gpsastry: The Ineffable Sex

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Falklands is in the news again. After three decades. I never heard of this tiny group of South Atlantic islands before that. They were a stone's throw from Argentina which decided to invade and annex them from their British sovereigns. England was at the other end of the Atlantic. But it was then led by that Iron Lady who decided to send a flotilla of ships, planes and guns to wage an undeclared war and throw the invaders back into the sea.

What a woman!

A decade before that our own Indirajee did something even more daring. She threw a huge entrenched Pak army despite fighting on two fronts and being threatened with more fronts and an aircraft carrier by a superpower whose president had it against her viscerally.

And then there was Golda Meir...

What an ineffable sex women are!

King Janaka was playing handball with his kid daughter Sita. The ball happened to roll under the crate carrying the legendary Shiv Dhanush (supermassive bow of Shivjee). Sita just pushed the crate away with a gentle touch of her left palm, leaving her dad wondering...and mystified. Yet, Sita allowed herself to be abducted by a mere brahmin just so that the Sri Lankans are taught a burning lesson by Hanumanjee.

Then there was this girl called Kunti. She so charmed Rishi Durvasa notorious for his ill temper by her devoted services to him that she got a boon. Just by reciting the mantra she got from him, she could bear an instant son. Did she keep quiet? No way. She wanted to test and find out if it was a fake mantra, which led to fairly disastrous consequences.

And then there was this Shakuntala who charmed King Dushyanta who married her then and there in the forest and returned to his kingdom after gifting her a wedding ring as her only ID proof. What did she do? She lost it in a river like a girl losing her cell phone in a city bus.

Naughty, all of them...

I am the only son among six daughters to my parents. So, I know something about girls alright. Indeed I am an authority on the subject of girl psychology.

My didi is the first-born, two years older to me. And I was like that Mary's little lamb following her and her orders. But to look at, it was she who looked like a lambkin. Frail like a flower, obeying her parents when they were looking at her, and lisping like a babe.

My first recollection of our misadventures was when I was just about three. The annual festival and fair of our village temple was on...a micro kumbh mela. It was summer and we were all sleeping on the stone pyols (platforms) jutting out of the house. Early that dawn didi woke me up and asked me to follow her pronto without washing or brushing. And I followed her dumb. She led me to the temple and we were watching the preps for the upcoming dhwajarohanam (flag-hoisting) ritual. An hour passed by. And she said, let's get back. By the time we reached home, there were several search parties reporting no-show. Father was relieved to see us alive and kicking but all the same, since he was a HM in the making, he jailed both of us in the coal-cellar. I started crying hoarse but didi knew that our youngest auntie will be there in a few minutes to unbolt the door and release us.

And then she was admitted to the girls elementary school as a punishment. And she insisted that I follow her as her accomplice. Father was happy to do it...two birds with one stone.

One afternoon after the school broke, didi asked me to follow her. This time she led me to the famous Reddy's Gardens for an hour's outing. Repeat of the same story...jail and release.

We then shifted home to a bungalow near our famous village tank. The tank was a huge affair, it seemed to me then. It was a square with about twenty steep steps leading down to it. And it always had plenty of water neck-deep for adults. And its stone steps were moss-covered and slippery.

When my didi was born, the astrologer who cast her horoscope had warned my mom that didi has a pitfall in her kundali that she faced the danger of drowning in a water body. So, mother asked me to keep a stern watch on her while we went to school and back by the tank. And I was just four.

Didi and I would walk along the bank with our satchels and as soon as we were out of sight of home, didi would leave her satchel with me and ask me to hold it while she would go down the steps and wash her tiny feet in the dirty water. And she would threaten me not to squeal. And I would be trembling and praying. It went on for a couple of weeks before we were sighted by our neighbor and reported.

Any guess who got the whacking?

Oh, well, she did her M.D. and married an IAS chap alright...as I did marry an M.D. too...

And I am the Leo and she a meek lambkin, Aries...