dv_matra

pdv_matra

dv_matra dv_matra

, . . . : . . . . . . . . ? ? . : . : ; , , , , : : !! !!!

, . , , , , , ! , , ! , , ! . , . . , , . . . , , . , .

:

-

, . . . . - . . . . . . , , , , , , , . , . RK . . , . . , , . . . . !

. . . . , . , . . . . . . . . . . .

. ( MAM ) . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

, .

. . - . , . , , , , , . , ! . . . . - . . -, . . " ,

. , , , , . , , : , . . . ? !! -

, " ?". , . . . , " ?" " ?" Indiana , . ; , . .

. . . ? ? , , , , ? : !! ? , ?

-

-

. ! . . . . , , . . . ! , . . . . , , . . . .

. . 10 . . . , , , , . . , ? ? . . . . , ? . . . . , . . . . . . . . . . . , ? . ? , ! !

. . . . ! . . . . . ; .

-

-

-

. . . . . . , . . , . . . . , , . - , !!! . - . . ; , , , . . . , ! . (: ) .

. . . . . , , , , ' , ' . . . . . , , , , , . . . . , ' , !

-

: ( - )

, . , , ! , ? ? ? ? , ? ? ! . . ' ' , ' ' , ' '! . .

! ! ! . , . , . . ?! " , !!

- . . -

?

. ! . , . . , , , , . ! , - , ! . , ! ? ! , , ! - . , ? . , , , . . , . . , . - . / , . , , ! , .

. . . . . . . . . . . , , - . , , , , . , !

. . , , . . , !! . . . . , . , . , . , , ! . !

-

: (- )

. . . , " " () . . - .

. . .

, .

" " , ( Soviet Union) . " " . , . . . . . . . trust . trust .

. , . , . . . , , . , . .

- - - : Hindu-Muslim Syncretic Shrines and Communities By J. J. Roy Burman

.. .. .. .. .. , , , .. .. .. - .. . , , , . . .. . ( ).

. . . . . . . . . . . . .. , . . .. .

!

, / . , " " . . . . . . . . . " . " " ,,, , ". " , ".. " ".. . . , . .. :) . . . ,

, , , . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. .. . ... .... ... !!

-

-

!

- - . , , !!

?

. . . .

. . . - - . , , . .

?

. . . , , . , , . . variety. downtown ? (Just a fantasy)

, .

?

lakes . lakes . lake : . lake . ' ' - lakes . . . /

- . . . .

?

. . - . . . . . - - - - - . . .

. . . .

?

. video . . , , . .

, , , . , , , , , . , . . '! ! ' . . . '' . . . . . . , , . , . , , .

, . , . . . , . , . . .

. . . . . . .

, ! , . . . . . . . . . . .

. . !!

-

, , !

, " " ,

-

!

''

(. )

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . , .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

'' . , ! . : . . . , : HATS . '' . . , . ., , , . .- , , , , . . . . . . . - - . . '' ' '!!

-

, .

:

:

. . . ', , ' . ' ' . , ! . ! - TV , . : . . ' ' . . ' ' .

. !

:

You-Me and The Cosmos

You are you I am me

I am not you You are not me

Me-ness and You-ness Make us unique

Dierent identities Diverse individualities

Uniqueness is the name of diversity

It cannot be bought It cannot be sold

It cannot be measured In our world of relative

reality

Chili is a chili Not a bell pepper

Shiny skin Hot body

If treated with respect Transforms the dull food

Into delicious dishes Produces endorphins

For stress relief If mistreated

Will bite our tongue Burn our eyes

And send us to a hospital For our malicious mischief

You are you I am me

In body and mind In form and content

In function and intent We dier in thought and

perception Language and expression

I do not say I am I Comparable to You are

you Why?

We dier in being and becoming

We dier in beholding and behaving

Life is constantly changing By the time I will be saying

I am I I will be saying You are

Thou Or You are thee

Or another form of address Which might make you

upset Of course,

I did not mean to call you with disrespect

Understanding diversity Is necessary for the removal

of strife Diversity and dierences

Must be understood in their own rights

As a way of life

Peaceful co-existence Is the only way to survive

Or else, forms will annihilate forms Into nothingness

Ultimately what will remain?

The spaces vacuum The times void

Useless for any life to sustain

Diversity and dierences Lifes beautiful nuances

Unity in Diversity Natures way of aesthetics

Right of existence Is the cosmic law of ethics - Anjira

dv_matra* dv_matra dv_matra

t t m dv_matradv_matra:

dv_matran vkdv_matra dv_matran p dv_matradv_matra: t kdv_matra

dv_matra dv_matra dv_matrakdv_matra dv_matra l l

dv_matra dv_matra dv_matra t dv_matra dv_matra dv_matra n tm j l kdv_matraX dv_matra dv_matra l dv_matra v t

dv_matrak c dv_matra dv_matral dv_matra

dv_matra dv_matra d: dv_matra dv_matra dv_matran dv_matra dv_matran dv_matran dv_matran dv_matra v tdv_matra

dv_matrac dv_matra

vk X X pc k bm 5

m j h j c t t c

dv_matradv_matrasc dv_matra dv_matra d

dv_matra dv_matradv_matrac t j tt dv_matradv_matra dv_matran dv_matradv_matra s m : t

X dv_matrast p X tdv_matra k m m

t t :

dv_matradv_matra dv_matran dv_matradv_matra: n

m s

- dv_matra

Gourmet

! :)

-

, . , . . . , . ' ?' . - . . .

, , , ,

, , , , ... , ...

, , , ,

..... .... , , , , , , .....

, , , ,

-

: :

. , .

( )

( )

( )

( )

State Fair : The Great Minnesota Get-Together (Rohit Nandgaonkar)

Outside In!Several non-Marathi spouses in our community have an excellent vantage point from which to look upon the curious peculiarity that is ! Amit Bhati is our guest author for this edition of giving a hilarious account of his first encounter with Pune.

(In memory of my mother-in-law Mrs. Sumitra Mudkanna. We enjoyed all of our debates and arguments, and conceded none to each other. This time, however, I shall have the last word.)

This happened in March 1996. I was visiting Delhi, to attend to my father who was soon to be operated upon. However, a couple of days before the scheduled date the surgery was unexpectedly postponed for at least a week. Having nothing else to do but wait, I thought of visiting Pune to meet Mrinalini - now my wife - who I had met in Bombay a few weeks earlier. I had quite liked her, and when I shared my sentiments with my sister and brother-in-law they encouraged me to make good use of the break. I called her parents, Mr. & Mrs. Mudkanna, and they agreed to my proposed visit. We found a hotel near their home in TELCO Colony, Pimpri, where I could stay, and a two-day trip to Pune was quickly finalized.

I had been living in the USA for several years at this point. With each passing year, India was fast becoming an increasingly distant place to which I had once belonged, but now saw with the eyes of a once-familiar outsider. The change was bitter for me because while growing up I had lived in seven different states, and visited almost all of the remaining - except a few of the Seven Sisters in the North-East, Gujarat and Maharashtra. I say that I hadnt visited Maharashtra because my forays into the state consisted of a few short transit trips between the Bombay airport and IIT Powai, where my sister lived. I had stepped into Maharashtra, but I hadnt seen its people and places in a meaningful way. So this two-day trip to Pune was my first substantial trip into Maharashtra as well. I had always been an avid traveller, and looked forward to spending time in a region of India new to me.

My ignorance of Maharashtra notwithstanding, I had heard much about Pune and the fabled Puneri Manus from former classmates and coworkers. All of them had warned me about the Puneris behavioral peculiarities and their sometimes strange point of view, so much so that I did view them as a unique cultural specimen that would make for interesting psychosocial examination. On the eve of my departure Mr. & Mrs. Mudkanna called to advice me about the acceptable cab fare from the airport, and the appropriate route to take to Pimpri, so that I may avoid being taken for a ride. I was told to drive through the Nigdi-Bhosari Bypass Road, and I was given two quotes for cab fare - a lower amount that a Puneri pays, and a higher amount that all North Indians and NRIs pay. The message was clear, it was up to me to negotiate between the lower and upper limits. However, the upper limit was many folds greater than the Puneris limit; so much more that I saw no hope of managing to negotiate down to it.

On Friday 8th of March I landed in Pune and, as expected, all cab drivers swore upon their mothers good name that they knew the Nigdi-Bhosari Bypass road right up to the doorsteps of the House of Mudkanna. But I am no stranger to this phenomenon, and I reminded myself that very soon I would be haplessly meandering through the unfamiliar streets of yet another city, at the mercy of a largely clueless driver. I picked a driver who appeared to speak passable Hindi. Soon we were traveling

Meeting The Puneri Manus: A Memoir

through stretches of highway interconnecting suburban localities. I was happy absorbing all I could from the back seat. Mostly, depictions of local politicians, who appeared to be insanely powerful but very loving persons, drawn on astoundingly large pieces of canvas, and colorful posters of regional cinema. The movie posters, though, werent very different from the posters of mainstream Bollywood cinema, except for the headdresses of the angry young man about to give up his life to forever own the honor of the young and buxom female wearing the sari in a different way.

An hour or so later, I was reasonably sure we had reached Pimpri because the taxi driver was looking around as inquisitively as I was. I sat upright and leaned over the drivers seat, ready to help both of us. For my own sake, I first confirmed that we were indeed in Pimpri by reading the addresses written in English on the signboards of some shops we passed by. After a few minutes, the taxi driver announced that we were driving alongside the wall of the TELCO factory, implying that if the factory was here the colony had to be nearby. For the next fifteen minutes he kept driving along the endless perimeter, always taking the necessary turns to keep right next to it. I understood that at some point in time he intended to serendipitously chance upon the factorys gate, where he would finally stop to ask for directions.

It was during this portion of the ride, while we passed through various sections of the town of Pimpri - Ashirwad Nagar, Morwadi and Masulkar - that I first laid my eyes on the ubiquitous Marathi Vegetarian Restaurant, one every 50-meters or so. I could read that each restaurant proudly announced itself as a Shakahari Bhojanalay this much of Marathi did not differ from written Hindi. But none of the restaurants followed up their culinary distinction with a proper name. I presumed that they thought that as long as the people only cared to know the type of cuisine served, giving the business a proper name was essentially redundant, so why bother? Quite terse and economical indeed, although one does have to remember which one they went into last time.

Each restaurant had a poor, underage boy squatting in the front, washing a large, blackened metal pot, roughly the same size as his body, while a swarthy and mustachioed owner sat behind the payment counter, on the other side of the entrance. These two unsavory characters covered much of the front, as though they were separating and guarding those on the inside (must have money to pay) from the rest of us on the outside (not sure if they can pay), leaving just a narrow path through which a would be customer had to walk-in and be scrutinized. After we had driven by several of these restaurants, I realized that each one was also adorned with an identical piece of signage painted on the wall, and written in Marathi. The only problem was that the words had either rubbed off in spots, or were partially hidden behind the aforementioned owners large body. All I could manage to read from inside a moving taxi was, Yethe Shuddha Shakahari Bhojan - and I proceeded to translate it as-is into Hindi. But the translation was perplexing. Why would a restaurant that announces itself as being a No-name Shakahari Bhojanalay on the outside go on to reassert, on the inside, that they had indeed served vegetarian food in the past? The redundancy did not add up. Now, I knew no Marathi had never laid eyes on it, in fact - but being that the script is essentially the same as the one used in Hindi - I had guessed at what the statement said and assumed that I must be approximately correct. What I did not know was that the Marathi letter small e is sometimes shaped like the Hindi letter , when it is written in Marathi. Thus, I erroneously translated the signage to imply in Hindi, Ye Thay Shakahari Bhojan aka This was a vegetarian restaurant Of course, I was quite familiar with the Here you get vegetarian food and Here you get non-vegetarian food signboards that can be found all over India. But, if I was right, this signage in Marathi was suggesting that each of these restaurants were also proclaiming that they used to serve pure vegetarian food, once upon a time. I tried to read more through the hustle and bustle of evening traffic, but failed to understand any more. I wondered what cultural peculiarity led the Puneri restaurants to assert that not only were they presumably a vegetarian

restaurant today, but that even yesterday, and the days and years before yesterday, they had always and forever been a vegetarian restaurant? How would it matter, I asked myself, that yesterday they used to serve one or the other kind of food? Isnt it whats on the menu today that matters? With no plausible explanation at hand, and the wall of the TELCO factory still keeping us endless company, I convinced myself that this must be an assertion of cultural and culinary supremacy - a proclamation of Our Pure Vaishnav Origins by a certain type of Indian Vegetarian Neo-Nazi, much like Jerry Seinfelds Soup Nazi.

OK, fine. I get it. You are, and always were, a vegetarian restaurant, I said to myself, and yet the assumption did not satisfy me. Being a software engineer I had to come up with a more satisfactory explanation. But the only other interpretation I could imagine was that all of these establishments had perhaps simultaneously turned into non-vegetarian restaurants just this very day, prior to my arrival in Pune. And I and everyone else were being notified urgently: We used to be a vegetarian restaurant! So the unsuspecting puritans do not accidentally transgress. Ah, stated tersely, by way of allusion to the contrary? Quite peculiar, indeed!

As bizarre as this sounded in my own head, the drive along the TELCO factory wall was still longer, and I began to be convinced that it may indeed be valid because it fit with what I had been told about the passive-aggressive and obliquely referential Puneri Manus. After all, I had been warned that for a Puneri statements such as, We have already had our tea were a very plausible and acceptable manner of greeting visitors, because they are absolutely firm yet socially less confrontational than saying, Come on in. But Im not feeding you. Put two and two together, and Yethe shakahari bhojana., aka We used to be a vegetarian restaurant totally made sense alongside the Shakahari Bhojanalay signboard.

Of course, in due course of time, I began to say to myself that this interpretation had to be wrong. These people, strange as they were said to be, wouldnt go to such lengths to be so indirect and subversive to their own kind, would they? However, I simply couldnt figure out what was the right translation. Eventually, while we were stopped in traffic, I could hold my curiosity no longer. I pointed to one such restaurant and asked the cabdriver in Hindi,

Ye sab vegetarian restaurants hai kya? At this the cabbie nodded his head like a bobble-head doll - with a hidden spring in its neck -

and said, Ho I had just come face-to-face, for the first time in my life, with that quintessentially Marathi rock-

your-head-sideways gesture. Was that a yes, or a no? I certainly had no clue. I was so taken by surprise that it took me a while to ignore the gesture, and ask him once again, Idhar meat nahin milta hai?

This time the cab driver thought for a moment, and with great care for my well being suggested that I do not entertain the idea of eating there. He would drive me to a better hotel for a meal. Hearing this I almost bumped into the roof of the taxi. I was in no mood for a detour; we were already lost, as it is. I also realized that asking him more questions about signage was fraught with other risks. I told him that I had changed my mind, and would be eating at the Mudkannas. Hearing this, the cabdriver let me have yet another sideways nod. This neither-yes-nor-no nod was quite frightening, because now I wasnt sure if he agreed to drive straight to the Mudkannas, thought it was a very poor idea to expect food at the House of Mudkanna, or was intent on feeding me at the right kind of restaurant? As far as I was concerned The Nod only meant, Im not telling you! It would be some years later when I would eventually learn that The Marathi Nod indeed implies a Yes if and only if that is what you were expecting the answer to be, or a No if and only if that is what you were expecting the answer to be. That it is much like an under-the-table handshake. A wink-wink, nod-nod type of internal-logic based

communication protocol that you understand because you already understand it! I would also learn, years later, only after long being married to the woman I was courting at that time, that The Nod is also used to say No by simply throttling down the speed of bobbling head - and only occasionally following it with a barely audible no. I would ever learn that if a Marathi person - especially your own wife says No with an unambiguous shake of the head using the gesture civilized people the world over have been known to employ since after the Caveman moved out - that it not only means an emphatic no, it also means that she vehemently disapproves of and completely forbids whatever I were thinking of doing. But, sadly, I hadnt yet seen those days, and wizened up.

After some time I thought that I had asked the wrong questions to the cabbie. Perhaps, what I should have asked him ought to have been more along the lines of,

So, all of these restaurants used to be vegetarian. But as of today none of them is vegetarian any more. Therefore they are all 100% non-vegetarian. Right?

As soon as I heard myself saying this in my mind I knew that I was doomed, for I would either be swiftly detoured, or receive The Nod again. I was now very far from ever getting to the fact of the matter. The realization drove me desperately crazy. I wanted to jump out of the cab, then and there, and accost one of those potbellied owners sitting expressionlessly behind the marginally clean payment counter, to demand a clear and unambiguous answer. For Gods sake, exactly what kind of restaurant are you? Cant you just say it? And how about naming your whatever-kind-of restaurant it is, while we are at it?

But the mystery remained unsolved. I couldnt look a gift horse in the mouth, for we had reached one of the TELCO factory gates. From there we were directed to the next gate, and the following one, until we were indeed at the correct gate to the colony where the House of Mudkanna stood - and my attention was driven to more pertinent matters.

During the rest of the day, one by one all of the family members dropped-in and attempted to interview me in as unassuming a manner as they could, which only made it increasingly obvious that they were on a mission of exhaustive fact finding and crosschecking. Not surprisingly, one of the frequently asked first question was, How much did you pay for the taxi from the airport? Not to be boxed-in and put down so swiftly, I averaged the higher and lower numbers I had been given, threw in another twenty rupees into the pot, and called the deal!

Later that evening Sumitra Bai served me my very first Marathi veg meal. It was a delicious and simple meal, and in complete contrast to a Rajasthani meal in the latter way. A Rajasthani meal, such as one served on the occasion of the visit of a prospective groom, must demonstrate the use of every kind of vegetarian dish, from mild, dry-fruits based gravies to fiery hot masala gravies, not to mention a spectrum of fragrant to pungent aromas all rendered in pure ghee. But here, I was looking at a couple of nondescript vegetable dishes and amti, which could only pass for healthy food in Rajasthan usually a euphemism for food only suitable for those with a poorly functioning internal organs, or a weak bowel, plus blood pressure, diabetes, and maybe even trouble chewing. To top off the meal Sumitra Bai brought out koshimbir, as if she were making amends for an expansive and rich meal with an offering of easy-on-the-guts, cool reasonableness. Mind you, all of this was totally enjoyable; it just wasnt what I had expected.

What surprised me most, however, were the portion sizes, which I can only describe using an American term having lived here for more than half my life now the bite-sized portion. The kind of portion size your pre-school kid is fed with, at his or her daycare. If the portion size was not meant to shock me, I could only assume it was meant to be symbolic, political posturing. Perhaps the Mudkannas were setting up the stage for a limited dowry size? It would be pretty frugal, in case I had come with high hopes. After the third request for a refill it became clear to me that we had run out of koshimbir in

the kitchen, and one of the sisters had started to fix-up some more. When the supply was replenished I took the opportunity to clearly state my benchmark for the future. Instead of accepting another bite-sized portion, I casually reached out and grabbed the very container in which the new batch of koshimbir was being brought out to me, and helped myself to all of it. I thought it would be prudent to state in equally symbolic but unambiguous terms that in Rajasthan a newly minted wife was fully expected to be able to serve a four or five course meal for half a dozen persons with only a few minutes notice, because as the erstwhile king of Jodhpur was known to have decreed, proudly, Sumptuously feed even those bound to the gallows.

I spent a wonderful two-days in Pune. I enjoyed the relative calmness of TELCO colony, and the unassuming and pleasant family I had just gotten to know quite well. When it was time for me to return to the airport Mrinalini walked me to the bus stand in Masulkar Colony, five minutes walk from her home. At the bus stop, with its half-missing shed, we proceeded to sit up on the greasy and well-worn metal bars that demarcated it, and waited for the bus of the right number. As luck would have it, I saw that right across the street from us was one of those currently as well as formerly vegetarian restaurants. Now I had to know.

But alas, the explanation came as a massive deflation. In fact, if memory serves me right, at first she found it hard to understand my question. Anyway, there was no cultural peculiarity to be found, no dramatic climax to the end of the mystery translation. It had been a deceptively simple mistranslation of a language unfamiliar to me. Yesthay as in here. Tense, present perfect - but in that moment it summed up everything about my first visit to Pune in a most matter of fact way. The city, and a new kind of people. The family, and a woman I was courting. Their intentions, and mine too. - Amit Bhati