T N Rajarathinam Pillai

Tamil Hindu newspaper is eminently readable. Quite a contrast to its much older sibling, The Hindu. I have my favourite columns  of course, and one of them is the column about a celebrity whose birthday falls on that day.
Today the nadaswaram vidvan,T N Rajarathinam pillai was featured. I have been an ardent fan of his rich and wholesome tone of his nadaswaram. My parents and aunts used to rave about his music.They have been very lucky to have listened to his music live mainly during the mylapore annual festivals. My aunt who lived in mylapore used to tell us how, unlike present day musicians, he will not stick to a three hour slot. If he is in the mood and the audience is appreciative, he can just go on and on. On one occasion that she witnessed, he played the nadaswaram right through the night, and the audience were mesmerised and fell under his spell. It was passion, passion and passion all through.

While I have heard a lot about his music, today I learnt a little about the man.That he was very fond of dressing up in a very grand manner. That on Independence day when he was in Delhi as an invitee, Nehru came up to him and said, he really believed he was one of the princes from the pricely states!

Once when he was travelling near Mayavaram, he realised that Kanchi Sankaracharya was on pattina pravesam in that area. So he got down from his car and stood by the wayside.When he spotted Kanchi acharya nearing him. he started playing the nadaswaram. Immediately Kanchi periyaval, asked ;rajarathinam pillai vaasipu pola irukku!. Rajarathinam pillai was very very happy and he played for one and a half hours standing on the road and Periyaval was there listening to him.
Rajarathinam pillai considers this episode as a real blessing and a high point in his life.

Two very great people in different walks of life, truly deferential and appreciative of the other. What beauty!

Truly  great people have lived in our country!

phone for 999 rupees anyone?

Chiku is fascinated by the mobile.There is nothing earthshaking about it.D talks to me and he immediatley wants her phone in his hands. She does not budge and tells him, you are all the time talking and blabbering to your mother. I also want to talk nice stuff with my mother. So there.

He is sometimes diverted to other interesting stuff  nearby and wanders off for a few minutes. Then he wants to be lifted up, so he is nearer the toy that mother is enjoying. Of late he has also started giving me stories.There will be a constant BGM when D talks to me nowadays. It is chikku chatter!

D know that she cant keep the chatter in the background for long. And Chiku will not be a silent spectator. So she told me, when you are coming here, get him a toy phone. If it is really dumb then he will not want it more than a day at the most.

So I told S to get a toy phone. He tried to wriggle out saying, I dont know what to buy, I get really confused seeing so many features and models of toy phones that these shops display. So you go and buy as per exact specs that D wants. I am a little clever in this game now.So I said, yes, I will but I would want you to go with me.

That made S buy the toy phone this weekend. I saw the price tag! 999 rupees. I was stunned. It was a simple plastic dubba, how can it cost so much. On closer examination, it teaches the numerals if you press the keys once. You press them twice, then it sings different song bits for each numeral on the keyboard. If you press it three times then it is nursery rhymes. OK, I have only deciphered this much after a lot of prodding and pushing.

I think Chiku will figure this out faster than me. He will keep jab jab jabbing at the same key and will get to discover more features.

All that is in the realm of the future. For now,would he be interested enough to fool around with it when  D wants to have extended conversations with me.

If yes, then the BIG investment  is paisa vasool. Otherwise we will have to make cost benefit analysis. You see I just found out that  the secondary market price of a  REAL base model phone that my maid has is 1000 rupees.

chiku's 100 cm dash!

Great day today. Saw chiku take his tentative 5 or 6 steps to plunge into his mother's waiting arms. Breasted the tape as it were. He was grinning all over and happily raced ahead.
I was chatting with D on skype and told her to show me chiku taking his tentative steps. And immediately she just moved away a few feet from Chiku and tilted the computer screen to have a full view. Next second he was on his feet and hurtling towards her. What a sight.

A small step for chiku, but a  thrilling giant leap for a doting grandmother.

Bangalore - my second home

I have spent time away from Chennai,  some on holidays and others for longer periods due  to relocations during my working life.
 First time away from chennai was to Vijayawada to my chitappa's house.That was my high school days.Next was holiday with a friend in her house in Hyderabad(yes this was our idea of holiday!) This was soon after my degree exams. Again in Mumbai for a month on a holiday with a friend(yes in her sister's house!).This followed soon after my Hyderabad trip.

It was then the real time away from home began when I had to go to Ahmedabad as part of a month long induction training in the bank I had joined,.No hostel facility, so stayed with a friend in their house.The friend was actually my dad's friend. See it keeps getting better!

The real breakaway came when I was away and staying in a hostel in Mumbai(Bombay then) as part of a year long training programme of the insurance company that I had joined. This was for a six month period. A more exciting period followed, where we were posted to Jullundur and we had to find our own accomodation. Real challenge and unlimited excitement. We also had our stipend to blow!We spent a glorious six months there and then the posting came to Nagpur.

Our working life began in our quarters the company allotted in Sitabaldi area, Nagpur.It lasted a little over a year and then a change to Pune as I had to relocate due to marriage. A husband and a son later, we moved bag and baggage after over 3 years to Madras. Family was getting incremented  and we wanted to be near our parents for the support package. A daughter and seven years later it was Ajmer that we marched out to. It was a short stint of a year and a half (but many a time it appeared as though our legs had grown roots there and we were there for ever and ever).

A long long stay in Chennai for over 16 years when the kids finished school and went away to different places for their undergrad studies.

And then  a decision to opt for  voluntary retirement  was taken and also decided to move to Bangalore as my son was taking up employment there. Set up house there and spent a relaxed and enjoyable 5 years in Bangalore. No work, did lot of socialising with the other apartment residents. It was a veritable mini India.Yes, IT had done the trick to bring people from every single state in the country.

We did a lot of travel, though a lot of it was to and fro to Chennai. We went to  Hogenakal, Bandipur , Mysore, Belur, Halebid, Sravanabelgola, Sringeri, Udupi, Mangalore, melkote, shivasamudram falls, We did a lot of driving around Bangalore to spots like Ramanagaram, Nandi hills and any number of non tourist places.The weather was a big plus and we made the most of it.Our travel was with an assortment of companions. We  travelled as a family, with  old friends and their families, and also with new friends and their families!

There would be very few areas in bangalore that our i20 car has not set its tyres on. We had our gps to guide us out of many tight spots when we had lost our way totally and did not want to step out into the rain to ask for directions in a language not readily understood by the bangaloreans. We had gone to the big and small malls that were mushrooming across the city and had roaring adventure making in and out of the non standard underground parking lots.(the slopes were deadly and the weird turnings were unimaginable)

I had celebrated festivals and national holidays with a fervour I had not felt all these years. Community life was a new thing for me and I dived into it with full gusto like a new convert.

A year or so earlier we came back to Chennai, but the bangalore establishment was left in tact. I was caught up with other role plays and could not have even a sneak peak to Bangalore.

Finally managed to squeeze in a four day trip last week. The place is being decenly maintained by my friend there, so we were not greeted with cobwebs and cockroaches. Just entering our house after such a long time, brought back lots of emotions.It became a flood and I hurriedly went to my friend's place and had a good session with their kid, who is totally unrecognisable now. He was flat on his back then and I used to egg him to turn over. Now he is ERECT and walking and running around and his mom is casually talking to me when he is running .He is so stable. He talks atleast five different languages that I could make out.His sleeping time used to be a nightmare(his mother has actually forgotten the dog days!) and he used to scream the roof down. Now he is a tiny kid still, but very very manageable and enjoyable.What a change!

Managed to take my friend out for a movie.Yes, we had been planning for it for atleast a couple of years down the road. It was 'Minions. A 3D animation movie. Juniors first movie theatre experience and he was glued to the screen with his 3D glasses. He stayed still for over an hour and that was a big bonus. S also managed to watch his first 3D animation movie. There is a small 60 years difference between S and the kid!

I went to visit a friend and caught up with our life happenings sitting in the shade of a huge jack fruit tree in a temple complex, just off Gandhi bazaar.It was so peaceful and unbelievably quiet just so near a bustling street.

Independence day celebrations had a variety entertainment programme in the evening in our complex. I used to love the Ganpati celebrations there stretching to a little over ten days each year. I was not sure I would be able to be there this time, so I was happy that I could get to meet many of my friends in that programme. I said IT , so you can guess, it is a young crowd with lots of tiny tots and their pitter patter. Kids  in fancy dress and their mothers in gorgeous outfits were a good treat for the eyes. Garbage segregations was the theme, so a very good presentation was got up and a little older kids were eager participants.A welcome community dinner, where the early birds got lots of crisp dosas and the late commers had to be content with very healthy idlis!

We were greedy and wanted to squeeze in a bahubali movie timeout, but that did not happen. But we did manage a lunch in a very authentic and ethnic restaurant. Enjoyed the food there. Our friend's kid was  happy to grab a handful of blue metal( which was strewn and made up for ethnic floor) and started to throw them merrrily. It was then time to leave, but not before a delicious and filling lassi served up in mutkas.

The weather was great, had very good rains on one of the days. We could go out any time of the day and not have the scorching sun, beating down on you.

Time to leave for Chennai. Heavy heart no doubt, but we will come more often.
It is after all my second home. Five years is the longest time I have spent away from chennai.
 So Sayonara Bangalore.

D innovation series 2

Home made bread.

Yes, seriously on an idli steamer. She tweaked it here and tweaked it there and has now come to a fairly acceptable bread preparation. So much so, they had vegetable bread burger for breakfast, made from first principles, including baking bread, the vegetables and the sweet and sour chutney to give the ultimate topping.Woh!

She is not resting on her success. She says she will have the dough stay for some more time the next time she tries to make bread(which is today, by the way) and watch the results.

For her father this is the ultimate in home cooking. He has been forever fascinated with baking bread at home. He has told me this on several occasions. Well, not directly, but in passing. It goes like, " Freshly baked bread will be so fluffy and tasty" ." I don't know if it is at all possible to bake bread at home, it is just a fanciful idea that I have".  So he is maha thrilled. D made banana bread as a beginning.She said it is not really bread, it is a crossover from a cake recipe.She tried that a few times and added her own thinking into it and it is just right for their taste now.

She has promised that she will make coffee cake for me when I visit them next.

I remember a friend of ours had made  some very delicious baked vegetable dish when we had gone to their house for dinner. She told me that she is not a very enthusiastic cook as far as traditional dishes are concerned.But she always likes to bake something new when she has guests. And how we enjoyed the preparation.

Perhaps D is also taking that path!

With this my maid and her circle will start baking bread in their idli steamer. Next you will find roadside idli shops replaced with homemade bread burgers!

Teacher's spite

A good friend of mine has started teaching in a school. It was a big career shift for her from holding senior position in the corporate world. She had taken  a break for a few years for personal reasons and was now ready to look at options. By word of mouth she came to know about a vacancy for a English teacher in a reputed school.The school was quite desperate as their English teacher had to suddenly leave without much notice.The academic session was just a few weeks off.
My friend holds a B Ed degree but has not worked as a teacher. She thought for a few days whether she will be able to handle the demands of a full time teachers job  at this stage in her life. She decided to give it her best shot and joined the school a few months back.

Initially the demands on her were more physical. She had to work in a non ac environment.It was also the height of summer and Chennai was sizzling hot. The fan in the classroom right above the teacher's desk was of little use.Guess why? The students in the front row of the close, slowly push their desks inch by inch so that they get some breeze from the fan above the teacher's desk.Yes, they also manage to push the teachers desk inch by inch towards the black board. She is totally new to the working of young minds, so used to suffer a lot. She also gets to move around a lot in the classroom, and since fans cannot keep up her pace, they were left far behind.

If students are smart, can other teachers be far behind? She was assigned a desk in the far corner of the staff room, where there is neither a window nor a fan.Yes, she had to stew even in her free periods.

She was quite up to speed with the class work. She is a very smart and imaginative person and brought in a lot of innnovation and enthusiasm in her teaching.She would take an auto from home and during the ride would scan the timetable and plan for the day.Smartphones are truly handy in her hands. She has her entire classwork accessed there. She takes a snapshot of the weekly timetable and so the day's classes are right in her hands. The way she talks about how she prepares and handles the class is truly fascinating.

She would tell me, classroom management is posing a challenge, as today's kids are not like what we were, nor like what her children were.They just get up and walk away right in the middle of the class and when she stops them. they say it is very hot and they want to have get some breeze in the verandah.No asking teacher, just get up and walk. She was also saying in corporate life, a level of authority is assumed and respected. Here she did not find that she could take the students behaviour for granted. Class strength was also not small, so it was daunting.

And I kid you not, she has to handle on an average seven periods out of the nine periods in a day.For five days a week. And usually saturdays also some other assignments are given.So it is effectively six working days with lots and lots of correction work to be carried home.

In this scenario what kept her engaged and interested is the interesting work she was able to do with the students.

All this changed yesterday. One of her colleagues came and told her that she goes late for her classes and her classes are very noisy so, this is the talk in one of the staff rooms and it could become a big complaint, so why does she not mend her ways. It really threw her off balance and made her very upset. It is then that another friend of mine, who was a teacher for a year and later took up a job in a government office, told me, that teachers are the worst in being jealous and spiteful. She found it in her one year teaching stint, but never encountered it with the severity that she did when she was teaching in a school.

We were both discussing the rationale for this behaviour and she came out with a possible theory. Good teachers make a tremendous impression on students. Especially new teachers who are also quite enthusiastic and bring a freshness to the subject. And they make their feelings very clear. And that is what spawns the jealousy in such a virulent form.. In a corporate set up we are dealing with adults, who dont show their appreciation or criticism so openly.

So I went back to my friend and told her, now that there is criticism and jealousy it is a sure bet you are doing something  right and the students are very happy with you.

Go ahead and do more of the same thing! Blaze a trail!

Chiku climbs up; chiku climbs down

A few posts earlier I had written about him climbing the stairs in our house for the first time. Now it is the climbing down learning time. No, not yet down staircases, but as a first step, climbing down from the cot.

Lots of friends had told D that she should not allow chiku to sleep in the cot when he is alone, because he now crawls and will fall off the bed. She has been careful about it and usually hangs around with him when he is awake and on the cot. A few weeks back she called me and told me excitedly that chiku has learnt to get down from the cot. I said how? His tiny legs wont reach the floor. She waited for a correct time and sent a video of his getting down from the cot. He comes near the edge. peers down,sees the depth and then turns and goes feet first while clutching on to the edge of the bed. His legs dont reach the ground,but he has assessed in his own way the distance to the ground, so in a leap of faith just lets go of his hand and falls on the floor. It is only a few inches and he is happy for the new experience even though it could be a bit of pain falling on the ground.


D helped matters by having mattresses around the bed on the floor, so Chiku was happy to come to the edge of the bed.do a round turn and fall plop on the mattress below. This has been going on for a few weeks. Now he has also become a bit taller and also understands navigation and space and distances better. So it was fun to watch a video D sent two days back. Video 1 , Chiku comes to the edge of the bed. turns around and tries to feel the ground. Not successful.So he climbs up and comes again and tries the second time. Again not successful. The third time around, somehow he has figured that he needs to come to the very edge and then turn around, so that he makes up the deficit in height.He does that and he is securely reaching the ground level comfortably.

Video ends with him looking at D with a huge grin on his face. Who needs languages. Here the conversation is complete.

D innovation series 1

With Chiku innovatively using the various stuff in the house for playing, learning and fooling around, D is also way up there.

This post is about the chocolate idli cake that she came up with. It has been a great hit not only in her house, but in our house and the bug has caught on to my maid and amma's nurse also. D is very happy about it hitting a soft spot in my maid's mind.

I think it started with D reading about the success in baking in one of the blogs she follows. Her creativity was screaming for an outlet, what with Chiku merrily gobbling up every available inch of her mind space. She looked up a recipe for an eggless cake and added her own ingredients to it. She tried to use the pressure cooker with a large pan at the bottom. She was not too happy with it, so then wanted to try the idli stand. Who said cakes should be shaped like cupcakes or other shapes and not like idlis. So she got down to it and made wonderful and fluffy chocolate idli cakes. She sent the picture over and I was amazed. I immediately asked for the recipe and got the ingredients. I was very surprised that it had curd, jaggery, refined oil as main ingredients. A very healthy and south Indian cake it is, I thought.

My first attempt was hugely successful and I shared an idli with my maid immediately.She loved it and said I should write out the recipe for her.She is not able to read, so what will she do with the written recipe I wondered..She said on a holiday, she will ask her son to get the ingredients and she has a idli vessel at home and she will ask him to read it and she will try it out.

This is the first time our maid who has been with us for over 10 years was excited to try out a recipe herself.Well, it does speak not so highly of my recipes, but I will push it aside and concentrate on the stuff in hand. So after a few days I showed her by actually doing it the second time. She was happy and today she insisted I write it down and give her. I did and put in a big envelope.She brought a huge polythene bag and safely put the envelope inside for complete protection.

Her goal is to make idli choco cake when her grandchildren come calling and clamour for exciting stuff to eat.

Truly democratising cake making!  D can feel good!

chiku innovation series 1

Chiku is a man about home these days. The videos that D sends me are about the very 'mobile' Chiku, Gladdens the heart to see the inch by inch, day by day  progress he is making in his locomotion.

He has made a new toy of the foldable clothes hanger. It is light and he can grip it and hoist himself up.It has lots of clothes hanging at arms length. So the minute D has put the  clothes out to dry, Chiku's playtime begins. He removes each and every cloth and makes a colourful tapestry on the floor.Then he moves ahead to other stuff.

Recently he is not satisfied with just that mundane stuff. Once he has got his hand on the rails, he pushes it around and makes a nice merry go round with it. He nicely pushes it against the wall and if he feels it is not fitting just right there, he pulls it back and reverses it and pushes it against the wall once more. It is a treat to watch, one can actually feel he is parking a car and is fussy about it, so moves back and forth and parks it just right.

I was telling D that with such toys, which he can pull, push, do things with, why would he like traditional toys, which are so staid and predictable. She said that's fine, now I am spared the  hassle of getting him a walker. He uses the clothes hanger as a walker.

Today morning during our skype session, he is pushing a single sofa around as though he is tugging at a chariot!

From a light weight clothes hanger as walker to a heavy duty single sofa as a walker, the learning curve has been just two days!

svanubhava 2015

Give me a programme in Kalakshetra, it does not matter what it is, I will consider being there. Okay, I may not make it all the time, maybe a few times in a year, that's it. But the place is so beautiful and green and has that special ambience that I care so much about, so I am a sucker for anything kalakshetra. We stay very close to the campus actually, so it does not require much planning. Soem of the programmes are ticketed  and getting tickets is a hassle. They get sold the day previous to the announcement in the papers. Campus touts? seriously;  or the rasikas have cosied up to somebody in kalakshetra and the minute a programme is planned they come to know of it and  book in advance through the contact.

Anyways, svanubhava has been a "must go" event for the last few years. Initiated by T M Krishna, as part of his passion to take arts to the masses and students it has a very nice and novel format. It is to make it also more open, there are question answer sessions at the end of a recital.They also webcast the programme.Normally  it is spread over three days.

This time around, the format was new, it was a 24 hour long continuous programmes starting from midnight till the next day midnight. Very interesting programmes were arranged. I was quite interested in workshop sessions scheduled for early evening. So I trooped in but was told , welcome, but sorry cannot go into the workshops. It is for students who had preregistered. So I came back but went again for the 7 pm carnatic music concert. It was held outdooors,And no garish lights but only lawn lights where audience sat sprawled over. The singer was in a small mantap which again had very soft lights which was just right and just enough for the audience to view.Gayathri venkatraghavan has a very sweet melodious voice and it was perfect for the setting. The venue was 'tamarai kulam'. The volunteer girls were so graceful and sweetly guiding the guests to their comfortable seating arrangements without disturbing and causing nuisance to other guests. How do they do that? Dhoti clad students were also bustling about and talking in soft undertones. Smell of jasmine was in the air and we could as well be in another  time and place.

It was magical.