The Maharajah's Whiskers - Part Ek

For the people who know me, they’d say I was a fairly even tempered person. (Shaddup! You there- stop snickering!) No really, I believe everyone has their bad days and one ought not to be quick to decide based on one experience. But I think three times kind of pushes it a tad bit.

I am of course, talking about our favourite airline, our national carrier, The maharajah’s whiskers. It’s been three months since my return from the homeland and is only now that enough time has passed that I can talk about the incidents (pliss to note the plural) without hyperventilating or foaming at the mouth (which in this country of the stiff upper lip is vitally important. You only have to flare the nostrils ever so slightly before you are dismissed as being a drama queen. A sliver of a sneer whilst describing the events in Q is apparently just the right touch of emotion).

I now lay down the events that transpired and shall leave you, the reader to be the judge. I shall recite just the first incident in this post, as one needs time between the accounts to recover from the sheer incompetence.

Incident 1: After a goodly three years or thereabouts, I, very excitedly reached the shores of Mumbai, with a flu-ridden toddler, and sleep deprived brat and four pieces of luggage. Or so I thought. I mean that’s what I left London with. One flu- ridden toddler – check. One hyperexcited six-year-old who wasn’t going to sleep a jot on the plane – check. Luggage – ek, do, teen… hang on, where’s my fourth piece of luggage? An airline official bustles in just then to inform the unfortunate few of us that have been awaiting our luggage that due to a technical mixup (meaning the off loaders screwed up), our luggage was earlier put on a different conveyor, but we’ll have our luggage in this conveyor shortly. He was quite pleased with that. To be honest, so were we. At four in the morning, all I wanted to do was find a nice, warm bed and crash until it was time for my connecting flight to Cochin that evening.

Luggage comes and luggage goes, but my bright pink strolley remains stubbornly absent. The airline official, trying to helpful does the following:

Scratches head, the peeks out into the loading area to see if there’s any luggage left (why anyone would leave just one bright pink suitcase unloaded was beyond me, but hey, it was four in the morning). Finds nothing. Scratches head again and asks me if I was sure I had a pink suitcase (why anyone would hallucinate about pink suitcases was, again, beyond me, but hey, it was four in the morning) scratches balls (we all need a change) and then asks to see my luggage tags – and counts them (yes, there were four) then counts my luggage (counts three). Having now satisfied himself that I was indeed missing a piece of luggage and was not playing the fool, he scratches his ear and the leads me to the ‘missing luggage’ department.

An equally helpful airline official then takes over, writes out my form in Marathi (we are still at the international air terminal at this point), asks me to read if what’s written is accurate and sign it.  While I try and understand what’s been written in my rusty Marathi, the official informs me that I have nothing to worry about. Apparently this is quite a common occurrence. I seem to sense this was true from his lack of alacrity with a Spanish woman trying to locate her child’s buggy. His colleague was trying to convince her to pick one from an array of buggies they had in their possession, and nevermind the small matter of the buggy not being hers. My helpful airline official, in the meanwhile, reassures me that my luggage has probably flown to Cochin without me (probably thinking I’m going to compliment the airline on being proactive and taking a call on my behalf. I couldn’t possibly need all my luggage with me in Mumbai when I was only going to stop over for half a day), and it was ultimately my travel agent(!!) who was to blame, since he had booked me on an evening flight to Cochin, when clearly, there was a morning flight to be taken to the destination (which apparently my pink strolley has managed to board).

By now, toddler and brat both decided that they’ve had enough of India and were ready to head back to ol’ Blighty. It was only the bribe of an infinite supply of chocolate and the promise that they’d never ever have to wear jackets in India that made them change their mind.  I was lucky enough to have an extremely patient relative waiting for me outside, and as he escorted the scruffy trio out of the airport, I was glad there was someone to take over the haggling of the prices with the taxis.

Thirty minutes into the car ride. I get a call. From the airport. The helpful airline official had located my luggage and could I please come a collect it. I was getting mildly annoyed now. I informed the helpful airline official that he could now load my luggage on to a plane to Cochin, without me, as promised. I wasn’t about to turn the taxi around only to find that this was a false alarm.  Another fifteen minutes later I get another call. From the airport. The helpful airline official informs me now that it was after all a false alarm, but not to worry, my luggage was safely on its way to Cochin (my luggage seemed to be having adventures of its own).

That evening:

As I land in Cochin, I collect the rest of my luggage and duly hand over two exhausted babies to two elated grandparents while I set out on search of my bright pink strolley. The solitary guard on duty at Cochin International (ha!) Airport (helpful airline officials were missing at this port) informs me that I’ll have to traipse over to the Maharaja’s whiskers counter located some distance away to have any hope of seeing my pink suitcase. The helpful airline officer at the domestic terminal tells me ‘ Ais, ais, ewe see, youze was un international fleit. Sow, eye think, your luggage, it will be at the international terminal’ Ah. The terminal is a hop, skip and a jump away. And the office is connected internally. But I naturally have to hop, skip and jump to the international terminal and repeat my request. Where another helpful airline official tell me, ‘But ewe floo domeztic wonly now, no, madam? So, it will be in the domeztic terminal’. Hop. Skip. Jump. Domestic terminal.

Helpful airline official#1: Madamm… why will I lie, madam? Nothing is here wonly. Wait. Wonly for ewe, I will check with the domeztic.

Strolls to next room. Has a cup of tea while chatting with other helpful airline official. Comes back.

Helpful airline official#1: nooo, maidamm. Are ewe sure they have sent the luggage from Bombay? It will come tomorrow, perhaps?

Me: But I was informed that your very helpful airline has very helpfully sent my luggage before my arrival to Cochin. Helpfully.

Helpful airline official#1 (scratching head meditatively – seems to be part of their induction training): wait, huh, madam. I will check customs. Maybe it haasn’t cleared that wonly, no?

Fifteen minutes later

Yes! It is waiting madam. You need to clear customes with it wonly no? (beams at having helpfully solved this puzzle)

Well, luggages, even bright pink ones have limitations to how clever they can be. As to the limits of helpful airline staff stupidty, there seem to be none.

Rookie Mistakes - 2

Having experienced Kochi on foot and thanking God that I have lived to regret it, last week
I decided to listen to Dad and quietly take the car when we decided to go shopping.
Now by 'taking the car', I do not mean driving it myself, although the Government of India has foolishly granted me a permit to do so for the past decade or so. I meant assigning Dad or he-of-infinite-patience-when-it-comes-to-his-daughter the chauffeur duties for the day while mum and self (and brats in tow) swan in and out of shops. We left punctually at the designated hour (i.e. exactly half an hour after it was agreed we would leave), and this time when Dad headed towards to car park he found me right along with him, matching stride for stride. Right. so far so good. As we settle ourselves into the car, I see dad quickly reverse out of the car park after strapping himself in. "whoa! Hang on Dad!!" I say - "I haven't strapped myself in - and neither have the kids!" Dad, for the nth time in this very brief trip looks at me like I'm a raving loon, visibly composes himself before answering, calmly, "It's not compulsory for the passengers to wear seat belts here. And the back seats don't have any seat belts."
I look around incredulously at the back. The seats are bereft of any anchoring devices. The kids are grinning away bouncing about like helium-filled balloons, rejoicing at the feeling of not being tethered down. As we continue backing out of the driveway - this time in a vehicle rather than on foot, I feel no safer and hang on gingerly to the door handle.
No sooner have we emerged out of the apartment complex (after what I though was far too much aggressive horn-tooting by dad), we nearly ram into an SUV which, from what I could gather thought we were involved in a fun game of Chicken. I roll down my window to give the guy a sound talking to - only to realise I was talking to thin air - Chicken man was continuing his dangerous trip down to road determined to visit the A & E by the end of the hour.
Dad meanwhile continued down to road, unaffected by our brush with death, merrily leaning away on the horn - apparently this was how vehicles communicated with each other here - a short 'parp' to denote mild annoyance at how you're driving to a longer 'paaaaaaarrrp' to denote - 'really now, you're being a twat' to a staccato burst of 'pip-paarp-pap-parp' to denote 'watch out! I'm a huge truck with no rearview mirrors about to burst forth from a blind turn at break-neck speed' to a myriad of other complex signals.
I seem to have learnt driving from a totally different rulebook because the left indicator here somehow communicated to two-wheelers behind you that this was the time to overtake the vehicle from the left and a right indicator - well, I don't know what it meant because it seemed to have no effect on the surrounding traffic.
My favourites are the roundabouts- manned by a traffic constable. Where if you choose to go clockwise when you want to turn right, The constable looks at you in askance like you didn't know what you were doing. It's obvious to anyone with half as much brains as the rotund constable that the shortest route in a roundabout if you wanted to go right was, of course anti-clockwise. And that is what one is expected to do. None of this new fangled nonsense about uni-directional traffic for our intrepid Kochi Konstable.
I now realise why almost all vehicles in India have an image of God hanging from the rear view mirror or firmly pasted to the dashboard (including Dad's car which now incidentally has permanent imprints left by my fingertips on the dashboard) - after all one never knows if one is ever going to ever return to your loved ones once you go out into the streets (on foot or by car) of Kochi. 

Rookie Mistakes - 1

Having just arrived in Kochi after about three years, I tell my dad, 'I need to visit the bank, Pops. Is there a branch nearby?"
Dad, in an effort to show off how much Kochi has moved on since I last came informs me, "Of course. We have a local branch not five minutes away."
Me: Great! shall we leave in about ten minutes?
Pops agrees.
half an hour later
Me: Right. I'm ready. shall we leave?
Poppy, who's been waiting patiently for the past fifteen minutes (having been used to years of waiting patiently for the wife, sister, daughter,and other miscellaneous womenfolk in his life) nods away.
We head out of the lift and suddenly I find myself bereft of company. I look around for Dad and and find him heading swiftly towards to parking lot.
Me: I though you said the branch was five minutes away poppy, why are we taking the car?
Pops(looking at me like I was a few cards short of a pack): You want to walk? It's fifteen minutes away if we walk!!
Me (thinking to myself): eh? what a spoilt bunch we are... we can't walk for fifteen minutes?
Dad having given up trying to convince me that walking was a bad idea, trudges along forlornly with me. As soon as we step out of the apartment, I am nearly run over by a rickshaw with horns blaring. And the driver has the gall to then turn around and advice me on how to walk on the road- nearly running over three other pedestrians while he was at it. My heart rate was just returning to normal when a huge SUV which had no business travelling in a three feet wide road gently nudges me into the open drain running by the side of the road. Dad, the veteran Kochi traveller swiftly pulls me into a roadside shop (whereupon a shop assistant looked up hopefully, ready to make is first sale of the day - or maybe the week, even, judging by the fine coating of dust on the shop shelves) and just as deftly hops out and into the next shop.
We walk in this pop-in-hop-out fashion, while dad ably guides me though the end of the street filled with drivers who I'm convinced have walked straight out of Grand Theft Auto V (or is it VI? I've lost count).
At the end of the the road, I'm met by a scene that can only be called bedlam. Anarchic Bedlam! Cacophonic Anarchic Bedlam!!
Shouting over the babble, I tell dad "Gosh, it must be a serious accident. there are even cops in the scene"
Dad (shaking his head sadly at how totally clueless I was): That, my dear, is a traffic cop. He is directing traffic. And this, is what we call a junction. We need to cross now.
My jaw drops. We need to to cross this? Is he kidding me? I have manic drivers gunning for me from four different directions now. I close my eyes, ask the Lord to take good care of my children, and make a dash for it.
Three sudden brakes, two screeching tyres and six blue curses later, I have made it across with all my limbs intact. I can't believe it!! It has to be a miracle.
At the branch I am so shaken by my experience I ask for three glasses of water. And consume them (despite the fingerprints on the inside of the glass).As we are about the leave the branch, I turn around and tell dad  "Do you suppose you could go and get the car? I don't think I'm ready to die just yet."
Poor dad. Shaking his head, resigned to his fate of having crazy women dictate his life, he steps out to go get the car. I quickly avert my eyes as a two wheeler does his best to grind his toes to pulp. *gulp* Maybe next time I should let Dad decide how we travel.

And the winner is...

...*drumroll*...

But hang on, before I let you know, maybe I should draw it out, you know, like a grand reveal in a mystery novel.
So, quick recap - we had a cover contest, and you we supposed to help me choose which cover design works best. So far, good plan. Poll all set up. Baby Hamper all picked. No obvious flaws in the plan.
But then, of course  I didn't anticipate the wonderful thickheadedness of the person who'd designed the poll, who ate up the poll results of week one, at the start of week two, and so had to resort to some pretty dastardly deeds to get them results, but hey, you guys made it relatively simple for me.
From the Four Options, it was pretty clear that the 'Arjun Kumars' (Options 3 &4) were impression nobody. They were pretty much non starters. That left me with the '50-50' option - for those familiar with Tarrant's choice  or, for the desi  reader Bachchan's choice (yes, granted, it was hosted by SRK for a brief interval, but come on, the show was always the Big B's, wasn't it?) Options 1 & 2 ran neck and neck, and for the entire duration of the poll were too close to call - closer than the US Presidential elections, even. Thankfully, though,  it didn't have the hopes of a nation resting on the outcome. Just the blood pressure of my Publisher, who by now was getting seriously miffed about my shilly-shallying about with the decision. So I did the only thing I could think of (no, not deciding for myself, because that would be mean weeks of sleepless nights about having made the wrong choice) - I let Pickwick choose out of the two. And here's what he chose:
Ta-Daaaaa!
Option 2:

Congratulations, to all those who'd made this wise choice. For those who'd chose Option 1, don't lose heart. The only reason he didn't choose that one was because he's going through a 'I-Hate-Pink-And-All-Other-Girly-Stuff' phase. 

Now for the all important Winner selection. Again, tough one, but I chose Gita Gandotra! Congratulations! I have no clue who you are, and you made a choice which wasn't even in the running, but hey, your name stubbornly refused to land in the rubbish bin. I promise to track you down and deliver hamper and book to you. Hope you enjoy both. 

Congratulations to you too, Mr Publisher. Looks like you can stop popping those pressure pills now. 

The Cover contest

It's finally here! my book cover design! but good things come in fours, apparently.

so now I have four designs to choose from. And I'm horrible at decisions. So I'm going the desi way. Delegate. I'm throwing the decision open to the public. You, yes you, dear reader will get to have a say on the book's cover design. How slick is that, eh? (and less decisions for me). 

I promise one lucky winner a signed copy of the Book and a baby hamper (that would be a hamper with baby stuff in it, not with a baby in it, just to clarify.), as is the norm in these kind of contests. All you have to do is use the poll at the end of this post to vote for your favourite option. 

The contest is open for a fortnight, at the end of which the final cover design shall be revealed. (or, I shall be forced to make a decision due to a lack of responses *shudder*)

So without further ado, introducing The Book Covers:

OPTION 1:

OPTION 2:

OPTION 3:

OPTION 4:

You might notice that a couple of covers have Rajni 'Arjun'Kumar down as the author. Don't let that throw you or in any way Bias you. I assure you, my surname is not changing any time soon. Even if my publisher thinks I ought to be re-christened. 

PS: If you're wondering how I'm going to pick a winner, it's simple. I shall throw paper chits with all your names into the waste basket. The ones that miss the basket make it through to the next round, where the basket shall be moved an inch closer, and paper shall be tossed again. After much paper -tossing and basket moving, a winner shall be declared. Much like reality shows on the telly. Neat, huh? 

Late Start

...we are what you'd call 'late bloomers'. Maybe we get the seven-year-itch three years later. 

The Mother of all Books: Everything you wanted to know...

...about the book! Well, not everything, You'd need to buy the book for that, you cheeky thing, but it's a start.

Right, so my book is being published. 'Great!' they say. 'But what is it about?' they ask.
Well, the book is about life, mostly. My life experiences. With the Baa Lamb. With Pickwick. (The Holy Terror wasn't in the picture yet). Our experiences as we stumble though parenthood. And finding our sense of humor along the way.
So here's the first of the comic strips describing our many experiences with this book release.

A typical conversation between Sense and the Baa-Lamb

The long road to Heaven

Well, I'm back from my holiday. I ought to feel refreshed. Alive. Invigorated. And I did. Until the plane ride back home. You see, Nice may be a wonderful place to vacation, but who would've though that getting there would be a challenge? Did someone sign me up for the 'Amazing Race' when I wasn't looking? When we planned this holiday, it was supposed to be a straight flight to nice and we'd be sipping Pina Coladas on the beach in no time. World economics and airline buyouts later, we were now headed to Nice  with a stopover in Frankfurt. Still, not the end of the world. We can handle it. The day of the trip dawns and in the flurry of last minute packing I hear the news that the airline staff has called a flash strike at Frankfurt! Noooooo!

Still, the ever resourceful Baa-lamb manages to speak to the airline and we will now take off some hours later with a stop over in Munich. Ha to you, Airline! Righty-ho... Nice, je viens! Sadly, lack of foresight on my part and lack of vegetarian meals in the flight meant that the holy terror (that is what we are calling the younger of the two offspring) was tired and hungry and she wasn't going to take it lying down. at one point, I thought the plane was going down, since she was quite determined to shatter the windows. We finally staggered into Golfe Juan at 2am in the morning. 

The next day, at a fairly sharpish hour in the morning (yes, the holy terror does keep unGodly hours), after a decent breakfast (and a minor mishap which saw the baa-lamb trapped in the lift for a goodish three-quarters of an hour), we contemplated the day's plan. By general consensus we decided to hit the beach 

Toddling off to the beach

The boats at the port

A storm approaches

Right, beach done, the afternoon was begging for a visit to Eze. Eze is a medieval village situated atop a hill, with the Jardin botanique d'Èze crowning it. The view from the top alone was worth the trek up twice (yes, once up carrying the holy terror, and then, having made the mistake of planting her on the ground, once more after chasing after her)

symmetry

Cactii

The view from Eze

Clear seas as far as the eye can see

I know, I should stop with the butterflies

One of the many wonderful art galleries

My plans for a lie-in were foiled second day in a row when this time, just to mix things up, it was Pickwick who was up bright and 'oily. Right, since we were already up, a drive down to St Tropez was the order of the day. I've already marked out the little villa along the coast I want to buy. Just awaiting the Euromillions win now:)

blue skies and blue seas

Day 4: *yawn* wasn't this supposed to be my holiday? Where are my lie-ins? Even the sun was taking a break today! Dragging self out of bed, the baa-lamb consults a train time table over coffee. Today we would cover Monaco and Ventimiglia in Italy (When on holiday with the Baa-Lamb, leave the planing to him.)

The Beach at Ventimiglia

  

more of the beach

Monaco

Ah. The final day of our hols. I have promptly sent the Baa-lamb to the beach with the brats. I finally get my lie-in. 

The less said about the return, the better. The bally airline decides to call a strike again- this time in Munich! after threatening to offload us in Munich and keeping us on tenterhooks, the flight finally took off, hours later. This time, we were well prepared and the holy terror was out like a light, but the two other babies in the flight hadn't read the memo. They more than made up for the deficiency in decibels emanating from the vicinity of our seat. *sigh* I need another vacation. 

Loo Blues

It’s now more than five years since we moved to this city. That is the longest I’ve stayed in one place after my marriage. We are so accustomed to moving around that Pickwick still keeps asking me ‘When are me moving to a new house, Mummy?’  He thinks it’s perfectly normal to move houses like one upgrades mobile phones.

For me this has now become my second home. Not yet my first love, but more like a happy crush one thinks fondly of. But when we came here the whole thing was a bit of a culture shock.  Tiny things, that make you realise that you’re from a completely different world. Take loos for example. Yes, Loos. We wash. Here, they wipe. No really, I don’t get it. Do you say ‘Gee, I’m all sweaty. Let me wad up a bunch of paper towels, wipe my armpits, and a quick dab all over, and Voila! I’m all clean’? NO? Then how the hell is it okay to do that for arses? And there is no concept of floor drains in loos.  How the hell are you supposed to wash the floors of the loos?  And we’re supposed to be the third world country??

Speaking of washing, we, that is, us Indians are obsessed with bathrooms. We need more bathrooms. When we first came here, we went looking for places to rent. The estate agent showed us plenty of houses, mansions even with 5 bedrooms, a reception room, a dining room a conservatory  and one, yes, ONE  bathroom and ONE toilet! I mean what is it with these guys? Don’t they ever need a shower? Oh yes, I forget – all they need is paper towels.

image courtesy:origami-resource-center.com

I still remember my grandmum used to freak  out when she came to houses with  bathtubs. She was used to, well, wells and rivers and such. So when I explained the concept of a bathtub to her, she went ‘chee!  You lie around fermenting in your own juices? That’s DISGUSTING!’ (This is a loose translation for her words from Tamil.  The literal translation would have be banned from blog sites) Thank God I didn’t have to explain toilet papers to her, she would have disowned me.

We have recently invested in a small apartment in India. We are delighted with it. When people ask us about it, we say, ‘Oh, it’s not much, it’s just a 2 BHK, and the proportions are quite small but it’s got TWO BATHROOMS!’

Ballooning in the Cotswolds

"A place of outstanding natural beauty" the tourist blurb says. Well, I was about to find out.
The Cotswolds aren't too far away to drive from London. Took us about a couple of hours to get there, and straightaway, you know that the information brochure does not lie. It was like I was transported back in time. There isn't even 3G in this place! But what it did have was ballooning - and weather Gods permitting, we were about to take off, after eleven unsuccessful attempts at praying for decent weather over weekends.
The snaps simply don't do justice to the amazing beauty we witnessed during the ride.

Hot air to get the basket upright. We then had to scamper in real quick before we were untethered from the station wagon

Looks like an image from Google maps, doesn't it?

Clear skies with visibility right up to the sea!

Keeping us alight

One of the most beautiful sunsets I've seen....

We were treated to a spectacular show by Mother Nature

The man, the moment, all very moving.

We Landed in a field - in the middle of nowhere.  The  pilot had to signal  the balloon chaser (yes, that is his profession, I'm not making this up) with giant flames shooting up into the night sky to guide him. Don't even ask how we packed the balloon up!

who knew landing the balloon and packing up would be more adventurous than the balloon ride itself!

The heart of London

So I attended this photography course over the wee

kend. And all in all it was pretty neat. Most of all it reminded me what was so amazing about the city of London. There we were, right in the heart of the city, and this is what we spotted:

No idea what that contained, but what a pretty colour.

Tre

k

k

ie moment

My attempt at creating movement.

Hail-O, halo

Atmosphere

A heron with a Mohawk