Ok it wasn’t on a motorcycle…
Fact is, I left mine at the hospital and had to go back for it!
Category: Life in India
SHATTERED
COMFORT ZONE
well and truly out of mine….. on the other hand its one of the many, some quite, unbelievable challenges Manjula has faced in her life. As usual, she manages this one with her usual, formidable, tenacious, but always gentle strength…..one helluva strong woman.
She jokingly calls it her honeymoon now she’s out of intensive care wolfing down her food and in a room ‘with a view.’
It wasn’t exactly unexpected as she has a serious lung condition that can’t improve. She will stay in hospital a few more days to observe and see what’s required when she gets home.
It’s a bloody relief.
Lucie says: “it’s about time we told Manjula’s and our story”
Stephen : ok, ok, more to follow.
Happy Ugadi
Sort of snippet
Just back from a MYCycle tour on Srirangaptnam with mother and her son from Delhi.
Everywhere were signs that it’s Ugadi or the Hindu new year. People amassing leaves, positioning them around their entry door, creating ornate and colourful Rangoli, to invite the Gods, girls all dressed up, people splashing and having family fun at the bathing ghats.
Coincidentally, I get back to a new parcel from Amazon. A book ….. 
The author is an effective self-publicist and has rightly challenged many of the assumptions around the British Raj. This book on Hinduism (which isn’t an ism, just my humble view) is a timely counter to the increasing, unsettling, unacceptable, extremism that we’re currently hearing and seeing.
Meanwhile, Manjula has been back at home getting a well deserved lie in (guest numbers are reducing now we’ve reached the end of the season) punctuated by endless phone calls from our friends wishing a Happy Ugadi, so Happy Ugadi to you too.
Why does it have to be this way?
the Indian Government insists that your national ID card, known as the Aadhaar Card be associated with your mobile number for you to have continued service. As below. (I’m not commenting here about ‘Big Brother’ and will leave that for another time. )
So I dutifully visit my local Airtel shop to do the business.
Young Airtel woman:
Sir, you can now call this number (as she hands me a small card) and arrange it on the phone.
Foreigner:
Takes card. Readies his…. Two phones, (one to use and one for password, ok maybe overkill, I am 61), his Aadhaar card (yes foreigners can get one) and phone bill.
Calls number. It’s working. Press one for Indian and press two for foreigner. I press two. Line goes dead. I try again. And again. And again.
Slightly irate foreigner:
“It’s not working”
Airtel young woman
“Come back on Monday sir”
Foreigner
“Why can’t you do it now?”
Airtel
Some mumbling about not having working equipment.
More irate foreigner.
“This is my third time here to sort this out. (Slight fib as it was my second time). Why can’t you do it! This is ridiculous” or words to that effect.
She calls me over. Gets out her mobile together with the fingerprint reader and does the business. It takes just a few moments.
Now why didn’t she do that in the first place? Why did it take two visits, phone calls, telling me to return in two days and a bit of a fit? To get her to do her job properly.
It’s not just in India but one of life’s conundrums. Instead of just doing their job well, being helpful and informative they give us the ‘runaround.’ Shame really.
well ‘Big Brother’ has just got back to me….
Stairway to heaven
Stairway to heaven….
I think not!
But it is a new beginning.
We know there are many of our friends in India and around the world looking forward to hearing about our latest tussles with the bureaucracy.
So here it is….
We’ve taken the big friendly giant (BFG) step and now fully registered Mysore Bed and Breakfast with the Police, the City Corporation and the Karnataka State Government. It’s been an absolute ‘joy.’ Yes, really 😉
If you like to see ‘the big picture’ first check the one at the bottom.
Step One
Visit: The Police Commissioner, followed by the local Police Station, to get a letter saying Manjula is a cool chick. No no no…. to show there are no objections ie. she’s a great character, has no record and the Police and neighbours have no objections.
Please note we’re saving you the agony by missing out 90% of the actual experience of visiting and managing the differently organised police service.
Step Two
ok, so you’ve got your ‘get out of jail free’ card, or your statement saying there’s no objection. Now collect up your documents: rental agreement, letter from owner agreeing to you using the house as a homestay, receipt for payment of tax.
Go to the office.
Then sort out the mistakes: redo rental agreement (letter not good enough) and pay extra tax. Spend two weeks trying to meet up with the officials, get letter typed up, and on and on and on… you just wouldn’t believe it…
is it incompetence, ‘we don’t care’ attitude or an intentional wind-up?
Step Three
The registration with the Karnataka Government was relatively straight forward. Complete the online form, upload the documents provided by the Police and City Corporation and rental agreement. Pay the bill, electronically or face the ordeal of going to a state bank queuing up, paying in cash or bankers daft, getting a receipt, scanning it in, uploading it. Forget that option! paid-up…. We now await the visit of the inspectors.
Step Four
Register on line with the Police to have foreigners come and stay and complete the online Form C within 24 hours of each foreigner who comes to stay. We’ll provide more details of this wonderful…. time consuming employment creation ordeal…. later to enable me (Stephen) to fully flaunt my Yorkshire sarcasm.
So we’ve done it. The team has arrived at the top step, we’ve had our highs and lows, we’ve learned to laugh and cry, we’ve met formidable obstacles, gone with the flow, we’ve sunk our flag in the hallowed ground. It’s taken time, almost a year, we’ve grown as a team and Manjula has made it happen. Phew!
She’s a star!
Next…. we’ll we do it all again next year.
The big picture
The A team includes:
Manjula, aka the boss, on point, who has traipsed around all the offices, made endless phone calls, been endlessly put off, turned up at the key offices to find the ‘houdini’ *official/policeman/Babu/patriarch (*delete as appropriate) has disappeared…. gone for lunch, on holiday, maybe hiding in the toilet, who knows? She gets a gold star for determination, fortitude, strength, with just a little innocence in the mix. madam has seriously been through it all!
Akram, auto driver extraordinaire, helping Manjula face the torture, mysticism and labyrinth workings of the Mysore City Corporation, and hiding outside when she faced the officials of the police commissioners office or the helpful smiley chaps at the local Police Station. To be fair he’s an auto rickshaw driver, rightly with an innate fear of coming into close contact with the constabulary.
Vidya and Tanu. Our knight-ettes in shining armour. Being Manjula’s counsellor, advocate, comforter, advisor and support in dealing with the Police.
Stephen, The clerk, computer operator, form filler, recorder and scribe. He lurks in the background. In the belief that to show his pale face will significantly add to the costs of said registration process.
Thank you for your invaluable help!
Maid in India 2
It’s almost eight years ago that I moved to India and mentioned to my grown-up sons that I was looking for a maid. They were horrified.
We’re from the UK, are quite liberal and left wing. I’m actually from a relatively poor working class background. The idea of having a servant was also way beyond the usual more acceptable (in the UK anyway) middle class practice of a cleaner.
It introduces a class dimension. It’s seen as a bit 19th century, old-fashioned, elitist and servants are employed by people who are not like us! Who see themselves a cut above the rest, or the hoi polloi , a case of upstairs/downstairs. In our world view, its all completely unacceptable.
I explained as best I could. It was important to provide employment particularly as there was no real welfare safety net in India. I was fitting in with the way things are, and my approach would be different (yep, it would be!) I would be a sensitive and caring employer.
So I asked my friends Ganga and Cariappa if they could recommend someone. The maid network came up with someone pretty quickly.
I was called round to meet someone.
So what’s the bigger picture? once again Tripti Lahiri helps out:
“Britain saw the number of servants drop from 250,000 in 1951 to 32,000 two decades later.”
India followed a similar trajectory until that is, the 1970’s when there began a dramatic increase in the numbers of servants (we’ll come back to terminology later) employed and this is a situation reflected globally.
“According to international labour groups, as of 2010. there were more than 50 million such workers globally, an increase of nearly 20 million from 1995, most of this made up of women. There are now over 40 million female domestic workers globally.”
So OK that’s enough with all the big numbers, what does this mean in practice for the women involved? who are they? where are they from and what lives do they lead?
Maid in India 1
Quotes taken from ‘Maid in India’ by Tripti Lahiri :
“We eat first, they later, often out of food portioned out for them; we live in the front, they in the back; we sit on chairs and they on the floor; we drink from glasses and ceramic plates and they from ones made of steel set aside for them; we call them by their names, and they address us by titles: sir/ma’am, sahib/memsahib”
Think that’s in the past?
Well, think again.
“In today’s India its not unusual to see, often in largely empty restaurants, a couple seated with their child at a table for four, while the help is despatched to sit not one but two tables away….. or a nanny dandling a child on her lap at a nightclub while her employers and their friends drink cocktails as it creeps towards midnight, her hours of sleep dwindling since she is no doubt expected to be up and ready for another day at sunrise…. or for example children playing in a neighbourhood park, seeing a plump, light-skinned boy on a swing crook his finger at the petite darker woman standing nearby and utter a single word: Push”
Womens’ life experience is an incredible indicator of how a particular society works, from top to bottom.
In India the situation of women and particualrly those who are most socially and economically excluded, in this case, the ones that serve others, shines a spotlight on the social mores, the rules by which we operate, the structures and belief systems that helps maintain the status quo.
It also shows something else.
That is, how these women in often extraordinarily challenging circumstances not only manage but can thrive, can flourish and through that, show their astonishing abilities. In a sense, the influence they subtly exert and how they deal with the changes facing them can also demonstrate to us, on a macro level, how to deal with some of the challenges and opportunities facing contemporary India.
Let’s take a look.
Wildlife in our garden.
We have beautiful art both natural flora and fauna on our roof terrace and peeking through are images from the painted sides of bullock carts.
The new buds on our Brahma Kamla plants are also coming out. We hope to see them flower over one night in the next two weeks.
new journey
we’re setting out on a new journey…. after the wonderful experience last year (Note English sarcasm) ..to firstly ensure that Manjula’s various IDs were accurate and consistent with name, gender, address, date of birth ( it took, four months), then the ‘reality game’ of applying for a passport (two more months) and being knocked back a couple of times (the board game of these tangles with bureaucracy will be in shops soon) then to top it all we applied for a TOURIST (yes just for a holiday) visa from the UK Government just at the time of some insignificant Vote or other (Brexit aka Biscuit idiotic referendum) only to be summarily rejected (Brit Govt is fast on its rejections, three weeks total) and applying again with an avalanche of papers (two weeks)… for you dear reader, what feels like lifetime’s experience compressed into six months has already been documented on these pages. Some of you may remember it .. well this new journey is…. wait for it…. an application to register as a Homestay with the Karnataka Government.
in my English wistful sort of way I think it will be very straightforward and probably a damn sight easier than a similar process in the UK.
lets see
background is we’ve been operating on the same basis as an AirBnB property but this year the Karnataka Govt has introduced a new rule and that means everyone has to register with them.
As I say let’s see, first step following the ‘critical path’ , let’s find out what’s required 🙂
Manjula’s Meals Number two
Dhal
Manjula provides lovely Indian vegetarian meals at Mysore Bed and Breakfast for our guests from India and countries throughout the world. Our international guests, in particular, are interested in learning more about Indian cuisine.
She can often be seen with the kitchen full of guests while she demonstrates and provides lessons on how to cook various dishes. It does get a bit cramped!
Our meals together are an important part of sharing our home.
After many requests we’ve decided to post recipes, even demonstrations here on our journal/bloglet. We’ve started with a couple of simple examples, first: Ragi Soup (Ragi is fast becoming a smart-ish food) check here for the recipe and on this page follow the link to our first home made (and it shows!) video featuring how to make Dhal. The recipe is below. check the video
If you wish to see a really good video of Manjula cooking. It’s not a recipe but a great video of Manj at work, created by our lovely friends Tom and Amy. This is a serious professionally made video, not to be missed! 🙂 Its here.
The recipe for Dhal
Ingredients for the first stage
11/2 tsp Turmeric powder
11/2 tsp Cumin seeds
3 Tomato
4 green Chilli
1 small Garlic
Small bunch Coriander
2 cups water1 cup Dhal
1 cup Dhal
Chop veg in small pieces
Add all ingredients together in pressure cooker.
With lid on and gas lit, leave cooking for twenty minutes or 4-5 whistles of the cooker.
Switch off and leave to cool for twenty minutes.
Check and if necessary add a little more water and boil for a few moments
Ingredients for the second stage
1tsp cumin seeds
1tsp mustard seed
2-3 red chilli
add oil to a saucepan, then mustard seed, fry for a moment, then add cumin seeds, fry for a moment then add red chilli, fry then add Dahl. Fry for ten minutes. Then it’s ready.
Farrell Factoid
Manjula’s meals have become a great success at Mysore Bed and Breakfast. She doesn’t, however, cook every night (so please note its availability is not guaranteed). Guests usually do however get at least one dinner. We are a vegetarian household. I’m the vegetarian, not Manjula who eats out with me or other friends to get her regular meat input!
Me and MYCycle 