With Valentine's Day just around the corner, I've been reminiscing about love and relationships. Not to say that I've had much of a chequered past. I was your basic wall flower with friends who were streets ahead of me in the 'attracting-the-opposite-sex' department. I did give away my heart on a modest scale though.


The very first time it happened,I must have been around 10 years old, when I first set eyes on Rahul Gandhi. It was at Indira Gandhi's funeral - no I wasn't present in person, I saw it on TV and promptly lost my heart! He was C-U-T-E! And having grown to manhood now, he has totally fulfilled the promise of beauty seen in childhood. I was pretty sure I would grow up and marry him one day. Fate would surely find a way to throw us in each other's paths. But then I got busy with school, studies, friends and extra curricular activities and poor Rahul was put on the back burner.

Years later, I was all ready to fall in love again. Considering Fate had taken Rahul Gandhi far out of my reach by then, I had no choice but to look closer to home. So I handed over my eager heart to the next handsome face. And what a handsome face it was! Only problem was the handsome face didn't really notice me. So I proceeded to do some really idiotic stuff - like writing a love letter - which I regretted writing immediately after I posted it (or did I send it by courier? I forget). I was relieved when there was total silence at the receiving end. But my friends would have none of this 'Silence' nonsense.

'You've got to ask him what his answer is!' Err....wasn't the silence speaking loud enough?

'No. No. Maybe he's feeling shy. Or waiting for you to make the move' I did make a move. I wrote a letter didn't I?!!

Dragging me kicking to the phone booth (those days mobiles were not so common) they forced me to make that call. And naturally, I got the expected answer - Sorry!

'Thank God!' I said to myself, but made a big production out of having having my heart broken.

'I shall never love again'!! Even my friends did not believe that one.

I never had the courage to speak of these things earlier. I guess it made me feel vulnerable. But I can do so now, and smile about it and share it with the world at large. And, as I have been assured by my well meaning friends, my tentative forays into the world of love, were tepid at best. Considering the heartbreak I have seen my friends go through, I must thank God for unanswered prayers. Because that has guided me to my true north!

I had a stop over of about four hours in Kolkata today, enroute to Chennai. I spent this time wandering through the city and taking pictures. You may have seen these pictures a million times. And I have nothing new to offer. Except - to me these pictures are reminders of a happy childhood spent in Kolkata, the City of Joy.

The first set of pictures are of the Victoria Memorial which have come to represent Kolkata as much as the Howrah Bridge. Wikipedia says the foundation was laid in 1906 by Lord Curzon. Here's an interesting tidbit. The funds for construction were not given by the British. Instead it was given by British Indian States and individuals who wanted to find favour with the British. So, apart from being a Memorial to Queen Victoria, it is also testimony to the sucking up and toadying done by Indians in the past.

The picture brings back a faint memory of when we had a picnic in the beautiful gardens around Victoria Memorial. I remember going into the museum with my father. I think there is a gown of the Queen on display. It was this delicate garment with some glittering embroidery or lacework on it. If being a Queen meant you got to wear grand gowns, then I wanted to be a Queen too!

Here's a picture of the sidewalk outside Victoria Memorial on the Fort William side. It was raining at the time that I took the photograph and the rain washed side walk with the greenery made for a pretty picture.


Here is a view of the Second Hooghly Bridge, also known as the Vidya Sagar Sethu. Taken from Fort William. It is beautiful no doubt. But somehow cannot compare to the majesty of the original Howrah Bridge (Rabindra Setu).


Walking down Park Street, I wandered past 19, Park Street. What is special about it? It is the address of the District Grand Lodge of Bengal of the Bengal Freemasons. It is tucked away between two large buildings and the lodge itself is not visible from the road. I didn't venture in. The signboard and interwoven letters on the gate intrigued me. Freemasonry is so secretive and Dan Brown has certainly added to its mystique.



Moving on to matters gastronomical - I had lunch at Flury's. Started in 1926, Flury's describes itself as a 'tearoom'. The website claims it to be the only tearoom in British India. Whatever the case, the food was good and the strawberry and cream sundae out of this world!





And finally, the drive to the airport in bumper to bumper traffic. Amidst the mounting stress of not knowing whether I would be able to make it in time to catch my flight, I took the time to be amused by the sight of traffic constables directing traffic while holding up umbrellas in the pouring rain. No pictures available of that though. You'll just have to take my word for it. It was a funny sight.

A friend and I were talking about delivering reprimands and homilies over email. It brought back memories of when I was still working full time. I worked as a senior manager and had a lot of email traffic. There were many demands, disguised as 'requests' that came my way. Mostly from headquarters. Now I was known as a bit of a firebrand at the work place. In fact, one one occassion, a colleague even branded me as 'Ms. Thunderbolt'. Naturally, my email communication matched my image. I developed a writing style that came to be known as the 'E-Slap'. A few examples:

If I wrote 'I'm surprised at...' it meant 'I'm pissed off!'. If I wrote ' I'm distressed...' it meant 'I'm enraged!'. If I wrote 'You will agree that...' it meant 'I don't want any arguments'. 'Thanks in advance for doing this' usually meant 'saying no is not acceptable'. And if I was REALLY displeased, then instructions over email would end with '...this is non negotiable'!

I thought I was camouflaging my feelings pretty well behind all those professional sounding words. Little did I realise how transparent I was. At a national level meeting, amidst discussions on e-governance and other 'E' stuff, matters took a humourous turn. A colleauge took my name tag - you know, the clip-on variety. It was cicular in shape. He flipped it over to the blank side and went to work with his pen. A while later, he handed it back to me with a huge smile. It carried the sketch of a hand with 'E-Slap' written across it. When I looked confused, the group broke out laughing. 'Its what you do when you said stinker emails.' they said.

E-Slap?! I didn't take offence. Was rather amused actually. It was an apt description of the way I expressed displeasure through email. Rarely had an appraisal gone by without reference to 'my tone' or 'communication style'.

Its not that I meant to be rude. It was a combination of factors. First, I did not suffer fools gladly. Second, the email represented me. I had to ensure that the words expressed what I FELT. And last - I (unfortunately) had an excellant command over the English language (please excuse my immodesty). All of which converged in a resounding 'E-Slap'!

There was a lighter side to this infamy. People in HQ thought twice before messing with me. Peers, on occassion, appreciated the 'E-Slaps' (naturally not the ones directed at them!). 'You said what we wanted to'. And come to think of it, if they could tease me about it, then they must have realised that my bark was worse than my bite!

This post should actually have gone out on Teachers Day. It is not one of the feel-good posts that one usually sees on such occasions. I read many tributes to wonderful teachers and really, I do agree that teachers can inspire you. But what about those that didn't? The bad apples, the eccentric ones, the one's who should never have been allowed near impressionable minds. Don't they also deserve some mention in blogosphere? So here's to the mean ones, the ones that made my life difficult and who I remember purely for how nasty they were to me!

I'll begin with kindergarten and tell you about Mrs. R. Back then, I had all this restless energy and didn't like sitting in class for nearly four hours every day. All that nervous energy led to a rather peculiar habit of shaking my legs. I mean I shook them like I would if I were operating the pedal of a sewing machine. Mrs. R noticed me doing this. When her admonishing me to stop had no effect, she hauled me up to the front of the class along with my little pink chair. Sat me down in front of the whole class and asked me to shake my legs in front of them. Naturally I was petrified and couldn't move a muscle. The habit was instantly cured. But the humiliation of it has stayed with me to this day.

Then we had this interesting geography teacher in middle school. I forget her name. Now she HATED us. I mean with a vengeance! I have no idea why. She just hated all her students. She'd yell and scream at us during class 'You muff!' or to a friend of mine who had the misfortune of having an older sister in the same school (and who did better than her at studies)- 'You dolt! Look at your sister and look at you!'. With hindsight I realise that she was a pretty good teacher - when she was able to set aside her hatred of us!

Cut to college and up looms the terrifying figure of our department head. A real dragon lady. Not a shred of compassion in her. When she walked down the corridor, we instantly hid behind our textbooks. You were in her good books if you got good marks and fared well in exams. If you didn't, needless to say that she made her displeasure felt.

I remember one year, she raised a huge ruckus because the students didn't wish her on Teachers Day!!! She made a big fuss that we were all ungrateful wretches who didn't think of doing anything for the teachers blah...blah..blah. She managed to gather support from other department heads as well. And so there was a hastily organised general body meeting called by the students union. They begged us to put together some sort of a cultural show and give them some gifts. I kid you not! This really happened.

And so we did just that. Collected money from the students, bought snacks, gifts and rehearsed a song and a dance. Cordially invited her and the other teachers (who looked a bit shamefaced actually) and put up a gala show, all the while cursing her in our hearts. Come Children's Day two months later - what did one get? Zilch!

I didn't write this post to pillory the teaching fraternity. Far from it. I've had some wonderful teachers who have influenced my thoughts and I owe a debt of gratitude to them. But when I saw so many blogs about 'gurur bramha...' and 'to sir with love' I thought - lets flip the coin over and look at the other side. Drona may have been the world's best teacher - but don't forget, he made Eklavya forfeit his thumb.

In college,I was part of the Indian Music Club. As part of the cultural life in college, we had the Mount Holyoke competitions. These were basically inter year competitions. It was the time when juniors tried to assert their suzerainty over the seniors. And seniors of course, fought back aggressively. As you can imagine, the competition was stiff. Each year was determined to win Mount Holyoke. The club membership divided itself into first, second and third years. Club leaders went into overdrive choosing the best songs, choreographing the best dances, organising the best events and slave driving club members. Life for a week was all about club meetings and rehearsals.

IMC in the second year stands out in my memory. All the second years in the IMC congregated and the assistant leader (elected from among the second years) took charge. We were going to do one Hindi and one Tamil group song. Then there would be a duet and a solo.

My gang and I were the 'Hindi gang' consisting of two tamilians, one mallu and one bengali. We were asked to come up with a fantastic number that would have the audience up and dancing to our tunes.

So what was this great number to be? It had to be catchy. It had to have melody. Should sound good when sung in a group. And it should also have that special something which was all 'US'.

After much debate and disagreement, we decided upon the song 'Yelo Yelo. Yeloji sanam hum aa gaye' from the film Andaz Apna Apna. It was the song of the moment. The movie had been released recently, it had AAMIR KHAN (drool! drool!), had that lovely O.P.Nayyar feel without being old and was totally US! What a wonderful idea.

There was a small fly in the ointment. Our pianist was in the first year. This meant that she could not play for us. No one else among the second years could play an instrument.

We were crushed. That song begged instruments. The original had the beautiful strains of a violin, guitar and castanets. In the movie the song was sung by the hero on a horse drawn carriage and the castanets gave an impression of the clomping hooves of a horse.

But never let it be said that we were defeated by this. We were a creative bunch and we hit upon a creative idea. That is to say, I hit upon a creative idea and the rest of the group thought it was a fabulous one.

"We can use coconut shells na?" I said. " We will beat it rhythmically to the required beat and it will sound just like horses"

"Wonderful! Wonderful!" A day ski in our group immediately volunteered to get the coconut shells. Everything fell into place and we started practice in right earnest.

The day of the competition arrived and we eagerly awaited our turn on stage. While we waited, I noticed that the second year group was the largest. I mean we had to be around 15 girls at least. Thats one thing about the second years, I thought. We know how to show solidarity. Look at us. Everybody is singing!! 'Everybody' is correct. When we filed onto the stage to sing, we were so many that the entire stage, some 10 feet wide was covered!

The song began. Out came the coconut shells and the audience collapsed with laughter. Yet another day ski had thoughtfully brought a tambourine (which she had omitted to mention) and she was cheerfully banging away at it. Oh yes. One more thing. We had not practiced previously with the coconut shells. So it was being banged away, in a valiant effort to imitate horse hooves, the tambourine girl was still going strong and the audience was in splits. Added to the mayhem was the fact that the group was way too large. The right end of the line was singing faster than the left. The icing on the cake was when some of the girls in the group, seeing the mirth among the audience, started giggling themselves. I even have a photograph of this.

The song ended and we walked off the stage. The audience wiped its eyes and moved on to the next song. We left the auditorium for the post mortem. Once outside, there was a general silence in the group. We looked at one another not knowing what to say. Then everybody started laughing. It was too much. Coconut shells?!! 'Whose idea was it?' they wanted to know and I tried to make myself invisible.

We went back in to hear who had won. We knew there was no chance it could be us. And it wasn't. But surprise surpise! We got second place?!!! WHAT? HOW? WHY?

Maybe we got points for creativity. Maybe we got points for 'echo effect'. The right hand not knowing what left hand is doing seems to have worked well for us. My theory is that we got points for full wholesome entertainment!! What say?