The Forgotten Birthday!

THE FORGOTTEN BIRTHDAY!

“Please join me for an evening full of fun, It’s my 16th birthday, hope you won’t miss this chance It’ll be great to see you there!” is what the birthday invitation of neighborhood friend read, sent via SMS.

Yesterday while coming back home after the party got over made me realize  how times have changed, how “Birthday Parties” have undergone a complete evolution. No longer do children go around distributing those handmade invitation cards en laced with beautiful calligraphy, technology has played a spoil sport. I wonder where the bunch of balloons have vanished that were tied to the letterbox so we knew what house it was at! Games back then were musical chairs, Peek-a-boo!, fire-on-the-mountain, lemon-spoon races, pin the horses tail, treasure hunt among others- simple yet enjoyable. The ‘cake’ was the showstopper back then, ordered days before the B-day, after carefully scrutinizing every little detail ranging from Spider man to mickey mouse et all, and the local baker would offer personalized service making every little birthday boy/girl feel extra special with free sparklers to adorn the beauty. Food was home cooked and innovative- open sandwiches, fruit salads, sugar-coated cookies, muffins, chole bhature, pineapple pastries, wafers and what not!  Frootie would be the thirst quencher. Guests included neighborhood buddies, schoolmates, grandparents and local family friends. The photographer would be the man of the house-the father! making sure the kodak ‘reel’ was bought and the camera was all set to roll! The biggest attraction would be the Piñata, a container often made of papeis-mache’, decorated, and filled with small toys or candy, or both, and then was broken as part of the celebration! All children with their party hats scrounging for all the goodies they could lay their hands on. The party culminated with a group photograph, as a memoir to treasure later, and bid farewell with the simplistic yet thoughtful return gifts.

As time has wound its way through the cosmic clock, an industry has grown up around birthday parties for the younger set. My little cousin went out for a birthday bash where he returned with a mobile phone as a return gift!  Parties are fancy, on a level I don’t understand; ‘theme’ parties have evolved ranging from comic characters to even Bollywood! There was also the period of “surprise parties”, where you threw your friend a party they didn’t (?) know about. Local bistros, food-chains, discotheques have become the favorite haunts for celebrating one’s birthday- doesn’t matter if you’re a 10 year old! Gifts have become more elaborate and fancy, the timings have changed, and cutting the cake with your parents and grandparents around is more of an embarrassment-sad but true in many cases. No longer do you find daddies haggling with the camera to take pictures, for the smartphone does the job!  There are no return gifts, and the little dust-infested star-shaped ‘Piñata’ lies in one corner waiting to be broken says goodbye to the “fun-filled” birthdays of yesterday!

Unforgettably green

Unforgettably Green.

Summer is synonymous with vacation. It was only last week that I returned from the Nilgiris, the salubrious mountain ranges of south India. A visit to a local nursery “leebon” neatly tucked away in a picturesque cove by a busy hill highway in the garrison town of wellington( a hill station,near ooty) made the trip unforgettable. A cobbled path leads to the little fairyland bungalow, wherever you look, on the walls, the windows, the doors, the chimney, EVERYWHERE – is a carnival of greenery , a rhapsody of sorts , that treats the human eye. A small little oval-shaped wooden slab with faded black calligraphy reads “welcome to my garden” and somewhere in the vicinity you spot the octogenarian Mrs.Lawerence with her pair of scissors carefully trimming her prized bonsai’s.

She took us around her one and a half acre of bountiful greenery, showing us her varied collection of greens and foliage. The saffron hibiscus, pink and purple fuchsias and begonias, and perennials like dahlia, petunias and nasturtiums were all in full bloom, so beautiful and serene. The garden had minuscule pathways, bordered with gorgeous untamed wilderness on either side, leading to the greenhouses, a treasure trove of sorts.  She displays the succulents, the potted ficus varieties, the neatly pruned and aged bonsais in moss infested clayed trays and the lesser know varieties of cactus with immense pride. A short walk down to the second greenhouse nestled in bunches of bird of paradise was spectacular. In one corner lay varities of star ivy and luscious succulents, demanding attention. Turn around and a row of read and white anthuriums greet you, in between lay exotic coleus dwarfs. I chip in and ask does she take her plants for local flower shows and she retorts with a big no! They are like her children she defends, nurtured with utmost care, can’t see them ruin just to please the audience’s eye. We step out with a few additions in our basket as she leads us to another greenhouse. The bright blood red passion flower veil, I identify proudly and she acknowledges my green knowledge appreciatively. We spotted sparrows and other birds chirruping away which gave us immense peace of mind and released our tensions away. I could stay here forever, I confess and she beams and gives out a little laugh.

“Not for sale, appa!”, she says politely with a smile, is her personal favorite, the hard-to-maintain tuberose begonia, carefully perched on the windowsill.

While she sits precariously on the makeshift bench billing the plants we’ve bought, she tells us what clearly began as a hobby transformed into a full-fledged enterprise. Crafting this paradise reflects a great deal of hard work and an unending passion for gardening, you are left to contemplate. In the mean time I walk around a bit and spot a pretty looking dwarf plant, brown leaves with pink spots over it, just like a cherry dotted muffin, I ask” how much for this one?”  “For Free” she announces with an angelic ear-to-ear smile and puts it in the carton box. Her nursery is a show case of her green fingers and more importantly, generosity, I tell myself and bid farewell.

A Serious Conspiracy(?)

“Tringggg…..Tringgggg” ……  “Tringgg…..Tringggg”

“Amrita! what is your problem in life? Can’t you get rid of this blessed alarm clock?!” Uday, mumbling in all his sleep. Amrita was already awake by then, convinced that every wife is a miss for a hour and stress for 23 hours. These men!

But then, amrita can’t take a chance….what if she gets up at 7:30 instead of 7?! A catastrophe awaits….

Biji will be missing her morning cuppa finely brewed darjeeling and it just doesn’t end there! Of how, Biji would start whining about daughter-in-laws aren’t really like how they used to be…docile, obedient, dutiful…! Of how Uday beta neglects his wife’s mistakes! 

“Grant me the senility to forget the people I never liked, The good fortunes to run into the ones I do!” (1-luv!)Biji winding up her morning prayers, stepping out of the prayer room ; Amrita ready with the cuppa tea with the folded newspaper all neatly assembled in the wooden tray, chimes in  “And the Eyesight to tell the difference! ” (1-1!)

 “Meetha kam hai, bahu!” whines biji as she settles herself on the wooden armchair putting on the glasses and ready s herself to go through the headlines.

Amrita sometimes wondered what prayers she offered behind those closed doors? who knows even God might have had to hear her string of complaints! How she wished before she got married into this house,” Rabba! yaan tay saas changi hove, nahi taan photo tangi hovey!” 13 years, too little, too late, she sighed as she prepared the morning breakfast.

Biji- ubiquitous colossus! hovers around the kitchen fretting of how dear-uday-beta will miss his morning breakfast! Haye, How Uday beta loves to eat….hard working , the bread winner of the family, bring home the dough to meet all the expenses from dal-roti-subzi…till uday beta has just enough to pay for his bus fare for the last few days of the month!

“Haye! Lace up the Paranthas with more Butter na! how skinny my bittu-Kittu have become!” Biji, with all her supposed Grandmotherly love just as uday settles himself on the dining table. (Whatte timing!, Amrita tells herself )

With all that nagging since morning a confrontation of its sorts is on the cards! Amrita shifting between the kitchen and dining room mumbles “Dear Mom-in-law, don’t try to tell me how to raise my kids. I am married to one of yours(looks at Uday) and believe you me, there is room for improvement!” She fumes and settles herself on the chair layering her toast with butter and marmalade. 

MEN: The victims of this Saga