Hey, teachers leave the kids alone! Should they...?

"Hey, teacher leave them, kids alone!
Hey, teacher leave us, kids alone!"
I wished, like the other kids that my teachers vanish
But none was able to fulfill my wish
Nevertheless
My love for Pink Floyd will never diminish.

Today, I'm glad to acknowledge
I wasn't left alone as a kid
My teachers stood by me
And I dared to dream and be able to stand tall
'Cause some teachers were not 'just another brick in the wall'
Their teaching was neither bound by books nor the classroom walls
And I'm grateful to most of my teachers
For being what I am, not just another brick in the wall!

Did I hear it all? They've heard it before me.
Did I read it all?  They've read it before me.
Did I see it all? They've seen it before me.
Did I feel it all? They've felt it before me...
Pink Floyd could sing and Ivan Illich could write
About de-schooling society and irrelevance of 'education'
While Postman and Weingartner and others
Told us enough about being subversive
Such radical thoughts on teaching and education
Have mostly verged on hypocrisy, in reality.
As I can say from personal experience
It was nice to get carried away by dreamy stuff
Not knowing where to strike a balance
As if I was sailing on a rough sea
This is where my teachers anchored my boat
Made me think, question, accept, deny
Helped me in forming my identity
Instilling courage, confidence and competitiveness.

Teachers are always the most sought after
As learning never ends
So will 'teaching' and facilitating
Since learning is a lifelong pursuit
And a journey in search of knowledge
The search for teachers would always remain
Someone who can guide, instruct and mentor in different fields
And tell us 'to strive, to seek, to find and not to yield!'
As did Ulysses in the famous poem by Tennyson.

When I look back and reflect on the lessons that life has taught me
Deep in my heart I've a special place for those who inginited my curiosity,
Inspired, nurtured my inquisitive mind and boosted my enthusiasm.
Not all were designated as 'teachers'
Nor was all learning in the classroom
Never was it limited to the textbooks
But I'm lucky to have met them throughout
In childhood, adolescence and my youth.

The joy of baking cakes

I love to bake cakes. It's such a joyous and feel-good thing to do. But, sad, I manage to do it only occasionally - not because of reluctance or lethargy, it's more to do with insufficient time for planning while working on other priorities. How I wish baking was my profession and not just a spare time activity!

Chocolate vanilla marble cake with strawberry icing

Busy day chocolate cake with chocolate icing

In fact, I love whole lot of baked stuff - cakes, muffins, breads, buns, cookies and pizzas. Actually, I often dream of baking all of them at home, though I've tried out only cakes and muffins (because of the limitations with the oven size and shape and scheduled and unscheduled power cuts in Hyderabad). In my college days, some of my friends not only shared my  interest in baking but they've always encouraged me by sharing interesting recipes. Padma Tamirisa and Aparna Tamhane - you are always in my thoughts when I bake! Padma's recipes "Golden butter cake" and "Busy day cholocate cake" and Aparna's recipe for cookies have remained my eternal favorites. Over the years, when I got confident with the basics, I started exploring marble cakes, carrot-orange-walnut cake and banana-walnut cake.

Of late, I don't miss any opportunity to try out my skills at the oven. Thanks to Shreya, my ten-year old niece, I get constantly motivated to not only bake but also try out different types of icing/frosting. Earlier, I would feel lazy to go an extra mile and explore decoration options and hence I'd leave out the icing part of it as that proverbial 'icing on the cake' that remained a wishful thought. Now, I find immense satisfaction in 'messing' my fingers with the butter-cream-icing sugar and enjoy the colors and flavors, eventhough the icing doesn't turn out consistently well all the time. Shreya often helps me and gives ideas for icing and decoration while I learn to improve my knowledge and skills in frosting.

 Chocolate vanilla marble cake

Chocolate cake with vanilla icing and strawberry flowers

Vanilla sponge cake with chocolate icing (Maansi's b'day)

It's difficult to resist the temptation to bake when we have such a wealth on information, videos on the Internet www.joyofbaking.com, www.wilton.com, and on TV, shows hosted by Rachel Allen, Nigella and of course the popular Masterchef Australia series and others. The content and presentation is simply irresistible. Even the most reluctant person would want to try out the recipes. Well, sometimes, it may be little frustrating because all the ingredients that are used in these TV shows may not be easily available in India, we may have to get them from abroad or order them online. Nevertheless, one can always learn and improvise with new ideas to accomplish the impossible.

Baking is different from regular cooking - this is what is nice about it. It demands accuracy and precision in everything - measure of ingredients, heating, cooling, decorating etc. And the best part of it is that you never know how the cake comes out after it's pushed into the oven - and I heard from the most seasoned bakers that they also have this feeling of 'suspense' till the time the cake is in the oven. For someone like me who cooks Indian vegetarian stuff all the time, it's a different experience. Normally, I don't need to use an oven for any of my regular cooking, nor do I store eggs in my fridge. Often, not having the key ingredients like eggs and butter at normal room temperature make me put off my baking plans. But whenever I plan to bake I enjoy the creative satisfaction I derive from the process of doing it and it is so very  pleasurable and de-stressing! And the best compliment I got for my cake was from my niece Maansi. Sometime, last year when she visited us, I had baked a carrot cake and I wasn't sure if she would like it. But, to my surprise, she not only liked it but found it difficult to believe that it was home-baked:) And of course, Shreya had often suggested that I start a cake shop and sell cakes in my apartments:) Well, not a bad idea!

Citius, Altius, Fortius (faster, higher, stronger)

This evening, as the flags are lowered and the flame extinguished, the London Olympics 2012 spectacle will come to an end. From tomorrow, we would have one topic less to talk, debate, discuss, analyse, follow, share etc.  For the last two weeks, most of us suddenly saw ourselves following a host of sports, reading about them, cheering the performers, watching them break records and create new ones. And, somewhere deep in our hearts we were hoping and praying that Indians get their share of medals. If only prayers could get more medals, we would have been richer by some gold. Sadly, that wasn't the case; we had to contend ourselves with silver and bronze, making it the highest medal tally so far. Cheers to all the winners and participants!

Undeniably, the number of medals may be in no way proportionate to the number of participants and the total population of our country but is this the only way to judge our participation? Aren't we tired of telling ourselves repeatedly how badly our sports are affected because of the lopsided treatment? So what, if Cricket is the game of the masses, what about our 'national game' hockey which has been reported extensively in the media as a 'national shame' after the defeat in Olympics - what ails us and why we fail? Isn't it also the opportunity to look inwards and reflect to understand what stops us from 'excelling' in what we do (not only in sports) and fight the forces that forbid us from realizing our talent and potential. Why do we often satisfy ourselves with mediocrity and not raise the bar and learn from constructive criticism and our failures. In the absence of such soul searching it is easy to fall  prey to undue negativism and cynicism - which, unfortunately, is dished out in plenty, especially through the popular social media channels.

Games of this magnitude may mean different things to different people. For technologically and economically advanced nations, it may be 'normal' to expect the number of medals over the years. Whereas, for countries like India, the sporting event is synonymous with unrealistic expectations, dreadful dreams and pressure-filled performance - what with the cynical media and the over-the-top analysts! Olympics or any games of this stature are also a reflection on the way we treat sports and sportsmen (strictly not including Cricket and cricketers). It seems as if this is the time we wake up from our slumber on how little attention is paid to sports and games, our attitude towards them, how we need new policies for including sports in schools, how our mindset needs to change to encourage our children, appreciate them, need for assistance from state and central government while we hear other countries preparing their performers almost eight years in advance. We start the blame game which we are very good at...blame the infrastructure, the coaches, the players and get defensive at the sorry state of affairs.

And, when it comes to rewarding the performers, we have very predictable ways to recognize the winners when they are back home - monetary and other forms of awards etc (I don't mean to undermine this, but would expect us to think deeper and wider). All this seems to happen instantly without any  vision for long-term engagement with the winner and participants. We hardly know anything about the participants who could not win the medals in spite of their sincere efforts. Look at the way popular media makes use of the 'celebrity' status of the winners. Why don't we pay equal attention to all the sports? Can't Mary Kom be promoted as 'glamorously' as Saina Nehwal or Sania Mirza for endorsing brands and other social campaigns? We badly and consciously need to promote our sports stars hailing from different backgrounds and playing in different competitions at different levels, nationally and internationally - without any discrimination. This could be a good way to create awareness, encourage and solicit participation, ensure sponsorship and support. After all one cannot 'force' people to pursue something like sports that is still considered secondary to earning degrees in higher education to make a living, especially in the middle class and lower classes.

The sad part of the story is that most of the winners - Sushil Kumar, Mary Kom, Yogeshwar Dutt, Vijay Kumar, Gagan Narang (except Saina Nehwal) may soon fade from our memory - only to be remembered again at the next Olympics. Saina, apparently because of the popularity of the sport and her glamour quotient has mostly remained in the headlines and catches the attention for her product endorsements. We don't find a similar effort to create more visibility or 'cash in on celebrity' status of other medalists. A lot depends on how we consciously create a culture of sports and competition. If it had to end with gifts and awards as a token of recognition (like our government does so very promptly) we would not have had sports persons struggling to eke out a living after they fade out of the competitive horizon. The life and contribution of a sportsperson is a much larger story - it's a journey filled with challenges, sacrifices and rigorous discipline. It cannot be 'compensated' with a one-time cash award or other short-sighted gestures that fail to build and strengthen sporting culture. If  we really believe in the Olympics motto citius, altius, fortius, which, in Latin means 'faster, higher, stronger' we would do much more than leave the message in these words to become the slogan of a popular health drink advertisement on the television.

How a delayed flight helped me in overcoming 'writer’s block'

Thanks to the 'extreme' customer service of Indigo airlines, I had to spend at least two extra hours in the airport, not being intimated properly about the delay in flight! Let’s be informed - Indigo believes in personally calling up customers, at any odd hour, than send an SMS. However I'd have appreciated an SMS than a missed call from a weird looking number that I saw on my phone. (BTW, I got to know that commercial calls are cheaper than SMSs). This was the 8.30 AM flight from Hyderabad to Bangalore which eventually took off at 10.10 AM. The reason for delay was a technical glitch for the flight to take off from Jaipur on time. Unfortunately, this is the second time it’s happened to me – both the times with the same flight - what a coincidence! The worst part of the story was my mother calling me soon after I reached the airport to tell me that there was a call on the landline phone from Indigo, probably informing about the delay.

"Had I known about the delay, I would have started late and spent time more productively at home", I cursed myself. This was my instant reaction when I came to know that I missed the call from Indigo on my mobile phone at about 1.43AM when my phone was kept in the other room for charging. Later in the morning, in the midst of hurrying for the early morning trip to the airport, I saw the missed number that seemed strange and completely unidentified. I thought it must be one of those cold calls from the pesky marketeers. So, I didn’t bother to call! Realized my 'mistake', if I could be blamed for not being a good customer!

At the airport, I tried telling the Indigo guys at the boarding counter that they should have sent an SMS and not depended on that call at an odd hour in the night. I frankly don’t know how many people responded to that call. “Okay, now I have so much time, and how do I spend it, there was some kind of irritation at the delay, frustration that I could not pick up that call and so on and on…I was angry at myself because I would be spending double the flight duration to Bangalore, doing nothing worthwhile!”

I took the boarding pass and went through the security check, decided to wander around browsing stuff in some of the shops. But as soon as I went to WH Smith, I felt I should catch up with some recent releases and so on, though I had nothing specific in mind to buy. I looked at the books in sections that interested me and since I had lots of time I really wanted to buy some good books. I purchased “The Game Changers –stories about entrepreneurs from IIT Kharagpur” and some books by Ruskin Bond. Now comes a call from home, “what will you do for so long, if you had known you could have started later, eat your breakfast first, …” that was my mother, over anxious and concerned as usual. After picking up some stuff from the Karachi Bakery and Pulla Reddy Sweets for my people in Bangalore, I headed straight to the Idli Factory, my favourite joint for steaming hot idlis. As soon as I sat at the table, my eyes fell on some interesting quotes on the glass panel there – reading them, I said to myself, “how true!”

“Travel can be one of the most rewarding forms of introspection.”– Lawrence Durell

“World is a book and those who do not travel read only a page.” – St. Augustine

It’s strange how carefully we notice and observe things which we would not have done otherwise, when there’s ample free time on hand and no hurry whatsoever. As I enjoyed the hot idlis with equally hot sambar, I began to think about my ‘eventful morning’ in a more positive way. The breakfast did me good. I made a note of the quotes on the glass panels and found them so apt; what with my list of places to visit, in India, of course. Somehow this got me introspecting. I didn’t feel like leaving the cozy corner even though I had finished my breakfast. Something in me told me to relax, chill, take it in my stride and not be regretful.

After the breakfast I strolled down to gate number 24 and again checked for the estimated time of departure. Then I looked for a seat on the quieter side of the lounge. Perhaps, I would have never felt this way: even the music that was playing in the background caught my attention and it seemed soothing to my senses. In normal course, I’d have never bothered to listen to it. I wondered, “is my hectic life taking away some of these simple 'pleasures'?” The music was occasionally interrupted by announcements like “Air India announces the departure of its flight to … all passengers are requested to proceed towards gate number 26….etc.” I could see people getting up and moving towards respective gates of their flights.

The agitated mind suddenly changed to a reflective one. Imagine, what a place and time to get seriously thoughtful and think back and forth. Probably that’s the reason my subconscious mind didn’t allow me to do the routine stuff like catching up with the news or browsing on my mobile phone. I was consciously telling myself that I should make proper use of the 'free' time. Most of us must have gone through this – when we begin to introspect, the first things that come to our mind are things that we could not do, what we missed or what could not be achieved. And we begin to speculate and feel bad, guilty about not making use of the opportunities or do things at the right time. My critical problem was my 'writer's block' and it needed immediate treatment. This was the moment I reminded myself of my inability to write, the block that I was trying to clear and compose and publish all the pending blogs and articles. I knew it was not my procrastination, it had to do with the ceasing of clarity of thought, expression and free flowing words. All the while I felt, "I want to write so much, have to say so many things but some unknown 'force' is stopping me and blocking me!"

I seem to have suffered from this 'syndrome' for at least six months now and just couldn’t get down to writing anything cogently, coherently as used to do earlier. I tried different ways of getting over it and failed. My blogs remained as drafts and brainstormed points and ideas sat on my desktop for months. Some write ups never moved from the 'notes' on my mobile phone. Whenever I saw them I felt miserable and guilty. I didn’t know what was happening to my fingers as I wanted to key in the words on my laptop. It seemed as if the fingers are frozen and there was a nervous problem. The mind would brim with ideas and some nice experiences and observations but nothing would get transferred to the readable format. Often, I wished there was some lozenges kind of stuff that would unclog my mind and help me with free flow of words...I longed for that pleasure of putting thoughts into words for that much-needed stress relief and fulfilling the creative urge.

However, the moment I started jotting down the points about my airport incident and began narrating it as it were, I felt a new kind of satisfaction. I was happy to experience the thawing process and the fluidity of words forming into sentences. I was overjoyed and felt like immediately sharing my happiness with my friends with whom I have often cribbed about my block in writing. The expression was natural and I saw this blog taking shape and worth sharing with 'public'. But then, does it mean that I should thank Indigo for indirectly helping me in getting back to my favorite hobby? Yes? Or, no? I'm confused...well, let me not get into this vicious cycle of confusion, muddled thinking, frozen brain and other 'reasons' that sound more like excuses for not writing.

Time can heal, but can it fill a vacuum?

It is one of those typical evenings with my niece, Shreya
As usual,  full of energy, mischief and playfulness
She makes me realize how important it is
To be childlike and never lose that innocence

I hear her calling from the balcony, 'Maasi*!'
'Did you see those stars shining brightly, come here!'
I run towards the balcony along with her
She screams in excitement looking at the stars
(and I didn't find anything special about them)
'One of them must be naana*!' she exclaims
Immediately correcting herself
'No, how can it be naana?'
'Why?' I ask her
'No, naana's star must be in North India'
I ask her, 'why?'
Promptly she replies, 'coz he was born there'
Then I correct her, 'no, he was born in a village near Mysore'
'Okay, then he must be shining brightly near Mysore'

My mood got pensive at the thought of my father
But, brightened up with the little one's reasoning
For a moment I wanted to believe and live her imagination
And didn't want to correct her saying
'The stars remain at the same place no matter where you are'
Probably she was aware of this fact
But, her natural and instantaneous reaction
Was more believable than any scientific reasoning
How beautiful it was - to think of a local star for every human loss...

Later, I went to the balcony
Gazing at the stars, my thoughts go childlike
'I'm sure one of them must be my father'
'Why is it that I never looked at the sky whenever I wanted him'
I wondered ...
Thougths shifting between innocence and experience
Some of them simple and some convoluted
Longing for that pure, unadulterated imagination
Lost somewhere in the process of growing up
Constraining my 'free thinking' with the bounds of reason
Equating loss of life as physical loss
Dreadfully reminding me of how he suffered
How I missed his physical being
A void that no amount of memories would fill
Missed him every day, as days turned into months
And months turned into years
Soon it would be all of six years!

Now I look at the same star
Shining, twinkling now and then
As if telling me, 'why do you feel sad
Look at me and I'm always there for you
Guiding you and cheering you
And tell me now what's bothering you?'

*Maasi in Hindi means maternal aunt and *Naana in Hindi means maternal grandfather

How a delayed flight helped me in overcoming 'writer’s block'

Thanks to the 'extreme' customer service of Indigo airlines, I had to spend at least two extra hours in the airport, not being intimated properly about the delay in flight! Let’s be informed - Indigo believes in personally calling up customers, at any odd hour, than send an SMS. However I'd have appreciated an SMS than a missed call from a weird looking number that I saw on my phone. (BTW, I got to know that commercial calls are cheaper than SMSs). This was the 8.30 AM flight from Hyderabad to Bangalore which eventually took off at 10.10 AM. The reason for delay was a technical glitch for the flight to take off from Jaipur on time. Unfortunately, this is the second time it’s happened to me – both the times with the same flight - what a coincidence! The worst part of the story was my mother calling me soon after I reached the airport to tell me that there was a call on the landline phone from Indigo, probably informing about the delay.

"Had I known about the delay, I would have started late and spent time more productively at home", I cursed myself. This was my instant reaction when I came to know that I missed the call from Indigo on my mobile phone at about 1.43AM when my phone was kept in the other room for charging. Later in the morning, in the midst of hurrying for the early morning trip to the airport, I saw the missed number that seemed strange and completely unidentified. I thought it must be one of those cold calls from the pesky marketeers. So, I didn’t bother to call! Realized my 'mistake', if I could be blamed for not being a good customer!

At the airport, I tried telling the Indigo guys at the boarding counter that they should have sent an SMS and not depended on that call at an odd hour in the night. I frankly don’t know how many people responded to that call. “Okay, now I have so much time, and how do I spend it, there was some kind of irritation at the delay, frustration that I could not pick up that call and so on and on…I was angry at myself because I would be spending double the flight duration to Bangalore, doing nothing worthwhile!”

I took the boarding pass and went through the security check, decided to wander around browsing stuff in some of the shops. But as soon as I went to WH Smith, I felt I should catch up with some recent releases and so on, though I had nothing specific in mind to buy. I looked at the books in sections that interested me and since I had lots of time I really wanted to buy some good books. I purchased “The Game Changers –stories about entrepreneurs from IIT Kharagpur” and some books by Ruskin Bond. Now comes a call from home, “what will you do for so long, if you had known you could have started later, eat your breakfast first, …” that was my mother, over anxious and concerned as usual. After picking up some stuff from the Karachi Bakery and Pulla Reddy Sweets for my people in Bangalore, I headed straight to the Idli Factory, my favourite joint for steaming hot idlis. As soon as I sat at the table, my eyes fell on some interesting quotes on the glass panel there – reading them, I said to myself, “how true!”

“Travel can be one of the most rewarding forms of introspection.”– Lawrence Durell

“World is a book and those who do not travel read only a page.” – St. Augustine

It’s strange how carefully we notice and observe things which we would not have done otherwise, when there’s ample free time on hand and no hurry whatsoever. As I enjoyed the hot idlis with equally hot sambar, I began to think about my ‘eventful morning’ in a more positive way. The breakfast did me good. I made a note of the quotes on the glass panels and found them so apt; what with my list of places to visit, in India, of course. Somehow this got me introspecting. I didn’t feel like leaving the cozy corner even though I had finished my breakfast. Something in me told me to relax, chill, take it in my stride and not be regretful.

After the breakfast I strolled down to gate number 24 and again checked for the estimated time of departure. Then I looked for a seat on the quieter side of the lounge. Perhaps, I would have never felt this way: even the music that was playing in the background caught my attention and it seemed soothing to my senses. In normal course, I’d have never bothered to listen to it. I wondered, “is my hectic life taking away some of these simple 'pleasures'?” The music was occasionally interrupted by announcements like “Air India announces the departure of its flight to … all passengers are requested to proceed towards gate number 26….etc.” I could see people getting up and moving towards respective gates of their flights.

The agitated mind suddenly changed to a reflective one. Imagine, what a place and time to get seriously thoughtful and think back and forth. Probably that’s the reason my subconscious mind didn’t allow me to do the routine stuff like catching up with the news or browsing on my mobile phone. I was consciously telling myself that I should make proper use of the 'free' time. Most of us must have gone through this – when we begin to introspect, the first things that come to our mind are things that we could not do, what we missed or what could not be achieved. And we begin to speculate and feel bad, guilty about not making use of the opportunities or do things at the right time. My critical problem was my 'writer's block' and it needed immediate treatment. This was the moment I reminded myself of my inability to write, the block that I was trying to clear and compose and publish all the pending blogs and articles. I knew it was not my procrastination, it had to do with the ceasing of clarity of thought, expression and free flowing words. All the while I felt, "I want to write so much, have to say so many things but some unknown 'force' is stopping me and blocking me!"

I seem to have suffered from this 'syndrome' for at least six months now and just couldn’t get down to writing anything cogently, coherently as used to do earlier. I tried different ways of getting over it and failed. My blogs remained as drafts and brainstormed points and ideas sat on my desktop for months. Some write ups never moved from the 'notes' on my mobile phone. Whenever I saw them I felt miserable and guilty. I didn’t know what was happening to my fingers as I wanted to key in the words on my laptop. It seemed as if the fingers are frozen and there was a nervous problem. The mind would brim with ideas and some nice experiences and observations but nothing would get transferred to the readable format. Often, I wished there was some lozenges kind of stuff that would unclog my mind and help me with free flow of words...I longed for that pleasure of putting thoughts into words for that much-needed stress relief and fulfilling the creative urge.

However, the moment I started jotting down the points about my airport incident and began narrating it as it were, I felt a new kind of satisfaction. I was happy to experience the thawing process and the fluidity of words forming into sentences. I was overjoyed and felt like immediately sharing my happiness with my friends with whom I have often cribbed about my block in writing. The expression was natural and I saw this blog taking shape and worth sharing with 'public'. But then, does it mean that I should thank Indigo for indirectly helping me in getting back to my favorite hobby? Yes? Or, no? I'm confused...well, let me not get into this vicious cycle of confusion, muddled thinking, frozen brain and other 'reasons' that sound more like excuses for not writing.