Happy Teacher's Day Saramma-saar!

Teachers Day. Well, it brings a lot of memories back on lazy ethereal wings. But one stands starkly in our mind as a defining moment, something we can't forget. We were born in Kerala and spent eight years of our life there. Those days kintergarten in Kerala meant squatting on the floor and writing on the sand spread before us, to the satisfaction of the cruel and sadistic old teacher. Homework was carved on palm leaves with a sharp instrument called "narayam." Woe to those who didn't do their homework, as punishment included beating with a stick and pinching with sand stuck to the teacher's fingers.

We were admitted to this class rather early, and naturally, we were one of the biggest malingerers around. Our mater, being a teacher of craft herself, thought starting early would be good. But we thought otherwise. We wanted to enjoy our life at home, lazing in the fields and looking at the bees. We felt school was a waste of our time. (From then till now we have not figured out what our school was meant for, except to pick up language skills. All our other classes and time were wasted on us, we still can vouch. Our education was mainly done by us, ourselves.) Our malingering would have got on our mamma's nerves as one day she decided enough was enough and took the matter into her hands. She escorted us with a stick, freshly cut from a bush, de-leafed and all, and then when she would turn back, thinking we were walking to school, we would turn back and walk towards her. Ruthless punishment would follow and the stick would be applied all over our body, rather mercilessly. The pain, we do feel, even now. This process of our walking ahead a little and turning back and being beaten would repeat several times, and, as many times we would get thrashed relentlessly. We cried, bitter tears, for mercy, but no mercy was shown by mother, with whom we kept a grudge all our lives for that incident.

Then as this process seemed a never-ending progression, along came Saramma-saar. She asked what was going on. When mother told her, she scolded her, hugged us, took us by the hand and with kind words of encouragement led us to school. From then on we had no fear of going to school, though we were not a very good student. It was just that act of kindness from our teacher that changed our attitude altogether to school and education. This incident underscores the need for teachers to be kind.

This teacher's day we remember Saramma-saar with fondness. Happy teacher's day Saramma-saar, wherever you are.

On Gareth Bale's Signing for 100 Million Euros

After the outrage we felt about the support a rapist received from a conservative people - my fellow men - we feel outraged over one other thing. The obscene amounts paid to football stars.

These days we watch a lot of football. It's a good game full of tension and excitement, unlike cricket, which is only interesting at times, i.e., when India plays Pakistan and Zimbabwe plays Bangla Desh. The reason is a 32 inch television that almost obliterates one wall of our modest house. Our son, of course, paid for it, as we are destitute, after resigning from our job. Our three credit card companies are baying for our blood like unfed Himalayan wolves. Well, the things we splurged on are rotting in different cupboards, now that we don't go to work anymore - Arrow shirts, Allen Solly trousers, Celio jackets, the works.

So it is upsetting to read that Gareth Bale has been paid 100 million Euros by Real Madrid. We like Real Madrid, it's one of our favourite teams, but 100 million? 100 million to backpass those cute footballs and strike it into the net? 100 million when people in several countries are starving. This is roughly a thirty-secondth part of the budget of Bombay. Isn't this figure obscene when writers like us are starving - well, not starving exactly, but struggling.

Would (rather, could) Gareth pass on the bucks for something, which is believed, he doesn't rightfully deserve, to this struggling writer?

Is Rape by a Person in Power Condone-able?

We are one of the few people who don't understand our fellow countrymen. Really. We have got out moral priorities upside down. 

The hoo-hah over the many rapes that came to light in the past few months had barely died down - just because the media drew attention to them - than we see demonstrations of people supporting an alleged rapist, who, incidentally happens to be a man claiming to be god. We see girls and women - the victims of sexual harassment all their lives - on the road blocking traffic, and lending support to an alleged rapist. 

So is rape by a godman okay with us? The question baulks our mind. After evading arrest for a long time the alleged rapist is now in jail. God - I mean the almighty - alone knows if he will be convicted.

There have been allegations of rape by politicians, godmen, and corporate czars, which have all been swept under the carpet. How many have been convicted? Of course there is no statistics, if at all. Our mistaken awe of people in power continues. "Malik, maine aap ka namak (or, whatever) kyaya hai," seems to the operative assumption here.

The Miley Cyrus Act

Call us retard, or out of touch, or whatever your sanguine heart would have us be labelled, we got to see Miley Cyrus' act only today. Hm. 

Now singers are a different breed altogether, that's why they are so crude and manage to get attention. Cyrus, by the by, did what was unpredictable, and abominable, in our opinion. Like the Indian item song routine each new song (or performance) tends to overstep what the other guys have done, thereby escalating the obscenity factor. Of course pop stars don't bring up children so they don't have to think about what effect the gestures would have on an unsuspecting generation. They would love it, as is their wont, but would they become better people, we doubt. The absolute slide in moral standards start with acts such as these, be aware and be forewarned.

Be that as it may, it has created a celebrity out of Miley Cyrus. Who has heard of her, not us. Now her albums will sell like that of Lady GaGa. In this world of ours the more the scandalous, the better it is. We don't have to exercise moral judgement anymore. Just go ahead and do it and become a celebrity, the bungalow on Sunset Boulevard with tennis court and swimming pool will soon follow. Provoke them, insult them, be obscene with them and they will make you into a celebrity, and will write about you in their scandal sheets. 

Because that's what the world has become, son!

Has Society Stopped Accepting the Lover?

Now that the dust has settled and the culprits have been caught, we are still shocked by the implications, nay, the nature of the rape of the journalist in Bombay. What resemblance does it have to the Delhi rape case, except that both were gang rapes, when multiple men rape a single woman.

Yes, both women were accompanied by men. Escorts. It's a well accepted fact all over the world that women with men - probably lovers, or spouses - be left well alone. Society affords its lovers their peace, to settle their own quarrels and talk their own language of love. Doesn't it?

But it seems it doesn't, at least, not in India. In both the rapes the women were accompanied by men, lovers or otherwise. Both men were threatened and traumatised before the women were subjected to their cruelty. 

Doesn't society accept its lovers? Those creatures of whom poems and novels are written. It is a society that has gone bad that doesn't accept vulnerable lovers, so we think. The signs are already out, the proclamations made. Make it known from roof tops and at village squares. Peet the dindoras.

Meanwhile for Nirbhaya another tear is shed, another totem pole demolished. Nothing has been learnt and nothing will be.

Oh, These Pakistanis! An Independence Rant.

Since the independence day has come and gone - though it was quite drizzly in New Bombay - a few thoughts and ruminations.

It's not right to be gloomy on this happy day, so I will start with something good. But, ugh, there is no good news to share. One remains optimistic through the grind of bad news, however, there's hardly any good news to go by, to share. Sorry, folks!

A submarine blew up after we announced proudly that we have constructed our own nuclear submarine. Could anything worse happen? Well, we also had launched our own aircraft carrier. However, the only news carried on the big boss of reporting BBC was of the submarine blowing up. Guess the Brits are cross because we decommissioned the HMS Hercules, which was what Vikrant was known as before we acquired it.

Be that as it may, we are in the market for submarines, and we can judge another scandal coming. Fellas, leave this transaction alone, I say. Because it's disconcerting to read about Liju's death after two months of his wedding. Look what dreams he carried to his watery grave. What happened? Who was at fault?

The Paks are very cunning people. That we know since our Saudi days. We had a lot of Pakistanis in the company we worked. They were all pretty decent in behaviour, except when it came to jingoism and chest thumping. "Thum Char Sau ko Hum Char Bus Hai." They would say. To this taunt our Sardarji watchman would say, "Saley thum hazaron ko hum ek bus hai." Bravo. Who started it?

Yes such was their jingoism and misplaced patriotism. So it's no wonder that after killing five jawans the Pakistani parliament passed a resolution condemning India's aggression. You must give it to them, surely, something like the Oscar of Demented Parliamentarians. Tomorrow, Pakistan will attack us with nuclear weapons and allege that we started the fight, they will fix matches and say we lost the game, they will invade Gujarat and say we captured Punjab. So, be warned and prepared for anything.

Enough for one Independence day. Sorry, we couldn't dwell about dollar prices, gold, American visas and such like. We will give them separate treatment in future episodes. Bye, and be good.

Snowden, Durga Shakti, and Antony, What Else? Saturday Musings.

It's another weekend and we, I mean our fingers, are itching to write another post here, this sacred space. The promotion we are planning for the completion of 10 years of blogging is underway. However, health concerns, certain anxieties prevent us from going full steam ahead. Do please, please watch out for it though.

So, Snowden is in Russia and Obama goes on to announce that he is not interested in snooping into the lives of us netizens. Then why is the Indian version of PRISM so zealous about applying cyber rules to ordinary citizens as seen in the Shaheen Dadha case? We do a double take when it comes to rules, don't we? Snooping on private citizens is, we maintain, an invasion of privacy. After all, a post on Facebook is not expressing ones views on a public platform, it is just an expression of views to a list of people on the forum who are friends. That's why Facebook classifies people in ones list a "friends." Now when has expressing an opinion to friends been a crime?

That said let's consider the Durga Shakti case. It is shameless the way a public servant is suspended based on unverified information and charges. Our politicians do jump the gun to receive media coverage, sure, but should they have gone to this extent? Then all public servants would become the menial servants of ministers, and of what use is their expertise and knowledge? Sand mining is a dangerous threat to our environment and what are we doing about it? When a public servant speaks up, this is what he/she gets.

The rain is still causing havoc in the country and all we can think about is our petty-minded little cover-ups and white washing. AK Antony failed so miserably in handling the case of the Jawans killed by Pakistani forces that he had to retract his statement. Has the former chief minister of Kerala lost face? True he has introduced a lot of reforms for the men in uniform. They have better salaries and better pensions now. But, should he have made that intemperate comment?

Since We Said We Would Post about Our Beard

And since we promised to post our beard on fb here it be, growing rather nicely! Since Amitabh's beard makes headline stuff, we thought this could be our own headline stuff. Uff!

Announcement: We Have Completed 10 Years of This Blog

We are proud to announce: this blog completes ten years of continuous blogging this month. Phew! We set about it in August 2013 and, what shall we say, it has been a rewarding and frustrating experience. Sometimes the post would appear sometimes it would disappear and we would wonder what happened. And, other times, we would read the blog and it would be full of bloopers. Then we would go and hastily press the delete button.

We are glad we did it,though it has had its frustrating moments. We were writing short stories and a novel.Yes, and poems too. All this made it too hectic. But we think the worst has passed, and good things are coming.

Gratified to know that no one abused us, or said an unkind word about our blog. Thank you readers, do come back again and again.

After two months of heavy rain the sun finally came out. So we took this picture standing at the door. Then we went for a walk and sun on our skin felt good. Feeling rejuvenated somehow, which portends some good things, hopefully.

On the Subject of Education and Healthcare: Some Random Musings

Last Sunday's Times of India has an interview with Nobel laureate Amartya Sen on how India is lagging being because of its neglect of education and healthcare. We, as someone marginally related to the field (wifey is a teacher, I have run around for sonny's admission to colleges), can comment on both these vital services which the government has bungled.

We take the example of Kerala, a state that is foolhardily important to us. Our brother-in-law is a government-appointed teacher there. He has a good life, a good salary, a car, a house, property from which he gets a monthly income, and will retire with a handsome pension which will rid him of all worries of the future. But he is not a happy man. Why? Because every year, come admission time, he makes around 100 frantic visits in his car to get students for his class. Only around six of them join, after much coaxing (free books, uniforms, mid-day meal, holidays) which is what they need to run a class. His worry is that if he doesn't get so many students the government will close the school.  In the same state there is rush for admission to private English-medium schools, where the admission rate is around Rs 30, 000 for a student. Come hail or high water these students from well-to-do families will not join a government school.

The government has spent crores of rupees on buildings and playgrounds and, yet, the schools are empty. Much the same thing happens in cities also. The craze is for education in a private institution, whatever their dictats (Which among other things include: donations, activity fees, tuition fees, and sundry other ways of drawing blood). These schools somehow manages to get good teachers and principals. And, also, their performance is measured by their results.

Now our questions are these:

Why can't the government schools get good teachers and principals, considering the pay is so good?

Why can't teachers with proven skills join government schools after a certain age? This is considering the government doesn't offer employment if a person is above the age of thirty.

If the results are good, and a good education is coming from government schools, will fidgety parents send their children to government schools?

Why can't the government be strict in evaluating its teachers and sacking a few (relegate them to desk jobs) if they don't perform?

Now on the subject of health care:

Many moons and many suns ago, when we were suffering from an ailment we saw an ad in the lobby of a nearby government-subsidised hospital stating that free medicines are availabe there for the ailment. We approached the desk and asked for those medicines. The clerk immediately came and took away the poster saying those medicines were no longer available. Some weird logic this! So where do all the free medicines given by the government go? You guessed it.

Recently, we had to undergo a surgery in a private hospital and spent Rs 80,000 on it. We put a claim for the amount with our insurer and were paid only Rs 20,000. Reason? We took an air-conditioned room with a television. The only reason we took that room was because it had a western toilet. But my semi-government insurance company woulddn't listen. We didn't have the energy to fight.

When we talk of free healthcare, which is a given in developed countries, our country fares very badly. We are dependent on private practitioners such as the private practitioners of education we mentioned above. We don't trust government-run hospitals because the staff there are rude and crude and are only doing a government job.

Now our questions are these:

Why don't people trust a government hospital where treatment is supposed to be free?

Why don't the government sack doctors and nurses who don't perform and, instead, give jobs to good nurses and doctors who have good private practises?

Where are the free medicines given by government to hospitals going?

Why can't the government pest control its hospitals? Some time ago we visited a colleague in a government hospital and was told that he can't sleep at night because of the bites of bed bugs.

Why can't the government which is getting so much money from software and outsourcing exports earmark some money to build clean, efficient, and effective healthcare system as even countries like China and Brazil have done.

Why does the common man have an inborn fear to approach a doctor, any doctor? People have lost their homes and entire savings trying to save sick relatives.

Has the government any answers to these questions? If they have I would like to know about them.