Guru Dakshina.

My young friend, let us call him ND, who considers me as his friend, philosopher and misguide recently bought a book on the recommendation of a well wisher and could not understand some esoteric stuff in it. He promptly rang me up and asked me if I would read the book and explain to him the portions that he found difficult and I readily agreed. I however insisted that he would have to arrange for Guru Dakshina to which he readily agreed.

The book duly arrived and has just come back after my usual rite of getting books covered in plastic to extend their shelf life.

Just before the book returned from the binder, the Guru Dakshina also arrived.

Before I proceed further, some explanation to a Urdu word Aflatoon. Originally, it meant Plato, yes, the Greek philosopher. In Mumbai, it is used to describe sweet gentle souls who are great team players but, who will not participate in the more masculine pursuits like pub crawling, gambling etc. In other words Wimps.

Aflatoon is also the name for a famous sweet made and sold in Muslim bakeries of Bombay, the most famous of which are Suleiman Usman and Zam Zam Bakeries.

ND is well aware of my fondness for both uses of the world Aflatoon. There are many mutual friends whom I call Aflatoon and I also enjoy the occasional indulgence of the sweet.

So, the Guru Dakshina turned out to be:
BERJAYA
BERJAYA

Guru is very happy. Shishya’s dakshina will not go waste.

Letter to Santa. What I want for Christmas.

BERJAYA

There is an affectionate term in Term called Mundirikottai which means Cashew nut. A cashew fruit while still unplucked from the tree looks like this:

BERJAYA

Do you get why I introduce it here and what relevance it has to the topic? Unlikely, possibly with the exception of Padmum who has suggested this topic for today, and / or Sanjana who speaks Tamil at home.

In Tamil ‘ mundiri’ means cashew and means a nut; So it is ‘ mundirikottai’

A nut or seed is formed inside a vegetable or fruit in the middle of edible flesh by nature, not visible outside except in the case of cashew.

Only cashew has this peculiar formation of the nut protruding outside of it and is visible.

Hence any person who tries to make his/her presence felt first ignoring others is called ‘mundirikottai’

For example, you ask a question addressed to the person ‘A’ in a group, expecting an answer from him/ her only. But the person ‘B’ comes forward suddenly/immediately to answer and answers even before the person ‘A’ starts to answer ‘B’ is rightly called ‘Mundirikottai.’

Now, I can call Padmum a cashew nut for wanting to write to Santa Claus in the beginning of November or call myself one for writing this letter to him much ahead of all the other letters that he will surely get from mid December onwards. The chances of his forgetting my requests are more if I write now but, perhaps that is what Padmini wants him to do any way.  Padmum however qualifies for this title as she has posted one day ahead of the scheduled Friday.  I think that she is desperate for her list to be studied in detail by Santa before he gets other lists.

I have reached the stage of life where my wants are none and needs are few. I have been blessed with everything that I need to live my remaining life span in reasonable comfort and so my letter to Santa this year will ask for just the following.

1. Please ensure that I and mine are spared the chinese virus.
2. Please ensure that the virus disappears quickly.
3. Please ensure that all beings experience good health, peace and joy.

And to wind up, a little humour.
BERJAYA

This is my contribution to this week’s Friday 8 On 1 blog post topic. The other seven bloggers who write on the same topic every Friday are Maria. Sanjana, Padmum,  Raju, Shackman , Srinivas and Conrad.  This week’s topic was suggested by Padmum. Please do go over to their respective blogs to see what they have to say on the topic. Thank you.

Unintended Consequence -2.

My readers will recollect my longstanding relationship with another restaurant in my neighbourhood The Flour Works. To just refresh their memory, here is one post on an evening there.

The Meeta who features in that post, is the proprietress of TFW and is someone very special to me. Seeing that I was an orphan, she adopted me many years ago, quite as what, I am still to figure out. Her family too have become friends and so what she feels for me is almost ethereal.

The unintended consequence that this post talks about is her comment on my last post Unintended Consequences.

“I may sound callous about this but my first thought was why didn’t you ask me for tea? I could have sent it in less than 5 minutes as well. The second thought was it’s good you’re considering stepping out and would hopefully walk a few more steps and come see me. 🤷‍♀️”

After this comment appeared on my post, I realised something that only semantics can appreciate. Before The Irani Cafe moved next door to me, I was located between them and The Flour Works. Now, TIC has come between me and TFW! Both of them are next to each other! And I have to physically cross TIC to visit TFW both on my way to and back.

Please click on the panorama image for a larger resolution.

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The extreme left is The Flour Works, in the middle is The Irani Cafe and at the right is our home with the watchman at the drive way.

Knowing my neighbourhood as I do, I can’t visit one without the other coming to know of my visit to the other.

Interesting times ahead!

Unintended Consequences.

BERJAYA

I received three phone calls yesterday from totally unexpected sources. The first one was the most significant as it almost resulted in the caller escalating the matter to crisis levels.

The first one was from my cousin who after reading my blog post My Life Saver got very worried and called me to find out what was wrong with me. Knowing that I am quite capable of making not only my own tea but also cook very edible meals, he thought that I was incapacitated in some way to order for tea from a restaurant. When he called, I had just got up from my siesta and the mobile phone was in the drawing room.  I did not respond to the first call on my mobile phone as I could not hear the ringing. He then tried a WhatsApp call which also went unanswered. He finally called on my landline and I answered just as he was about to disconnect to ring up my son to find out if there was any emergency. When the calls were unanswered he concluded that something serious must have happened to me and since even the land line was not being answered by either my son or daughter in love, he got really worried.

A little explanation is called for here. I should have been clearer about why I wanted to get tea from a restaurant in my post. For the past four days, I have been under some discomfort due to a pulled back muscle which makes standing and walking very painful. I am under treatment for it and feeling much better as I write this but, the day before yesterday was really very bad. The idea of standing and brewing my tea was very uninspiring and also distressing and that is why I had sought to buy tea from outside.

I explained this to my cousin who was assuaged and calmed down and we spoke about some other recent family matters and that was that.

The other two calls were from friends who too read my blog posts and who too wondered why I did not simply make myself a mug of tea as I would normally have. They also had to be given the same story and all was well that ended well.

I have learnt a lesson. I should not cause such worries to my family and friends and write in such a way that they get a full picture of why I do certain things.