From Godliness to Worldiness and back in 15 Minutes!

As a rule, I don’t eavesdrop.
As a rule, I am not judgmental.
But this morning, I broke my rules!

The First Round

I was in the park, walking the well-trodden track around it, cogitating over the age-old question – why mothers smother their children, when I turned the corner and came upon four middle-aged ladies singing a hymn – they sat upon the benches with their feet tucked neatly under them, singing and swaying – praying to Lord Shiva and his consort, the Goddess Parvati (Some of our gods and goddesses are happily married couples – such as Shiva and Parvati, Laxmi and Vishnu, and a few others, whose names wifey would be able to recall quite swiftly, if asked. But I am not going to ask.)

Anyway, so that was my first round around the park.

The Second Round

Then I passed them again, and it became clear to me that one of the ladies, the one equipped with the shrillest voice, was the leader of the group. She was preaching to the other ladies, her wide-eyed and innocent followers, and they were listening intently.

“so you see, it’s all moh-maya, ji (material things). If you go to a saint who lives in a hut and ask him about his wellbeing, he would say, mauj hai! (Life is fun!) but if you ask a rich man, he’ll bore you with the stories of his trials and tribulations. So you see, it’s all in your heart. If your heart is pure, nothing will bother you – neither your neighbor’s new car nor his wife’s new jewelry.”

The Third Round

The third round brought me to them again. The preacher had now finished preaching and there had been a significant drop in her decibel levels. She was now almost whispering, and the other ladies were leaning towards her, trying to catch every pearl that dropped from their leader’s lips.

“If I hadn’t wheedled it out of their maid, nobody would have learned about it, ji. Their son has landed a very high paying job in a multinational company, and he is an engineer from some faltu-sa (useless) college – so they might be lying about it for all we know, but that woman didn’t even have the courtesy to tell us. Perhaps she thought we would ask her to distribute sweets. What a cheapskate, hain ji? (Isn’t she?)”

The Fourth Round

On my fourth round, I came upon them again. Once again, the four of them had pulled their feet up and tucked them neatly under their bottoms. Sitting there thus, with their eyes closed, their heads oscillating sideways, they were chanting once again, praying to Lord Ram, counting the number of times they took his name.

Thirty-one Ram Ram, Thirty-two Ram Ram, Thirty-three…

Hai Ram!

 

The Great Indian Pothole through a Quirky Indian’s Lenses.

In the life of an Indian, a pothole isn’t just a hole in the road – it is a traditional concept that dreams are woven around.

How?

Read Pothole, Pothole, thank you for saving me! to appreciate the positive influence of potholes on our daily lives.

Please don’t comment here…comment on my ROFLwithQSM blog – so that we can have some Quirky Snarky Malarkey with Hot Chai and pakodas.

Bidesi (Foreign) Indophiles might not be able to appreciate the goodness of Chai and pakodas (not pagodas,) without further explanation…so here’s one. (Note that this explanation is by me alone – wifey didn’t help at all.)

Pakodas are delicious Indian snacks prepared by covering a wide variety of veggies in chickpea-flour paste, dunking them into boiling oil and frying them until they turn crisp. These awesome snacks are then devoured with sauces and pickles, and washed down with Chai (hot milk-tea.)

PS: Just happened to hum the song…
I: Ek garam chai ki pyali ho…aur usko… (If only there was a cup of hot tea…and a…)
Wifey: pilane wala ho?! (a gentleman who’d prepare it for me?)

Reminding you once again…this isn’t the post. Read the post by clicking the following link:

Pothole, Pothole, thank you for saving me!

#ROFLwithQSM friends!

 

Diaper-changing Dads or Mansplainers?

When Snapdeal published their advertisement lauding diaper-changing dads, I am sure they had no intention of reigniting the mansplaining debate in my house. I don’t blame them, for in all probability their advertisement was visualized by a mansplaining ignorant man…

“Mansplaining Mania Spills Over in an Advertisement on Father’s Day!” on the QSM Blog is the second part of my mansplaining debacle, and I hope that it marks the end of this series of unfortunate events.

Click Snarky to see the Mansplaining cartoon!

If you haven’t yet followed my new blog, please follow it – because that’s where all the new posts go. There’s a blue button in the right sidebar – just click it…and no, I am requesting, not mansplaining.

Mansplaining Defined and Purposefully Explained.

Just posted: Mansplaining? Let me tell you what it is, to share my recent learning experience under wifey’s tutelage.

It’s on my new blog – and if you aren’t following it, you are missing out on all the Quirky Snarky Malarkey that I’ll be dishing out in the future. Not mansplaining, just requesting. Visit ROFLwithQSM.com/blog/ and click the blue Follow button in the right sidebar. See you on the other side 😀

Click the image to reach the QSMwithROFL.com website.

#ROFLwithQSM

A Special post for my Blogging Friends

My Blogger Friends,

This post is for you.

As you must’ve noticed, my posting schedule has gone haywire recently, and my visiting behavior is even worse.  Let me explain.

• For the last 3 weeks, I’ve been working on publishing the next issue of the QSM magazine. Trust me, if that were the only thing I had been working on, life would been easy, but there are two projects that I am pitching for with little hope of any of those coming my way.
• Yet, if those were the only two things I had been working on, life would still be livable, but there are 4-5 hours long power cuts, and when the day temperature hits 115 F, there’s little motivating you to create silly Powerpoint presentations.
• I’d still sweat it out, I’d get up at 3 AM instead of 4 AM and try to get things done, and life would still trundle along, but then Mom is here.  She’s back – the commander of the indomitable army that’s made entirely of her, and when Mom and Wifey are both in the same house, you get plucked, marinated, and roasted.

And roasted ducks don’t blog.

With that litany of excuses, I’ll attempt to evoke your gentle and forgiving nature, and request you to overlook my tardy online behavior. Soon after the magazine is published, I’ll be back to stalking your blogs and leaving some quirky but mostly snarky remarks. This also means that the QSM magazine will hit your inboxes soon (I won’t put my foot in my mouth once again by providing a date, but it’s going to be very very soon. Just don’t write me off yet 😀

And then, there’s something coming up for all of us. Piyusha Vir, the quirky Editor of QSM’s Facebook page has taken the onus of that announcement upon herself, so I’ll leave it to her, but from my viewpoint, it’s rather biiiiig!

I’ll be back with more…soon. “Until then,” as our news-anchors say, “stay here, don’t go anywhere, don’t do anything useful, because I’ll be back with some sweet, sour, and spicy, quirky, snarky, malarkey!”

Do visit the Facebook page of the magazine and Like it because it’s utterly bitterly delicious 😀

 

497 marks out of 500! What lies ahead?

Delhi girl Sukirti Gupta has set a new standard for examinees India-wide. Now parents have a new bench-mark for their kids, and those prepping up for taking the board exams next year now have a new kind of nightmare – they now see menacing fours and nines and sevens in their dreams, and then they wake up screaming.

But all this fades in comparison to the resulting benefits. For instance, expect businesses to benefit from Sukirti’s feat. I also believe that in future all this may lead to stronger familial bonding in India’s already bonded-by-fevicol families.

Motivational Products for Children:

I hear that some stationery manufacturers are planning to recruit a phoren-ka-cartoonist (foreign cartoonist) to create a cartoon likeness of Sukirti so that they may manufacture geometry boxes and notebooks with the cartoon on top with a callout near her head with a motivational anecdote from her life. For instance, “I used to wake up at 2 in the morning, walk straight into the bathroom, and dunk my head in a bucket of ice water. If I could do it, you can do it too!”

Advertisements of Coaching Institutes:

I’ve also come to know that coaching institutes are thinking of roping in Sukirti’s look-alikes for advertising their offerings. The copy of such ads could read, “I studied at Tunkuram Institute and got a near-perfect score,” or “waste neither light nor life by studying hard, when you can study smart – enroll yourself in Pinkuram Institute to become the next topper!”

Names of the Indian Newborns:

If it is not already happening to little newborn babies all across the country, I am confident that it will begin shortly. Parents will now begin to name their daughter Sukirti and their sons Sukirtan, in the hope that eighteen years later,  The Times of India will publish their picture with their naak ka baal (hair of their nose – as in their blue-eyed child,) parivar ka gaurav (honor of the family,) and khaandaan ki shaan (pride of their dynasty) – in which they’ll be seen proudly proclaiming how on the chromosomal level they were the ones responsible for those 490-some marks out of 500.

So you see, it is just the beginning of a grading-apocalypse. But I’ll leave a more in-depth analysis of the situation to Arnab Goswami and speak about matters closer to the QSM Magazine:

Last week Piyusha Vir, the Wandering Soul of the blogging world, decided to take matters into her own capable hands and shunted me out of the Facebook Page Management business. I accepted her decision and handed the page over to her. Now she is the editor of the page and in the last 5 days, the page likes have already crossed 50! I’d like to thank her for not just lending me a helping hand, but also for placing trust in QSM’s potential.

If you are on Facebook and you haven’t liked the QSM Magazine’s Facebook page yet, please do so now. A lot of good stuff is waiting to happen there 😀

 

The QSM Magazine – Anandhotep makes a Splash in the Rajma Bowl.

The May-June issue is still not on stands, and trust me when I tell you that the blame lies squarely on the shoulders of that twit Anandhotep. I sent him the air-tickets; I emptied my cupboard so that he could store his stinky old bandages in it; I ordered figs and grapes online; I cleared the bed-box for him to curl in after work – but that pinhead didn’t arrive in time; instead he couriered me a scarab with his message engraved upon its underbelly.

“I’m not in the right mood,” the hieroglyphics read. (Here’s the actual reproduction of the hieroglyphics thanks to the online English to Egyptian Hieroglyphics translator at: http://quizland.com/hiero.mv)

That was the message the bonehead sent me, leaving me high and dry, wondering how I’d face my audience.

Not in the right mood?!

What kind of excuse was that? What was the bugger up to?!

I had a bad feeling about the whole thing. For about three weeks, I received no communication from him and I sat twiddling my thumbs, wondering how the magazine would survive without that moody and irresponsible bucket of bones at the helm of affairs.

And then, suddenly, with no prior intimation, he materialized right there on top of the dining table, in the bowl of rajma (kidney beans for the Indophile foreigner,) splashing and thrashing about, splattering us all red and maroon.

“Here I am!” he said, pulling his rajma-dripping self out of the bowl. Mom looked at him with disdain – a lot of things repulse her but nothing – repeat – nothing shocks her, so even this didn’t; Dad grunted indifferently; wifey first shrieked then recognized him and shot her sweetest smile his way. (I don’t like the way she smiles at that frizzy frumpy fool; if I didn’t know that she was in love with the neat and natty me, I’d have thought there was something brewing between those two.)

I did what I did. At first I sulked. Then I complained. Next I tried to extract a promise from him – that he won’t leave me in a lurch ever again. I’m still not sure if he made that promise – those bandages hide his expressions, but I am sure that he’s going to be around for a while. After all, he wouldn’t have lugged that humungous suitcase half-way across the globe, if he didn’t mean to stay.

You know that he knows the way around the house, and wifey follows him around like a love-sick puppy – so even before it could all sink in, I found his suitcase emptied and stowed away and three sets of stinky old and ragged bandages hanging in my wardrobe. The mummy itself was seated in my seat, typing away furiously.

This of course, means that QSM shall soon be hitting the stands. Now that Anandhotep is here, I can rest easy.

 

Stroll…Stroller…Road-roller!

Stroll? Hmmm.
Stroll? I think I’m getting an idea.
Stroll?…wait, I’ve got to switch on my computer!

“Kya stroll te stroller da siyappa laga rakha hai?” (Why are you raising such a hue and cry about stroll and stroller?) Mom’s booming voice caught me unawares and I toppled out of my chair.

“Stroll Mummy Ji, Stroll,” murmured wifey in a tone that could’ve meant two things – one, she wanted Mom to disappear and go for a “stroll” in that “go, take a walk”, dismissive kind of meaning, or she could’ve been clarifying my statement to Mom in an effort to ensure that Mom didn’t cast one of her witchy spells to change the flavor of our conversation entirely, by bringing in the apparently innocuous stroller into it. With wifey you can never say. I stole a sideways glance to see which meaning Mom decided to hear. With Mom too, you can never say.

Fortunately for wifey, and unfortunately for me, Mom decided to focus on the second meaning.

“Stroller? Arey tum dono se kuch ho to stroller ka munh dekhen hum!” (Stroller? If only the two of you were capable of doing something, I’d turn fortunate enough to see the face of a stroller.)

“Mom,” I interjected, “let us not go there again please.”

“Go where, puttar (son)?” Mom shot me a glance that was quicker and sharper than a Rampuri knife and continued, “if only I had a stroller with your son in it to give me company, I’d go somewhere. I could show my face in the neighborhood. I could boast about my grandson…at least.”

The “at least” was a well-thought-of-afterthought – a barb that was almost invisible – hidden in the tail of the scorpion-statement she flung at me.

“Mom,” I repeated – trying to sound calm as my temper began to rise, “I said: let us not go there. Whether or not we get a stroller would depend on a lot of things – not just your need to boast.”

“To main deenge maarti hoon? (So you are saying that I boast?) Is this why I brought you in this world? Is this why I carried you in my womb for nine months and seven days? Did I do all that so that today you tell me that I boast?”

“Mummy ji,” wifey intervened. I shuddered inwardly. She had the knack to make worsen the worst. “Mummy ji,” she said, “he didn’t mean to say that, he only meant that we aren’t ready for a child yet.”

I covered my face with my hands and waited for the inevitable!

“Ma-bete ke beech taang mat ada,” (Literal translation: Don’t stick your foot between mother and son,) Mom blasted her, “go into the kitchen and make a cup of tea for me. For all I know, something’s wrong with you!” She then turned to me and continued, “This is what happens when you pick a girl from a different community – no strollers, not even one! Everyone gets one…everyone! Even the newly married modern couples – they go on their honeymoon, and the first thing they buy after they come back, is a stroller. All I ever wanted from you was a blue stroller…but you never think of your mother’s feelings, do you?”

“Mom, should I go to the market and buy you a blue stroller? Will that make you happy?” I asked her.

She stopped her litany, then riveted me to my seat using her characteristic unblinking stare. “You don’t mean it, do you?” she asked.

“Of course, I do. If a stroller makes you happy, I’ll buy one for you. I might even get an off-season discount if I bought it right away.”

She looked at me. She knew something was fishy. I never gave in that easily.

And then she understood.

She didn’t go for a stroll; I didn’t buy a stroller. I just faithfully reproduced the whole incident for my readers. 

This post is written in response to the daily post prompt Stroll.

Beached!

“If the word “beach” makes you think of “beached”, you must get your head examined!” exclaimed the lady who in the first place was responsible for my thinking up the word “beached” when I saw the daily post prompt “beach.”

The fact that she must watch me surreptitiously is one of the reasons why I feel beached in a house that’s at least a thousand miles away from any beach.

“And why?” I ask my jailor, swiveling my chair to face her, “why do you think that I shouldn’t have thought of the word “beached”?”

“Because “beached” means “stranded”, “marooned”, “wrecked”, “abandoned”, “left high and dry!”

I get up with the speed of light, find my wallet and my car-keys, and rush out. She’s still right behind me. At the door, I turn. Her face morphs into an island with a single palm tree, under which I see myself, watching the wreckage of the ship that I used to call my life; and her nose twists itself and transforms into a question mark. She still wants to know.

“Because of you,” I answer, ducking and scooting out of the door, and the vase crashes against the wall.

I run down the stairs, skipping alternate steps, get into the car, and start the car.

It doesn’t start.

I try again.

Instinctively I look up and see her watching me triumphantly. Suddenly and miraculously, I acquire the ability to lip-read.

 

I think you know what I read.

Written in response to today’s prompt “Beach.”

I and others of my kind are causing global warming and climate change!

The Accusation:

I am sure you had no inkling that I was the culprit – that it was this despicable me who caused climate change; that I am the guy who’s responsible for the depletion of the ozone layer, the melting of the glaciers, the increase in the global temperature, and everything else that is wrong with our Earth climatically!

But Mom thinks I am.

The Digression:

Perhaps I overreach when I say that “I” am the one responsible for climate change – I should keep my language inclusive and say, “my kind.” But then Mom doesn’t care about the newfangled norms of inclusive communication, nor does she think that there are others of my kind – for her, I am a unique piece of work, a man who shot himself in both his feet – in the first foot by marrying a girl who became his bane, and in the second foot by leaving a cushy job and becoming a programmer. She, of course, doesn’t say this in English…she uses the gorier and more violent hindi expression – apne payr per khud kulhari maari hai tumne,” (you swung an axe to chop off your own feet!)

I apologize for digressing, but talking about Mom makes me lose my sense of direction – actually, if I followed Mom’s example and talked gory, when I talk about her, I feel like a freshly decapitated chicken who has lost his sense of purpose.

But oh, I’ve digressed even further. We were talking about climate change, and Mom’s belief that I, her errant son, is the man who has caused it.

Let me lay it out for you – plain and simple, unsalted and un-spiced!

The Situation:

I was on phone, talking to an acquaintance about a mobile app, when I felt the quality of the air around me change. I could feel it heat up and trust me when I say that I even felt a build up of static energy around me. With the phone still in my hand, I turned to identify the source of the heat. Right there, about two feet from me, stood Mom – huffing and puffing, and fuming from her ears and nostrils. She stood akimbo, her feet planted firmly on the ground, as far from each other as the perimeter of her saree would permit, and her huge round eyes bore into me.

When Mom stands like that, she means business – and in her case, business means giving me  run down on one of my crimes.

So I hastily ended the conversation with my acquaintance, and turned to face her fully.

The Conversation:

“Yes Mom,” I asked, trying to appear brave, like I didn’t care even if she has a machete hidden behind her.
“So you are the one,” she jabbed a finger at my nose.
That made me curious. She couldn’t be thinking of me as “the one” who’d save the world. Spiderman, Superman, Wonder woman, Green Lantern,  Batman, Cat Woman…there was a whole brigade recruited by DC Comics and Marvel guys, who were working their butts off to save the world. And yet, who knew – Mom might’ve seen something in me that had escaped the creators of these superheroes!
“The one?” I enquired.
“The one who is causing this whole issue of climate change. The one who is making the world hotter. The one who is responsible for the odd-even scheme, that has made us miserable!”
“The odd-even scheme? But Arvind Kejriwal is responsible for it, and you know it,” I forgot those other allegations by her…for this I had proof!
“You, he, what is the difference? He studied in IIT, he became a politician; you studied in IIT, you became a programmer. See how both of you took an axe to your feet?”
The fact that becoming the chief minister of Delhi is no mean feat and by no means comparable to becoming a programmer, was lost on Mom.
“And you are worse than Arvind Kejriwal,” she continued, “you and your programmer friends are the reason why we have been facing climate problems, which led to the odd-even scheme, and I had to pay twice the regular fare to hire a cab to go to Delhi on the 23rd, because the number of your bucket of bolts ends in a 4!” she spewed it all forth in one fiery breath, as she towered and I cowered.
“Please explain, Mom. How am I responsible for climate change?” Even when under parental fire, a programmer can’t let go of his need to understand the logic.
“You are one of those who are messing up the clouds, aren’t you? You access the cloud, you store stuff on the cloud, you and your ilk engage in cloud-corrupting!”

And then it dawned upon me.
“Cloud-computing?” I said.

The Judgment:

“Call it what you will – all I know is that one mustn’t mess with nature. You use those clouds for other things, then they don’t do what they are supposed to do – THEY…DON’T…MAKE…RAIN!”

Note for the readers of the QSM Magazine:
The May-June Issue of the QSM Magazine should roll off the line by May 15th. The theme of this issue is “juggling responsibilities.” Have your say in it, by sending me your thoughts in less than 150 words by May 10th.
Thank you!
The Cloud-corruptor.

 

When will Rahul Baba get married? India wants to know.

Click the image to lose yourself in 52 pages of Indian Wedding humor – read the QSM Magazine Online.

Fitting a misfit with social-shoes is Impossible – says wifey!

“Why do you have to do it?” she asked, pushing a cup of cardamom tea in front of me, displacing my magic trackpad, so that the Facebook icon that I was adding to the following Facebook header got scaled up a thousand times, and covered the whole image.

Wifey Speaks her Mind!

It irked me, but displaying my irk would’ve made the cardamom tea disappear; so instead I smiled at her and asked her the obvious question.
“What?”
“All this Facebook-shacebook,” she said, pointing to the blue blot on my computer screen.
“I am trying to promote the QSM magazine,” I replied, “what’s wrong with it?”
“You aren’t made for it,” she said with an air of finality, as she turned, then marched out of the room.
For a moment, I sat there stuck to my seat, flabbergasted.
What made her say that?
Suddenly, the need to find an answer to that question superseded my need to get that damn Facebook sticker right. So I followed her out of the room and into the kitchen.

I Look for Answers!

“Why did you say that?” I queried.
“What did I say?” she parried.

“That I am not made for Facebook,” I asked, the dam of my patience on the verge of breaking. She knew what I was talking about, but she wanted me to spell it out. Was I seeing some streaks of sadism shine through her otherwise amicable temperament?
 But I needed the answer. So I prodded her again.
“You aren’t made for it because you are an introvert, and to make matters worse you don’t want the world to know who you are,” she said, tossing the rolled chapati upon the pan.
“You know that I have six dozen family members, who’d be baying for my blood if they read my blog or the QSM magazine, and still you question my need to stay anonymous,” I      asked, angst filling my heart. Of all people, she should understand it.
“And also because you visit your Facebook page once a week and Twitter once a fortnight,” she said, rolling a new chapati. I have no idea how she manages to roll it into such a perfect circle, but then I am clueless about most of the things she does, including why she harasses me with her harsh judgments of my character.
“So according to you, I shouldn’t have a Facebook page or even a Twitter account?” I enquired, tentatively.
“And,” she paused and stopped rolling the chapati, then turned and looked into my eyes, “you should stop publishing that silly magazine!”

And the Answer Tumbles out!

“What? Why?” I asked, trying to figure out what set her off against the magazine.

“Because Sajjan Chacha has called four times since morning. He wants you to swear that it wasn’t you who had written Live Decor ka Vaada (The Promise of Live Decor) article in the QSM magazine, and he also wants you to participate in a QSM burning event this afternoon, after which you’ll swear the solemn oath that you’d never publish that nefarious magazine again.”

 

My Last Lucid Memory:

That was my last lucid memory.
When I woke up, I remembered only bits and pieces of what had transpired.
Wifey tells me that when she told me of Sajjan Chacha’s ultimatum, my mouth fell open, a couple of copulating mosquitoes flew in and set me coughing; in that fit, I stumbled, hit my head on the corner of the kitchen table and lost consciousness.
I shall be attending the swearing-my-innocence ceremony this afternoon.
I don’t intend to keep the words I speak at the QSM burning ceremony, because if I stopped publishing the QSM magazine, Anandhotep will bury me in his tomb beside him – but I must rely on my dear readers for promoting the QSM magazine – I cannot, repeat, cannot let any of my myriad uncles, aunts, and cousins learn about it. I also intend to use the Obliviate spell to obliterate Sajjan Chacha’s memories of the QSM magazine.

But Who is the Mole?

Hey, wait a minute!
Who told Sajjan Chacha?

What’s your theory?

Help Me.

Thank you.

For answering my cry for help. There are a hundred things going wrong in my life right now, and I am hanging from a precipice, waiting for someone… anyone, say Mr. Goyal, or Trooplijaah, or even Mom to pull me up and save me…or not.

But Mr. Goyal, as I noticed this morning, is busy with matters that are more important than helping a neighbor in need. Mrs. Goyal has still not learned to prepare tea per the taste of Mr. Goyal, and according to what half the block heard, Mrs. Goyal has been practicing the craft of tea-making and trying to poison Mr. Goyal for the last 35 years!

I cannot expect help from a man who’s being poisoned by his own wife now, can I?

Trooplijaah has developed a hatred for us earthlings, and we all have a certain Peeeyoookkkhaaa to thank for it. As I hang from this cliff, clinging to dear life; he watches me from the shadows, smirking and grinning. “When I needed your help, you sided with Peeeyoookkkhaaa, and now you want me to pull you up? When I wanted to meet her, you shut me in that carton with a copy of Bhagwad Gita! Isn’t it written in Bhagwad Gita – the soul is immortal – water cannot soak it, wind cannot dry it, fire cannot burn it – the soul doesn’t die, only the body does. Recall from your book of infinite wisdom that this body is just a fashionable piece of clothing for your soul; when the fashion changes, your soul too removes the old out-of-fashion dress and dons the new one!”

Tell me, how can I expect a uni-eyed man I wronged just a few months ago, to help me?

Mom comes right to the edge of the precipice, asks the maid to pull her a chair of gold, and perches herself upon it. Then she looks down at me and my bloodied fingers that about to slip on the stone slick and slippery with my blood, then waits for me to cry for help. “Mom, help. Pull me up,” I swallow my pride and cry for help. Her eyes drill deep into mine, then she snickers. “Lodh padi to aagaya maangne, (when a need has arisen, he comes requesting help,)” she says, chewing then spitting each word at me.

Her words, more than the sharp nudge of her stick on my fingers, throw me off – not just off the cliff, but off the desire to fight and to live. My fingers slip and I find my self falling into the gorge below – I feel the air scrape against my skin; I hear its roar through my reverberating eardrums; I see the ground rush up to meet me – and I close my eyes. Knowing that my life as I knew it was over – Knowing that even if I survived the fall, I’ll be maimed for life, in those few seconds, I pray that I die.

When I survive with my limbs gnarled and twisted from the fall, Mom looks at me, repelled by the sight of me, then tells anyone who’d listen, “I could’ve saved him, but he didn’t ask for help. I even had a rope with me, and I’d have held it for him, had he asked me properly. It’s his fault that he’s in this shape, you see.”

 

I shall be operational soon. I think my heart is beginning to beat again – the beat is slow and out of rhythm, but wifey believes that with her love and support, I shall soon be back in action again. Anandhotep to has sent me a get-well-soon card. (Who could’ve guessed that the man still has a heart under those rotting, stinking bandages?)

A Bollywood Movie for Civil Services Aspirants – Your GK will never be the same again!

• I confess.
• I watched a movie on TV.
• I learned that a movie could be a learning experience too.

  Especially, a movie such as Players. This is a movie that every Civil Services Aspirant must watch, because it improves your General Knowledge by leaps and bounds – and you don’t have to work hard for it.

Well, actually, I might be exaggerating slightly. The movie has Abhishek Bachchan playing the lead, and keeping your eyes open when he is on the screen, can involve some work, but his presence is offset by the twin presences of the sizzling Bipasha Basu and the dazzling Sonam Kapoor. Then there’s a post-interval villain with three solid names – Neil, and Nitin, and Mukesh, who seems to have an incredible upper hand in everything!

But I’ll come to the point and tell you what I learned. This knowledge may hold you in good stead.

• India has the best people anywhere in the world! India has the best hacker, the best illusionist, the best automotive expert, the best makeup artist, and the best explosives expert in the world.
• Russians can’t defend their country. It is fairly easy to get into Russia, hire a train-engine, prop it up with turbo-accelerators, cranes, and whatnot, and run it alongside a train carrying Romanian gold – bullion worth $100 Billion, at exactly the same speed for about a third of the duration of a Bollywood movie, i.e. one whole hour, all you have to do it, is get Bipasha Basu to tinker with the engine and drive it.
• The New Zealanders don’t have traffic police. Our Indian team with all that gold in tow (actually in the boots of three little cars) flit about their roads like bees gone crazy in a hive, but not a single cop is anywhere to be seen. Either the New Zealanders don’t have traffic police, or they don’t find enough gumption to come out when Indians go berserk on their roads. I wonder if they had seen this video before Abhishek and team wreaked havoc on their roads. (I salute the brave pedestrians.)
• The Catherine Palace is not in St. Petersburg but in New Zealand, and you can buy it for $10Million. Or it was transported to Wellington in New Zealand, bought by three men called Neil Nitin Mukesh, destroyed by Abhishek Bacchan, restored in less than 48 hours, then perhaps transported back to St. Petersburg.
• The Indian police attends coaching classes provided by some of its seasoned criminals and are tremendously respectful toward them. The way they talk to the law-abiding middle-class public could make you fear any chance encounter with them – but don’t worry, they are actually very nice when they talk to criminals.
• Indians rule the world. Anywhere in the world, when we appear on the scene, others cease to exist. A handful of the original inhabitants (say Russians, Americans, or even the New Zealanders) that still are around, start stammering and they lapse into speaking English with a heavy Indian accent, regardless of their original accent/lack of accent.

You didn’t know all this before, did you? And this is but the tip of the knowledge iceberg. You’ll learn a lot more if you watched the movie – beware of the twists and turns though. This movie is so full of them that in the end, you are still left wondering if Bipasha Basu and those three men Neil Nitin Mukesh were still alive! (Sorry for the spoiler!)

 

 

The QSM Magazine’s Indian Wedding Special issue is out…

…and your copy is already in your inbox. If you aren’t a subscriber yet, head over to ISSUU.com here, and join the party!

This Indian Wedding special, unravels the complex tapestry of the big O.B.E.S.E Indian wedding to lay bare the quirky, snarky, malarkey that lies under.

Read about the 8 Rock ‘n’ Roll rituals of an Indian marriage, attend Chintu’s wedding and appreciate its Live Decor, meet Honey’s In-laws and watch Mom bristle, figure out the Indian matrimonials if you can; and when you are done with weddings, enjoy some Free ki Advice, and find out the psychology of emojis – but that isn’t all. This issue is the biggest yet with all of its 50 pages dripping malarkey like never before.

I’ll be back after I’ve dropped Anandhotep at the Airport. He’ll be flying back to the Valley of Kings this afternoon, leaving me free to do my own thing – and that would be blogging and visiting blogs – but before I am really truly free – I must do a few household chores or lose wifey’s goodwill.

About that desiccated old bundle of rags: Good riddance to bad rubbish, I’d have said, if I wasn’t worried that he might be reading my blog in his tomb.

Friends, I’ve got this super-cool idea…what do you think of it?

Celebrate your Wedding Once again!

Update: The Shaadi ka Laddoo feature is on! Thank you for participating! I promise to ensure that Anandhotep is on his best behavior when he adds those thought-bubbles to your pictures. Neerja – the Thinking Soul Talker Sunita – the Expressive Word-Artist Jackie – the Art and Craft Magician Sharon – the RVing Explorer Writer Anandhotep has just told this underling of his that four fabulous pictures are already in! There’s only one place left on the Shaadi ka Laddoo. QSM Readers, send in your picture for that coveted place.

As you all know, this issue is about Indian weddings. The QSM magazine will be rolling off the line in a week from now. While I was putting everything together, I was struck by this brainwave – and I thought I’d ask you if you’d like to participate.

How about a one/two page section, called “Shaadi ke Laddoo“ (the name may change – recommendations/suggestions are always welcome.) You could send me your favorite wedding picture to stick on the laddoo (well, that’s the visual treatment I am envisaging presently.) A line or two, quirky or not, from you would be a great value addition. If anyone in the family has just got married, you may want to toss the idea to them too.)

Think about it. It would be cool if we did it. Anandhotep doesn’t know about this brainwave yet, so I could drop the idea and nobody (except you,) would be any wiser!

If you’d like to celebrate your wedding once again, on the quirky pages of the QSM Magazine, send me an email. My email id is the same as my blog address, except that instead of wordpress.com, you must use @gmail.com.

I’ll look forward to your thoughts and emails,

Anand (still in thralls of Anandhotep.)

Non-Indian friends: Shaadi ke Laddoo roughly translates to the “candy of marriage” and the term is used to underline the fact that the candy of marriage whether eaten or not, makes you regret your decision. Our focus in the feature will be the candy and its sweetness!

The QSM Magazine Issue #3 – The Indian Wedding Special!

In the upcoming issue we lose ourselves in the  the biggest, the grandest, the sparkliest, the loudest wedding in the world! Here’s a short definition of this magnificent event.

Indian Wedding – A Definition
The Indian wedding is a fine-tuned but bug-riddled event in which two strangers become life partners; and which when successfully concluded, marks the biggest milestone in the lives of Indian parents. 

Coming Soon!

Subscribe now and win the opportunity to own your own (huh?) pdf copy of the QSM Magazine. 

I’ll let the cover do the talking.

They say don’t judge a book by its cover – but that’s how the story of an Indian wedding begins, by judging someone by his or her picture – and quite often it succeeds. The way it succeeded for Mom and Dad. According to Mom, “You can’t ride a potholed road together in a bullock cart and not fall in love with each other.” (Disagreeing with Mom doesn’t take you anywhere, so whenever she says this, Dad and I just look at each other and shake our heads.)

An Appeal to all my Dear Readers:

If you’d like to help a fellow blogger follow his dreams, do tell your associates about the magazine. Here’s a smaller image of the newest issue for you, which you can use to help me row the QSM boat.

Even tweeting and sharing this post could help and I’ll appreciate from the bottom of my Indian heart.

 

The QSM Express is chugging along…expected to arrive on time.

The QSM Express is running on time.
Though there was an initial delay, but it is expected to make time by picking up speed.
The QSM Express doesn’t go through Haryana and it isn’t among the trains that were cancelled. 

So breath easy.
I’m still chained to my desk. Juggling work, other work, the QSM Magazine, and home.
Anandhotep becomes more irritating and demanding with each passing minute. (Now I know what those construction workers who built the pyramids felt…or not. They were likely treated better than I am.)

 

Total Paisa Vasool – Getting your money’s worth, the Indian way!

Anandhotep has used some of stinky old bandages to tie me to my desk so that I can work on the next issue of the QSM Magazine. I’ve been barred from posting on my blog, until I’ve painted the cover, sent emails to the new authors, and edited all of my own articles for the March issue.

But then I am a new age man who knows that there’s something called screenshots, and so I am posting an article from the Jan issue of the QSM Magazine for you. When you are done commiserating with Dad, me, and wifey, head over to ISSUU.com to download/read the full issue.

While you are there, please don’t stop yourself from clicking the “share” and “like” buttons. Your support is essential for the success of the QSM Magazine.

Anandhotep is getting restless and I have this sinking feeling that he knows…so let me post this and scoot!

 

If you enjoyed this post, find more of my Quirky, Snarky, Malarkey in The QSM Magazine. Read The QSM Magazine online on ISSUU.com     or Click here to get a free PDF copy of the next issue in your inbox.

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Makeup-shakeup Beauty-sheauty – mentioning it is my duty!

Pristine beauty-sheauty hai bakwaas,
yeh sab to hai ji makeup ka kamaal!

Translation:
Pristine beauty is nothing but hogwash;
Makeup created this whole look, by God!

Use the word pristine in a thirteen word story, she said, and I started scratching my head.

Right now, my head stands at the threshold of a new hairless existence, and wifey is becoming overly possessive of my hair. She has a long list of dos and don’ts, a hand-me-down from her mom. The fact that on a full-moon night, my father-in-law’s head can confuse a moon-gazer, is beside the point. “He still had full head of hair when he had turned 50,” wifey insists.

Snipping a long yarn short, wifey doesn’t want me to leap into the deserted lands of bald pates, nor does she want to let the world see my grays. So when I sat scratching my head, she decided to broach the subject again, “You are so handsome and if you colored your hair, you’d look not a day older than 28! And stop scratching your head. You’ll make the hair fall off!”
“They are rooted in my scalp,” I retorted, “they won’t fall off! And I don’t want to color my hair. I want to keep those grays. One of my blogging friends told me that they’d make me look distinguished!”
“Distinguished?” wifey snickered, flaring her nostrils and pursing her lips. “You trust them more than you trust me? I know more about make up and looking good than you do, don’t I?”

I saw the catch. Plain and clear. I also saw the answer to Rashmi’s riddle.

Pristine beauty-sheauty hai bakwaas,
yeh sab to hai ji makeup ka kamaal!

Translation:
Pristine beauty is nothing but hogwash;
Makeup created this whole look, by God!

On hindsight, I shouldn’t have recited it aloud. But I did. Earlier, the Sunday breakfast plans included mooli ke paranthe with butter and tomato-chutney. That was before I wrote the thirteen-word story for Rashmi. Now we’ll be having bread and scrambled eggs.