About Books, muffins and basic honesty

There are a couple of things that Guha and I are always amazed about while walking around on the streets and while we potter around in book shops:

1. How incredibly clean the surroundings are (people tell me that it's very different in inner city neighborhoods, and while driving through some towns on the outskirts of Chicago - quite by accident, I wouldn't disagree) – nonetheless that doesn't take away from the great majority of surroundings, and not just posh, high class localities, that are clean and neat and incredibly well-kept.

2. How incredibly honest people are.
There seems to be a basic base-line level honesty and integrity amongst people in this country, which is unthinkable (as horribly disgusting and pathetic that happens to be) in India. Not to say that people don't steal or shoplift or that there aren't any instances of burglary or looting but that still in no way takes away from the base-line honesty that exists at an individual level in this country.
Bookshops here will often have neat stacks of books outside the shop-doors (no doubt to attract any potential passer-by who doesn't have any intentions of venturing inside the store). These books are normally ones that are on sale. People will browse through them, put them back from where they got it; if any book catches their fancy, they go in and buy it. I've never seen anyone running off with three books without paying for them. Never seen a huge van stopping right in front with a couple of hooded louts leaping out and throwing the boxes of books into the back of the van and then whizzing off. Haven't noticed any shifty eyed teenagers, stuffing some books into their trousers, giggling and snorting, and running off without paying. (Some things I have heard about and some odd things I have seen - but that's for another day).
Of course not. Then the system would fail to work.

Libraries are yet another amazing place. Both the university libraries as well as the public libraries. Now with certain rule changes - graduate students can take out books and keep them for as long as they are using them. The only thing they need to do is to renew the books every three months. And then of course one can take out as many books as one wants to, and one can roam around the stacks and pick out anything that looks or sounds interesting. I remember the first time that I went to one of the school libraries. I went to the counter and very softly and politely enquired, “How many books may I check out?” The lady behind the counter said with a smile, “As many as you can carry out, dear.” And of course I packed my bag full. I couldn't believe my luck. What if they changed the rules the very next day....!

In the school libraries: students and faculty check out the books on their own with a scanner. The only thing (and obviously I have thought about this a fair bit) that is there to prevent anyone from stealing a book is the barcode. That is all. Or so it seems. Rip out the barcode and walk away with the book, and nobody would be any wiser. But it almost never happens. I can't say it never does - because I don't know whether anyone has ever stolen a book from the library - but I do know that if people were stealing books with any regularity, then the system would not be able to sustain itself.

And obviously it's not just that little barcode, which prevents people from filching books.

Once, some years ago I had chanced upon this lovely book of poems. I seem to have forgotten the exact title – but I think it was called “Songs for Krishna”. This book had not been taken out of the library for ages. The last time it had been borrowed was in the 70s. I know this. For the book did not have a barcode. It had the library card tucked away in a slot on the back flap. I examined it, checked it, and was reading through some of the poems (many were by Meerabai), and I thought of taking the book and never bringing it back. Nobody would know. It wasn't even filed under the current system. Nobody even knew that the book actually existed anymore in the library, by the looks of it. It was a forgotten book lying on a library shelf, and I knew that I would read and re-read it many times more than it had been read in all the years that it had been there...

Another place where I've noticed basic honesty is in the school cafeteria (and other eating joints - especially coffee-shops and the like). In the school cafeteria - most main course meal items are served by the folks behind the counter. Yet one does have the option of picking up salads, fruit cups, desserts, bread, muffins, donuts, and bags of chips and the like, and then paying for them at the counter. Now the glass shelf where the muffins are kept, is miles away from where one pays, and I remember one year when I was rather hungry an awful lot (but certainly not starving or anything like that), I had seriously considered the possibility of pilfering a muffin. And not just once but on plenty of occasions. That whole “muffin-madness” had the usefulness of demonstrating some useful concepts when I was teaching social psychology and even the introductory classes a couple of years back...it never failed to make the students grin or guffaw or chuckle either.
Some weeks ago when Guha, Namrata, and I were sitting in the school cafeteria, we were talking about how polite and honest people are about using the condiments (which are “free”: jam, jellies, butter, milk for coffee, and about twenty different sauces and spreads and salad dressings). Namrata half-joked, “If this were back home, there would be a security guard monitoring the use of the tartar sauce, and he'd probably be paid less than it costs to buy a bottle of the same.”

I am reminded of some things:
How hordes of students from Presidency used to steal books every year from the Calcutta book fair. Far from being ashamed or embarrassed – they would boast about their exploits.
How a student once cut out pages from an expensive encyclopaedia in the National Library, and the news was carried in The Telegraph.
How terribly intrusive and heavy-handed the library system happens to be in India.
I could put ten other points that I am reminded of – but I intend to keep this post short.
About cleanliness, I'll write in another post.
....and it does make me wonder though. Why on earth are some folks so lazy about returning shopping-carts to their proper places! But about this oddity and others – some other day.

The Madman - I

There's a mad man, they say, in a one horse town.
“Does he dance around in a see-through gown?
Does he squabble aloud with his other selves?
Does he hold midnight meetings with the garden elves?
Does he wake up the neighbours with full-throttled hollers?
Does he toss rotten eggs down clueless collars?
Does he giggle while squashing down human heads?
Doe he take swinging leaps over the flower-beds?
Doe he howl at the moon, moo, coo, bray or bark?
Does he chomp down on legs with the jaws of a shark?”
............
They huddle, they whisper, “none of the above”, they say.
“Then what makes him mad - pray tell me,” I bay.
They whisper, they chatter, they babble some more,
“He beats up the parents who come to his door!”
I tilt m'self forward, “You've seen this no doubt?”
“Sunny saw it with her glasses, perched on her stout snout!
Sunny told Fanny, who told it to Beena.
Beena told Reena, who told it to Meena.”
Meena tosses her hair and lets out a purr,
“It's Sunny who saw it. You should ask hurr.”
Sunny titters and stutters; looks this way and that
Flapping her hands around – much like a bat.
I turn to Snout-Sunny, peering into her face -
To me she looks like a basket-case.
“So you saw it yourself? It must have been scary?”
“Err it wasn't really me, it was Barry (who's so Hairy)...”
All tops topple over to find Barry in their midst
Barry, who’s rubbing one very hairy wrist.
“So you saw it? Didja? Saw it with your own eyes?”
Barry grunts “T'was Bandy”, and stares at the skies.
The whispers rise like a murmuring gale
But that isn't the end of this long-winded tale.
Bandy comes forth, hands deep in his pockets
I yelp out as I look into his eyeless sockets.
“And what did you see?” I bark, "What have you seen-huhn?"
“Nought a thing.” Says Bandy, “I heard it from Meena!”

Discovering India...

I have to put up another post because something rather embarrassing happened in the morning today.

So I was chatting in the morning on google chat with Pupu, who's taking her final exams of Class - 6. She had her Physics and History examinations today. She was very pleased with her Physics exams but informed me that her History exams were a little off because she got muddled up with some dates. The dates were related to the Turks invading/conquering Constantinople, and the discovery of both the United States and India.

I didn't bother about the first one, the second one I remembered with a sudden jolt but it was the last one that had me completely stumped.

I continued with my bizarre questioning regarding when indeed was India discovered, for I didn't have the vaguest idea. I asked Pupu what the books said about India being "discovered". Pupu said that it was some time during the renaissance. I replied with, "but that can't be. India was there long, long before the renaissance". Did the books say something about India being "discovered" in the B.Cs? I was wondering what in heaven's name the history books had to say about this famous "discovery" when Pupu replied (I have no idea what was going on through her own head about me) with a, "Oh no, no - not that. But it was in AD 1488, or AD 1498 or AD 1499 that Vasco da Gama discovered India".

Then of course there was that low pitched "oh" rumbling through my head. But of course! How could I forget Vasco da Gama, the little ditty, his discovering India...

And then I was left shaking my head at myself. Not to excuse myself in any way (there is absolutely no way that I can dig myself out of this hole), but I still find it considerably curious. There should be some other word describing the intrepid western voyager's first contact with a piece of land and its people, both of which had existed for thousands of years before the voyager's "discovery". Since there were people living on the land long before Vasco da Gama set his brave foot forward, one can assume that their long-gone predecessors must have had some finger in the discovery. Yet, when one talks about the discovery of India - is one talking about a geographical tract of land or a culture and her civilization? In the second sense I guess it would make some sense to talk about Vasco da Gama discovering India in the 15th century. Yet even in this sense India did have contact with the "outer" world prior to the 15th century. So we're talking about India being discovered by the "western" world.

I know I should go and read some history or potter around on google for a bit - yet part of my musings is not entirely related to the "facts" of the case - but is related to the concept of "discovery". And what it means. And then of course there is the other point that comes to my head in a trickle. If da Gama had not discovered India in the particular sense he did - when would the British have come, or the Frech and the Dutch and the Portuguese? da Gama's discovery did indeed have some immediate consequences...

One thing I do know: once Pupu reminded me of the approximate year of India's "discovery" not in isolated terms but in relation to the renaissance - now I know I'll always remember.
Err...maybe this is a good time to check up on the exact year of the discovery of India.

Sights, Air, and Sound

A very short one.
One of the places that I have regularly been going to once Joe discovered it some years ago, and told Guha about it is Prophet's Town of course. Every time I go there, there is always some moment, which always sticks in my head, and makes the trip somehow stand out.
Once Joe, Guha, and I had skated on the frozen lake at 10 at night.

Another time, also at night, there had been this one moment when I had been looking up, and heard the tall trees shimmering, shivering, and swaying in the wind against a dense, liquid blue sky.

Another time while Guha and Joe were walking along the trail, I had ventured off and found the small stream which becomes the 15 feet deep lake (it might be 9 feet...) within some yards. I sat beside the stream and looked at the stream and heard the water trickling and gurgling over the rocks and the pebbles. The stream, the small pebbles, and rocks, the white snow. I remember that still. But most of all I remember the sound of the water rushing, trickling, plopping in waves.
Guha and Joe joined me some minutes later, and we threw large clumps of snow into the flowing stream and we cheered the clumps till they were swiftly carried off by the stream...

The last time there was a moment when I was skidding across the very narrow and hardly shin deep part of the stream when I broke through the ice and nearly landed on my face into the stream amidst Guha's chuckles.

Another thing I've noticed:
Joe looks. He looks through his binoculars, he looks without them, he looks all around him. He observes.
Guha breathes. He breathes deeply. He breathes and he breathes and fills his lungs in, and he keeps breathing in the blue and green air.
I listen.

Enough for now, I guess.

Jam, Cereals, and some such things

Time for a post.
It's been six years now that I've been in one place, and there are lots of things I could write about but today I'll write about jams, cereals, biscuits, and stuff.
It's rather curious actually: the first time I went into a grocery store in this country, I was quite amazed to see the lines and lines and rows and rows of stuff and more stuff, and some stuff I'd never even heard of. After awhile of course the amazement wore off, yet even after all this time I've noticed that I'm always fascinated still by the different varieties of jams, cereals, biscuits, and small tubs of yogurt.

For the last three years or so, Guha and I almost always end up going grocery shopping together, and for most of the times while both of us will hunt around for the cheaper brands (for most things I can't taste any difference), for a long time I used to be maniacal when it came to cereals, jams, biscuits, and yogurt.

For awhile now I've given up my experimenting with yogurt. I have two favourite flavours -
chocolate and raspberry mousse and that's all I'll have (Guha will only have Blueberry burst). And for most of the times I'm also not too terribly picky about cereal. Although once when we went to a different store, we did end up buying an unusual box of cereal, which was quite interesting - nuts and fruits and crunchy oats (something toffee-chocolate almond crunch it was called). Guha, I remember though didn't want to get the box of cereal.
But look at all the different things it has, I said - almost drooling at the sight of the box of cereal (of all things!)
No, no - said he. Too expensive. Just look at the price Shilpi.
But it's just this once, said I.
Finally after haggling back and forth we did pick it up. And a good box of cereal it was too. But that was the first and last time. I have been pleased to note that I haven't really hankered for that cereal again.

Yet unfortunately with jams and biscuits it's taken me longer. Guha and I once had a massive fight, over a crummy jar of jam in yet another store that we ventured into quite by accident another time. I wanted, demanded that we buy a jar of jam. I don't even remember anymore what flavour it was or why I wanted it so badly. I had to buy the jar of jam.
Guha finally at the end of his patience, just told me shortly "buy the jam then." But there was that exasperation in his voice, and so obviously I walked away from the jam aisle, but very angrily did I stomp away. I just didn't see why we couldn't buy a jar of jam. It was expensive for a jar of jam but it was only a one time jam jar anyway. I couldn't see what the big deal was.
Guha tried to placate me after that, saying as we were walking around the store: want a bar of chocolate? We could get some chocolate. Want a fruit bar? You like fruit bars.
Of course I shook my head. I didn't want anything else. Finally he said, "Oh just go and get the jar of jam for heaven's sake if you want it so badly." But by then of course it seemed silly to go and get the jar of jam. So we walked out of the store after a bit. And it must have been ten minutes later that we were hollering at each other.
G: It was just a jar of jam after all.
S: Then if it was so why not get it.
G: But the price. It was so expensive.
S: It was less expensive than two packs of cigarettes.
G: But it's not as though we're not going to smoke them now, is it it?
S: But it's not even as though we're going to buy a jam jar every day. Ugh.
G: Why didn't you just go and get it then.
Well after ten minutes of this, we were dead silent and then before we knew it we were in splits to think that we had had our biggest fight in a while over a jam-jar. I gave him a random plastic flower that had been in the car (another story) since I didn't have an olive branch...
And when he came back from the field last September he got me a jar of blackberry preserves (of which I have preserved some still)...But I have not had the craving for any expensive jams anymore when we go to the grocery store. I stick to my generic brand of orange marmalade, which I love, and Guha shifts between marmalade and grape jelly (which goes well with peanut butter).

Different varieties of biscuits/cookies jump out from their respective places on the shelves and bite me every now and again.

Yet for a long time I used to wonder how Guha was never bitten by anything on the shelves. Nothing. He would meticulously stay away from the expensive brands, and I never saw him experiencing a sudden "I have to buy this right here, right now." It's not that he didn't look, or say "oh, that looks good." But he never put anything into the cart. And of course every now and again he would say, "Ah, expensive tastes and not enough money don't go well..." I would pipe in with "oh we can get it once. Let's just get it." But he would shake his head. "Naah," he would say
That mystery was finally solved. I don't really remember where, when, or how. As he put it in "You see if I could, I'd buy stuff that caught my fancy whenever I wanted to. But since I can't - I'd much rather not get the taste of it for now." I went "Aaah. So you'd really like eating that cereal we had once every day?..." "Well maybe not that identical flavour...but you've got to admit that the cereal was very nice. I'd try out the different flavours..." "Hmmm." Said I. "But it's okay to ty it once...isn't it? Then one knows what it is, and one knows what it tastes like." Guha grinned. We talked some more up and down along the same lines.

It's not as though Guha or I are profligate spenders and he is not really a miser nor would he ever be a spendthrift even if he did have tonnes of money (I don't know really what I am - both a miser and a spendthrift) but we have different approaches to jams, jellies, biscuits, and the like. He is fond of ice-cream (especially all kinds of chocolate flavours) yet he still will never look at the shelves, which have the more "exotic" stuff unless they are on sale. Me - on the other hand - I keep hankering to taste the "exotic" stuff at least once. Both of us love cheesecake and tiramisu, and end up having cheesecake on birthdays and special days, and there's nothing like more or less expensive cheesecake - so no, there's no squabbling there. We have no problems buying whiskey or rum (we have settled on the ones we like, although every now and again when summer comes we both longingly look at the Tanqueray wondering if it might go on sale, and then the day it does we make a grab for it or when birthdays come we get some single malt)....so the rest is all fine and dandy.

But jam still remains a sticky issue. Even though I've told Guha that I don't care anymore about interesting jars of jam, even though I whistle past the jam and jelly aisles, Guha will say, "I'm not coming between you and your jam."
P.S: There is one other thing that I really could have every other day (but I don't and one shouldn't. It probably has enough calories to kill a fair sized horse). It's available only in one coffee-shop near campus, and it's called a Lemon-Berry marscarpone cake. It's a regular cake but has cream cheese flavoured with the hint of lemon, and lots of creamy blueberries. Guha got me a humongous slice of that a couple of days ago. That's how I remembered how much I enjoy it, and thought it was an appropriate post-script for this entry on jam, cereals, and some such things...