FC 202 on Kashi- The Eternal City, by Ashvini Ranjan, resonated more with my overseas readers who, besides saying “loved it”, wished they could visit the city and see it for themselves. Some other readers appreciated Ashvin’s articulation and loved his narrative. Thank you, Ashvin.
🤭 Life's Like That
Dear Readers, when someone has had too much coffee, you would expect that person to say NO if you offered another cup. But, not so. That person may opt for a ‘chota-peg’ or he might say let’s have one-by-two or two-by-three as the case may be.
My Aussie friend Andy, Thomas from Stuttgart and many other overseas readers may note that these expressions relate to coffee sharing. To what extent this sharing goes! In college we were always short of cash not because we spent too much but because pocket money was always in short supply and needed to be conserved. So, eight of us would go to the cafe and order five-by-eight coffee. The waiter would know how to divide up five cups of coffee among eight of us.
This fractioning of coffee is very popular in South Indian restaurants. I’m not sure if this sharing has caught up among North Indians though it seems quite likely given the proliferation of South Indian restaurants all over the country.
The other phrases I came across recently are ‘vada-dip’, and “idli-dip”. It is nothing but vada or idli dunked in sambar (a curry-like preparation, for the benefit of Andy and others). I am not sure if there are other jargon peculiar to south Indian restaurants. I invite readers to please share.
Going back to where I started, I have served you 202 cups of coffee and I'm delighted that they not only have been savoured well by all of you, but many are asking for more. FC cannot be served FC-by-two, but I can offer you a shorter version just like coffee & tea are served in short paper cups which you can hardly hold.
But why am I going short? Am I short of ideas? Nah! Short of time? Yeah! As I mentioned in FC 202, on the 26th of June I took the red-eye flight to Doha and then to Atlanta. I will, of course, experience some jet lag (not as much as I would on the return) but that’s not the reason to keep this post short. It is said that jet lag shuts the eye and not the mind. The real reason is that we are eager to spend time with my 2-year-old granddaughter and not let anything come in the way of bonding with her.
As the popular adage goes ‘life is like that’. A toddler can make you dance and even make you behave younger than her. I am looking forward to doing exactly that. After all, the child in you is always eager to be set free. If you missed reading my post “The Child in Us” use this link and browse:
So, if you are inclined to believe, I pounded away on the keyboard on the 25th of June, after having finished packing, to give this truncated edition of FC some shape and be free to frolic with my granddaughter.
Talking about life is like that, I have enjoyed reading Reader's Digest (RD) for as long as I can remember. It was founded in 1922 in the USA. Unfortunately, the UK edition shut shop recently and I wondered if it was due to the readers’ apathy or due to their gravitation to e-books and audiobooks.
Mercifully, the Indian edition of RD has survived the waning interest in hard copies. The annual subscription is a mere Rs.550 and I urge you to consider subscribing using this link.
It is a digest that will last you a month if you choose to read a few pages every day savouring the knowledge, humour and stories that it brings.
I was a regular subscriber but somewhere in the process of relocating to Bangalore from Mumbai, I got disconnected. A regular feature in RD was ‘Life’s like that’ which was devoted to interesting and mirthful real-life anecdotes. I have one such anecdote, arising from my own experience, dating back to the late 60s, that I can share with you.
My little cousin, all of 6 years old, was being inducted to various chores, one of which was to go to the post office and drop a letter in the mailbox. Off he went enthusiastically on his kid’s cycle more for the fun of riding it than running the errand. Twenty minutes on, he returned with the mail intact in his hand and said “The mailbox was locked and there was a plate that said it would be opened at 2.30 pm”.
There are hundreds of anecdotes from RD but I will share a couple of them:
My husband and I both drive red vehicles. Our youngest daughter also has a red car, as do our eldest daughter and her spouse. Our son is the odd one out. One day he called to tell me he was looking at a new vehicle—and that it happened to be red. “Well,” I said, “It looks like you’ve finally seen the light! “Yeah,” he replied. “I’m tired of being the black Jeep of the family.”
Here’s another one:
When we take our dog on car trips, we carry his drinking water in a gin bottle. During one jaunt, we’d stopped to let him out of the car. As I poured water into his bowl, I noticed a man watching. He came over and whispered, “I hope you won’t let him drive!”
There are some excellent quotes on 'life is like that’. I will share a few and let you resonate with them.
Life is like that, some days are diamonds and some days are stones -Jann Arden.
Life is like that, You live it forward but understand it backwards -Abraham Verghese.
Life is like a garden, you reap what you sow - Paulo Coelho.
Life is like a foot race, there will always be people who are faster than you, and there will always be those who are slower than you. What matters, in the end, is how you ran your race. – Joël Dicker.
Dear readers, I’m sorry for this short post, Hope you like it, if you know of a real-life anecdote, please share it. The next 10 to 12 posts will be from Biden Land. Let’s hope he plays his cards right and doesn’t get trumped. Until next week, take good care and be safe. Ciao!
Had a feeling of having filter coffee in a shorter paper cup
Welcome to western land and enjoy if u drop by Nj or Ny let me know we can perhaps plan to meet Regards