What`s this brouhaha about Pakhala Dibasa?

Pakhala existed wherever there was rice - grown and consumed as a staple. Leftovers were treated the same way to preserve them till the next meal everywhere but called by different names.

Then why are we celebrating it? And why it`s so important to us.

Today is the 3rd day since Mohanty Babu passed away from a sudden cardiac arrest. A midlevel executive in a government department, he was to retire in May. These days when we see young people in their thirties, fit and fine with no medical history to worry about dropping dead without notice; the death of an almost senior citizen should not raise any eyebrow.
It was just one of those events which happened every day.
It was quite a shock for his wife as she had never spotted any signs of illness or stress which could be possibly corroding him from within; ditto his colleagues and relatives. His family stand devastated and distraught.

It was still fifteen minutes to daybreak.

Usually, in the winter season, you don`t expect many people in this part of the park unless they are serious morning walkers. And I was preparing myself for a solitary walk in the misty dark morning.

She refused to buy tickets for the movie Jawan for the 7th time today.
The movie Jawan was released on the 7th of this month and by today the global collection stands to cross 750 Cr. Each time its collection crossed a 100 Cr mark, I would get curious to see what was attracting people in hordes and would goad her to buy tickets. “My friends in Hyderabad have seen the movie and I know you and your taste; you will fret and fume and leave the hall halfway dragging all of us out with you. I don’t want to spoil my evening” was her reply. She was clear and firm on her stand this time too.

Hold your horses. I am not going to discuss the kind of plant whose parts make some people get high and happy. The title is a bit misleading. This piece is about any plant growing where it is not wanted and our losing fight with it. The story of our fight with weeds is just not limited to the state excise department burning them deep inside some forest or apprehending the contraband in baleful during transit. 

It is as old as the fight of humanity with hunger.

Perhaps humans dealt the first dent on nature by altering it, when they identified the plants they need for their food and shelter, and they understood how and where the plants grow the best. And then he chose to be a settled agriculturist from the hunter-gatherer life of his earlier generations.

ISRO successfully launched Chandrayan 3`s third lunar exploration mission on 14th July 2023. It is expected to make a soft landing on the southern lunar pole after a month-long journey on 23rd August. When the GSLV Mark 3 (LVM 3) heavy-lift launch vehicle lifted off successfully from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Andhra Pradesh’s Sriharikota as per the scheduled launch time at 2.35 PM, the roar of the engines symbolically matched just not the joy of the people behind it, but the euphoria of the whole nation who celebrated the achievement. India stands to become the 99th country that has such technological capabilities. The picture of ISRO scientists carrying a rocket on a bicycle to this launch of the 14th describes the story of India which in just 75 years emerged from its struggle with poverty, malnutrition, disease, and early mortality to assert its position as a global political, economic and knowledge power to reckon with.

The day before yesterday when I was about to finish a quiet dinner with a friend of mine at a corner table in a not-so-crowded restaurant, a new-age reporter with a camera in one hand and a Rode wireless microphone in another rattled me by asking this question. They were creating content for the hotel which is organising an event for Friendship Day.

I was unprepared.

Not because I didn`t know what it was to me, but because I was at a loss how to capture this enormous multi-dimensional variegated feeling that we all have been living with since our adolescent days in a few casual sentences. I chose to dodge.

By the beginning of June after enduring the harshness of the hot and humid Indian summer season from March, the nation starts looking skyward for the rain clouds to appear. The parched earth and roasted humans in utter despair go to their Gods, weathermen, and astrologers to hear the good news of the arrival of monsoon.

Their huge errors in predictions in the past don’t stop the hapless populace from dabbling with the discussion over rains even if it’s just in the discussion. The pain and hope behind this trepidation are like the hopes of one of the lovers in a broken relationship for the other to return.

The arrival of the monsoon on the Kerala coast is the most awaited event in the month of June.

If I was instrumental in bringing you into the world, certain things came along the deal which I`m responsible for; you better know about the roles I`m going to play in your life.

As the Protector:

My primary role as a father is to give you physical, emotional, social, and financial protection to the best of my ability till you become an adult. It`s also my role to provide you with exactly that much protection which will prepare you to be independent and autonomous and not make you dependent on me for life. Don`t expect me to protect you when you are wrong; I`m not your private bouncer. But when you fall, betrayed by your love and the world, I will be there to provide the safety net and a launch pad to swing you back into life.

They were stowed away and forgotten for close to 15 years till we discovered them while clearing the cupboards yesterday. But as I look closely at each one of them, flashes of memories come rushing back.

From the day they came into our house - either bought or gifted, how my kids played with each of them, how many kilometers they traveled with us, what all are the places they visited with us, and how many times they suffered being smeared in Cerelac and how many times they had to suffer the washing machine and the tumble dryer to the mountains of joy they brought into our kids’ lives. They were living beings with individual personalities and identities in the chaotic circus we called home.