“Hmnn, anything special?”
“Nah, usual. Nothing special”
“That’s why I didn’t notice anything different. You ALWAYS look beautiful”
“Right O”
“Hmnn…….for your money, which I will inherit” he said, still looking into his laptop
“C’mon, how do you know you will outlive me?”
“I’ll manage that….”
“Stop this nonsense”she said, a bit irritated
“Then you stop asking me these silly questions…”
A: Aunty, open your eyes, the surgery is over
No response from “aunty”
After a lot of waiting, and adequate pharmacological reversal of anaesthetic agents we gave up and sent her to the ICU with the tube in….
If I was Mrs. M I too would have kept sleeping…..
So one day, we were sitting in their overhead cramped AC section and munching our parathas. Next to us were a gujju couple and another girl.
Girl: (ultra sweet, fake scolding) Jijuuuuu…take good care of my sister OK……
Jiju: Smiles, fiddling with his smart and expensive looking phone
Sister: He takes such good care of me……And provides so well for me. And I don’t want ANYTHING from him. (Pativraata tone). I am satisfied with just the flat he got us in Juhu (Just? and she’s just satisfied?!). I don’t want ANYYTHING else.
NP to me: I hope she wants atleast some sofas for the house. Waise after buying a flat at Juhu, I hope he has money left over for that.
Me: Shhhh
Sister (continues, oblivous I presume to me and NP and our conversation):  No diamonds, jewelery and stuff. This is enough for me, I am happy.
NP and I: (nothing was said between the two of us. We were speechless)
The Do’s, everyone will tell you them, here are the don’ts that I have learn’t the hard way, i.e personal experience
1) Don’t bake till you have at least once seen someone bake either in real life or on TV or an authentic video. Small Things like how to fill, grease, flour and line the pans are very important.
2) Before you start out, have all your things together. The cookware, the spoons, whips, ingredients, measures….everything in place. My routine cooking is very intuitive. I start cooking, then walk around the kitchen, gather stuff and ingredients while I am cooking and that works fine for me for my roz ka khaana. NP claims I am a great cook, which I believe he says to convince himself and to gear himself to a lifetime of my radioactive cooking. (OK, I am not that bad, but not great either, a little better than average is quite where I am). But baking requires a little more effort than your routine cooking. At least in the beginning. So be well prepared.
3) Read the recipe carefully. Trust those from good books. Sites I am not sure. Cooking blogs are generally good, but do not go by the pics. Awful stuff can look awesome in a few fancy photographs. If a recipe seems complicated, please stay away. Use your intuition before you cook. This is presuming you are a newbie like me (since you have reached so far). Start with simple things first. Like a basic sponge cake.
4) Follow the sequence, yes. But do not take things THAT seriously. Like at the fag end of the recipe they will tell you to drop the mixture in greased and flour dusted tin and put it in an oven preheated for x minutes. No one will tell you that the tin must be greased and dusted before you begin. And by the time you are done the oven better be pre heated. Once the batter is made, it must be baked soon. Leaving it out for long will result in cakes that do not rise enough.
5) The tooth pic/knife/fork test, again do not take it SO seriously, the way I did. Kept poking my cake so often that it looked like a pock marked cake by the time it was fully done! BTW also beware, opening the oven too often during the innumerable fork tests is not good, the heat is lost out.
6) Prepare small portions at the oust. Expect some wastage and failed experiments before working out exactly how much heating your portions, your oven need. My first cake had a charred crust and rest was fine after I literally tore off the crust. Second was absolutely tasteless and charred mess. Third was too dense and sweet but overall not bad. Fourth attempt a year later with previous gyaan was much better but past “burns” made me poke it too often and my cake collapsed and got dense as the poking spoiled the top and let the air inside the baking cake escape.
7) Remember, Fahrenheit and Celsius were two different people with contributions to science similar yet different. So read carefully the temperature stated on the recipe and carry out appropriate conversions. Your oven may still need different temperatures so watch your cake get baked, this is not the time to watch that silly reality show on TV.
8) Finally, whatever you do, whether the outcome is a good cake or a damaged cake, your kitchen will end up smelling like heaven (that is how I imagine it smells), of course unless you char it way too far. And do not get discouraged, its really not rocket science, baking cakes, only practice makes one perfect. So happy trying.
No Time
Anu: When mummy will come home?
Varsha Mami: She will come real soon.
Anu: But WHEN???
VM: Soon dear…She will be home in no time.
I realised the phrase was new to her only when she gave me a worried cum sad look,
Anu: In no time means she is not going to come home???
Full Name
Whenever anyone asks her the name of her school, Anu always says “Garodia”, almost never the full name unless specifically asked for. So one fine funny day
VM: Anu whats the name of your school
Anu: Garodia
VM: Tell me the full name of your school
Anu: Garodia Academy Preschool
VM: oh…do you know what preschool means??
Anu: Mmm, I don’t know…(after a moment of careful thinking) Is it the Surname of the school?
Firstly, Thanks Harekrishnaji for your concern. I am very much around. Just with my exams nearing, blogging has taken a back seat for the moment.
Snippets of some interesting dialogues I have had with my naughty 5 year old niece Ananya. This post is dedicated to my sis (sister in law, technically) Radhika, who is Ananya’s mother and wanted to maintain a log of all these funnies.
Disclaimer: Some of the convos may not seem too funny to those who don’t know Anu….some jokes could be situational, and difficult to put into words.
Most of the dialogues are Ad verbatim(as I remember) So kindly excuse the grammatical lapses.
Playing Games
Usually once she returns home from school, Anu has this habit of pestering me with “Play with me na for FIVE minutes”. On the occasions on which I do comply, we are almost never done in 5 minutes.
One day, after I returned from my classes, I was in no mood to study and was dying to play with Anu. However she took no heed of my genuine requests.
Next day after she came from school,
Anu: Play with me no for FIVE minutes.
Varsha Mami: No dear I have to study.
Anu: How much you study!! Play with me no……only five minutes……
VM: Your 5 mins never get over…..And yesterday, when I was begging to play with you, why didn’t you play with me?!
Anu: Oh. I was not in a mood to play na! And I was very busy. But today if you beg, I will play with you…promise.
Being Humble
Anu: Please put on the fan
VM: No way. I am not feeling well. And I am feeling verrry cold.
Anu: But I won’t feel cold…put on the fan.
VM: No I said…..I am running a fever. Sorry, no fan
Anu: (standing next to me, holding my hands, with a forlorn expression) Please put on the fan. Very please, verry please. I am saying very please no…put on the fan.
Babies
Anu: When will you have a baby?
VM: After I finish studying.
Anu: Why can’t you have a baby when you are studying?
VM: Arrey, If my baby says “Play with me” I will have no time na…
Anu: Then I will play! I am also alone na, I get bored.
VM: But small babies need a lot of their mother…to clean the, feed them…
Anu: I will play and look after your baby. I will come from school and play with your baby. (after a moment of thinking) No, I will come from school, wash my hands, eat food and play with your baby, OK?!
VM: Hmnnn…OK. I will have a baby when you are old enough to look after him/her…..
Anu: OK.
There is a lot more to come…….
the thought bug strikes HERE today for a change….
Mid Day Boy
There is a boy I often see on the train who sells Mid-Day. He hops on the train, shouts “Mi de Mi De, tsk tsk”…..”Mi de, Mi de..tsk tsk”. He has a ‘eager+ forlorn+ anxious to jump out of the First Class ASAP’ expression on his face. Suddenly I got an urge to buy Mid day from him (Mid Day is something I buy only on impulse, or unless my Ajji (gran) is home. She HAS to have the crossword or she gets bored sitting at home all day). So he got in at Khar and I took a paper…started hunting my wallet for change. The train was about to leave and TC was on the train. So the guy said,
“Baad me sandaas me akey dena…”
I said “Huh, aye ruk….” He had long left the train, and the train had left the station. I keep feeling bad for not having paid the fellow, and befuddled by the toilet bit till Santa Cruz arrived and I realised I heard him wrong. He had said…“Santa Cruz mein main ayega to dena….”
Professional Secrecy
Now I know why professional secrecy is such an important legal issue in Medicine. Today in the Gyn OPD came a patient whose name I will obviously not mention. She was married and in Gyn you have to ask the patient a lot of personal questions…like time since marriage, about miscarriages, contraceptive use and so on. The lady started giving her history by telling me that she had been married since 5 years but her in laws had cheated them so she and her husband had had no physical relationship whatsoever. In her words, he had still not ‘broken into her’. I was shocked. Not as much by that fact as much by the realisation that without having known me at all that lady had confided a very personal, a very serious matter in me. I am still dazed…..
Jara sa or little bit is such a popular word of the Indian man’s jargon. Like when they cook, they always put jara sa hing or haldi or whatever. My jara sa never matches with that golden standard jara sa I feel, hence when I cook, the haldi hing and salt are either jara sa excess or jara sa less..or maybe jara sa more would be fine….huh
Or when I miss meeting the head of the unit for the coveted signature and posting completion I am always jara sa late.
The other day in the casualty at around 2 am came a patient with a nasty laterated wound on the scalp, outcome of a fall.
I am not going to translate the rest, won’t be as much fun….
Me, “Vomitting vagera hua?”
“Haan, jara sa.”
Me, “Chakkar aya kay?”
“Haan, jara sa.”
Me, “Kahi aur laga kya?”
“Haan idhar udhar jara sa laga”
Me, “Behosh hua tha kya?”
“Haan, jara saa hua…..”
Me, “AREY, JARA SA BEHOSH KYA HOTA HAIN??!!!….HUA KI NAHIN??”
“Haan matlab hua……..”
Go to the market, try shopping for a …say bottle of shampoo and then tell me, do you really believe its fun having so many choices? Has our life improved by these?
First the dilemma of the brand. I decided I would pick looking at the company….hmnn P&G is good, so is HLL, hmnn and so are many others…..Plus one company has more than one brand. Uh..
Ok now you narrow down to particular brand based on any considerations….price or whatever (I go by the appearance or even the fragrance at times..heh heh. Makes a funny site in a store…a looney girl sniffing into shampoo bottles. Thats why I like shopping at less crowded hours). but the confusion doesn’t end here. 
Which one of the many types now….hmnn lets see now is my hair just dry? Or is it dull and dry? Or dry and damaged? Dry and frizzy?? I guess all of the above options….oh but I also need volume, bounce and shine….oh is there one which combines all the goodies?? And the strength……too. Plus not to mention the split ends…(By now my head is split too) Plus just the shaft is dry….the scalp is like an oil mine in the middle east.
Lets go by the contents. Egg is good for the hair..lets buy this one. But isn’t olive oil good too? And wheatgerm? And lemon? And Rose hips? uh rose hips? REALLY? Amla? Oh ya my granny will swear by that one. Water of xxx spring? Oh now where else will my hair get THAT?
By the end of it I want to pull out my hair. But that will defeat the purpose of buying a nice shampoo. Probably I should buy a strengtening shampoo. So that my urge (or anybody else’s) to pull out my hair won’t be successful.
So by the time I have purchased a bottle I know that
One fine day
N, “You know most girls I have seen have a backup….they see one guy and have a backup in case that doesn’t work well”
V, “Oh ya?? When I was seeing you I didn’t have a backup..”
N, “Well I say most girls….those typical types you know…..”
V, “Elaborate…”
N, “Those typical girls who bother a lot about their external beauty and those …..” with a slight tinge of MCPsm
V, “You mean I don’t take care of my external beauty?? You mean to stay I stay sloppy!!”
N, “No what I meant is that you don’t need to….” a cute smile flashed at me…..
N and V break into laughter…..I love troubling him this way. He too always has a diplomatic answer for me.
One Day on the phone
V pulling N’s leg, “We do not belong to the same generation……I am of a younger generation” (FYI V is 23 and N is 28)
N, “No…you are so of my age…..you look and seem so mature”
V, “You mean to say I look 28!!! No I most certainly don’t! In fact I look less than 23”
N, “No I mean you are so mature…I like mature girls”…..probably flashed the cute smile but I didn’t see…..
V, “Heh heh I know….but I love troubling you this way!”
Many more mad conversations like this…will have to keep updating this post when I remember!!
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