Celebrated Holi with great fun with the kids…as with every year, apul started the day early and start preparation enthusiastically…filling up the balloons to make “gubbaras”, mixing water with all the colours…after about one hour and when nobody joined him as it was too early, he said it was getting boring !!! but as more and more of his friends came along and the fun started flowing, he had a great time…
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In response to my post, ” Silver Lining” a commentator observed,
” Dear Tamo Basanta, it will be more meaningful if you give examples of our role models as persons who are not the likes of Agatha Sangma or Sachin Pilot or Jyotiraditya Scindia… who had ready made ladders made by their fathers. Anyway, it’s great to see Agatha Sangma as the youngest minister in the midst of the likes of SM Krishna. Greater to hear that she wants to be the voice of the neglected North East India. To me PA Sangma’s story of how he grew up in a small tribal village of Garo Hills is more interesting than that Agatha Sangma”
I’m highly impressed by Agatha Sangma – yes, today, I may have to introduce her as P.A Sangma’s daughter, but I believe, within a few years, P.A. Sangma might be known as Agatha Sangma’s father. Already the youngest MP at 28, she is set to join the union ministry in a few minutes from now. What impressed me is despite being her father’s daughter and the fact that she has many options open before her because of her excellent academic record ( she did her LLB from Pune, Masters in Environment Management from Nottingham University) – she chose a path which many like to batter, despise and make a scapegoat of but never have the courage to plunge-politics. We blame politics and politicians in particular, but do nothing about it- let alone go out and vote. Do we have the right to complain/blame? Just as we have “rights”, we have corresponding “duties”, as well. Well, I believe, Agatha can be a very good role model for the younger generations in general and those of the northeast in particular.
India goes to the polls today. Starting today, the biggest democracy in the world begins the mammoth task of installing a new government. Because of the sheer size and the logistics included, not to mention security concerns as well, the whole exercise has been split up into 5 phases, ending on the 13th of May.
This time around, because of the rapid strides made in View full article »
I just saw the Time Machine on TV last night and was wondering how technology has evolved through the years, more so within the last 5-10 years. With all kinds of gadgets for all sorts of purposes today, it is indeed a changed world today. Laptops, palmtops, ipods, pmps, PDAs, mobiles, navigators, digital cameras…the list is endless and things like sms, email, blogs, podcasts, online communities like orkut, virtual worlds like second life, virtual identities like avatars etc have become so much part and parcel of one’s world today that it is difficult to imagine what life would have been like without them.
But yesteryears have their own rustic charm which could never be replaced by today’s convenient gadgets. I could vividly remember my childhood years when the only means of personal entertainment at home used to be View full article »
Although I do not relish the typical “Spicy” food, I do like my food with a pinch of salt and pepper. Chilies and those too green chillies in particular- are a favourite and I cannot do without them while having food. Any food I take seem to be incomplete without some form of chilies. Being in the service that I’m in, I need to travel a lot, stay at odd places, sometimes far off from civilized world and more often than not the comforts of “compatible food” is a far cry, not that I’m choosy about food, but it is simply that I like my food to be prepared in a certain way. I can adjust to other ways of preparation and menu, but the effort is much more easier if I have my two best companions – green chilies and garlic. Most of our rest houses are well equipped especially on official tours and the staff do make extra effort to make the “sahib’s” stay as comfortable and as homely as possible. Sometimes, despite the best of efforts, there seems to be less salt in the dal, the mixed vegetable a little too spicy, and the paneer – how do I explain that even though I’m a strict vegetarian, I do not like paneer at all. And that’s when the chilies and garlic come in handy.
Being an avid lover of “shingju – bora” , I try to maintain a steady supply of the major ingredients, especially the aromatic grasses or “maroi”. Unlike Delhi and other places where there is a sizable population of meiteis, and every visitor brings the “shoibums, ngaris, kanglayens,” etc, my places of postings are in areas which are rather off the usual circuit of common Manipuris or chinkis. So, Wherever I’m posted, I ( rather, my wife), maintain a kitchen garden wherein we try to grow all our native vegetables – nakuppi, napakpi, tokningkok, phadigom, phakphai, khongjai napi…and in most cases, quite successfully. However, one of my favourites, the u-morok, the king of all chillies has been an elusive entity. I have been posted in several biogeographic places like the fertile plains of Patiala and Amritsar to the arid sandy areas of Muktsar and Ferozepur. In all these places, I tried growing the u-morok, both on the ground and in pots, and even though they survive and grow well in all these places, they never flower and produce the chillies. So it was just as routine and without much expectation when we planted u-moroks after moving to Chandigarh some two years ago.
And what a surprise it was to see a true u-morok hanging out from the branches, one fine morning while I was watering the plants in my garden. The problem still persists in the sense that of the many plants, only one was bearing fruits and that one plant was bearing only four u-moroks. Anyway, it was such a pleasure to see them there dangling in all their glory and we watch it grow each day, not even dreaming of eating even after it matures!!
He maintained a blog during his lifetime which gives some insight about his work and passion…www.xckevin.blogspot.com
It is part of Indian ethos and culture to treat guests as “Gods” and serve them as if you are serving the Almighty himself. “Atithi devo bhava”, so says the saying in sanskrit. However, as most of us, especially in cities, living in cramp places, fighting for everything from space to clean air to power woes to choked drains to potholed roads to demanding bosses..know all too well, that sinking feeling when the doorbell rings at that odd hour, when you know you have paid all pending bills and the person having the thumb on the bell could only be an “unexpected” guests.
As for me except for some hardcore loyal friends, I have been relatively spared the honour to entertain such guests, even close relatives, as most of the time I have been posted in so called “distant” areas. However, after being posted in Chandigarh, most people have me “visible” in their touring radars and guests have been popping up quite frequently now. Being a frequent traveller myself who likes the comfort of “home” and “home cooked” food, I normally trouble my friends, if I can find one, whenever I land up in a new town or city, intead of staying in a hotel. Based on the experiences I have on such outings to friends places, I try to make improvements in my dealing with guests when I do receive one.
I recently had a few experiences which were quite trying to say the least. One of my close friends visited me with family some days back. They were with me for just a couple of days but during that short period it shattered all myths I had about that family. We tried our best to make their stay comfortable. The conditions at home that time wasn’t helping either- the domestic help was on leave and my young son was not feeling well. We took them out on a guided tour of Chandigarh, prepared “typical manipuri” dishes for them, showed them the best bargains in shopping centers…however, the response to our hospitality can be summed up squarely in one of the one-liner comments – this is ok, but…Well, some people can never be satisfied it seems…
This morning while I was checking my mobile for missed calls and sms after coming out from the bathroom, I noticed that there was a missed call from a friend who is presently based in Guwahati but travels a lot throughout the North Eastern region as part of his job. When I checked the time, it was around 6:30 am, normal for people over there, but way too early for people like me living on the western parts of the country, and he also knows that. So I was a little apprehensive as to what could be the reason while I rang him back at around 8 AM. He said there was almost a sense of hysteria as some Professor from Chennai had predicted that there would be an earthquake today at around 8:21 AM, and news about it having been flashing in all major news channels. I was totally perplexed as to how I could have missed the news. However, when I turned on the TV to Zee and Star and… there was this prof giving his predictions, the local administration in Guwahati assuring the public that all precautions have been taken for any untoward hapennings and he went to churn out statistics of how many hospital beds, policemen, homeguards, firetenders, ambulance…which are kept ready …I could not help laughing out aloud. In this age and time people beleive in such things as predicting an earthquake?…well, my friend who himself is an engineer continued, “…yes it has not been done before but considering the fact that the predictor is a respected professor from Chennai, that there is so much coverage by the media,…there must be something to it…” Well, I told him all the best, and that I would phone at 8:30 am to find out if he is still alive!!!
Well, the devil in me kept me glued to the TV set for hardly 7-8 mins and memories of student days where we used to mug theories on plate tectonics, continental drifts etc falshed before my eyes… before some guest rang the doorbell and I had to go down. When I came up, it was already 8:40am and not able to control my curiosity, I turned on the TV again to find out what happened. Lo and behold, the channels were flashing “Breaking News: No earthquake, prediction fails…”
The Culprits? Dr. N Venkatanathan, who was assisted by Dr. N. Rajeshwar Rao, Dr. KK Sharma, and Dr. P Periakali, all from the department of Geology, Madras University.
 | mandakini on Ukhrul da eigi |
 | Marcelo Damiano on The Elusive U-Morok |
