When did you last post a card?

Question:  How many Christmas and New Year greeting cards did your family send and receive when you were 10 years old?

And how many did you get last Christmas??

My Answer:  40+ and ZERO!!

Here is my story..

 

Once upon a time,

Long long ago,

When cell phones and ring tones were non-existent….

We communicated thru inland letters & postcards. And there was one and only one agency – The Indian Post and Telegraph Service. It used to be called P&T.

Envelopes were costly and they were meant for special occasions- like sending your bio data to various companies along with attested copies of your birth certificate, marks sheet and a character certificate.

And for enclosing Jathakams (horoscopes) in response to matrimonial ads.

 And to send a crisp five rupee note to your loved ones on their birthday/anniversary or their son’s poonal (sacred thread) ceremony.

And to send greeting cards, of course!

Marriage invitations and other joyous functions were informed with pre-printed covers with bright haldi or Kumkum smudges on all the four corners – a tradition which is still practiced today. But the old P&T is mostly bypassed by the courier services of DTDC, DHL and Professional couriers. P&T’s speed post also gets a fair share of this business.

Death was announced on a naked white postcard.

Urgent messages were sent thru telegrams.  Many of you might still remember some of these.

Reached safe. 

Blessed with baby girl/boy.

Greeting #30 : May the heavens shower their choicest blessings on the newlywed couple

Greeting #25 : Our sincere condolence

And so on..

And you paid 25 paise per word to transmit. 

Our local postman was the man for all seasons.

Wearing crisp well ironed khakhi uniform (with baggy pockets) and khakhi cap with a red piping, he was probably the only respected and loved government servant ever. He was also one of the few literate ones in the locality who would deliver post and read them as well – an unrecognised & unrewarded value add by the Indian postal service!! 

The postman and his bicycle and his canvas satchel filled with letters was a common sight and the ring of his cycle bell announced his arrival into the small lanes of our mohalla (community).

Start of each month, the Postman was a hot property. Much sought after by many – pleased and pampered by all.

A generous bar of fresh ‘mysoor pak’ would be ready for him at the corner maami’s house when he would give her the money order from her son. And as he went along giving away the money order amounts to each house-hold, he would receive rings of handmade murukkus, a packet (potlam) of mixture, a couple of rava laadus freshly made from ghee residues, ribbon pakoda, kesari and what not!

An acceptance letter for a marriage proposal would fetch him 2 rupees, a job appointment letter- one rupee, and an occasional banana or a mango from the fruit vendor for reading/writing his letters. 

Come Deepavali, Pongal, Navaratri and New year, his satchel would ger heavier with loads of greeting cards, printed post cards and other odd sized envelopes. Sometimes he had to make two sorties to complete the distribution. 

But he never complained. He was always cheerful, wished each one with bright smile and accepted his festival gifts with humility & grace, generously wishing each one with his blessings & good tidings.

My Paati would always make him sit on our front porch cement slab, give him a big tumbler of warm sweetened milk or cool buttermilk depending on the season.

And we soon forgot Mani Iyer, the ever-smiling Postman when we relocated from Vellore to Dehra Dun!

Times have changed rapidly, the cell phones wiped out the traditional postal business. The humble postcard became the benchmark for Dhirubhai Ambani when he announced his vision to the nation saying that he will enable every Indian to talk to anyone in India at the price of a post card (40 paise/min then)!!

And WhatsApp went one step further. You could now write as many letters to as many persons for free!!

Sadly, communication nowadays have lost their personal touch.

Last birthday I got 42 messages on WhatsApp and another 20+ on FB ( some repeats).

Every Christmas & new year, my msgs run into a hundred at least and Holi, Diwali would fetch over 60++ - almost all of them mass forwards, one liners & GIFs.

But I very much miss the 6 odd birthday cards that I would always get earlier – all carefully selected and signed and posted a couple of days in advance so that they reach me on time. 

And the smart post man would correctly guess and wish me first and collect his 5 bucks!

Come Diwali, bright colourful Diwali cards ..

Lovely Christmas and New year Cards – remember Unicef & CRY cards? and others with snow topped Christmas Trees and Santa Claus and greetings written in many languages!

Remember the singing cards??  You open them, and they play the tune, Jingle bells, jingle bells or happy birthday to you in fast forward mode??

Remember the 3-D greeting cards??

For a very long time I carefully preserved one new year card that had a Japanese girl in a bright orange kimono who winked at you when you slightly turned the card sideways!

And we spent hours and hours at Archies and other book stores to select the perfect birthday cards / Christmas & New Year card / or the huge Wedding Anniversary card.

And patiently write our personal wishes and sign by all the folks in the family, write the address and stand at the post office Q to buy stamps for posting them.

And we all eagerly waited for a few special ones from abroad. And these came in fancy printed envelopes and big foreign postage stamps!! 

And we fought over the stamps.

So, when I went to the US the first time in 1979, I bought 20 picture post cards and a variety of stamps and posted them to all my relatives and friends who had kids.

Back to our topic..

Back in those days, between Dec 10 thru Jan 15^th, every empty space in our showcase would be filled with cards.  Our TV top and fridge and every flat surface in our drawing room would have these cards prominently propped up proudly . And at my friends place even their huge Christmas tree would be covered with loads of bright cards!

Not anymore.

It’s been more than 8 years since I got a genuine greeting card.  My fault – I have not sent one either!

By the way did anyone of you get an actual Merry Christmas or Happy New Year greeting card this holiday season?

If you got one or more,

I envy you!!

Krish..

Varadarajan Krishnan Iyengar

Varadarajan Krishnan Iyengar  was my Great Grand Dad (GGD) - my father’s father’s father !
I inherited his entire name.
And a couple of his genes as well
And that’s about it ! Nothing more , No less !!

Great Grand Dad (GGD) was a very big and wealthy landlord. He owned huge tracts of fertile paddy fields, vast acres of palm groves and large plantations of banana trees . And all of this in a rich agricultural belt near the border of Tamil Nadu and Kerala – 26 Kms drive from Coimbatore .
His land would have easily supported more than a hundred families, farm hands, casual laborers, plantation workers and odd job migrant workers from neighboring states as well .

In those times there were no man-made disasters, no El Nino effect & no global warming problems either.
Monsoon came in , poured its heart out and went – on time , every time !!
The sun shone brightly each day and the crops flourished.
I would imagine GGD’s coffers must have been overflowing and he had more than enough to share generously with workers and all his relatives as well . 

GGD was a simple man with a large heart !!

Interestingly GGD also had a mistress, in the adjacent village  – as it was common amongst most wealthy landlords  in those times . It was a once a months affair .

The double ox drawn cart would be prepared for the journey. Post noon, fresh after bath, generously sprinkled with sandal powder, Great Grand Dad ( GGD ) would dress up in a spotless white zari dhoti and a comfortable silk Jibba ( kurta ) . Great Grandmom would specially and thoughtfully pack for him , his pillow , mattress and a change of clothes and a big silver gooja ( Jug ) filled with Kesar milk !!

Next morning when GGD returned , he would have to go to the rear courtyard, have a good bath, perform regular surya namaskaram and then only enter his house for his first tumbler of hot coffee .
So convenient , so elegant – a simple ctrl-alt-del operation to reset and then get going on normal mode as usual !!

While GGD was very wealthy , he was also very trusting, extremely gullible , unsuspecting and probably plain stupid as well.  

An ideal combination that attracts suspicious friends, bad company and rotten advice . GGD was no exception and he quickly succumbed to all of it and within a quarter of his lifespan he lost all his wealth, eroded his entire family property and notched up a pile of debts .

Pride or plain stupidity ?

GGD employed two British hunters in his fields to shoot and scare away rampaging elephants and other wild animals that came from nearby forests . I am sure that the amounts he would have paid these British gents – in silver or gold coins would have created a bigger dent to his coffers than all the damage done by those poor elephants !

Bad advice ?
He built a medium sizedl clay-mud dam to arrest the water from the small river and store it for irrigation. When the dam developed cracks , he was advised to pour molten lead (Eeyam Kaachi Kuttinal) to fill them up . Cannot imagine what a huge amount of money must have got flushed down thru this dam !!

Greed ?
He was coaxed into growing tobacco crop because it would yield better profits per acre. So huge tracts of coconut groves and banana plantations were erased to make way for the tobacco crop . And very soon he got into trouble with government regulations, corrupt officials & unscruplous authorities . Very soon and predictably the tobacco mafia from Kerala smelled blood, moved in quickly and stripped him of everything !!

GGD sired 9 daughters – never gave up shooting for a son . And when grand dad finally arrived , it was a great occasion for him – but an extremely challenging and adversely loaded dice for the infant . And by the time all the daughters were happily married off and all the debts settled , there was nothing left  but just memories.

Grand dad gave up his graduation midway, moved into a small house in Mylapore in Chennai along with his parents and took up a clerk’s job in a government office .

GGD must have been a sad and a broken man . Having lived in a palatial house with dozens of servants  he now had to make do in a one room and wash his own clothes.  

And his end was very sudden and tragic too . He got run over by a speeding bus opposite Chennai railway station. He was returning back home after helping Great Grandmom board her train to her village .

You see, village folks are not very adept at crossing busy city roads .
And the young speeding Chennai bus drivers are not very forgiving either !!

Krish..

Flash 55 Fiction

Flash fiction is a fictional work of extreme brevity that still offers character and plot development. Identified varieties, many of them defined by word count, include the six-word story,  the 280-character story (also known as "twitterature"), the "dribble" (also known as the "minisaga"; - Wiki.

Flash 55 fiction, often called “micro” or “nano” fiction, is the art of creating a complete short story in exactly 55 words, no more, no less.

Here is my attempt. 3 stories!!

One pure fiction

The other two stories, I will let you decide!

The Hitchhiker

The hitchhiker settled in his seat and casually asked, “Do you believe in Ghosts?”  The driver laughed, “What nonsense. I am a 21^st century realist. No God no Devil and no Ghosts for me!”

As the car passed by the local cemetery,

“Please stop” said the stranger.

He opened the door, got down, and vanished!

Tom and Daisy

He followed her, everywhere.

Day and night.

In the park, through the roads, over the play grounds and all around the neighborhood.

Finally, he won her affection and they united.

For them,

No vows were taken

Nor rings were exchanged

No priest either, to bless their wedding

For Tom was a dog

And Daisy another.

Rushing to Airport

5.00AM

"TAXI STAND!!  Gaadi bhejo, JALDI".

"Wrong number", a sleepy old voice replied.

Finally, taxi arrived, I checked in and inside the departure lounge I called the 'wrong number' and apologized.

Thanks, young man. I am enjoying a hot tea and watching the glorious sunrise which I would have missed otherwise, the old lady replied.

Krish..

The Power of AND!!

I love the word ‘And‘,  and the symbol ‘&’.

By now you would have noticed that I use this word very frequently in my writing, especially at the start of each sentence.

Why I do this?

There is a short history behind it.

If you wish to know, please read on..

20 years back, at Hewlett Packard India (HPI), we had a challenge in selling our newly introduced DeskJet line of InkJet Printers. HP was the No. 1 leading and dominating brand in the Laser printer category with market share >85% !

However, we just could not ramp up our DeskJet volumes. Our numbers for India could not even qualify for bulk shipping rates, which only made the product even more costly.

There were basically 2 product lines. The commercial DeskJets for corporates and office use and the personal DeskJet for home and SMB (Small and Medium Businesses).

Commercial DeskJets were expensive and the inks ( cost of printing  ) for these printers were comparable to the lasers.

Personal DeskJets was our biggest focus as they meant huge volumes and equally large potential for consumables (ink) .

Worldwide HP followed the classic ‘Gillette’/’Kodak’ business model.

Sell the main unit cheap (at negative margin) and make money on the consumables.

So, in India too we priced the basic printer at a low price (making an upfront loss on every unit we sold) and priced the ink cartridges high so that we could get profitable over the lifetime usage of the printer.

Many felt our Ink cartridges were ‘obscenely’ priced. And I was also once royally roasted in an NDTV interview for 30 min on this painful subject.

So, the choice for customers were

-        Buy high cost printers with low priced ink cartridges

-        OR

-        Buy low cost printers with very costly Ink cartridges

Combinations that made choice difficult and ultimately leading to low sales.

And these choices were not acceptable to the India Business team either. 

So, we went back to the R&D at HP and demanded a special model/SKU for India. (SKU = Stock Keeping Unit).

The target we set for the development team was to give India a printer that cost less than 100 USD and delivered printed pages at less than a cent each!

Soon we got one close to our expectations.

A model that we could price at Rs8,999/-list price.

Black ink cartridge at Rs 499/-, which could deliver more than 550 printed pages.

Then we ran a huge promo campaign, print and BTL (Below the Line marketing)

Theme – the Power of &!!

No more difficult choice.

Now get a low-cost printer AND lower priced ink Cartridges!!

All our Ads and marketing collaterals carried a huge symbol ‘&’!

For our resellers & channel presentations I made up a story and started each of my talk with this one…

A team of research students went to a school and questioned the children in Class 1.

They asked a simple question – who do you like – Your Mon OR your Dad??

The kids replied as expected – Some Dad, Some Mom & Some were indecisive.

Then the students went to nursery section and asked the same question.

They got the normal answers too.

BUT,  a fair number of these tiny tots surprised them with

Mom and Dad -BOTH!!

Some even paraphrased – I like my mummy AND my daddy!!

That is the power of AND.

Check it out again!!

Offer these nursery kids – Toffee or Lollipop?

Many will grab BOTH  - unlike the ‘educated grownup kids’ who would choose just one.

Folks, you do not have to get compromised with an OR anymore!!!

That was my message. So, Go ahead and sell HP!

And we sold by shiploads each month.

Now just think about it.

We get too easily boxed in with a set of choices, many of which are forced upon us and some due to our own making.

We never explore if there are more choices than those presented to us. Pressure and time constraints only make it harder and make us myopic.

In my story, only two choices were presented

Either Mom OR Dad.

But there were two more which many of us would never think of.

Both Mom and Dad

Neither Mom nor Dad.

So, as we grow older, we tend to stereotype our brains and constrain them with such limited choice. Many times, these are driven by our parents, teachers and bosses too.  How many times in our younger days have we heard….

Eat your cabbages OR you won’t get the ‘gajar halwa’.

You can take either computer programming OR Economics.

You can be either a musician OR an Engineer.

Why are we forced with such limited options?

Why??

And slowly and consistently our minds are brainwashed from that wonderful free thinking beyond the boundary imagination of a nursery child to a well programmed ‘educated Robot’ – to make choices based on the given data only. And no more!

So much so that most people have forgotten to think without boundaries and take bold actions out of their own free will.

And now it takes a De Bono to teach us ‘Out-Of-the-Box-Thinking’. Lateral thinking as he calls it..

Something that came to us so naturally when we were young.

The power of ‘&’ unshackles such constraints and explores possibilities beyond the obvious choices presented to us.

So why should there be just Either Beauty OR Brains.

You can have Beauty & Brains

You can have Cheap & Good Quality

You can be Handsome & a Computer whiz Kid!

You can score max in English & in Maths

You can be Fast & Steady

You can be Super rich & Honest

You can have an Egg & the Omlette

AND you can also have a Cake & eat it too!!

Why not ??

Krish..

Christmas & New Year Celebrations @ Sobha Palladian !!

Very early in December we sighted the bright shining star on the western horizon.

And on 15^th Dec. the Magis (the three wise Kings) dropped in at Sobha Palladian on their way to Bethlehem.

And all of us celebrated a wonderful Christmas and New Year party that evening!

50+  families, 210 adults and  children, all enthusiastically converged near the fountain area to celebrate the birth of the King and usher in the New Year 2019 well in advance! 

  There was food, games, dances, carols and more Christmas carols and more food winding up a night of festivities! 

While the scheduled start was 5.30PM  for the games and the children’s sales counters, it took a lot of persuasion and some desperate WhatsApp messages to finally get all the folks, to come out of their homes and head for the stalls that were set up by the enthusiastic kids. Some had been working o their stalls since 2.30 PM unfolding the steel tables and trying to manage the thin table covers against the swift breeze. And they were successful only after all their food stuffs and games were finally placed on the table to hold down the table covers in place and prevent them from flying over.

A variety of stall and enthusiastic kids – all trying to get your attention and the money in your wallet!

 And they succeeded pretty much. Everything got sold out finally! Even the 14 small potted plants!

Squares of joy is a group with 9 members who come together during every Sobha Palladian Event. They bake delicious food (cakes and muffins) and sell them for the cause of charity. This Christmas party they made Rs. 7,500/-  and in future, hope to collect more money for the cause.

Fresh baked muffins and raw mango and watermelon salad were the first to get stocked out.  Snowman treats (authentic south Indian Maa-laadu based ones) were great.  If I were to believe that all these treats were actually prepared by these kids, then i can see some real talents and i can also predict some excellent future chefs!!

But the sad truth is that many of these budding prodigies will ultimately land up doing an engineering course or commerce degree and with an MBA they will all land up in an IT company or a Bank Job!  

Entrepreneurship? Good thought!

 A career in a kitchen or a restaurant?  Joking?? No way!!

And some smart kids set up games stall. Looked challenging!

And with my limited vision, slow reflexes and moderate IQ level , I did not even dare to try them out.

Coming back to food, this time I went cautious on my calories. Restricted my temptations to just 2 baked potatoes.

But,

My wife did not have the heart to say NO to the kids requesting her to try out the various dishes. So, we both ended up eventually having banana walnut cake, raw mango with watermelon salad, fried peanuts, brown bread with tomatoes and a few sticky sweet stuff!

And finally, the much-anticipated event started.

In marched a troupe of cowboy girls – high heeled riding boots, tight jeans, checked shirts and Stetsons.

And Attitudes to match!!

Seriously, all of you folks must audition for ‘Jane Got A Gun’ Sequel.

And the 2002 American Idol Kelly Clarkson blasted the air with ‘Run Run Rudolph’ !!

And WOW, they all danced – the country western line-dance!

With absolute grace and abandon!

And it brought back age-old memories of the time ( 1979!! )  I spent in a small Western town called Colorado Springs and went to the Colorado State Fair and Rodeo meet at Pueblo!

Did anyone wonder what would happen if these ladies had real horses. a pair of Colt Dragon Revolvers and Winchesters and   lariats.

Methinks I would head for the hills and pan for gold.

Back to SP..

Frosty the snowman

Was a jolly happy soul.

Wonderful performance by tiny tots in snowman suits.

Rudolph the ref-nosed Reindeer.

Had a very shiny nose,

And if you ever saw it..

You would even say it glows.

And there we so many Rudolph here!

And their big shiny red nose popped off every now and then !!

And they all spiritedly sang and danced, while their moms ran around picking up the red noses and plugging them back.

The kids sing so well and with so much of enthusiasm and energy levels that we should seriously consider starting a SP Choir Group. It will be more sustainable in the long run.

  

And then the Sobha Palladian Carol group took over the evening with some wonderful rendering of ‘Do you hear what I hear, and a medley of short songs and finally ending with Jingle Bells . It was wonderful to hear them again.

 Sing we joyous all together

Fa-la-la-la-la,

La-la,la,la!

And the grand finale before dinner!

Santa danced his way through the mob of excited children. And he seemed to be having much more fun than the kids!!

And the kids shrieked with joy throughout his performance and his gift giving antics.  

He gave away 60+ gifts and each one of them with his personal touch!! 

I am sure Saint Nicholas would be very proud of him and blessed him well.

Santa was just wonderful and jovial (Yes, Jovial)

And my recommendation to the MC is that we give him the Santa contract for the next 5 years with a ‘Clause’– He must put on additional 100 pounds weight and increase his girth to 50 inches at least.

And finally, Dinner was simple and sumptuous. Pasta, Noodles and fried rice with gravy and tarts for dessert.  A perfect meal for a person on a strict calorie count!!

And while this evening lasted for just under 4 hours, can you imagine the long hours and hours spent by the folks organizing this event and the performers practicing for their show??

First, a big round of applause to all the ladies in Palladian. You folk are par-excellence. From traditional Garba dance to wild western line dance, from Patriotic Salil Chowdhury song to Christmas carols, you just rock!! Thank you for the wonderful show!!

Sincere appreciation and acknowledgement to ‘behind the screen silent heroes’ – folks who meticulously chose those carols that can be sung best by this group, the patient folks who taught and tutored the kids and the adult to sing cogently and in rhythm and the choreographers for the dance and for all the other nitty gritty details that goes in to putting up such a fantastic show !

And a big THANK YOU to the MC team, and volunteers and to the kids for executing another memorable event!!

And wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year 2019!!

And I am already looking forward to the Republic Day next Year.

Krish..