Showing posts with label memoir. Show all posts
Showing posts with label memoir. Show all posts
My relationship with food goes a long way back, way back to my childhood days. I love to eat, I have loved to eat since I was a kid, but I can’t quite say the same thing when it comes to cooking. My mother tried to make me believe that food and cooking go hand in hand. If you like to eat you should know how to cook – that’s what she said. But I didn’t think so. Not until I flew away from the nest.
The first time I found out that having basic culinary skills was not only helpful but a bit necessary was in high school.
Since her parents were not at home, my friend D, invited me over for a movie. We were very hungry and decided to boil some eggs. After a lot of musing we decided on the appropriate pot, measured the water, put the eggs in the water and put it on the stove. After a while both of us decided that enough time had passed and the eggs should be ready by now. So we promptly turned off the stove, drained the hot water from the pot and put the eggs under running cold water in the sink. As we tried to crack open what was supposed to be a hardboiled egg by now, out came a whitish liquid. The shell still stuck to the egg and it was a total mess. All our combined efforts couldn’t even produce a proper boiled egg, not even a half-boiled one. Not knowing what else to do with the eggs we left them in their current neither-solid-nor-liquid state for my friend’s mom to come back and take care of. On her arrival at the scene she was flabbergasted that the two of us couldn’t boil an egg. “What will happen to you girls?” she said with a sigh.
That sigh travelled all the way to the US and was released by my husband one night at the dinner table.
Both of us are very fond of shrimp, so one day I decided to make chingri macher malaikari (a spicy shrimp curry with coconut milk) and rice. One major thing with shrimp is that it has to be cooked perfectly; otherwise it can be tough and rubbery. Now how to cook it perfectly? Using a pressure cooker would be ideal except I had no idea how to use one; in the sense how much water was required and when was the right time to stop cooking. So I gave up the idea.
In a pot I put the shrimp, some mustard oil and water, covered it with a lid and let it simmer. I kept checking the shrimp frequently and almost half an hour passed before the shrimp were cooked to my liking. When the shrimp were done I made gravy with onion, ginger and garlic paste and coconut milk. After the gravy was done I put the shrimp in it and let it simmer for a while. When it was dinner time my husband was very happy to find out that it was shrimp night. But his happiness did not last long as he had to literally fish out the shrimp because there was too much liquid in the pot. I had to scoop the shrimp from the bottom of the pot. Instead of a curry it turned out to be a stew. The pot was a deep one and my estimation skills weren’t quite up to the mark. (They are not perfect even now, but they have definitely improved, though there is the occasional shortage of chicken curry or abundance of khichuri (a hearty one pot dish of rice and lentils), to get rid of which we either have to eat it for three days or invite a few friends. Usually we go for the latter, especially when bachelor friends are around.) I asked my husband how it was, and while fishing for shrimp from the pot he said, “It’s good”. But he didn’t sound very good. I was a bit surprised that he said it was good, but I believed him (despite the hint of sadness and the sighing which I thought I detected). I needed to believe him to boost my confidence. It was later when I had improved that he told me how scared he was that day. In his mind he had already started looking up Indian restaurants which served home style meals while hoping that I’d improve.
And improved I have but not before my fair share of fiascos in the kitchen. And the one I am about to mention involves my in-laws.
Two years back my in-laws came to spend the summer with us. After all the great food cooked by my mom-in-law I thought I should treat them to something. So one Saturday afternoon I decided to make a tray of baked vegetables. I had made this once previously with good results. I chopped up all the veggies into big chunks, drizzled olive oil, seasoned them with salt and pepper and put them in the oven. It was to be a matter of an hour before lunch was served. After an hour when I opened the oven the vegetables looked just like the way I had put them in. maybe a bit drier. So I raised the temperature and waited for one more hour, totally confident that a steaming tray of perfectly cooked vegetables was on its way. But when I opened the oven a tray of shriveled up, dry and under cooked vegetables stared back at me. My face turned red and I can assure you that it was not due to the heat of the oven. I looked at my husband and my in-laws who smiled back and made light of the whole thing. But in my mind all those words took the shape of a collective sigh.
Luckily bread and eggs saved everyone from starving that day but it didn’t save me from embarrassment. And that was when I decided that I had to take cooking seriously. That it was essential, both for my sake as well as for the people around me.
To this day my father-in-law remembers the fiasco and asks me if he’ll be able to have some decent food the next time he comes over. And he’s visiting us this summer. I am keeping my fingers crossed.
In the US for the first time, I faced a difficulty from an unexpected quarter. Water taps. I’ve lived all my life in a city more than three hundred years old where taps work in a single uniform way -- clockwise to turn them on and anticlockwise to shut them off.(Well, it used to be this way when I grew up and left the country.)
In the restroom of the airport what I saw was a very fancy looking thing in the name of a tap, I could by no means find out its head which I could turn. I just stood at the wash basin staring at the curvy shining metal object in front of me, trying to figure out a way to make it flow for me. When staring didn’t help I decided it was time for action. I pushed and pulled and tapped but nothing happened. In desperation I poked at the mouth of the tap. And voila! Water gushed out of the tap onto my wrists wetting the sleeves of my sweater. I moved my hand away instantly. The flow stopped within seconds. Tentatively I moved my hands underneath the tap again. Water started flowing. These things need to come with instructions, I thought.
Now that the water’s flowing I merrily started washing my hands, taking my own sweet time -- completely forgetting that this is not holy water from the Ganges washing away my sins -- when all of a sudden the tap runs dry. My hands had moved away a bit. That’s what happens in the US when you are not paying attention to business on hand, even if you are only washing your hands. I moved my hands again, washed my hands as quickly as possible and proceeded.
Hands all clean, and all refreshed I now needed to drink water. One look at the water fountain and my thirst vanished. Am I supposed to drink from here? How do people manage to drink from that thing? Don’t they use glasses here? My only other option to quench my thirst was to buy bottled water which I was not willing to do for various reasons. Firstly, I don’t trust the bottling companies. I am very much convinced that they are selling tap water in the name of mineral water. Secondly, the conversion of dollars to rupees was quite shocking. So I just stood at a distance and watched people. The restroom episode was behind closed walls. But this was an open space. I didn’t want to provide free entertainment to hundreds of people out there. All they did was press the big button at the base, water came out and they drank. Looked simple enough.
As the coast cleared up I marched ahead confidently, took my position and pressed the button at the base. Water did come up sure enough, but instead of filling my mouth it spluttered in my face. Taken aback I glanced sideways to find out if anybody had noticed what was going on. As luck would have it I saw two kids smiling mischievously at me. Ears burning and my face as red as an apple, I walked away stoically. As the days passed I learnt to drink from the water fountain, though not without a bit of choking and getting my dress wet.
My ordeal was not over at taps and water fountains. Once I stepped into the country I realized I had to deal with Fahrenheits and Miles and Pounds and Gallons. I could leave behind kilometer and litre and make do with the mile and gallon, but the Celsius I couldn’t forget -- the chilliness of 5°C couldn’t be brought out by 41°F and the frequent conversions from Fahrenheit to Celsius have left my brains racked..
Sunday lunch was a sumptuous feast in majority of Bengali homes and ours was no different. What made it special was the chicken or mutton curry which was made on Sundays almost without fail. On Sundays lunch generally consisted of steamed rice, tarkari (vegetable curry), dal (lentil) and meat followed by chutney. You could have meat on other days but on Sundays it was kind of mandatory. For procuring the raw meat if you went to the market place on a Sunday you'd be greeted by long queues in front of the meat stalls.
Back in those days dressed meat was not available and one had to stand in line and watch while the butcher chopped of a chicken or a portion of a goat in front of your eyes. Shops selling chicken and goat were always different. These shops were more like shacks and the same shop never sold the two. In a mutton stall two or three goats were de-skinned and hung in rows from the ceiling while in chicken shops live chickens were kept in a cage in front of you and you could take your pick from an array of unfortunate birds.
Around 10 or 11o' clock in the morning the delicious mouthwatering smell of meat cooking in a gravy of onion, ginger, garlic and other spices, in all the houses would waft over the entire area. As a young girl I'd often make an appearance in the kitchen as a taster. This habit remained as an adult too. At times I went too early when the chicken had just been put to cook and was too raw for tasting and asked "Ma, can I taste the meat now?"
"Not yet," she'd say patiently.
I would somehow control myself for another fifteen to twenty minutes and then appear again, "Ma, can I taste it now?"
"Out from the kitchen," my mother would chase me away.
"A little bit Ma. Just some gravy will do for the moment," I'd pester her. My mom would be fed up and give me some gravy in a little bowl which I'd savor until the time came to taste the real thing.
"And what about me?" it was my elder brother now.
"Ufff...I am fed up with both of you. Here...now out of the kitchen," she'd say after handing my brother a bit of the gravy.
"Boudi, don't forget me", my uncle would say. He was a bachelor at that time and often visited us on weekends. (In Bengali language a person's elder brother's wife is referred to as boudi.)
"I'll leave the kitchen now," my mom would threaten but not before she has handed over one more bowl of gravy to my uncle. Since he was the last one in line he's lucky enough to get a piece of chicken which he shares with the two of us.
Apart from the food lunch on a Sunday afternoon was special for another reason also. It was a day when the entire family had lunch together. On weekdays we just stuffed something into our mouth and rushed, barely aware of what we were having. After the cooking was complete and everybody had taken a bath we gathered at the dining table. From the kitchen my brother and I brought forth the succession of dishes and laid it on the table. It felt so good with all the food laid out in front of us and everyone sitting around. My mother serves the food to everyone before sitting down with her plate.
"The meat tastes excellent but had it been tasted by an experienced taster like me it'd have been even better," my father complains about not getting a share during the tasting time.
"Ok, then. Next Sunday I'll leave the meat to you," my mother says with a mischievous smile.
"Boudi, inform me beforehand if dada (elder brother) is cooking next week. I don't want to damage my taste buds again," my uncle would side with my mom. Lunch would thus continue with teasing and counter-teasing and everyone having an enjoyable time.
After lunch my dad would ask if anybody wanted to join him to his trip to the Dakshineshwar temple and except for me no one showed much interest. My brother would be more interested in the neighborhood cricket match. My mom wanted to catch up on her reading and my uncle would lie down in front of the TV. My interest in going did not have to do with anything religious. I was not too religious and am not even now. For me the attraction lay in the surroundings, the atmosphere of the temple. It was the very tone in which my dad asked that made it so special to me. He had this indirect, very magical way of asking "Who'd like to go with me?" At that age it seemed magical to me -- it was as if we were going to a faraway place, away from the mundane realities where imagination could soar like the eagles flying high up in the sky, where like Superman I could tell my imagination to go 'up, up and away' -- which so attracted me.
After my dad would finish offering his puja to the Goddess Kali, both of us would head straight to the steps leading to the river. There I would put my feet in the water and enjoy the cool breeze on my face and in my hair and watch the kids dive into the water and enjoy themselves. How I envied those kids. For one I didn't know swimming. But it was not that which I envied. It was their freedom to do what they were doing. Coming from a conservative family and being a girl, never in my life would I be allowed to do something like that. But that didn't stop me from dreaming. Sitting there on the banks I would imagine myself as a swimmer crossing all barriers to the other side, to the realm of my dreams. The magic created by the shades of orange, red and golden transported me to a faraway world, away from all the chaos.
Sitting there on the steps my dad would tell me stories from his childhood days specially those of his summer vacations. He grew up in the countryside and had a whale of a time fishing, swimming and enjoying a whole lot of other activities. Those were things unattainable for me, growing up as I did in the city and it made them all the more special to me.
My father was very mischievous and had a group of equally mischievous friends and together they were always up to something or the other – invading farmers' fields for sugarcane, mangoes, guavas and blackberries, fishing in other people's ponds, climbing up coconut trees -- the list was endless. Fed up with all his pranks and the complaints from the neighbors my grandfather sent him to a school four kilometres away from home and arranged his stay at the school headmaster's residence where some more students of the same school of different classes used to stay. The arrangement was somewhere between the Gurukul system of ancient India and the present day boarding school. (Gurukul is a type of ancient Hindu school in India, residential in nature, where the students learn from the teacher and help in his daily life including household chores.)
"Baba (father)
tell me one of your childhood stories...the night-time fishing one."
tell me one of your childhood stories...the night-time fishing one."
"But I've told that so many times. How about climbing the coconut trees story?" he says with the hope that this time it won't be the fishing story.
"Some other time. Its fishing time now," I demand.
With no other option my father would proceed with his daring act.
"Around a kilometre away from the headmaster's residence there was a big market on the banks of a canal. Small traders and businessmen from different places came with their merchandise in canoes for trading in that market."
"One night with two other boys...I can't remember their names now...we secretly got hold of a canoe and decided to go for a fishing expedition. In those days during August-September prawns and lots of other fish were available in plenty in swamps and nearby villagers used to lay down nets to catch those for a living. It was a lonely moonlit night and we scoured a long stretch of the swamps for a considerable amount of catch. It wasn't all that easy as it sounds now," he adds a note of caution.
"I know, I know. It doesn't sound easy at all," I assure him and he continues.
"It was a very risky job as often venomous snakes in the swamps would visit the nets in search of food and get entangled in them. Moreover if the villagers got a hint of our activities they'd have beaten us mercilessly and complained to our parents which would call for a second round of punishment. Since we were brave enough luck favored us," he glorifies his activities.
"What did you do after that?"
"We silently rowed back, anchored the canoe, tiptoed back to our headmaster's house and slipped into bed."
"And what happened to all the prawns?" I inquire.
"That was taken by the local boy in our group. In our teacher's house we had no way of utilizing the catch so we had to give away everything to him," I sense disappointment in his voice.
"Didn't he call you and your friend to his house to have a share of the prawns? He should have done that," I declare.
"In those days there was no concept of friends inviting friends to their homes for lunch or dinner like you do now. This is a trend of your generation my dear," he says.
My imagination was already at an all time high being fed constantly on Famous Five and The Five Find-Outers. The settings of these stories also were mostly rural and on the banks of the river as my father narrated his story a world of fiction merged with a real world and weaved magic for me. We would generally sit there until the sun hid its face in the waters.
Even after I grew up and left home I came to this place when I visited home. I was all grown-up and no longer went off into dreamland. I just enjoyed the beauty of Nature. As an adult, life was too complex and I found relief sitting there by the river. It was as if the flowing water took away with it all the cares and worries in an attempt to provide inner peace, provide solace to mankind. Maybe that's why the river was so sluggish in its pace and so gray in color. It was tired of taking away peoples' burdens. But did we care? Not really. All we think of is our mean, selfish selves.
Years later when I left home and went down south to Mysore for a job I still managed to take out time and enjoy sunsets occasionally. At times after a hard day's work, trying my best to do my best, my colleagues and I'd take an hour's drive to the Brindavan Gardens.
My friend Manjistha sitting at the desk next to me sends an e-mail to me cc-ing our group of six.
"want to go to Brindavan Gardens? i need a break. this is too boring."
Its 4:30 pm on a Friday.
"ok. when?" I reply back.
Replies start pouring in and within the next ten minutes everything has been planned.
"lets leave now. our boss has already gone home," Shradha and Arundhati reply enthusiastically.
"i can come now too. don't have much work today," Mou chimes in from the second floor.
"yasho and i can't leave now. too early. 5 pm sharp," Manjistha instructs again.
"no, make it 5:15. i can't submit my weekly report before 5:15," its Isha this time.
"ok then. done. everyone at the bus stop by 5:15. isha don't be late," I send the final e-mail.
At five o' clock I take out my purse from my bag, put my computer in hibernation and walk casually out of the room as if going for a cup of coffee and walk right up to the bus stop. After five minutes Manjistha's cell phone starts vibrating. She walks out of the room with her purse to receive the call and heads straight towards the bus stop. Shradha, Arundhati and Mou are already there. One person missing. "I-i-i-sha-a...where are you?" All of us think out loud. It's 5:25 and still there's no sign of her. Mou tries to call her up but no one answers. Meanwhile the bus to Brindavan Gardens whizzes past right in front of us. Finally Isha appears at 5:35.
"Sorry sorry. Boss called me," she pants.
Since we had missed the bus we decided to take an auto rickshaw as the next bus was half an hour later. We had decided on the bus initially because it was much cheaper than the auto rickshaw, almost four times less expensive.
We take an auto rickshaw, a small three-wheeled vehicle which is a very popular means of transportation in urban India now. It is supposed to carry three passengers but by paying fifty percent more than the stipulated fare you could travel more than three. Since we were a group of six and a mix of thin and slim, four of us squeezed ourselves on the seat and the rest got a ride on our laps. The drive itself was very pleasant with the Ring Road stretching itself out in front of us, lined on both sides by green plots of land. Brindavan Gaerdens is one of the most visited places in Mysore both by locals and tourists. The beautiful gardens are laid out below the KRS dam across the Cauvery river. The wide and sprawling area and the decorated landscape appealed to me. Here I did not get to watch the sunset directly but the changing colors of the sky, the mix of pink and purple announced that sunset was imminent. We would come back after lazing around in the grass and having discussions on topics ranging from the current Bollywood movies to lack of good North Indian food in Mysore to tough colleagues and bosses. We'd often make plans which by the way, never went further than the coming week and included mostly what and where we'd have dinner. Sometimes we waited to see the dancing fountain show where the fountains seemed to dance with joy to the accompanying music. After sunset the place came alive with all the illumination and the fountains and it felt like being in fairyland.
That was a time when we thought we had the world at our feet. We were a group of six girls who had just finished their studies, landed themselves a good job and were enjoying life to the hilt. In India the Information Technology Industry is a booming industry now and every other person you meet will tell you that he/she is working in the IT sector. In this scenario we worked in a language research institute and were very proud of the fact. Though in general people in Mysore didn't think much of us once they came to know we were not in Infosys it didn't bother us much. I particularly derived a sort of pleasure in disappointing such people. Infosys Technologies declared themselves as "a global leader in the 'next generation' of IT and consulting". They had a huge training campus in Mysore and accounted for much of the young non-South Indian crowd. Very often shopkeepers gave a knowing smile and told me, "You must be in Infosys."
"Actually no," would be my curt reply. Sometimes I told them where I worked and sometimes I didn't even bother. It was a time when I felt that everything in the world is fine, there are no cares, no worries in the world.
Walking back home after office was also a good experience. What made the walk back home in the evening so special? Most of the time we left office after 8.00 pm and went home guided by the lights from the shops that lined the streets and the few functioning street lamps. So the occasional days when we could leave after 5.30 or 6.00 pm while daylight was still there, going back home was special. Specially in summer when the flame of the forests were in full bloom, and the riot of vermilion and orange flowers were visible from quite a distance. Mysore is a hilly area with the roads going up and down and while walking down the road we could see only the bright red flowers from a distance and as we approached, the grayish brown trunk of the tree would slowly make its appearance. The presence of these red beauties made summer in Mysore very colorful and cheerful. Mysore is a very beautiful city surrounded by the Chamundi hills and leaving office in the evening meant we could enjoy the colors and watch the sun go to sleep behind the mountains. On these days I felt that I was going home together with the sun. I was no longer lagging behind like I always did.
A year ago sunset took on a very special meaning for me when I met my life partner. I was coming home from Mysore after a year to meet my aunt who was coming from Canada after four years. We shared a very close and friendly relationship and I managed to take a week off from work and arrived in Kolkata at the end of the year.
After reaching home my parents told me that they had quite a few eligible bachelors lined up for me. Now that I was home my parents couldn't let go of the opportunity to find someone suitable for me. It was because of this reason mainly that I avoided coming home. Over 2000 kms away from home I was quite safe knowing that without me in the picture my parents could do nothing to fix my wedding because the boy or boy's family has to meet the girl before they can proceed. But there I was, back home after a long gap to find prospective husbands staring me in the face.
Although my aunt tried to convince me that it would be fun I was not amused at all. The very thought of decking up and presenting myself in front of a bunch of unknown people who I know are judging me constantly from top to bottom, left to right repulsed me. It didn't look fun to me at all. But alas! that was the procedure I had to go through if I were to get married as I didn't take the trouble of finding myself a life partner. Luckily for me I didn't have to go through that ordeal too much. My husband was the second guy I met. Technically speaking he was the first guy I met. Before him I met a boy's parents who very proudly declared that their son had only a single childhood friend, was a bookworm and was aiming for the Nobel Prize. That was enough to shoo me away. Good luck to the man in his endeavor of the Nobel Prize.
It was from this list of 'eligible bachelors' that I found my husband. My father told me that he was a computer scientist, had completed his Ph.D and was 29 years old. For me having completed a Ph.D meant you were at least over 32, if not more. So the fact that he was 29 and had completed his Ph.D caught my attention. I set out to meet him.
This would be our first meeting. The venue was a rooftop cafe in Kolkata whose ads claimed that 'a lot can happen over coffee'. It sure did for me. I was waiting in front of the designated mall and then I see this guy looking here and there as if in search of someone. I hadn't even seen his photo and was left groping in the dark, looking around and wondering who can it be. My heart skipped a beat. Is he the one I am supposed to meet? He seemed smart. He was wearing a black full sleeve shirt with the sleeves rolled up halfway, light blue jeans, and black frame spectacles. And then I realized he was the one. Because he was steadily walking in my direction. He had already seen my photo before so it was easier for him to spot me. At that point in time everything came to a standstill like in the movies where only the protagonists are in motion and everything else stops, except for my heart. It thumped so loudly I was afraid it would pop out into my hands. And then he asks me,
"Are you Yashodhara?"
"Yes. And you must be..." I couldn't remember his name.
"Santashil...have you been waiting long?"
"Umm...not really...I just came 5 minutes back..."
"Shall we go in?"
"Sure."
With that we moved up to the open-air portion of the cafe where we ordered coffee – black coffee for me and double shot espresso for him.
"Wow...that's pretty strong for a lady", he remarked on my option of black coffee without sugar, without milk. Sitting there with him I felt very stupid and unable to think of something better I asked "So...what are your hobbies?" As soon as the words were out of my mouth I realized that was a such a cliched way to start a conversation. Why didn't I keep my mouth shut? Later on he told me that even he was amused by my question of the hobby. Our conversation lasted for two hours. This was day one. I wonder what was it that we talked about?
As we were talking, the sunlight streamed into his face and lit up his already twinkling eyes. He had dark brown eyes and in the glow of the sun it looked a shade lighter and very warm. I always had this fascination about brown eyes and here was this guy sitting in front of me with exactly the same shade of brown as I wanted! He turned out to be a very warm and attractive person and soon I was engrossed in all that he told me. He loved to travel, had been to my dream destinations of Venice, Rome and Paris, and was an outdoors person. And I loved the way he'd shake his head a little and say 'right' after almost every sentence. It can't be better than this I thought. I had already fallen for him and was dying to know if he felt the same about me. I could see that he was all smiles which made me even more thrilled on the inside and increased my struggles to remain calm on the outside. It was our very first meeting and I didn't want him to know that I was sort of mesmerized by him. Afterwards I found out that my inner excitement was all too clear on my face. In vain were those attempts. We still fight over who fell first for the other, each claiming that it was the other one. The romance which brewed over a steaming cup of coffee culminated in marriage eleven months later.
Nowadays sunset means waiting eagerly for my husband to come back home. It means anticipating a new dawn to start a new day of life. It means discussing future plans and dreaming of the days ahead with a golden halo around them.
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