Know your language

‘If good poetry
is hard
then drink champagne.’
That’s one of the bits of poetry that I have constructed on the door of my refrigerator. Another one is:
‘I know
the deep secret
of god’
You see, I have a box of those magnetic words and can combine the words to express myself on the door of the fridge. So, while I wait for the coffee to brew, or the mandatory three minutes for my tea bag to steep, I can express myself. The problem is that my imagination, and creativity, is limited by the words that the manufacturer has provided me in that little plastic box. (And by the amount of patience I have in searching for the right word, but we shall set this aside for the moment.)
My friend Tom, the linguist, put it in a very profound manner. ‘Ideas depend largely on language,’ he said. Of course, he was not commenting on my magnetic poetry skills but on the importance of learning one’s language well. And how different languages have evolved differently, allowing different words to develop to express the ideas and emotions of the people of that language. Every high school text on social studies will tell you that the Innuit have 23 (or 32?) words to describe different kinds of snow. The Tamils have no need of that. But they have a distinct word for every kind of familial relationship (mother’s older brother is different from younger, and from the father’s brothers!)
If one understands the nuances of the language, one can express one’s thoughts and ideas better. The reader or listener should also be able to understand those subtleties of the language to grasp those nuances. Hence, sometimes, a joke is lost on non-native speakers of a language. And hence, again, the frequent comment of the learned who say that Homer’s Iliad should really be read in Greek.
Think about the one who is expressing the thought, and the availability of sufficient words to do so. If one goes through school studying subjects in a foreign language, one has to simultaneously learn the language while also learning the subject. That is fine, if it is math, perhaps. But if one is not very proficient in the language in which one is learning the subject, the ideas are truly lost in translation.

What do you do?

You know how the first exchange when two people meet is ‘How do you do?’ That may sound formal, but it is still used when people are introduced to each other, although ‘Hi’ and variations of it may be more common in less formal situations. Do you know what the next question usually is?

It’s ‘what do you do?’ We are so grounded in life by the work we do that we want to quickly assess the other person and place him or her in the giant ladder of progress by trying to know which rung on that ladder he occupies. When the reply clearly states the rank and organization, it brings much satisfaction all around. So when you hear ‘I’m the Senior Asst. Warehouse Manager in charge of the 1st. floor at the National Nuts and Bolts Company Ltd. in Azerbaijan,’ you know exactly where to place him in the great big order of things.

When you try to describe what you really do, it is seen as obfuscation. So, when I say in response to that question, ‘I teach’, it is quickly countered with, but what do you teach, where, and so on. What if we instead say what we do most of the time in a day or in our life? Like when somebody wants to know what you do, and you say, ‘I watch TV,’ I doubt if the next questions will be ‘what program’ or ‘what channel.’ After a few humming and hawing, the question will be back to, ‘No, what I meant was where do you work?’

I think the best way to break this cycle is with the first question. Instead of ‘How do you do’ we should be able to shake a person’s hand and say, ’Don’t you think Bush was an ass.’ That way, we can directly get into the important things in life, and by the end of the conversation, if we had found the other person interesting and worth knowing, we can always say, ‘Oh, by the way, my name is xx and I am the Senior Asst. Warehouse Manager in charge of the 1st floor but in a few years time, there are strong chances I will get to the 2nd. floor. Give me a call when you are next in Azerbaijan.’

Time Management

Just this week, after a lot of controversy, Vijay Mallya secured several Gandhi memorabilia for $1.8 million in a New York auction. He intends to donate them to the country. Of course, we need to ponder over the irony of a liquor baron acquiring the items of an avowed prohibitionist for the sake of the country. But that will have to wait for another day. Let's get back to those items. One of them was a watch. Gandhi was obsessive about time and the one concession he made to modernism was to dangle a watch from his loin cloth to make sure he does things on time.
Sure, some things require being done on time. You want the anesthesiologist to know how much time it takes for the neurosurgeon to operate so as to prevent you from sitting up on the operation table when the surgeon is still sawing your skull. But there are lots of things that are now time bound that must be freed from the clutches of time. Let me take two of them.

One is exercising. I used to care about whether I walked for 15 minutes on the treadmill, trying to get up to 20 minutes, and so on. Now I don't care. I don't turn the timer on. I walk as long as I feel like walking. By being free from that clock, I find I am not staring at it trying to find excuses to stop when I have been on for just 8 minutes. I suspect I walk longer, and I am certainly feeling better. Isn't that what it is all about?

The other is meditation. I used to struggle to meditate for about 10 minutes. After a few years, I got it up to about 20 and there were thrilling days when I hit 30 minutes. Then, enlightenment dawned on me. I have stopped looking to see how long I sit and just focus on meditating and not on how long I can sit. Wow! It has freed me from trying to compete like I am in a race. I enjoy my meditation sessions more, and who cares how long I have done it for.

This weekend, we are supposed to turn our clocks ahead by one hour for some daylight savings reason. Should I bother? I wonder.

Dentistry as a business

I often think dentists are like garage mechanics. Not that I have anything against auto mechanics. But they have a keen eye for new business. So if you go to get that tail light fixed, the mechanic will notice that your exhaust pipe seems rusted and has a few holes. ‘Perhaps it is time to replace it,’ he will recommend, helpfully, all with your good interests at heart.

My dentist is like that. I cannot imagine why you need to take x-ray pics of your teeth every year, other than to boost the annual revenues of the dental profession. But my hygienist put out five picture tiles on the tray and casually mentioned to me that she will be taking those pictures. This time I was brave. ‘No thanks,’ I said. ‘I will take it next time.’ ‘OK,’ she responded, looking at the chart. ‘It has been a year and a half already, you know.’ ‘Yes,’ I lied through my teeth. ‘I’ve had them taken in India last time I was there.’ ‘Oh, you have had your teeth cleaned since you were last here?’ she asked. Inquisitive one, she was. ‘Yes,’ I said. Another lie. Oh, God!

I was prepared for these and more lies, really. I had been preparing myself all the way from home, since I know the routine now. I don’t think one needs to have the teeth cleaned by the hygienist twice a year, but even I knew that two years was quite a bit. So I had fixed this appointment. Well, she cleaned away, and then called the dentist for a check. I knew what was coming. ‘I see a shadow on #13’ the dentist mumbled. That usually meant they want to do a filling there. The last time, they even removed an existing filling to put a new one. ‘These usually need replacement every few years,’ that one had proffered. Like brake pads?

Then peering around further, the dentist noticed that I had a gap in my lower jaw where a tooth had been pulled out. Over 10 years ago. ‘We can plug that gap, you know. There are some very nice implants these days,’ she offered. I smiled and shook my head. (Every dentist has been trying to plug that gap since then, in vain.) The shadow on #13 proved a dead end for her, too. She left the room mentally delaying that Porsche she has been wanting.

Bangalore through foreign eyes

I took a bunch of students from the US on a trip to Bangalore (a course – not a sight-seeing enterprise!). They, of course, had many questions, which gave me an opportunity to see events through American eyes (and to provide my own spin to the reasons). Here is a sample:

1. The Deccan Herald (a local Bangalore paper) lists readers’ comments on some recent antics of Paris Hilton. Paris Hilton has a following in Bangalore! (Yes, she wants to act in local films.)

2. The elevator in the Barton Center goes up to the 13th floor where there are two restaurants. 13 is not unlucky in India? (No, we break a coconut on the elevator every day.)

3. They have not removed the plastic wrapping from their car seats! (Indians like to preserve the new car smell.)

4. Oh my God, there is a guy peeing in the corner of the side walk. (Indian men have weak bladders, I said.)

5. Did you see those two cows in the middle of the busy intersection? (Indian cows are sacred, and have the freedom to be where they want to be.)

6. There was a lizard in the bathroom! I ran out without going. (Let it fall on you. It brings luck.)

7. How does one cross the road? There is no pedestrian crossing and the traffic does not wait for you. (Walk slowly right through the traffic. They will flow around you. Indian traffic is in a symbiotic relation to its people.)

A hair dresser, salon, saloon, or clinic?

When I asked Hari what time his barber shop opens, he asked me, ‘Why? You don’t need a hair cut.’ The barbers also wonder why I walk into their shop. When I sit in my Arlington barber’s chair (a 3-seater place with only one barber), he finishes his job within a few minutes, then keeps hovering around trying to find places to work on. He must be feeling guilty for charging me his normal rate of $12 for so little time spent on my head.
I prefer barber shops with male barbers. They know how to use that scissor/comb the way it should be used. Women barbers tend to clutch clumps of hair and snip them, not gradually work the comb as it progresses up the back of your head giving you that cool feeling as the hair falls off and the air hits your scalp.
The Chennai barber ‘Diamond Hair Dressers’ (a 8-seater place with at least 4 barbers) at the junction of Kasturibhai Nagar 2nd cross road and Guindy road is my favorite haunt. The proprietor would be sitting in the corner of the shop reading ‘Dinamani,’ the tamil daily. As you walk in, he will greet you, and direct one of his assistants to attend to you. You have a choice of the machine or manual. Haircut is Rs. 50, beard trim Rs. 40. And oh, that head massage (Rs. 50) is divine; he will slap your scalp and stroke it in different ways that will make it move independent of the cranium. By the time he is done with your head, you will wonder if you still have one.
But I was in for a surprise when I walked into ‘Gateway, Hair Clinic’ (2-seater with one barber) on Double Road in Indira Nagar, Bangalore. The bareber was chatting away with his assistant in an empty saloon (salons are for women) on a Saturday morning which should be his peak time. He got into action, pulled out what looked like a used sheet and covered me. I wondered what was to come. He asked if he could use the machine (I only wanted a light trim) and I reluctantly agreed. But he attacked every hair with professional precision. He wanted to know if I wished to have my beard ‘shaped’ and not just trimmed. I hastily said ‘no’. I was already being greeted by Muslims on the street as one of their own and didn’t wish an appointment to the local mosque as their imam. Then he told me that I should keep the underside of my chin more closely trimmed for it will make the upper part look more shapely for my face structure. Hmm. Wise words. All for a mere Rs. 50 (I generously added Rs. 20 as a tip).
Of course, nobody around me even knew I had a haircut.