By June our brook's run out of song and speed. Sought for much after that, it will be found Either to have gone groping underground (And taken with it all the Hyla breed That shouted in the mist a month ago, Like ghost of sleigh-bells in a ghost of snow) - Or flourished and come up in jewel-weed, Weak foliage that is blown upon and bent Even against the way its waters went. Its bed is left a faded paper sheet Of dead leaves stuck together by the heat - A brook to none but who remember long. This as it will be seen is other far Than with brooks taken otherwhere in song. We love the things we love for what they are.
Yes, it had to happen one of these days and it has happened...I hit the Blogger's Block.
The symptoms are: exhaustion, emptiness, and fatigue. Like at the end of a mental Marathon. The mind refuses to cooperate although the heart is willing.
Time to take rest and recharge batteries.
Received a wonderful surprise gift from Pratik...a very appetizing book: The Diary of a Nobody. Raring to go..
The Feynman Letters Book gifted by Supratim is almost over. Great Book...Wanted to write a Review...maybe some other day...
On his last trip to the US a month ago, my son brought me a very thoughtful gift: a cute reading light that can be clamped to the book you are reading. Watch-battery-operated tiny LEDs with a Universal Flexi-Spring for angle adjustment. It just gives the extra light needed to make reading comfortable for a chap with about 1.25 eyes.
My son is funny. He is so tensed up with his crazy job that he has no time to read at all. But he does so many li'l li'l things so I can read and write and be out of harm's way...
The last 300 blogs together read like The Life & Good Times of a KGPian hailing from the Sea-Side Village Muthukur... a tiny piece of a half-century's personal history, thoughts and feelings inspired by my many younger colleagues, students, grandstudents and li'l Ishani.
Here is a charming mail from a grandstudent I read once in a while:
******************************************************************************************************* Wednesday April 28, 2010
Dear Prof. Sastry,
I was woken up on the day you put up the blog by a call from a KGP physics-deptt.-mate, now at Stony Brook, with a congrats. And then upon being told the reason for the congratulations, I hurried to see it with my own eyes.
May be thanking you is not appropriate for the same; instead I would like to inform you as to how keenly we watch out for any of your new posts. Your blog has all the ingredients of a R K Narayan novel - the small town boy, the road to the modern world, the modern world (KGP) and its evolution through your own eyes. It is perhaps the only story "based on true IIT experiences" that I read. (I have dared not touch any of Chetan Bhagat- as a general rule I try and avoid books popular at the moment).
Indeed for me your blog is a very interesting albeit a tantalizing read. Tantalizing since it always brings to my mind how close our worldvolumes passed each other by!!!
Hoping to read many many more columns and seeking your blessings.
"...no circumstances, however dismal, will ever be considered a sufficient excuse for the admission of that last and saddest evidence of intellectual poverty, the Pun"
"-.. Do you mean to say the pun-question is not clearly settled in your minds? Let me lay down the law upon the subject. Life and language are alike sacred. Homicide and verbicide--that is, violent treatment of a word with fatal results to its legitimate meaning, which is its life--are alike forbidden. Manslaughter, which is the meaning of the one, is the same as man's laughter, which is the end of the other. A pun is prima facie an insult to the person you are talking with. It implies utter indifference to or sublime contempt for his remarks, no matter how serious. I speak of total depravity, and one says all that is written on the subject is deep raving. I have committed my self-respect by talking with such a person. I should like to commit him, but cannot, because he is a nuisance. Or I speak of geological convulsions, and he asks me what was the cosine of Noah's ark; also, whether the Deluge was not a deal huger than any modern inundation.
A pun does not commonly justify a blow in return. But if a blow were given for such cause, and death ensued, the jury would be judges both of the facts and of the pun, and might, if the latter were of an aggravated character, return a verdict of justifiable homicide. Thus, in a case lately decided before Miller, J., Doe presented Roe a subscription paper, and urged the claims of suffering humanity. Roe replied by asking, When charity was like a top? It was in evidence that Doe preserved a dignified silence. Roe then said, "When it begins to hum." Doe then--and not till then--struck Roe, and his head happening to hit a bound volume of the Monthly Rag-bag and Stolen Miscellany, intense mortification ensued, with a fatal result. The chief laid down his notions of the law to his brother justices, who unanimously replied, "Jest so." The chief rejoined, that no man should jest so without being punished for it, and charged for the prisoner, who was acquitted, and the pun ordered to be burned by the sheriff. The bound volume was forfeited as a deodand, but not claimed.
People that make puns are like wanton boys that put coppers on the railroad tracks. They amuse themselves and other children, but their little trick may upset a freight train of conversation for the sake of a battered witticism...
.....And, once more, listen to the historian. "The Puritans hated puns. The Bishops were notoriously addicted to them. The Lords Temporal carried them to the verge of license. Majesty itself must have its Royal quibble. 'Ye be burly, my Lord of Burleigh,' said Queen Elizabeth, 'but ye shall make less stir in our realm than my Lord of Leicester.' The gravest wisdom and the highest breeding lent their sanction to the practice. Lord Bacon playfully declared himself a descendant of 'Og, the King of Bashan. Sir Philip Sidney, with his last breath, reproached the soldier who brought him water, for wasting a casque full upon a dying man.....
The fatal habit became universal. The language was corrupted. The infection spread to the national conscience. Political double-dealings naturally grew out of verbal double meanings. The teeth of the new dragon were sown by the Cadmus who introduced the alphabet of equivocation. What was levity in the time of the Tudors grew to regicide and revolution in the age of the Stuarts."
Who was that boarder that just whispered something about the Macaulay-flowers of literature?--There was a dead silence.--I said calmly, I shall henceforth consider any interruption by a pun as a hint to change my boarding-house. Do not plead my example...."
In our Village High School where my father was the Head Master in the glorious 1950sthere was this Assemblyeveryday.
One of the routine items in the Agenda that came up before the HM's drone speech inspiring us to become patriotic ideal citizens was the punishment to be meted out to mischief-makers of the day before.
The Class Teachers would submit their lists of habitual offenders beyond their control to the SPL (School Pupil Leader) who would then read out the List, standing beside the HM on the other side of the flag which would almost always refuse to be hoisted duly, the blame duly passed on by the Drill Teacher to one and all and finally to the weather.
Each one of the named rogues would fall out from their positions in the assembled classes and make a beeline before the HM, quietly suppressing their giggles (lest that should be another cause for extra punishment). And they would all be imagining that the assembled ladies are all eyes ogling at them and their bravado.
One by one the students would advance and take the allotted number of hits on their cane-hardenedpalms. The number would be decided beforehand by the HM in consultation with the AHM whose duty it was to keep a muster roll of the first, second, third..time offenders and calculate...
The offenders would all consult the SPL secretly beforehand and find out the number of canes allotted to them; and pretend they don't know when the number is over and advance their palms cheekily to one more of the same.
This would enrage the HM who would be helpless because he can't break the rules he himself framed with the help of the AHM.
The ladies would giggle and this would further enrage the HM who would prolong his speech as a punishment for all concerned and unconcerned; till the Doctor's son faints in the sun..
So I got the suspicion that Routine Public Punishment is often counter-productive..
Fast Forward 20 years when I was working under SDM for my Ph D.
In addition to myself and DB who were Faculty Members, SDM had also a couple of Research Scholars once in a while (they often ran away...).
When his Scholar upsets him by not doing his allotted work but sleeping in the BC Roy Hall without turning up to meet him for more than a month, SDM would get terribly annoyed, justifiably...
All the Scholars had to sign their names daily in the Register kept in the Physics Office in order to get their Scholarship money regularly....the less said about this the better...suffice it to say that no Scholar ever forfeited his Scholarship any month on this count...
When he lost his patience, SDM would ask another Scholar of BC Roy Hall to fetch the offender before him at 12 noon sharp tomorrow. And would issue instructions to sundry other Scholars and to me and DB and whoever was in the Corridor to Assemble in front of his Office.
And he would announce to everyone that he would administer a public snub to the offender.
Everyone knew the drill...SDM was the kindest and timidest of all souls and would never report to the HoD or Dean to stop the Scholarship amount for the month...but would scold left and right as he would say...
DB would pretend to be serious...he was past master in that art; but I would be struggling hard to suppress my laughter. And the other assembled Scholars (all of them hand in glove with each other) would giggle...
But SDM wouldn't notice it at all...he would be red in the face and would slam for a good ten minutes and let everyone go except me and DB.
He would then look at us as if he has discharged his duties and won the round...
But if the Scholar happens to come up with even the merest hint of any originality in his calculations, SDM would be all praise for him and would propagate that his public snub worked and gloat...
KK tells me that I laughingly humiliated one of his classmates in M Sc publicly for not only copying his Assignment from his friend but also copying his friend's name...I don't recall...but KK should know...apparently the student cried...
May I please say I am sorry publicly to whoever it was?
Daily I read or hear stories of intelligent men and women paying advances of anything between twenty five thousand and a lakh of rupees and losing them to online fraudsters.
Con men (women) come in two broad kinds: many conning one, and one conning many.
In my school I read the story of four smooth operators working in a gang cheating a well-read Brahmin of his fattened calf.
This Brahmin was tugging along the said calf to the Kali Temple to sacrifice it (and possibly get magical powers thereby).
The first thief appears passing him by casually and wonders aloud why such a well-read Brahminical Pundit is leading a dog on his leash...the same thing is said by the second after another 100 meters...and by the third....and by the fourth...
The Brahmin's confidence in himself vanishes by degrees and finally he leaves the calf on the road and jumps into the nearby pond to bathe and wash off his pollution.
Lifelong friendships between two intelligent persons, between siblings and blood relatives are similarly broken by a gang of a few men (or women) waiting for the opportune moment and saying again and again to the more gullible of the two what a fool he (or she) had been....leading a dog on his (or her) leash...Instances of this willing suspension of disbelief abound in mythology, history, literature and personal experience...
The most famous example of a single unqualified but powerful personality conning an entire civilized nation is Hitler...
I witnessed one homeopath conning an elite campus and the surrounding township for over a couple of years......Dr C....
Over as short a period as a month Dr C arrived from nowhere with his family, rented a small off-campus place, and built up a terrific reputation for his wizardry and philanthropy...he never demanded money...he took whatever was inserted into a piggy bank by his table....and healed everything from stomach ache to cervical cancer...
I didn't believe the story till a famous case of his was corroborated by my MD Uncle Dr KKM when he was the Superintendent of the biggest hospital in Hyderabad. The lachrymal glands that lubricate eyes and produce tears (of joy and sorrow) of the wife of a VIP dried up and the suffering was prolonged and unbearable.
Dr KKM and his team tried but failed to cure her.
Then the case was brought to the notice of Dr C and he cured the complaint with just one dose of his medicine.
I trust this story because our body, mind, and consciousness are largely biochemical in nature and tiny doses of the right substance used or abused can produce miraculous effects.
In my school days there was a common plant brushing lightly with whose leaves on the arm used to be our way of teasing one another...the itching it induces can be frightful...
Also, the skin ailment I suffered from for four decades and which couldn't be cured by any ointment including Cortisones vanished without a trace for the past two decades with just a drop of Antibactrin whose main ingredient appears to be just the household mustard oil.
After two years of curing everything under the sun for almost ten percent of the population of the elite campus, Dr C vanished without a trace one night with his family...just vanished..
Slowly and slowly by bit by shameful bit, news spread in the campus that he owed tens of thousands of rupees to dozens of well-meaning professors...
Either hypnotism or mesmerism or just power of personality..a Rasputin Avatar....
I conned two or three generations of students that I knew some Physics at the same campus before I was caught leg before in Hyderabad (now repeating it with English language)...
For folks of my generation in South IndiaI don't have to explain that MSMA stands for Member, Society of Mutual Admiration.
Let me outright clarify that these Societies of Mutual Admiration are not to be confused with the formal, elected, registered, fee-paying Professional Societies like the Royal Society of which Feynman was so critical:
MSMA is totally informal. It is not an honor conferred by a Letter or Convocation.
There is no office, no budget, no official entry criteria, no nothing...just an occasional unpremeditated accidental gathering here and there under mango trees to all appearances. Membership is not by Application or Invitation...it just happens. There are no advertised Meetings or Conferences...no minutes...nor hours for that matter.
These Mutual Admiration Societies are all over the world....in villages, towns, cities, campuses, as well as deserts (like Lowell Thomas & Lawrence of Arabia)...
These are not to be confused with Guilds of Artists or Artisans or Political, Social or Philanthropic Bodies.
They have no purposes to achieve...
Just Admire Mutually...bask and enjoy....
I have seen many of these at IIT KGP where:
The minimum number is 2 (unless you are a schizo..).
The optimum number is 3.
The maximum is 4.
Beyond that the Society undergoes Spontaneous Fission into two smaller Societies that tend to grow again.
This doesn't mean that the Gatherings of any Society are confined to the Number of Members....no, usually each Member is trailed by one or more incidentals, aspirants or even critics who are silenced silently...the treatment for disapproval is Silent Treatment (ST).
The Gatherings can last anything from ten minutes to half an hour...there is no Agenda...just humongous admiration and mild mention of recent conquests...the camaraderie and bonhomie is quiet and not boisterous like in Trade Guilds like Teachers Associations.
The unofficial but agreed entry criteria are: 1. Success 2. Fame 3. Notoriety...never Just Money.
Even Utter Failure in ALL Walks of Life is welcome...that is more than Fame in just one walk (or talk).
...- If I belong to a Society of Mutual Admiration?--I blush to say that I do not at this present moment. I once did, however. It was the first association to which I ever heard the term applied; a body of scientific young men in a great foreign city who admired their teacher, and to some extent each other. Many of them deserved it; they have become famous since. It amuses me to hear the talk of one of those beings described by Thackeray -
"Letters four do form his name" -
about a social development which belongs to the very noblest stage of civilization. All generous companies of artists, authors, philanthropists, men of science, are, or ought to be, Societies of Mutual Admiration. A man of genius, or any kind of superiority, is not debarred from admiring the same quality in another, nor the other from returning his admiration. They may even associate together and continue to think highly of each other. And so of a dozen such men, if any one place is fortunate enough to hold so many. The being referred to above assumes several false premises. First, that men of talent necessarily hate each other. Secondly, that intimate knowledge or habitual association destroys our admiration of persons whom we esteemed highly at a distance. Thirdly, that a circle of clever fellows, who meet together to dine and have a good time, have signed a constitutional compact to glorify themselves and to put down him and the fraction of the human race not belonging to their number. Fourthly, that it is an outrage that he is not asked to join them.
Here the company laughed a good deal, and the old gentleman who sits opposite said, "That's it! that's it!".....
.....If the Mutuals have really nothing among them worth admiring, that alters the question. But if they are men with noble powers and qualities, let me tell you, that, next to youthful love and family affections, there is no human sentiment better than that which unites the Societies of Mutual Admiration. And what would literature or art be without such associations? Who can tell what we owe to the Mutual Admiration Society of which Shakspeare, and Ben Jonson, and Beaumont and Fletcher were members? Or to that of which Addison and Steele formed the centre, and which gave us the Spectator?..... Such a society is the crown of a literary metropolis; if a town has not material for it, and spirit and good feeling enough to organize it, it is a mere caravansary, fit for a man of genius to lodge in, but not to live in. Foolish people hate and dread and envy such an association of men of varied powers and influence, because it is lofty, serene, impregnable, and, by the necessity of the case, exclusive.
Wise ones are prouder of the title M. S. M. A. than of all their other honors put together.
CAS:At our University during the 1950s our Old Library had only CAS: you are not allowed to access the book-shelves. You just write down the name of the book you want in the Requisition Register, return the next day and try your luck with the comely Library Assistant...
OAS: When I entered the Central Library at IIT KGP in 1965, I was stunned: it was run on the OAS basis. You can go round every Section: Science, Engineering, Arts, Literature; fondle and dandle any book or magazine that catches your fancy, take it to any table on any floor, read to your heart's content, get it issued if you have cards left or leave it on the table, come tomorrow and resume. You are requested not to return the book to the shelf since there are people paid to do it.
It was Heaven. By and by you learn that the right time to go to the CL is 7 PM. All books and magazines like Punch, Time, Life and the Heritage of Britain are lying on the tables; you don't have to hunt and search: other readers more knowledgeable than you have done the groundwork for you.
By and by the OAS got screwed up by Selfish Giants who do replace the books they have taken out in inaccessible places like returning the latest Physics Book Quantics on the sixth rack of the Upanishads Section....and so good books were weeded out and a Reserved Section appeared run on the CAS.
Eateries:
I am told that there are French words like table de hote and a la carte for different fancy systems.
CAS: But in Hyderabad, the CAS eatery is one in which you enter and take a seat. No food item is visible to you. Everything is clean and neat. Kitchen lies hidden unseen but heard and smelled alright. The waiter appears by and by and throws a 10-page menu at you. The book has all the colors and smells of the kitchen, having been around for a decade. After studying it closely for 10 minutes you tick 5 items and order them to be served serially. The waiter smiles and says that none of the 5 is available at the moment (whenever the moment is) and points to the only item available at the moment: Veg Manchuria...but expects a heavy tip for his service with a smile.
OAS: On the other hand there are OAS roadside eateries aplenty where everything is visible. If you can stand the heat, stench of the gutter, and oil fumes, there is nothing like it for the palate and the purse. Great Bargains. Good for once in a while, but if you are a regular, you are sure to land up in the CAREless Hospital for a good fortnight.
Malls:
These also come in two varieties:
CAS: Seamed: These run on the CAS basis. As soon as you check-in, you are hounded by roaming salesmen who wouldn't let you breathe but breathe down your neck. You try to disentangle yourself from one but the next chap hounds you. You give up and let out that you want a sari for your wife. He would ask your budget and lead you to the stall where you can sit or stand and the girl behind the counter throws a couple of them at your face. You pick up one and, as you try to go to the cash counter, the girl behind will smile sweetly and ask you to take the other one also for free. You are stunned and she explains to you that it is (always) some Puja or the other bonanza: Buy one get one free! (The sticker price takes care of everything). But it is a very good bargain indeed as long as you don't cram the shop and get lost with what is palmed off on you.
OAS: Seamless: Here, you are on your own. Fully OAS. You don't know where one stall ends and the other begins. There is none to help you. After touching and feeling and smelling everything on display for an hour, you feel guilty, pick up one sari and go the cash counter, which too is hidden somewhere. It is a highly satisfying experience; only, the price tag on the sari which is inferior to the other one in the CAS is four or five times higher. And you notice that there are surveillance cameras everywhere instead of salesmen.
Matri-Mals: CAS: These run on middle-class morality. The bride and the groom have never seen or met each other. They have seen only heavily doctored photos and horoscopes, also heavily doctored. They meet and exchange glances for the first time in a Drawing Room with their four parents on either side and ten other Peeping Toms. They are not allowed to meet or talk in private. Everything is above board. If the dowries and other incidentals match, you can either say Yes; or No and wait for the next sales season.
OAS: This is the latest craze. You register your CV on a Matrimonial Portal, paying through your nose every 3 months. Every year in the Marriage Season the Portal will allow you to attend a Matri-Mela organized by them in your City at the Town Hall. Pay a thousand rupees for the day's food, drink and entertainment. When you reach the Town Hall you will find it crammed with prospective brides and grooms with not an inch to spare. It will remind you of the Sunday Cattle Fairs in your Village. But it is an exhilarating experience with so many cattle of both sexes to meet, talk to, smell and perhaps touch in the crowd. If you don't have the time and money for the next Cattle Fair, you latch on to the one within your reach at the end of the day. Shop till you Drop.
Ancient Matrimonial OAS:
Before closing, I would like to remind the readers that India had the most advanced Female-Loaded Marital OAS during times when men were blue-blooded men and women demure but determined.
Sita: She advertised that anyone who wished to marry her has to lift and wield the super-massive Bow and Arrow of Shivjee. Everyone fell in disgrace but Raam not only cracked the system but broke it and married her (but they were already in love the evening before or so).
Draupadi: She advertised that anyone wishing to marry her has to shoot a revolving fish on the ceiling looking only at its image in the pool below. Arjun did it. It is a different matter that all four of his brothers tagged along like so many parasites.
Damayanti: This poor Princess was in Love with Prince Nal who also was dying to marry her. So she imposed no bravery conditions, but that she would wed anyone in the crowd that she likes. But five or six demigods wanted to spoil her sport and all of them appeared disguising themselves exactly as Nal. But Damayanti, being a clever girl, knew that demigods are translucent and so cast no shadows unlike opaque men like Nal. Also they don't blink or wink like men. It was cakewalk for her. It is a different matter that one of the demigods wasn't pleased and persecuted the legally wedded couple for the whole of a book called: Hamsa Doutyam: Swan-Arranged-Love.
My wife married me in the CAS system:
both of us were dying to get married on the first-come-first-served-basis......
FCFSB
So did my daughter-in-law my son..FCFSB sems to run in the family.
The other day I was in our nukkad Post Office in Hyderabad buying stamps to affix onto the packets of the latest Ishani booklets.
The PM passed on stamps of two denominations and I was gazing at them rather nostalgically as it turned out that they carried pictures of two famous Calcutta Personalities.
The young chap behind me, dressed impeccably, nudged me gently. And I gave him a little elbow room. While transacting his business he looked at my stamps curiously and asked:
"I know THIS lady...but who is this gentleman?"
THIS lady whose life-size statues I see at a couple of high-profile places in Hyderabad, rather put the streets of Calcutta into the consciousness of even Hyderabadis by the Color TV transmissions of her high profile Funeral...
....Mother Teresa...
"Satyajit Ray" I mumbled for this gentleman.
"Who, who, who?"
I bypassed his Viva Question and shifted to the nearby table for my gluing.
Instead of who, who, who; I started asking myself why, why, why...
A half century ago, at 17, studying at our University, 4 years before I landed in Bengal forever by sheer unbeknown chance, I was one of the local experts on Bengal...she was all over the place...huge pictures of her illustrious sons (and our daughter-in-law) in Offices, in text books of science, history, literature, religion, medicine, and newspapers...
.....Ramakrishna-Vivekananda, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, Rabindranath Tagore, Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay, various Boses (SC, JC, and SN), Banerjees and Chatterjees, Vande Mataram, and of course Satyajit Ray...these were the talk of our elite group discussions, debates, chitchats...those who read in poor Telugu Translations Devdas, Vipra Das, Shreekanto, Charitraheen, Parineeta, Hungry Stones, Kabuliwalla, Gora, Shipwreck and sundry other novels, flaunted their knowledge on their sleeves and sleevelesses...much before THAT lady settled down in Calcutta Consciousness.
And this chap of 25 or so, well-fed, well-read and well-dressed asks me who, who, who...
After getting my violin down and fiddling on it and snorting my Sherlock Holmes thing for an hour, I came to this logical conclusion:
"The complete blackout of things Bengali over half a century from the AP consciousness can be traced to the invention and perfection of that self-destructing weapon called BB (Bangla Bandh), which alone was ironically passed on to AP....tomorrow is Telengana Bandh and ny son has to travel to Nellore..."
In order to pay the salaries for its workers from its impoverished Treasury, the Government of Bengal raises the Sales Tax on salt by 1 percent...the new price of a packet is Rs 1.01 instead of Rs 1.00.
The next day 50 lady workers trailed by 50 drones storm the Bastille and castle the concerned Minister in his Office in a Bengali Operation called Gherao, a lovely contribution of Bengal to the English Lexicon.
After 4 hours of deprivation and desalination the Minister faints, leading to a mild lathi charge by the Government Police...
The next day the Opposition calls for a BB.
By now Calcutta knows the drill and Aniket, getting bored playing chess at home and reading Mocking Bird for the tenth time, comes out on to the streets of Calcutta to join the ongoing Cricket Matches held all over the megalopolis.
The miffed Government lays the blame on the Center for diverting all Calcutta Revenues to Bombay and calls for a Government-Sponsored BB the next day.
Aniket plays his tenth innings...
But this is the right opportunity for the Ruling and Opposition Parties to test their relative strengths. So, pitched battles are fought with petrol bombs all over Calcutta during the Lunch and Tea breaks in the nukkad Cricket Matches....
The next day Funeral Processions for the killed Party Workers are held leading to more violence and a BB the very next day.
Then it is the Puja vacation that stretches from Panchami to Bhai Phota, which means for the cognoscenti a clean one-month shut down of Calcutta including the Bastille....
And you will find knowing Bengalis vacationing on LTC in as obscure a place as Vizagh which has nothing worth seeing but the sweat, tears and blood of gps who was laid low there 30 years ago...
During the third week of a wonderfully wintry sunny January this year, myself and my wife found ourselves in the backseat of a car driven by my driver-friend Venkat traveling on the 6-lane superhighway from KGP to Cal to catch the afternoon flight to Hyderabad.
The metamorphosis of Bengal Highways charmed me and I was extremely pleased that things in Bengal have turned around for profitability and productivity.
Suddenly our car came to a halt...all the 6 lanes of the highway were closed to traffic..miles of vehicles piling up on both sides...
On inquiry it turned out to be the Netajee Birthday and a massive celebration was going on that spilled all over the town, perhaps the HQ of Netajee's Backward Block...
None of the vehicles was given any leeway by the Organizing Party Workers till the Birthday Party would be over in an hour...
Our Driver Venkat turned back and asked me to lie down and lay my head on my wife's lap and groan, clutching my chest....
Playing the possum being my specialty, I obeyed at once and groaned like nobody's business while my wife shed a stream of glycerin tears...her specialty....
I overheard Venkat talking to the Party Worker: "Heart Patient...aachey..."
A narrow by-lane was opened to us (like the Sea that parted sometime ago in the Good Old Story) and we reached the Airport in the nick of Reporting Time.
It has been a long long while since a politician graced our blog.
And what a politician!....Mamata Banerjee, as young as my youngest sister, but of course she is the Didi for all. Coming from a lower middle class non-superior-intellectual background (cf: Wikipedia), she stormed the formidable Writer's Building manned by the aristocratic JB once and now the intellectual BB.
I simply adore her.
For a Spectator like me who watched her career from close at hand in West Bengal (..I think it is high time that they drop the West from Bengal...the only surviving East Bengal being the Football Club..) she is the most colorful of all the current crop of pale politicians.
And she is colorful despite (or because of) her colorless dress, makeup, car, home, and Bank Balance.
But of course her English is most colorful and I adore her diction, inflection and power; next only to Pranab-da.
"Nano makes a Big splash on Day 1": DC Front Page Headline April 10"I will never ride Nano; it is made of peoples' blood": Mamata April 3
Nano comes in three colors: Blue, white and red; A splash in Mamata's metaphors Turns them all Bloody Red!
**************************************************************************** That brings us to why my sudden interest in her after more than a year and a half:
It is because of her piquant statement a couple of days back that she would love to have Pranab-da as the next Chief Minister of Bengal.
Mamata Banerjee left Congress terming it the B Team of CPM. But didn't drop Congress from the name of her new party: Trinamul Congress. Note it means the Grass Root Congress: not Flower or Fruit but Grass Root.
That brings us to the B Team folks.
In every sphere of life it is the B (not the A) that is the most colorful and influential; and she knows it: hence the offer of the A Post to Pranab-da keeping the B Post of Home Minister to herself.
Britain has been the wisest and the most graceful nation. She acquired the Biggest Empire in History without meaning to do so, almost dreamily, for a Nation of Shopkeepers as Napoleon called her. She managed it with minimum Force and dismantled it with minimum bloodshed (of Englishmen).
Contrast this with the American Fiasco in Vietnam and the Hapless Downfall of the untenable Soviet Empire like so many ninepins.
And Britain's most powerful person, her PM, is a B and not A. The powerless A Post is reserved for her King or Queen. And her most powerful agent in her Empire was the Viceroy (note he is the Vice...and not the Roy).
In our University the Principal had only a Humble Home but our Vice-Chancellor had a Regal Lodge. The Governor-Chancellor, a mere figurehead, is an A with rubber-stamping and rebuking power. But it is the B, the Vice, that holds enormous powers of Appointment and Disappointment.
And in day-to-day affairs it is again the Vice-Principal whose office is most crowded. Please the Vice-P and you get your work done automatically through the Virtual-P.
At IIT KGP it was the DD and not the D who was to be buttered...D being unapproachable for Commoners like me.
In Halls of Residence it is not the Warden, who rarely comes, but the Ass. Wardens who hold the Fort and manage things.
It is not the President's Gold Medalist (who is a bookworm and a geek) who is colorful and goes places but the Best All-Rounder B C Roy Medalist who oozes charm.
It is not the Deity but the Temple Pujari (having direct access to the Sanctum Sanctorum) who is the most powerful...marry into his family and you don't have to stand in the mile-long queues at Tirupati for shaking hands with the Lord from close quarters.
In every well-oiled household it is the Mother who wields Real Power but not the Father who is busy winning bread and a little butter.
In every hive it is the Queen Bee that rules....
In Chess it is the Queen and not the King that has the most mobility and killings. The King is castled most of the time...
In the Newspaper Industry it is not the Proprietor but the Editor (and perhaps the sub-editors) who make thing happen.
In the Film Industry it is not the Producer but the Director who rules the Sets.
In most Businesses it is the VPs not the P who brings home the bacon.
In the Indian Railways, the First AC is infested with rats and vermin but it is the AC Two-Tier that is most comfortable and luxurious (ask Didi).
And Buddha says it is the Middle path (like the middle lane on the Hyderabad Roads) that is the safest.
Always aim to be a B (B for Bengali) for maximum happiness instead of an A (A for Andhra)!!!
====================================================== Last night at 11 Supratim caught me on the wrong foot.
Sharp at midnight I discovered that a physicist almost as famous as Supratim did it almost half a century ago to another physicist almost as famous as me {;-} ************************************************************************************************ Supratim:
Dear Sir:
....Of all the kanjooses you described in your delightful Rainy Day Post, the one with the greatest potential to spread good cheer and have long term impact is the Praise Kanjoos.
But alas that potential is never realized because of his kanjoosi.....
.......There is no doubt that your writing is superfluent. In particular the mail I cited in my blog flows like liquid Helium welling up.
Yes, flattery costs no money...but most people are more kanjoos with it than with their money. If you make it a practice, you soon realize that you have to constantly look for others' good points to flatter them about...this leads in time to a healthy mindset (see no evil!)................ ********************************************************************************************** Supratim:
Dear Sir:
.............This may sound like splitting hairs but I would make a distinction between flattery and praise. Flattery has an insincere quality and sometimes even a "quid pro quo" aspect associated with it. Praise on the other hand is an expression of a genuine appreciation of another's work and perhaps like the quality of mercy "blesseth him that gives and him that takes"............................
...............The one who is flattered thinks that he is being praised and vice versa....as you say, it is a matter of viewpoint and temperament.............
The principle is the same...try and find out what is praiseworthy in others..
I am sorry to have hurt you by my careless misusage of language. I did not mean to imply that your letter was insincere in any way. The word "flattering" was wrongly used, as I have just looked it up in the dictionary and found it has negative connotations, which I certainly did not mean. I should have used some word like 'complimentary" instead....
========================================================== Almost exactly 11 months back, one tense evening in Hyderabad, my son, Sonoo, my wife and myself were sitting on the edges of our sofas waiting for news from Nellore where my daughter-in-law Sailaja was just wheeled into the OT for a Caesarian Section.
Sonoo was biting his nails right to their quick.
Sailaja's elder sister, Neeraja, was our Cellphone-Reporter on the spot.
In a few minutes came her excited voice with four details:
1. It is a girl!
2. She is oh! how fair like Cinderella & Snowwhite!
Sonoo was jumping with joy and relief on all four counts.
1. It's a girl!
Apparently he wanted a daughter, and Sailaja wanted a son; just to bet on both sides.
When Sonoo was born 30 years ago, I was happy he was a son....honestly....was bored with six sisters all the time playing their Home-Maker games....
But now I wanted a granddaughter...just for a change; since it was tough trying to coach Sonoo for IIT JEE....he was so rebellious at that hormonious teenage and I was so unequal to the task...it was a punishment for both...luckily fruitful in a way...
But one Lady who troubled me endlessly in my University Days was Candida of Bernard Shaw. Candida would have been fun if only I were not required to answer lousy questions on her Character in our Exams. By the way, how does the character of Candida concern our Examiners?: It should solely be the concern of her husband Morell....I don't know....English teachers are so snoopy and nosy...they spoil all the fun in English.
2. She is so fair!
That the kid is fair was gratifying...fair skin being at a premium in the Matrimonial Fair.
But Indian girls and boys, fair or foul in their complexion, beat Westerners hollow in their skin-glow.
"...And as for the Indian brown--firm, smooth, blemishless, pleasant and restful to the eye, afraid of no color, harmonizing with all colors and adding a grace to them all--I think there is no sort of chance for the average white complexion against that rich and perfect tint....
That's very good. I am told by one who knows that High Heels were invented by a lady who was constantly kissed on her forehead.
4. Rich hair...
I think ladies all over the world fuss a lot about their hair. Next to skin, hair is the best-seller in the Ad Bazaar.
I read that Western ladies are classified into three broad groups by the color of their hair:
a. Blondes:
As youth we knew only of Marilyn Monroe as the be-all and end-all blonde: Gold, Platinum, Iridium or whatever. Obviously there are no blonds in India (other than albinos) and we saw very few Hollywood movies. And there was this Piece from: Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos in my Sub-Treasury of American Humor.
But of course the most enduring blond is Blondie: Feynman writes that he used to look out for this Cartoon Strip in his youth. The Stripper, Chic Young, created what a contrasting hair style of Dagwood Bumstead!
b. Brunettes:
I haven't seen many brunettes apart from Sophia Loren and Audrey Hepburn; but they must be very like our modern Indian ladies with an added ooomph of henna-dowsed hair.
c. Redheads:
The first redhead I met with in real life was the Pawnbroker in Sherlock Holmes's Redheaded League...what a terrific story!
And of course the lady who was the object of such hair-raising curiosity in Anurag Mathur's Inscrutable Americans.
Ishani's hair was truly lovely....dark locks sailing across her fair face trying to hide it.
But she is now completely devoid of her hair...tonsured...and she looks lovelier... Arundhuti says she looks super cute, and Arundhuti should know!
This tonsure ritual at Tirupati in the 11h month for all kids here, boys and girls, is compulsory. Lord Balajee who is the world's richest god, lolling in tons of gold donated by His devotees is supposed to be more pleased with the donation of one's hair..the symbolic ego..
But of course, at 11 months of age we have no ego . Maybe the hair which kids are born with is not stylish and healthy and so they are made to go through this ritual so that the new crop of hair is more amenable to fashion.
Lord Balajee earns tons of hair every week and it is graded, cleaned, and sold to fetch him more gold in return. All this hair perhaps goes to making wigs.
The first picture of Newton I saw in our science text at age 11 had his head covered with a massive overflowing wig...I didn't know then and I don't know now why?
Maybe he had a bald head...
It is said that hair, teeth and nails are the first among those that lose their fancy immediately after they lose their native site...(like gps fallen out of IIT KGP).
"...Last night I have gone through some of the topics and they are quite absorbing. I would say they are interesting not because of the 'the topic' but the way you present (story telling) the article. The presentation is so mesmerizing that it will not allow the reader to take a break till he completes it.
My son (Varun, class X) will be having his exams soon; therefore we didn't allow him to go through the book. He found alternative place (bathroom) to read the book (without our knowledge). This shows how gripping your writings are....
Thank you for changing your area (Physics to story telling) to show us that there is another subject (story telling) which can also be made more interesting (like you did for physics teaching)...."
We read dozens of books, enjoy them, and put them away.
It is only rarely that we meet with a Passage at which we suddenly halt, seeing that the author is saying what we wanted to articulate all along but felt too puny to say it.
I had this experience the other day while reading the Compilation of Letters of Feynman titled: Perfectly Reasonable Deviations (from the Beaten Track) gifted to me by Supratim.
I was playing marbles on the streets of my Village Muthukur, when the results of our Pre-University Exam came out in the Newspaper in 1958. I was 14 then.
Seeing my Roll Number in the First Class, my HM-Father sent up his thankful salutations to Heaven with folded hands because it meant that all his worries were over: in just three more years, I would be getting my B Sc from VR College at Nellore, a stone's throw away, get absorbed there as a Demonstrator, and would be Demonstrating and earning money on the side by Coaching, minting enough of it to build our Own House in a decade and taking over his many family responsibilities.
But, he never imagined I would stand First in the University in the so-called Science Group till the Marks List arrived; and my MD Doctor Uncle KKM from Vizagh, 500 miles away, arrived carrying that path-breaking List.
KKM whisked me away to Vizagh and admitted me into the select group of a Dirty Dozen students from all over the AU doing B Sc (Hons). The Hons thing shattered my father's every dream. For, when I was playing Indian Cricket (Gulli Danda) in our Village 4 years later, KKM once again brought the Marks List gloating that his faith in me was vindicated and I once again stood First in that Learn-by-Rote University (to this day my memory for things I don't understand remains phenomenal).
Then started my precipitate Downfall: I ran away from Vizagh mid-stream from my Ph D Program to IIT KGP. And took a decade there to get my Ph D (at last!), a good dozen years after my Masters (some sort of a Record).
A dozen years is a long while; and they turned out to be my Golden Years: everyone in my family, led by KKM, struck my name off the Family Roll of Honors, Hall of Fame, Mailing List....
By then I developed a Vested Interest in Failure: A sort of Immense Peace dawns on one who is written off...you are henceforth free to do what pleases you instead of what others expect you to do for their Pleasure...
Fast Forward a couple of decades when I reached 50 or so...
I get a Letter from Dr KKM that he got to know from my innocent father that I am in touch with an MIT Prof...
Dr KKM had spent a year at Johns Hopkins Medical School at Baltimore and knew that MIT was good enough...
He asked me to send him my Achievements, highlighting my MIT Connection...
In my foolishness I did that, to please KKM who was solely responsible for my Misadventures at IIT KGP, which as you know was the very Heaven during my time there...
Within a week I get a Packet containing a Brochure and an Application Form from Dr KKM, asking me to just sign it, attach the Annexures, and leave the rest to him...promising me that he would do the rest...and I would be able to affix FNABCDEF after my blessed name in about six months...
Me: FNABCDEF?
I dumped the Packet quietly into the Great Basket.
He didn't give up so easily...
When I was traveling with my family by Madras Mail, he came down to the Vizagh Station to meet me and dump in my lap another copy of the same...
I was ashamed to say either Yes or No to my Lifetime Benefactor... I was feeling guilty and was kicking myself to have set the ball rolling foolishly...certain things need to be snipped in the bud..but how could I guess...?
He gave up by and by but never forgave me...
But I made him immensely happy, visiting his place with my wife and son when my aunt (Mrs KKM) passed away prematurely; and spoke up in the Ceremonial 10th Day Gathering how MUCH our entire family is indebted to her for keeping me and my elder sister for two good years at their home and taking care of us...his eyes were moist...and he passed away soon after...
But how could I tell him that I had the Unique Honor of getting a Solid Rebuke on 3-Lions-Embossed Parchment Paper from His Excellency the Governor of West Bengal for declining consistently for over a decade the coveted offer of a Member of the Selection Committee of a University for which he was the Chancellor!
"..I am sorry that you had to be bothered about this matter of my wanting to resign my membership in the Academy. It must be quite a job worrying about all the peculiar whims of all the strange birds that make up your flock...
....My desire to resign is merely a personal one; it is not meant as a protest of any kind, or a criticism of the Academy or its activities. Perhaps it is just that I enjoy being peculiar. My peculiarity is this: I find it psychologically very distasteful to judge people's "merit". So I cannot participate in the main activity of selecting people for membership. To be a member of a group, of which an important activity is to choose others deemed worthy of membership in that self-esteemed group, bothers me. The care with which we select "those worthy of the honor" of joining the Academy feels like a form of self-praise. How can we say only the best must be allowed to join those who are already in, without loudly proclaiming to our inner selves that we who are in must be very good indeed. Of course I believe I am very good indeed, but that is a private matter and I cannot publicly admit that I do so, to such an extent that I have the nerve to decide that this man, or that, is not worthy of joining my elite club...."
"Individually we can do Nothing But collectively we can Resolve that Nothing can be done"
Charter & Motto of Committees
*********************************************************************** That is rather one-sided, though it reflects the Spirit of all Committees.
I guess Committees were invented to pass on considered advice to whoever appoints those Committees without being bound by their advice.
*************************************************************************************************** Julius Caesar:
Caesar: Antonio!
Marcus Antonius: Caesar!
Caesar: Let me have men about me that are fat, Sleek-headed men and such as sleep a-nights. Yon Cassius has a lean and hungry look, He thinks too much; such men are dangerous.
.............Julius Caesar Act 1, Scene 2, 190-195
Caesar's hunch was right; his wife Calpurnia was uneasy about his going forth to the Senate on the Ides of March; he ignored with contempt the warning of the wise Soothsayer; and he met his sad end because he didn't appoint a High-Power Committee.
Cassius was cleverer. He wanted to get Caesar assassinated for his personal grudge. But he appointed a Senate Sub-Committee and personally roped in Hon'ble Brutus as its august Chairman and got his wily wish fulfilled.
Brutus was soliloquizing endlessly. He knew that Cassius was egging him on for his own wrong personal ends. He didn't listen to his wife Portia and ultimately met his Brutal End at Philippi, all the time seeing ghosts. He should have appointed a Standing Committee to weed out rogues, like our DC at IIT KGP.
********************************************************************************************************* So in Iliad:
Paris was inveigled into stealing Helen of Troy by that Greek Goddess...he should have appointed an Inquiry Committee.
They wanted to rope Ulysses into the Trojan War. He was fond of his wife Penelope and infant son Telemachus and wanted to evade Conscription and foolishly tried to act crazy and started plowing a sandy land; they cleverly threw his son in front of the plow. He lifted his hands up to Heaven and gave in. He should have appointed a Steering Committee instead.
Duryodhan did have a Standing Committee: the so-called Gang of Four: but he was foolish to include Shakuni who had a history of antagonism towards him. He should have appointed a Screening Committee.
Yudhistir thought he was all-wise. He gave in to his gambling instincts (like Hitler invading Moscow suddenly when London was his in a week). He should have appointed an Ombudsman Committee.
***************************************************************************************************** So in Ramayan:
Dasarath didn't appoint a Search Committee before taking in Mandhara as the Adviser to his Queen Kaikeyi; and met his bitter end.
Sita should have appointed an Ad-hoc Committee before stepping out of Laxman Rekha; and so she was stolen.
Ravan had his Advisory Committee headed by his brother Vibhishan but chose to Veto its Recommendations: all his ten heads were shot down like ninepins.
I never succumbed to the temptation of becoming an August Member of any Senate Committee or their sub-committees for 38 years. But my friend the HoD in my last lap requested me to become one.
I attended all its meetings but kept resolutely quiet till the last; just sipping (Harry's) Tea and munching (dog) biscuits. There was no need; others were talking eminent sense.
But in my last Meeting, I found everyone beating about the bush coyly for an hour without coming to the brass tacks: Money
So, I opened my mouth and said: "Increase the Honorarium 5-fold!".
Everyone was aghast at my shamelessness.
But I am told that they were all citing "Professor Sastry's Formula" then on till it was granted.
Thanks for the wonderful gift of the latest collection of your blogs. I was very happy to see "Workaholics Anonymous" included in the collection and had another good laugh after reading it again for the umpteenth time. However, after reading Pratik-da's Foreword, I must admit to feeling a bit guilty about "demanding" along with Aniket that you blog daily. While I eagerly look forward to your blog posts and read them with great pleasure every day, I can only imagine the work that it takes to finish such delightful compositions within a strict deadline. I am beginning to wonder if we have, by our selfish motives, ensured that your "whole afternoon from one to five" is ruined. I hope not and I suspect that you enjoy this task of creating as much as we enjoy reading your daily blog posts.
An English teacher in my school used to tell us to follow the King of Heart's advise - " Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end: then stop" while teaching us how to write essays. Since then, I have found that while writing can be exhilarating and excruciating at times, it is seldom as easy as the King of Hearts' dictum. So here's hoping, for our sakes, that you find writing your blogs more exhilarating than excruciating, for then we can continue to enjoy our selfish pleasure without feeling too guilty about ruining your afternoons.
********************************************************************************** Supratim writes well.....will use him... *********************************************************************************************** gps replies:
Dear Supratim:
No, Pratik didn't say that you 'demand' my daily-blogging. He said: 'command' like Ishani does. She got to know by now that books contain reading matter. As soon as she is launched on my bed by her mom, she runs crawling to my side, picks up one of her Ishnai booklets lying there and proffers it to me asking me by gesture to read it aloud.
and she is mighty pleased with the Sanskrit Hymns I let out..
Honestly I feel no difference between my kids, grandkids, students and grandstudents. I tell Pratik often that I miss very much the fact that he was not a classmate of yours at IIT KGP, sitting in my class and dozing {;-}
As you folks by now know well, the intimacy of the class room at its best can beat the intimacy of the family dining table.
And anyone who reads my Ishani booklets will know immediately that the fun in them is spontaneous and not contrived: proof that I enjoy composing them more than you enjoy reading them...like my wife enjoys cooking it up than I enjoy eating her delicious cooking.
So, have no qualms....you have instilled Life into an aging mind by giving it a favorite creative pursuit.
And your gift of Feynman Letters is waiting in the wings.
As you people know, the knowledge that a good book is waiting for you makes the wait exhilarating.
Whole afternoon today I was reading the latest Ishani booklet (it took 3 hours) and so couldn't cook up tomorrow's blog...so I import a 'piece' from Mark Twain.
".......One day two malhas (boatmen) living in Tanakpur went to the Sarda river to net fish. They stayed out longer than they had intended and the sun was setting when they started on their two-mile walk home. ....they saw two tigers standing on the far side of the channel......and as the tigers were between them and their objective the men crouched down where they were, intending to wait until the tigers moved away...
Presently there was a movement in the grass....(and there) stepped an elephant with big tusks...
When the elephant stepped out on the channel and saw the tigers on the far side it raised its trunk and trumpeted and started to move towards them. The tigers now turned to face the elephant and as it approached them one demonstrated in front of it while the other circled round behind and sprang on its back. Swinging its head round, the elephant tried to get at the tiger on its back with its trunk, and the one in front then sprang on its head. The elephant was now screaming with rage, while the tigers were giving vent to full-throated roars. When tigers roar with anger it is a terrifying sound, and since the screaming of the maddened elephant was added to this terrifying sound, it is little wonder that the malhas lost their nerve, and abandoning their nets and catch of fish, sprinted for Tanakpur at their best speed...
....Opinions on the duration of the fight differed. Some maintained it lasted all night, while others maintained that it stopped at midnight......
In the morning the residents of Tanakpur again assembled on the high ground, and at the foot of the hundred-foot boulder-strewn bank they saw the elephant lying dead....it was evident that it had died of loss of blood. No portion of the elephant had been eaten, and no dead or injured tigers were found at the time or subsequently in the vicinity of Tanakpur.
I do not think that the tigers, at the onset, had any intention of killing the elephant....The fact remains, however, that a big bull elephant, carrying tusks weighing ninety pounds, was killed near Tanakpur by two tigers and I am of the opinion that what started as a lark by a pair of mating tigers when an elephant tried to shoo them out of his way - developed into a real fight. I am also of the opinion that when the second tiger sprang on the elephant's head it clawed out the elephant's eyes and thereafter the blinded animal dashed about aimlessly until it came to the high bank. Here on the round loose boulders, which afforded no foothold, it was practically anchored and at the mercy of the tigers who - possibly because of injuries received in the fight - showed no mercy."
So, it is never easy to kill an elephant. And the tigers didn't want to kill the elephant at first but...killed it anyway.
This reminds me of George Orwell, narrating ever so beautifully as I told you before, in one of the best essays ever written: Shooting an Elephant, killing an elephant coming out of its masth, ever so unwillingly and in an absolutely clumsy way with a firearm totally inadequate for killing an elephant.
Why did he do it?
George Orwell was no funk. He was a trained Officer of the British Empire, with a stiff upper lip. He didn't want to do it....but he had no escape...a thousand eyes staring at him silently egging him on for their Tamasha and the elephant's flesh...British Honor at stake...if he backs out...he would be jeered and booed of having lost his nerve..Not Done...the Power of Vox Populi...
He was carrying on his young shoulders the heavy weight of the White Man's Burden....He was desperately alone, like many Decision-Makers standing on the spot marked "X".....
