Bollywood goes Vegan!

 

Bollywood goes Vegan! So screamed the headline in Page 3 supplement of a popular Newspaper.  This made me sit up and take notice.  Oh! Good, I thought, Bollywood has woken up at last and very soon even Hollywood would wake up to the benefits of Veganism or at least Vegetarianism.  When I read the article through, alas, I was a bit disappointed; as per the article, a few actresses (apologies! Actors, to be on the safer side of the feminist hardliners) had converted to Veganism as their dietary choice.  If only 4 or 5 actors (note: female actors) follow Veganism, does it constitute that the entire Bollywood has gone Vegan?  Well, merely reading the headlines without reading the accompanying article is definitely misleading, I thought.  The author of the article could probably be a Vegan, and hence this huge misdirection; probably, the author would have loved it, if the entire Bollywood per se, had gone Vegan.

Based on my upbringing, at one point in time, I had thought that all the people in the World ate only what I ate i.e., the Vegetarian food.  I had absolutely no notion, that people could eat animal meat anywhere in the World.  Well, you see the World consisted only of my family and a few relatives and friends.  I was literally living in a ‘well’ (like the analogy of frog living in a ‘well’, thinking that this is the entire World!), up until I completed my primary and middle school days; and had no knowledge what constituted the World; even though I studied Geography and History like everyone else in my School.  This indicated that I was only mugging up for passing the exams without actually gaining an understanding of anything that we were supposed to study.  Please note, I don’t have anything against those following a non-vegetarian diet including eating beef or anything else that moves on this Earth (like one of my non-vegetarian friends fondly preferred to say).  I seek apologies, in advance if I sound, prejudiced or racist or something else; in today’s hyper sensitive World one should be very wary of what you say.   As a matter of fact, I was just pointing out that, what a dumb student I was!

One day, when I was in class 6 or 7, a classmate of mine invited me to his home.  I went along with him and saw lots of hens and roosters moving around in their house compound.  I was kind of flustered with the smells emanating from the hens’ shed nearby.  The friend told me that they had kept hens because it gave lots of eggs and around their festival time, they prepared chicken dish in their home by killing off one or more of the hens.   That was the first time I had come across a family killing off hens and eating them.  I was kind of confused and my mind was whirring.   I couldn’t understand how anyone could eat these hens with all the feathers and the kind of smells emanating from them (Pardon my ignorance here!).   My food habits were limited to the extent of rice, sambar, sabzi and its associated preparations.   My major conclusion was that this family was an aberration!  Very soon, I, forgot all about my friend’s house visit. 

However, on enquiry much later with my other classmates, I found out that many of them had also tasted chicken dishes at home and they, in fact, had loved it!  What I didn’t know then was that “we” (as in my family/relatives and a few friends) were an aberration and not the other way around!  May be, barring one or two percent of the World population, the rest of the people (mind you, the World population at approximately 7.3 Billion people) in this World love eating animal meat including fish, steak or anything else that moves on this Earth!   Here is a titbit.  All chocolate bars have at least 7-8 insect legs (on an average) incorporated inside it during their manufacture (We are told that it is impossible to avoid insects, roaches and the like while manufacturing chocolates on a mass scale).  Have we all not eaten chocolate bars at some time?  Cool, right?  Then, why else was I feeling so excited on reading the headline about Bollywood going Vegan.  Well, go figure!

The Lord of Learning – Revisit to happier times

We make our way down the main street of Gandhi Bazar on the eve of Ganesh Chaturthi; the familiar sights and sounds, especially the chatter of the people breezily wading through the mad crowds, evoke deep-rooted memories of another era.  Our family was staying at a house in the vicinity some decades ago.  This was the quintessential Bengaluru that has been associated in my mind with its quaint beauty and naivety of the happier times that I am talking about.  The time was when Ganesh Chaturthi, the popular festival of the South, was celebrated with great pomp and gaiety, amidst my abiding faith in Lord Ganesh, that had characterized my mind as a young boy in the seventies.

The procuring of Ganesh idol by the devout on the eve of the festival day was a big source of excitement.  The first and foremost activity was visiting the different stalls put up by small time Retailers, in order to enquire and settle on the correct market price for the chosen size of the Ganesh idol.   The next activity was to find a Ganesh idol that sported a particular kind of ‘tilak’ that was acceptable to the category of the sub-sect of the devout.  I was told to look for a Ganesh idol that sported an “exclamation” (!) symbol painted in black, on its forehead.   Most of the Ganesh idols exhibited in the stalls had three white horizontal bars on its forehead; which was the most common and popular ‘tilak’ among the devout; but I was told that this form of ‘tilak’ on the idol did not meet with our family’s sub-sect parameters.  I did remember that some of the more enterprising vendors had offered to make some minor alterations to the ‘tilak’ on the forehead of the Ganesh idol instantly from a differently designed ‘tilak’ to the one that we had requested.  The style of the ‘tilak’ was a non-issue to the Idol vendors; but to the devout, like us, it mattered very persuasively.  Buying the Ganesh idol with many other required pooja items and cavorting home was like competing in a marathon; with rain gods, usually playing spoilsport (it invariably rained in Bengaluru; the festival normally arriving at the end of monsoon season).

As the day of the festival dawned, having an oil bath early in the morning and donning new clothes stitched for the occasion (ready-made garments were not very popular back then) was indeed, a great excitement.  After the elaborate Ganesh pooja was over, the sumptuous lunch at home was a huge affair; especially, as the meal was embellished with the soft chewy jaggery and coconut dessert packed inside the fried flour shell (the treat was called kadabu in kannada or modak in Hindi/Marati).  Ganesh Chaturthi was incomplete without this sweet dessert; it was believed that Lord Ganesh loved this sweet treat tremendously.  Lord Ganesh had a mouse as his vehicle. If you notice closely, the picture of the mouse is depicted at the bottom of every Ganesh idol.  How can any human being (Ganesh being three-fourth human) ride on a tiny mouse; wouldn’t the mouse get crushed underneath!  This thought was a source of amusement to younger self.   As the story goes, watching from the skies the Moon also did have a moment of humungous merriment at the spectacle of Lord Ganesh, riding on a tiny mouse with his swollen belly and a huge elephant trunk, fall off from his tiny vehicle (the mouse) while roaming around gleefully after having a hearty meal; this sight, was a source of uncontrolled mirth to the Moon.   The story continues that Lord Ganesh became hugely angry with the merry laughter of the Moon and placed a ‘curse’ on the Moon; and due to this irreversible ‘curse’ on the Moon, the devout are barred from viewing the Moon during Ganesh Chaturthi.  As if by some divine intervention, the Moon would be clearly visible between the passing clouds on those Ganesh Chaturthi nights; I distinctly remember that my eyes would stealthily dart towards the skies (perhaps, as a sort of involuntary dare, especially when you are told not to look at the Moon) and upon sighting the Moon from the corner of my eye, I would soon look away with trepidation, remembering the ‘curse’!

The evenings of the festival day held another great excitement.  A few of us mates had a sort of pre-arrangement every year, visiting and prostrating before the Ganesh idols in innumerable homes of neighbours; and sometimes even outside our familiar locality.  Our target, each year, was to visit 108 homes and prostrate before the Ganesh idols.  Before stepping into the homes of unknown people, we used to look for signs of any dogs in the compound.  We were scared of Alsatian dogs.  Once we were sure there were no dogs around, we confidently stepped inside the gate.  As a group, we would step inside the homes and prostrate before the Ganesh idol, one after the other.  Some of the home owners treated us to a small snack or sweet, which was usually, baked chickpea masala or finely ground yellow gram mixed with sugar and coconut. This treat could be one of the attractions for us to venture into this activity.

It was a stupendous task, believe me, going about visiting the homes of unknown people with the target of reaching 108 homes in mind.  However, to my great consternation, I never achieved the target during any of those years.  The rhythm would get broken somewhere between the 20^th or 25^th house visit and I would return back, to my home, citing flimsiest of the reasons to my mates.  Possibly, this could be one of the reasons that Lord Ganesh, the Supreme God of Learning and Education hasn’t blessed me with any great learning or education!

The love affair with cars

My love affair with cars goes a long way back.  The old-timers in my family, my uncles and aunts, swear to a rather, funny story that when I was a young boy, perhaps, 5 or 6 years old, fervently pleading with my dad to drive home the cars that were parked on the road-side, when the owners of these cars were not around!  Lucky for me that, in later years, I didn’t end up being a car thief!  Another of the family secret is out.  Many of my male cousins are obsessed with cars too.

It was the early eighties.  We had no inkling that a new round of car revolution was just around the corner.  The Ambassadors and Fiats (later Premier Padmini) were on the verge of disappearing into oblivion forever.  As fresh recruits at the Head Office of our Bank, we were awe-struck to watch the spectacle of the Bank’s senior management (or executives as they were commonly referred), arrive in their Ambassador or Fiat cars and walk up the few steps at the entrance of the Head Office to reach their respective Offices or Departments on different floors of the Head Office building.  These senior gentlemen started arriving, one after the other, as if on cue, in a space of few minutes just before the clock struck 10’o clock (the Bank’s start time). The liveried drivers opened the rear door of their cars for these gentlemen and carried an assortment of files, hurrying after them.  This parade of the senior management arriving in their Ambassador or Fiat cars was a great spectacle to us young employees (we were in our early twenties); we stood aside respectfully on the stairs, mutely watching after them.  A few of the fresh recruits, who were slightly brazen enough, threw in a smile and Good Morning salute at them, while some of the timid ones, hurried furtively behind the top executives, avoiding their eye.   After the executive had gone inside the building, we looked pensively at the cars in which they had arrived.  The cars, gleaming in the sunlight, would be lined up in style, in the ample parking space by their respective drivers.

The executive cadre was considered a creamy layer in the Bank hierarchy because each position carried with it many perks and powers.  The allotment of a car was the foremost perk that attracted us, the younger Bank recruits.  The highest aspirations of the younger lot of us recruits those days were measured in terms of being provided a car by the Bank along with driver.   The lure of the Ambassador or Fiat car as a perk drove some of my colleagues to seriously think of taking up the tests for promotions to higher cadre.  There was also a mad rush (considered premium posting) for getting a transfer to such of those branches which had a Bank car attached to it.   These cars were considered branch property and the senior most Manager or Senior Manager was most likely to use it as his personal vehicle!

I remember a time, when the Bank’s Chairman & Managing Director had been provided with a Contessa sedan for his personal use.  Some of us youngsters, had rushed out from our Office, just to look at this car and feast our eyes on the new offering.  We were just used to watching with wide-eyed wonder, a Rolls Royce or some fancy Italian sports car in glossy magazines or posters!  Seeing the Contessa sedan right in front of us, was considered, indeed, our good fortune.  Anyway, for Hindustan Motors, the Contessa sedan was not a success, and bombed badly at the car box-office.

Alas, my biggest aspiration of those days, to drive a Bank car, remain unfulfilled!  Nevertheless, my love affair with the cars has ended.  It is a nightmare to drive a car in good old Bangalore, what with the crazy traffic conditions and parking problems.  Even if, by mere luck, some benevolent philanthropist was to offer me a Ferrari or a Porsche now, I wouldn’t want to go anywhere near it!

Eating out, the Bengaluru way!

Eating out has almost become a way of life with most Bangaloreans in the present-day.  The notion that Hotels and Restaurants served unhygienic food prepared in a filthy kitchen by dirty cooks, is almost becoming passé.  Home food, however, has always been considered healthy, tasty and hygienic.  As I am a big fan of eating out, I may not agree with this hypothesis and hence, I feel that the truth (or taste), as usual, lies somewhere in-between!

My tryst with eating out takes me to my boyhood days when my dad regularly took me out to eat in small restaurants; the Hotels (as these were commonly called in the local parlance) were very few and far between.  Hotels were generally meant to cater to bachelors or out-of-towners; men, living with their families, hardly patronized these Hotels.  Some of these small Hotels (or even coffee-bars, as they were called) were well known for its tasty Dosa and Idli/Wada preparations.  The Darshini-style restaurants were still a long way off.  The Hotels, those days, had stinky kitchens, which looked more like bathrooms (we carefully avoided looking within); unbathed and shabbily dressed waiters serving us tasty (perhaps oil rich) Dosas and other items.  The general notion amongst us regular Hotel patrons was, dirtier the Hotel, tastier the food items!

The Idli/Wada items served with rich sambar tingled our taste buds.  The rich sambar that was prepared using onions (shallots were also used in some Hotels) was heavily dosed with a variety of spices.  Onions were a strict ‘no-no’ at home, forbidden by my grandmother, who generally had a large say in all matters concerning the Kitchen; so, eating this thick, spice-loaded onion sambar was like having a sneaky ‘affair’; with our taste buds dancing away with delight.  The unique blend of onion and potatoes with the gravy loaded with spices, gave a special taste to the Idli-sambar (dipped and mixed) that was consumed in large quantities by the Hotel’s discerning clientele (including self)! There were some hotels which were famous for their Dosas alone; Udupi Krishna Bhavan, Vidhyarthi Bhavan, New Modern Hotel come to mind, on the South side of Bangalore.   There was this Hotel named Modern Hotel in Gandhi Bazar Main Road which has been closed down a long time ago that was famous for its Khali Dosas.  There was a Hotel by name Gajendra Vilas in Chamarajpet, which served crispy chapattis and sago masala Dosa, that had an extra special taste to it.  They have closed down shutters since a long time ago.  The names of the Hotels that were spread across Bengaluru had common names such as Sri Rama Vilas, Krishna Bhavan, Venkateshwara Coffee Bar, etc.   We do not see such names now, perhaps out dated and out of style.

With the mushrooming of Darshini-style restaurants in Bangalore that caters to a large number of growing patrons (literally vying with each other to have a go at any new offering or trying out newer outlets), it is abundantly clear that the restaurant business is here to stay for a long time to come.   Bengaluru, in my mind has the best restaurants and Hotels and can compete in terms of taste and variety, with any such eateries anywhere across the country or even the world (countries only that I have visited!). This being the case in point, I can confidently say that eating out is the best thing that has happened to us, Bangaloreans!