CM and LG.

And while I can understand why someone needs to certify drugs , I never could see why someone needed to certify foods.

Until now. 

Long long moons ago,  there was much discipline in the way we lived . That was how "management" happened instinctively in families. Mostly by the mothers, the Executive Directors.  To be sure , there was HR.  Human Resources Management.

There was more consideration about the "H" in "HR" than the "R", or the Resources that lay around.

 We were our own FDA, and our own cops. And we did our own appraisals and took them seriously.  I count many HR managers amongst my friends, and they would possibly be the first to acknowledge the contribution of their domestic  "Executive Directors"  in making them what they are today.

  Matriarchs of families cooked seasonal foods, traditional foods, along with foods that were prepared in summer, sun dried well on terraces, and then stocked  for year round usage,  as accompaniments , on kitchen shelves. Kids guarded the drying stuff on the terrace as part of their summer holidays, and shooed off inquisitive birds et al. There was a wide variety in the foods we imbibed throughout the year.  At mealtimes as well as snacks.

One of the biggest differences between childhood then (> 50 years ago)  and today, is strong knowledgeable mothers vis a vis those today who mindlessly give in to every whim and fancy , in a family unconcerned about food values.   

I've known someone who once had to travel to the native place urgently, left her college going sons to their own resources,  and on return, indulgently mentioned that in the 4 days that she was absent, the fellows managed to consume 45 packets of Maggie noodles.  The empty packets were the proof. It wasn't that regular food was unavailable ; there were places that would provide a dabba service, canteens etc. Maggie didn't grow in your backyard, and had to be bought, just like the dabbas.  But their choice was clear.  (What my son wants , my son gets.)

I've known some ladies who aspire to make pav bhaji "just like in the hotels",  blobs of butter, shining oil, perhaps food color et al, and they never forget to mention how Coke or Pepsi is mandatory on those days because "In my house , it is a must, no one has pav bhaji without it..."  . 

And I have known well educated and informed ladies , who pride themselves on their Chinese dishes (after having attended classes) , who display horror and surprise at the fact that I cook all that without MSG.  Ironical, because the horror is misplaced. 

And what to say about mothers who dote on expensive high fructose corn syrup loaded fruit juices for their kids, and then crib and discuss on how fresh fruit prices have gone through the roof.  And they  are always the ones who look for kiwi fruits, imported apples , pears, extra large grapes, fair and lovely bananas,  and assorted fruits sold with individually suck fancy labels.   

I grew up enjoying seasonal vegetables and fruits.  There were certain fruit preparations which were traditional and seasonal, and one learned to appreciate and enjoy them.  As a child one loved sweets, but something that has always remained with me throughout half a century is that, doing exercise earns you a meal.  I didn't know then what a calorie was.  And anyone overdoing sweets (or any other  special item ) out of normal proportion at a meal, was gently admonished. Being able to eat like a glutton was never considered an achievement.    

The unwritten rule at mealtimes was that you ate what was served on the plate ,  regardless of whether the vegetable qualified as your favourite . Asking for seconds was optional.  And so you always started the meal with one representative of everything  that was  cooked,  long before someone designed the food pyramid. The various preparations  offered a plethora of tastes and textures.   Some of us tried shoving unpopular veggies behind dal katoris  and got found out.

And it was never all serious.  Raw mangoes, guavas (off the neighbor's tree) , tamarinds (red and green), Rai amlas ,  were all enjoyed secretly, with spices and salt,  on hot afternoons on the shady part of the terrace,  while everyone else napped ,  and matka cooled water drunk immediately because it tasted so sweet.  Families even made ice creams  in pots, where the churning work was outsourced to the kids and their friends. Seasonal fruits, saffron, sitaphal and such , were perennial favourites as ice cream flavors.  

Traditional snacks and festival food preparations had much to do with the seasons and the soil. These were prepared and relished during those days, and offered to friends, but we never made meals out of these. Unless of course, it was Puran Poli.  That too, in moderation .  We were introduced to delicacies of other parts on India too, and loved them.  But like the Bard said, "For everything there was a season...."

When food processors first appeared on the Horizon, my mother was in the process of acquiring a ghanti or electrified grain grinder.  The existing option was the manual stone grinding , which was laborious and time consuming and the public grain grinding places at the chakki,  where the entire output came with huge temperatures and assorted mixed grains from the previous grind. She felt the excessive commercial grinding power destroyed the nutrition due to the heat generated.  To this day, we see the difference between food prepared from the home grinding ghanti and commercially ground flours. I still have my mothers chutney stone, and use it. 

Clearly, this isn't the place to praise anyone.

But it is certainly the place to point out, that sometimes, taking unpopular steps is necessary to introduce and convince kids about good food.  There is something to be said about seasonal and traditional versatility   in our foods. Traditional practices of cooking foods, that not only preserve but even add nutrition (think cast iron kadhais).

And there is something to be said for taking the trouble to introduce kids to this at a young age.  So they can make sensible decisions when faced with a food ad tsunami, made up of 50%  inaccuracies .

It is difficult in a society, where some folks get their self esteem from being demanding and having people give in to their demands.  And a mother trying to improve some one's eating habits gets made fun off by those who didn't bother with them in the first place .

Like I said , we need to concentrate on the "H" in the "HR".

Today we are awash in the "R"'s as in Resources.  Most resources today come glamorized.

There is , as in life, an over emphasis on  "looking good".  Even in food.

Many resources claim that they make life easy. And convenient . Even in food.

Like stuff that discourages  active chewing, and encourages mindless swallowing.  

Sometimes, swallowing  of claims, rumors and distorted facts emblazoned in television and print ads.

(Having said that, I wonder if it is a sign of the times, that the first thought that came to mind when one heard about Maggie people being booked for excessive quantities of lead in the food,  was whether some one was getting back at someone ?  (banning 2014 manufactured batches in mid 2015, given the consumption rate of Maggi Noodles,  kind of boggles the mind..)

On second thought, would the FDA do similar actions  against cosmetics producers using harmful products in things like fairness creams et al ?  

At the end of the day, what really remains is the ability of generations to use native intelligence acquired thru generations, common sense , and be their own FDA....

Ambassadorial Times

I actually learned driving,  in 1967 , on an Ambassador car , that our family owned. I even remember the license plate number and the color of the car.

The earlier car was a sea-green Hillman , with the sort of horn you don't hear today, and as children , we always knew someone was reaching home, when a signature honking with a 1-2-123 beat was heard  on roads with the then minimal traffic near our house.  This car had trudged up hills, blown radiator lids in the ghats, and even successfully made it to a hill station , stuffed with passengers, and a radiator with a banana skin tied on top to replace a lid which actually fell into the valley. The banana skin thing was a truck driver's idea.  The car had also driven down the mountain to the coast, with passengers sitting on mattresses loaded on to the rear seats, en route to leaving a child (not me ) to a residential technical Institute in Mumbai (from where I am now actually writing this) .....

Growing families and the firm belief that larger spaces enabled the transport of entire sets of relatives from point A to Point B , probably made folks zero in on the Ambassador , which was acquired , after advancing for years and years,  through a  huge wait list.  In those days, the choice was between Fiat and Ambassador, and it was, regardless of the technical specifications,   like choosing between  a delicate girl, and someone who was healthier.  My mother even once thought the Fiat as "taklubi" , and I suspect the idea was that a car  should have an ability to be hardy, and to hold its own in severe circumstances  and not collapse .

Silence was never a virtue in these cars,  you never changed the hand gears according to speeds specified in some manual, but actually by sensing the engine sound as you accelerated. There was no power steering then, and turning these cars at sharp angles was an achievement that kept your upper limbs in excellent health. Seat were designed for maximum usage , and clearly with the possibility that people would sit on laps, given the amazing leg room in the rear seats. Bucket seats were unknown, which was nice. I mean why should the company decide how many folks can occupy one seat ? 

The trunk of the car was very spacious, and nothing was sacrificed  to, say, modern design considerations.   These cars also came with something we used to call, for want of a better word, "handle".   This was in addition to the usual "jack" , using which we learned how to change punctured tyres in our time.   Whenever the car did not start after pulling a thing after switching the ignition on, someone would get out with this handle, poke it in through a hole way in front below the radiator, and rotate the shaft in a motion similar to extracting sugarcane juice.  For some reason it was always done with a jerk,  and at some point, the air-petrol mixture managed to ignite and get things moving, so to speak. 

Trunks and Bonnets did not ever open with some magic click from the driver.  Someone always tickled something below the bonnet , moved it and lifted the bonnet, showcasing the engine in all its glory.  A  collection of so many interesting shapes and sizes, at so many levels, where you could use a screwdriver to minutely tune things, and some experts could even do it by ear. There were steaming radiators, where someone always shouted at everyone else to stand away,  while opening the lid, and occasionally got scalded by the hot water. Those were the days of a complicated arduous climb up the Bhor Ghat from Mumbai to Pune, with mind boggling fearful acute U bends combined with a sixty degree simultaneous slope,  and everyone stopped up the plateau, after a tunnel, with bonnets open, and radiators cooling, with folks refilling the water in there, while other folks bought ice golas from vendors who frequented the place.

Being part of a family function, could mean being the driver, who transported numerous relatives from house to wedding hall in minimum number of trips, thanks to people occupying every single available space in all the seats, and laps of people. Seat belts and such restrictive stuff had not entered the Indian market,  were probably considered fashion then, and no one knew what air bags were. Small kids often stood leisurely leaning back against seats (front and rear), buffeted by weighty adults who kind of packed the kid in. It was considered  completely normal to ask your driving age son to give you and your ten friends a ride to the house of your eleventh friend who was having a Haldi Kunku. And it was often a prize winning , wordless, sometimes quietly  protesting performance from a  son, accompanied by so many ladies , in rustling silks, jewellery, flowers , some younger ones on laps of older ones, heads hitting the roof,  all of them vociferously wondering if they just missed the turnoff  to whoever's house, and should they go reverse and go back....

The sturdy car bore all these excesses with equanimity.  It was built  for societies such as ours, with bad roads, potholes,  lots of travelling luggage of assorted shapes, folding stools, random additions to number of passengers at the last minute, and people with a knack for pushing cars when stuck. When there was an engine problem,  there were people who would delve in and adjust settings , screws and levels, since nothing was packaged and covered like a black box, a la today's cars.  It also made members of the family,  semi expert on things like Carburettors, fast and slow settings, Shellac, Delco, Bendix Wheel, Starter, Fuel pump, dynamos, Armatures, washers, accelerator springs and so on. And no one ever cribbed about drying a drenched Delco point after driving through flooded roads in torrential rains.

When I moved on to a Fiat consequent to a life status change,  everything was so light. In comparison, driving the Ambassador felt like driving a tank.  The Ambassador was like a strict tough school teacher, who ensured you put in the requisite strong effort changing steering wheel  gears, doing laborious sharp turns, and proper reversing.  Because all that training is good for you. (Like learning math tables up to 29).

 The Fiat was like a holiday ; everything was easier on the biceps and triceps, and for some reason the steering while , although not of the "power" type,  could be twirled occasionally with one hand. It was actually like a female version of the Ambassador.  By and by, our  Fiat retired after 38 years of meritorious service, and is in Vanaprsathashram at a automobile repair teaching department at a  polytechnic at our native place in Kokan..

Those were days of no expressways, people drove with windows open, sometimes assorted handkerchiefs and towels drying in the breeze, anchored somewhere inside the car.  Hot seasons saw wet khus mats on the top of the car.  You stopped when you saw someone selling local fruit,  or a chai tapri away to one side.  Or a famous vada place . Someone would see a temple and one would stop to  honor a grandmother's wish.   We didn't really have radios, but plenty of kids sang popular  songs and played antakshari during the journey.   External communication from the car was  simply non existent. (I mean if you said "Bluetooth", a shocked driver would  simply take you to the nearest dentist, and saying "Ice Cream Sandwich", would get the benefit of a strict maternal glare. )

Life has changed. Today's cars  talk less. They glide.  Trying to do it noiselessly, on roads that haven't changed at all. Its like trying to do a fashion show in the middle of Bhuleshwar. 

 They also cost more.  Most are air cooled,  and it is in the fitness of things, and probably not a coincidence, that the radiator cooling spot in the Bhor ghat , disappeared with the advent of the expressway.  Today's cars are also selfish.  One seat , one person.  Compulsory seat belts.  When malfunctions happen, entire packaged engine parts are changed. Banana skins are not used.  Looks are important. And so are dynasties. German, Korean, Japanese, US and yes , Indian.

Mumbai's weather has not appreciably altered from the old days, but every modern car now come with AC.  With the result, that people are unable to otherwise tolerate heat.  And they get easily rattled.  When life gets too easy,  you get demanding  and  lose temper easily.  Speed is of essence in everything. Whether it is the expressway,  responses, phone calls,  food preparation,  or just about anything.   Which includes losing temper.

 So you have road rages.

I suppose we need to move with the times.   The newer cars are here to stay  in their different categories, shapes, colors, makes, fancy engines and fancier names.

But  somewhere, there is a thought, that  we lost something wonderful, when we gave up our eclectic ambassadorial lives  in this modern world.

Clearly, it wasn't just a car. It was a lifestyle......   

      



     

SAHM and HFM....

One of the unfortunate side effects of being part of a Digital World, is that there is a need to label  everything.  You might question this,  saying one always used adjectives to qualify and describe stuff.

And there is a difference. The domain of the adjectives is more personal, local, subjective, and open to random useful change. Like milk, that boils, sometimes splits, curdles, aggregates, even gets hung up , and becomes paneer without making a song and a dance about it. 

 Labels is something more global. Someone decides what can be called cheese, and you comply, varieties/definitions/parameters  et al, without worrying whether you really need it. At some point you start believing in labels.  And forget that things were just fine before that.

Like with the label SAHM.  Otherwise read as Stay-At-Home Mom.   

In a boring digital world, this means someone who alternates between cooking, cleaning, child-managing, official picker-up of stuff around the house, catering to whims and fancies, visitors,  advising relatives,  and then stresses out at the lack of intellectual  pursuits and  what is called "me time" . (All these things are again labels, that mean something specific.  Intellectual pursuits defined by your professional training, and "me time" could be anything from stationery cycling , reading, writing,  gym , singing, socializing,  et al)

In my time, my mother was what you would call a SAHM.  Thankfully she couldn't be bothered by nomenclatures.   She was a post grad from Columbia University (1948) in Food, Nutrition and  Child Development, and was in her element  as a SAHM, despite assorted  obstacles in her path by those , who had very narrow views about things. 

She learned to drive  a car, so as to be useful when my father was posted away from home in his transferable job. At a time when  bread was becoming ultra fashionable at breakfast time, (with people mindlessly devouring it slathered with butter and sugar), her kids had fresh moong dal khichdi, sometimes bhakri, with poha papad  and ghee  along with a small glass of fresh orange juice, for which she would drive once a week to the big mandi to source her juice walla oranges, to the great delight of the vendors.  As someone who never tasted an egg in her life, she ensured that her kids had occasional omelettes with loads of dhaniya etc, and a lot of her effort was directed towards sourcing hand pounded rice, so necessary in our  B-12 deprived  vegetarian diets. I remember the Khadi Village shops would sell this rice, and after they stopped,  she had a threshing "hole" installed in our garage, and two old people would periodically come and do the slow manual dehusking of paddy she sourced and purchased  from admiring farmers on the outskirts of the city..

All this was just part of what she did.  She and my father played badminton and tennis on weekends, in a plot in our colony, with our neighbors. No special clothes, sarees tucked in , Bata canvas shoes, sometimes barefoot, and as soon as it was possible, we children started on our own regular sports in school and out of it.  One of my most abiding unforgettable memories is that of doing 30 suryanamaskars  everyday, till I was 13, without which breakfast  strictly, did not happen. 

She could do everything she asked us to do.  

When I started learning swimming, and  gave  the usual fake excuses, she got determinedly into the water, in her ancient swimming suit, and I  quietly followed suit, soon doing deep water jumps etc. All of us soon learned cycling (which she already knew)  and  eventually cycled daily to school  for miles. She was part of the group that often ran behind us, as we tottered on the bikes, pedalling on for dear life, during the learning days..  

This wasn't all.  She thought school was only part of what our brains attempted. And so we learned music, musical instruments, calligraphy with reeds, and  there was even a guy who came to teach sanskrit shlokas , because we went to English Medium schools, and she felt we shouldn't miss out on those.  There was never a running down of any cultures or religions.

The purpose of writing this is not to eulogize her.  Nothing would be enough. 

But the purpose is to show, how you do not need to fit,  in labels defined by society , as a Mom.  SAHM or otherwise.   You could have me-time, us-time or just time.

You have your own education, possibly in a unique filed. You continue to learn.  Your education is not over.  No one can be allowed to define your levels of expertise.  Your general life education is something you need to realize.  Your children are unique in the sense that you can guage their capabilities and guide them uniquely at various ages, and instill confidence in them. Young kids often pick up different languages  very fast below the age of 5.  Simply playing with different kids everyday.  Encouraging your kid to be bilingual or even trilingual is a great achievement.

Sometimes you find that you have inherent teaching abilities.  You do not need a job to prove anything to anyone.  Creating games for your kids as they play with friends at a very young age, could be your forte.  This is no less, and perhaps much more than doing something for someone, so he/she can make money out of it.

I have , at various times, been employed, unemployed, and now retired, but thanks to a general awareness of being gifted a wide education by my parents,  frustration and disillusionment has never been an issue.  It has been a continuing education all the way.

Being a Mom,  SAH or otherwise, is many things. Which do not need labels.  It is a smooth analogue sliding into one or more roles, innovatively, as per your needs .    

Sometimes it even improves your sense of humor. 

When I decided to take early voluntary retirement to attend to my father , and the kids education requirements,  someone asked me , "What do you do the whole day, now that you are home?  .  Dont you get bored ? "

 This required the taking of a deep breath , to cool down.

 I told them , "I do nothing. Take naps in the afternoon. "

Later, with the daughter into serious swimming, I did get into the pool myself to renew my aquaintance with the sport.  Waiting for her workouts to get over, I was once sitting next to the wife a a very highly educated person, in the viewing gallery, where she had stopped by  during her evening outing.

"Kya aap ko yeh sab pehenke swimming karnemein kuch sharam nahi lagti?"  was what her biggest worry was. 

Once again a deep breath. And then I let go .

"Kya hain na, jab mein yeh sab pehenti hoon na, tab khudko Madhuri Dixit samjhti hoon aur Pani mein jati hoon swimming karne....."

I cannot describe her expression in response to that.

Like I said, it improves your sense of humor.  

And so to hell with labels like SAHM.  Discard the labels.  

Be a HFM  (Have Fun Mom).   

                      
   




 

Trash Can Philosphy....

I once heard someone call someone a Trash can.  Clearly, not Trash, but Trash Can.

And it really set me thinking.

Contents of a Trash Can, regardless of their origin, history, nature and value, are basically regarded as good-for-nothing or plain junk.

While being called "Trash",  may have something to do with the thrower's concept of dirt clashing with  the  throwee's concept of right, wrong, and debatable, and the thrower's concept of beauty, misguided sense of high standards,  inability to tolerate anything other than one's own opinion, and a very touchy Amygdala,  being called  a Trash Can is something else.

It says that one is then a fitting receptacle for  everything useless and bad.

It describes an ability  to mindlessly accept anything that is thrown at you. And a pathological  inability to refuse. It could be really good useful things.  But thrown at you as trash, they lose value.  A trash can's job is to be available, open, and accepting. Sometimes it overflows, and causes problems, and dogs, scavengers, and others are known sometimes solve this peril of plenty. Cows in particular are excellent trash researchers.

Across the century,  as potential and now confirmed Trash Cans, there has been  so much physical imbibing of trash by us.

Harmful chemicals used in ripening fruits, and making them look so called color perfect.  Which we so admire and eat, every season. Mindless marketing of leafy greens grown  in suspect soils by the railway track, and an avid buying of these by those who think this is cheap.

Cooking substances cleverly adulterated by unscrupulous traders/manufacturers, and blindly used by an entire generation smitten by and taken in by ads, as metanil yellow, iron filings, sawdust , papaya seeds etc get a new life in your trash can anatomy.

Carcinogenic chemicals in shampoos, fragrances, deos and creams,  which hide maliciously behind shining hair, bouncy silky hair, fairness creams , age controlling creams as they lather and dry, leaving all the bad stuff quietly behind.

Careless food labeling, unverified and unchecked , particularly where ready to eat fast food is concerned.  A flood of trans fats, MSG and sodium, that hides behind fancy pictures, misleading advertising.  Unscrupulous  bottling of vague water , fancy labels, and selling to those , away from metros, desperate in thirst.  

There is even more when  someone is labelled a  Trash Can.

Mental imbibing  . Of Trash.

Mostly Pressure Trash .

The ability to accept random nonsense as gospel truth under pressure, mostly family and society related.  A newly developed ability to close eyes and ears and mouth at important times, sometimes defying anatomy in the case of ears.

The ability to lose the use of logic, because you are seen to stand out in defiance.

The ability to accept wide ranging abuse, and and the capacity to hear about it being justified.

The tendency to listen to rumors and accept it as scientific fact.
     
The ability to  stand as an onlooker, under some one's pressured teaching, when something terrible is happening to someone around you.

The ability to be part of a gutless herd , because it is fashionable to make sexist jokes, insult , and use shocking swear words , and to hell with everything and everyone else.

The list of Mental Trash is endless. 

In a world where everyone wants quick results, status, and   an attainment of some kind of dubious standards defined by someone selling something, be it false dreams or something concrete,  it is so easy being a Trash Can.

Sometimes, the Body rebels, and  sometimes the Mind.   Of course this assumes that the Trash Can has a mind.

The body may sometimes be treated by the advances in science, at huge costs.  The mind, already in Trash Can mode, is willing to accept it all.

When it is a question of the mind, the treatment is often very specific, involves many others, support systems, and observers.  Sometimes medicines too.  And it is all about remembering that you are the Trash can and not the voluminous Trash itself. And that, as in a real world, the Trash Can is to be emptied .

This is the age of cell phones and Apps.  There is an App for everything.

I wonder if we as humans could download an App called "UnTrash"  and install it somewhere in our brains.

Any Trash detected approaching you, and the App  would ring alarm bells in your ears, and create an allergy on your skin.    Should be so useful, given that most folks today walk around with earphones in their ears.

However.

Nothing will stop someone from calling someone else a Trash Can.   But then one can always be, an Intelligent Trash Can.

And you don't need to search or this Intelligent App on any Play Stores.

History says that the first Intelligent Trash Can happened way before Intel et al were born.

That was when we started the first compost pit.   







 







   

Memories, Melbourne and other Matters......

My mother grew up at a time, when computers were not only not there, they weren't even on any horizon that she could see.  While life went  on peacefully with traditional hardware making things in life relatively easy,  the software was mostly in the head.


At some point, calculators happened, and the initial reaction was that they threatened the "learn your tables" philosophy.  The progression, if one can call it that was interesting.  My parents and their contemporaries knew tables, of 1/4, 1/2,  3/4 , 3/2 , and one could sense immediate applications of the same when one accompanied folks to the mandai or vegetable market. The vendors probably knew the tables too, and a decent truthful calculation by the vendor often earned respect from the purchasing parent.   As children we learned tables of all integers till 30, and had to recite them daily before dinner.  Somehow, we escaped fractions.

It was not just the mathematics.  There was a method to remembering things.  You associated events with people. You associated, relatives with people. You associated professions with people. And if you discovered any cross linkages, you remembered those too,  creating more and more links and indexes as life went on.  All sitting nicely in your  brain.

As an adult, it was fairly common for me to meet at my home  in Mumbai,  someone from , say Pune,  and sense that maybe I knew them. A quick call to my mother, and a summary later, she would rattle off how the person was linked to some one's someone, who was connected to me in a  roundabout way.   In the Maharashtrian way of defining relatives, aunts/uncles/nephews/nieces  are never defined in general, but have specific names based on how they originated, which side of the family, and how close (once removed, twice removed etc). It was amazing that my mother's generation had this inborn constantly updated mental software, that allowed them to link people, and more important, store and retrieve this information at random and at will.

And so, when my mother identified someone  as someone's brother-in-law's maternal aunt's  cousin's daughter ,  a light was supposed to go off in my head.   And all this time it was totally clear as crystal to my mother, how we knew the person, as I tried to follow half way there, and gave up.  

One of the reasons they were able to do this, is because they continuously used their brains, and kept the algorithm alive.  "Use it or Lose it" was not an old saying, but was really meant for us.

Some of it rubbed off on me . For other times, there is always Facebook.

A few days ago, I got a message from someone in Melbourne. It was someone (SG) who often commented on some food poetry  I wrote on a friend's  recipe posts.  I didn't know the lady, but had, as they say, seen her around on Facebook.

Turns out, that her uncle (twice removed, ie not a direct relation, but through  her mother's aunt) was  on her FB friends list, and she found me on that uncle's friends list. ( It happens that I am related to him by marriage).  She ecstatically messaged me defining the complete people link in detail, and giving some of her own family history, and the place where she spent her childhood years.

Turns out that , my in-laws spent their early married years, with their young children, in the same city , same area, and when I messaged her back with this information, she was probably thrilled to bits.  She told me , that she had actually spent her childhood knowing my in laws, knew the entire family complete with their childhood pet names, and often stayed over at their place as a child.

This lady is older than me, (I am 65), and if you actually analyze all the linkages of the people that link me to her, I end up being an aunt of hers.....

As if this was not enough, the next evening, I got another message from someone else (SC) in Melbourne, mentioning my mother by name , and asking if I was her daughter. Enthused, we spoke on the phone, and it turns out that she knew my mother very well about 35 years ago, and then lost touch after going to Australia.  This lady too , is 71, and says she remembers meeting me at my parents place in Mumbai.

Then again, in a manner which would have had my mother nodding in approval, the talk got around to some relatives on my fathers side that she was connected to by her marriage, . Five minutes later, it turned out that she even knew the person i worked for before I retired, and was his first landlady in his early marriage years.

Just when I was taking a deep breath, she tells me that that she and the previously mentioned SG (also now in Melbourne),  both have great grandmothers who were sisters. And somewhere in between she lets me know that I sound just like my mother when I speak ......

In a way, all this gladdens the heart.  People look out for folks and initiate friendships, value old links, and respect genealogies.  It isn't all about  being on Facebook and "liking".  It isn't  about beeps and notifications reminding you about events like birthdays, family group messages and stuff.  It isn't about operating systems outside your brain reminding you about who is who, and offering you a template about what's a good thing to say to them.

I have nothing against computers, cell phones and their capabilities.  I have everything against lazy brains that leave everything to these contraptions, and blindly ape murdered English language syntax,  and substitute  screen games for human conversation.

Having heard about fancy chess folks  who play against computers, it  boggles the mind to think, that perhaps, my  mother , had she been alive today , could have played a game against a computer, trying to find the connection between me and the above two ladies. 

Possibly , the machine would have gone into an infinite loop trying to figure out who was  who, amidst all the agitated relational databases and indices .

She would have won, hands down.

Mind you, hands down, but not idle hands. She would have been busy making something for her grand kids, while explaining the linkup to me.....

Just  remembering her today.  Her birthday . She would have been 98......

      
 




     

#Mychoice Festival

Deepika Padukone's  #mychoice  #Empowerment Video, made by Homi Adajania went viral over the Net. Very slickly made, geared to a certain audience, it evoked tons of reactions, and everyone and their uncle are now making videos .

What is not known is that this has inspired so many others , to whom #Empowerment  is something someone spells wrong, instead of saying "I am powered" .

Never mind. What is important is the POWER and the #mychoice video

Balu Rasad Zadav,  well known exponent of the saying "when you empower a politician you empower generations to come", has just made one.  Set in a field, green after unseasonal rains, interspersed with cows from his shed , he sits on a charpoy, bare chested in the sun, chewing away many things. " Its #mychoice, whether I head the state, or a family member does. Its also #mychoice to decide where to apply the word "Communal forces". So what if I cannot spell empowerment.  . (Turns around and spits, as a sidey dives with a spitoon singing Gimme Red ).  "The Railways have never been the same since I left. Harvard students  never came after I left. So finally, i had to send my 40 year old married daughter to a Harvard Conference. You must have seen her photos at a lectern speaking at the Student Conference.  Backdrop Dekho ji.  These Harvardwallahs are so communal, they said they did not invite her. Why ? Because she is 40 ?  (Chews some more, moves it all into the left cheek. Chews some more. Decides to spit, then changes his mind.) .Arre Bhai, in Delhi, 40 and 50 is the new 25. Powerful children of  powerful parents are permanently qualified . Age is just a mind set (Chews angrily, and spits to the right, misses the spittoon.  The flunky standing at second slip, moves into first. That's empowerment...      

Then there is Pinjrada Wall,  who has inadvertently appeared in so many videos, that he decided to finally make an official #mychoice video.  Naturally, set in the capital, amidst Lutyens architecture, he is seen driving up, sorry, being driven up, in a box type car, his face wrapped in a muffler.  "Its #mychoice what headgear to wear,  and yes, the Gandhi topi certainly keeps the muffler in place along with my red tooth contraption" .  He runs up the entrance steps of what could be his office, followed by a bunch of fellows in topis but without mufflers.  They are received with flowers, and once in the office, he beams as he sits on the chief's chair. Removes his topi, places it in front of him, smiles at the others seated opposite him, and starts plotting for a meeting. A knock on the office door, and he says "Kam in e..."  causing whoever was outside to freeze.   It's the cops with a police dog, come to sniff bugs in his office. The dog keeps pulling away from the door, refusing to go in. Pinjrada Wall is heard shouting    "Kam in e..."  louder, and the police dog drags his minder away from it all.  He probably knows, that the next word to be heard from the sanctum in "Kutte" , and he doesn't want to be part of any #mychoice videos.  On his way, the minder respectfully nods at Admiral Lakshman Das, Unshant Vibhushan, and  Yogasan Ladav, all walking away .

And how can you forget Mantri Tu-asa-kar,  minder of that wonderful small place on apna west coast,  who has been so stung, by so many folks in various levels of exposure , lying unchecked on the golden hot sands. He has been left with no alternative to make his own #mychoice  video, exhorting folks via a loudspeaker, as he rides in a jeep on the sand, telling them to cover themselves. " Who will marry you if you turn dark ?  It is a question of your future. Please getup, cover yourself; go have something cool in the cafe ; 20% off  to those who mention my name ".  After several rounds dodging brave ladies in sarees doing parasailing on the beach, and flying above him, he returns back to his office. The film shows him being saluted by his staff and escorted to his office, through a crowd on nurses gathered silently outside.  "Ab kya hua !  Kai zhala! "  he exclaims as he sinks into his deep chair with a towel on the backrest.  He receives a delegation , as his AC is put on its highest setting. Shuts his eyes, leans forward, and  tells them,  "All this sitting in the sun, will make you black, and ruin your marital prospects , so first thing is go home, apply besan haldi, wash your faces and come back again tomorrow ....  My government is committed to being Fair and Lovely ...."  

Hmm.

It really is not possible to review videos made by so many worthies.  Then someone had an idea of a shortcut method, that of editing videos of legislatures where the members tended to have free for all fights , threw hardware around and ran to the well to do a chorus in front of the speaker.

It's OK. Not everyone can be Deepika.

Not everyone can wear fashionable clothes, brilliant smiles,  proudly display artistically  radially flying hair (which actually reminds me of an Amul ad), and display what filmy types describe as a "come hither"  look.

All the better, for it allows the public to tell these guys, to simply "go thither"  and stay there.