I'm a nocturnal person, probably to do with being born at midnight :) But what can I say.. I saw a nice comment by my brother Vinod on my blog, and that got me thinking... hmmm...
This post is dedicated to him, Veena and most of all my Periamma (Vinod and Veena's mom), who's no more with us... but left us with many sweet memories.. to cherish and love...
Right, now that the mushy stuff is over, let's get on with the story, shall we? You might wonder what is Bournvita ice-cream. I mean, everyone in India knows Bournvita .. the health drink with that nice song "tan ki shakti, man ki shakti bournvitaa!!" but ice-cream from Bournvita?? Well, this was the brainwave that struck Veena, Shilpu and me at Ghatkopar one day. So we decided to experiment, with help from Vinod of course. Now, I'm going the Project Management way to show you what all happened....
Project: To make professional quality ice-cream from Bournvita and milk.
Resources: Vinod, Veena, Shilpu and Me, a large steel pataram (vessel), spoon, rusty old egg beater.
Ingriedients: Milk, Bournvita powder, Sugar and Ice.
Technology: Refrigerator (not frost free)
Sprint 1 : We mix Bournvita powder (4 tbsps - it's a wonder we didn't get pasted for this), 2 cups milk, 5 tbps sugar and blend all this nicely in that steel vessel. We put it in the fridge to set. Hours later, no effect, its cold but not set. The bulb blinks on, someone realises it sets in the freezer not the lower part of the fridge, so we put it in the fridge.
We get up at 3am in the morning to check our ice-cream (if our parents used the same motivation for us to study, we would be NASA scientists today), it sets, but like well, ice.. impossible to take out or eat.
Sprint 2: we defrost sprint 1 and decide to put it in ice tray instead (I know, I know.. how the hell is that going to make a difference, but to be fair, we were only 8 then). Bad result, plus a fair amount of questioning from Periamma as to what exactly we were doing poking our heads into the fridge so many times. We decide to do this another day and dump the stuff before someone finds out the wasted milk and Bournvita.
Sprint 3: Introduction of new resource, Sriram (Vinod and Veena's cousin). He gets the bright idea to mix salt with the Milk-Bournvita-Sugar concoction so that it sets like ice-cream. Now that I think of it, good idea, but bad proportions. We mix salt, nobody has a clue how much so the measurement is random. Result is good setting, it does resemble ice-cream but one spoon in the mouth and everyone goes.... BLAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!! It's salty ice-cream!!!!!!!
That did it, we abandoned attempts to do any ice-cream business then and decided that the 5 buck ice-cream at Tequila bar was better than all the effort to actually make one.
I can tell so many other things at Ghatkopar, the best part was that Periamma was the coolest parent I ever knew. She was fun, strict, but had a nice way of being strict, and basically let us make messes and well be kids...
Life is complicated now, but Bournvita Ice-cream always brings a smile to my face.. :))
P.S:- Veensey, we missed doing that dance the last time you were here... ;-)
Sunday, November 22, 2009
Wedding - Shedding, Shaadi-Vaadi
I had been to a wedding today with Tani and my friend, Arpana and her son Aditya. Watching the two kiddos reminded me of all the weddings we went to when we were kids.. and so here I am!!!
Anybody who has been even remotely associated with a Pattar family will know the importance of a "Kalyanam" (wedding in Iyer lingo). It's the mother of all affairs, more important than electing the country's PM or surviving a tsunami. Parents get their children dressed, themselves dressed and the hours spent discussing what sari to wear will probably make Gandhiji turn in his grave (not that he has one, but you get the point :)). Women take the frontseat here, bustling about, picking out clothes for their hapless husbands who follow merely because there won't be any food cooked at home on that day... besides the "booffaayy" chaapaadu is worth it!
For us kids, luckily, we had a whole battalion of weddings to attend thanks to so many mamas and chittis getting married one after the other (yes, they were planned that way!). Sandy, Shilpu and me got to attend a lot of them, our whole focus was on dressing up... this was the one time you got to wear nailpolishes, "leefteeks", jewellery and look cool...! Mahalaxmi Mami (Sandy's mom) was our default lipstick person, she had the best shades in her handbag. We would get to wear them after ALL dressing and eating was done, before going to the hall. Post the lipstick application, we wouldn't let the upper lip and lower lip touch each other even while swallowing SALIVA!!! This is because the lipstick would run off otherwise... LOL!!
Once we were at the hall, there would be a mad dash to sit next to the poor bride and groom so that we would come in the "video". Not complying with this rule would lead to cold stares and tight pinches from our mothers who thought that coming in the video was "visible proof" that we have attended the wedding (Honestly, I really don't think the bride and groom could care less, but their parents would for some weird reason). There would also be a competition of sorts between kids from the girl's side and boy's side. This not only applied to videos but also to playing outside & eating.
When there's a wedding in the family, then what fun!! We kids got first preference when it came to clothes. Sandy, Shilpa and I were always "band baajaa" (same clothes, in different colors). I remember Virmani Mama's wedding, the "pavadais"... the material came from Madras (now Chennai). I got a peacock blue one with a dark blue border (temple style), Sandy got the parrot green one with identical color border, Shilpu got a rose colored one with same border. But there was a problem. Sandy's and mine had golden "buttas", Shilpus' did not!!! Big issue...!! Shilpu was weeping, mine is not same as theirs, you are leaving me out, I am the odd one... and so on. My parents were in a fix, trying to tell her its ok, Sandy and I being the bad ones were smirking, while trying to look sympathetic. Well, my grandma had her way and sent the material back with a neighbor to Chennai and got another rose colored one with the same buttas and border for Shilpu!!!! Can ya beat that??
Now, there's the food thing.. Shilps and Sandy hated curds, I loved it! When the "thayiru pachadi" guy would come, they would say no, put their hands over their elais while I would ask that mama to put thayiru pachadi for those two, which would get them really upset! Once, I fooled Shilpu by saying that the Mango Kadi (Mambaya Morkootan) was actually payasam and she allowed the Mama to put it in her elai... then threw up and I got into a whole lotta trouble with my grandma for that. He He He...! I would like to add some stuff here about people's eating habits we would observe.. but will refrain (Sandy, Shilpu, Vidya will know what I am talking about).
The best part is those memories you form. As a child, you are least bothered about fashion, dress sense, the heat, the good food, the bad food... etc. You really aren't bothered about the bride and groom either. All you care about is meeting other kids and having a blast, playing cricket with laddoos and stuffing as many flowers as you can in your hair.
We still have those pavadais (south indian ghaghra cholis), the dresses that we got for Mina Akka's wedding (hey, Gokul atim actually called us "models"... we were in cloud nine after that!!) and Virmani Mama's wedding are still around somewhere. They were priceless for us, probably because that was the only other time we got new outfits (apart from Diwali and birthdays).
And probably, because a wedding to us, was a party to attend... a child's innocence.... an adult's misconception....
Anybody who has been even remotely associated with a Pattar family will know the importance of a "Kalyanam" (wedding in Iyer lingo). It's the mother of all affairs, more important than electing the country's PM or surviving a tsunami. Parents get their children dressed, themselves dressed and the hours spent discussing what sari to wear will probably make Gandhiji turn in his grave (not that he has one, but you get the point :)). Women take the frontseat here, bustling about, picking out clothes for their hapless husbands who follow merely because there won't be any food cooked at home on that day... besides the "booffaayy" chaapaadu is worth it!
For us kids, luckily, we had a whole battalion of weddings to attend thanks to so many mamas and chittis getting married one after the other (yes, they were planned that way!). Sandy, Shilpu and me got to attend a lot of them, our whole focus was on dressing up... this was the one time you got to wear nailpolishes, "leefteeks", jewellery and look cool...! Mahalaxmi Mami (Sandy's mom) was our default lipstick person, she had the best shades in her handbag. We would get to wear them after ALL dressing and eating was done, before going to the hall. Post the lipstick application, we wouldn't let the upper lip and lower lip touch each other even while swallowing SALIVA!!! This is because the lipstick would run off otherwise... LOL!!
Once we were at the hall, there would be a mad dash to sit next to the poor bride and groom so that we would come in the "video". Not complying with this rule would lead to cold stares and tight pinches from our mothers who thought that coming in the video was "visible proof" that we have attended the wedding (Honestly, I really don't think the bride and groom could care less, but their parents would for some weird reason). There would also be a competition of sorts between kids from the girl's side and boy's side. This not only applied to videos but also to playing outside & eating.
When there's a wedding in the family, then what fun!! We kids got first preference when it came to clothes. Sandy, Shilpa and I were always "band baajaa" (same clothes, in different colors). I remember Virmani Mama's wedding, the "pavadais"... the material came from Madras (now Chennai). I got a peacock blue one with a dark blue border (temple style), Sandy got the parrot green one with identical color border, Shilpu got a rose colored one with same border. But there was a problem. Sandy's and mine had golden "buttas", Shilpus' did not!!! Big issue...!! Shilpu was weeping, mine is not same as theirs, you are leaving me out, I am the odd one... and so on. My parents were in a fix, trying to tell her its ok, Sandy and I being the bad ones were smirking, while trying to look sympathetic. Well, my grandma had her way and sent the material back with a neighbor to Chennai and got another rose colored one with the same buttas and border for Shilpu!!!! Can ya beat that??
Now, there's the food thing.. Shilps and Sandy hated curds, I loved it! When the "thayiru pachadi" guy would come, they would say no, put their hands over their elais while I would ask that mama to put thayiru pachadi for those two, which would get them really upset! Once, I fooled Shilpu by saying that the Mango Kadi (Mambaya Morkootan) was actually payasam and she allowed the Mama to put it in her elai... then threw up and I got into a whole lotta trouble with my grandma for that. He He He...! I would like to add some stuff here about people's eating habits we would observe.. but will refrain (Sandy, Shilpu, Vidya will know what I am talking about).
The best part is those memories you form. As a child, you are least bothered about fashion, dress sense, the heat, the good food, the bad food... etc. You really aren't bothered about the bride and groom either. All you care about is meeting other kids and having a blast, playing cricket with laddoos and stuffing as many flowers as you can in your hair.
We still have those pavadais (south indian ghaghra cholis), the dresses that we got for Mina Akka's wedding (hey, Gokul atim actually called us "models"... we were in cloud nine after that!!) and Virmani Mama's wedding are still around somewhere. They were priceless for us, probably because that was the only other time we got new outfits (apart from Diwali and birthdays).
And probably, because a wedding to us, was a party to attend... a child's innocence.... an adult's misconception....
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