- This post is not a lecture on the chemistry of either humidity or hard water (That is not a given, thank your stars).
- This post is not about the environment. I think my pal Al Gore's doing his best. God bless him.
Right about now you're thinking, "This guy is such an attention-grabbing, slimy old prick. He comes up with these snazzy titles and clarifications in every post, and then forces everyone to read more". I'd say you're right. Having suitably gratified ourselves with pleasantries, read on.
About a week ago I mentioned to a friend of mine that I was going to be Best Man at my brother's wedding the coming Monday. "Oh really? That's so cool! So is it a Christian wedding?", she enquired, rather excited. The answer to her question was negative; it wasn't a Christian wedding but in fact a Tamil Brahmin wedding (in future to be referred to as Tam Brahm, or if I'm too lazy, T.B., not the disease). It was probably her infectious excitement that caused me to look forward to playing my role this Monday. It turns out (for the uninformed) that the role of the "Best Man" in a T.B. (I'm getting lazy already) wedding is much less glamorous than his counterpart in a Christian wedding. For all practical purposes, a Best Man is really "Free Labour Umbrella Holding Man". That's all the Best Man does, slog his brown bottom off and then get up at four in the morning (a painful subject I shall approach later in this post) and hold an umbrella over the groom's head while the groom takes a supposed trip to Kashi (usually about 100 feet away from the venue so that everyone gets a share of the entertainment). The entertainment I'm referring to here is getting to see a full grown, half naked man, with kajal on his eyes and one spot on his cheek, being followed by an entourage of full-grown-half-naked men, led by the Best Man himself, holding the umbrella. As events transpired, I didn't even get to hold the umbrella. So at the end of the day, I was "Free Labour Man".
Back to the actual wedding itself then. We first flew some ten thousand miles (exaggerated by a factor of about 4) and then drove another five thousand (exaggerated by a factor of 80) to get to the wedding venue. Needless to say, any place that far away from the north of the country and still within the country, has to be, the south of the country. Guruvayur, to be precise. Guruvayur is a temple town, complete with scores of plush hotels and markets, and of course, not to be left behind, a five hundred year old shrine.
Let me then discuss a few peculiar things about the way of life of my people (The T.Bs, note the attempt to make us sound like a cool lot). They like to get up early. Period. They love, adore, have a thing for getting up early and making noise. If you head out in a small South Indian town at five in the morning, you'd probably find the kind of rush you'll find on Delhi roads at ten. And it's not just the people. I was woken up on the second day at half past three by the chirping of a bird that had a very warped sense of time. It's not a surprise then, that Free Labour Man (FLM from now on) was woken up at four by the sound of the band-baja playing at the venue, the morning of the wedding. If I haven't mentioned it, allow me to mention it now; us T.Bs marry in the morning. Not just morning, really early in the morning, but that shouldn't be a surprise anymore.
At this point, you're scratching your head and wondering one of two things. One, you're wondering if the scratching is because of dandruff, or more likely (hopefully), you're wondering why I christened this post thus. Turns out, as I was grumbling to myself in the shower after having being woken up rather violently, my mind began to wander. I noticed that most places down south are grossly humid. To compound your trouble, the water is hard and salty. So, when you're having a bath down south, first, the soap refuses to come off. Once you've laboured your life away to get the soap off your back, the water refuses to dry. This is the awe-inspiring cycle of humidity and hard water, the quagmire that traps all us T.Bs when we're in the motherland (And that's not somewhere in Sri Lanka). At this point, I assure you that such thoughts arise only when I'm grumbling to myself in a shower in the motherland. The world is still a safe place to live.
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