“A pair of silver anklets poured out. He lifted them against the cheek of the evening sky and he shook them to unspool their rhythmic zhan-zhan-zhan. ‘Take them with you,’ was all she said. Years later he realised what she had really given him. The sound of her feet. The preface to her movements.
As I’m now officially a writer. Ha ha. Well I have pen and a blank sheet of paper.
I spend time reading with two perspectives: firstly as the reader, I always was, appreciating the journey I’m being taken on and secondly realising more about how the writer has created and revealed their story.
I quote another book to help reveal why I like the one above.
“This feeling resonated in me. It was the resonance that had lingered on, exactly as it does when the last page is turned of a book which reaches the heart.”
I want Manjula and my story to reach the heart as it did for me.
Manjula and I had our first wedding, the official one in the government office where they exchange contracts on immovable objects. We are undoubtedly immovable objects.
I was age 60 before I got married so there was a big build up and it took some time to move in that direction.
Manjula signed so many documents after we met: applications for passport, visas, accounts, tax returns, becoming a Director of the company, but this was the most important. I’ve got the photo albums out, here at home.
three days later we celebrated and married again in a field
Superintending Engineer Rangaswamy SE Biligiri receives my proposal. Phone call to his colleague Arshaya who heads development for zone 9 and asks her to give permission Who arranges for Sanjay to meet me in the park and will provide letter of approval next week. A total of 53 minutes from beginning to end.
I now have to find help to create the bed and plant the plants.
Manjula’s garden will be between the two stone benches at the top end of our park.
Jan Brouwer does it again, with the relaunch of his popular and well regarded: Cottage Chamber Concert.
On the 14th February, in his home in Mysore we were entertained by Faleen and his sister Falisha.
Falisha age 13
Imagine you’re in a lovely house, tastefully decorated and well designed but it is a home. You meet the other guests in the downstairs hall (Lounge) for snacks and politely talk about the concerns of the day, in this case, no surprise as it was about vaccinations and the pandemic. Promptly, on time you’re invited upstairs to the Music Room where a Yamaha C2 concert grand piano is centre stage. You’re seated on attractive 19th century Dutch furniture, surrounded by paintings and images of some of the featured composers.
We were entertained by two young people to the music of Burgmuller, Chopin, Shostakovich, Bach, Beethoven, Schubert, Prokofiev, Grieg, and Moritz Moszkowski. Phew, yes, all that.
Faleen age 13
It’s as if many years of training, practice and performing as concert pianists had been crammed and concentrated into two small , young bodies who gently teared across the grand’s keyboard to provide a wonderfully unexpected experience. A musical talent demonstrating a sensitive maturity way beyond their years. You just had to close your eyes to imagine you were in a concert hall in one of the European capital cities but with the comfort and intimacy of visiting a favourite auntie and uncle.
Congratulations to Faleen and Falisha for a wonderful concert and thanks to the Brouwers, as we look forward to more entertainment from the jewels you find.
One of the greatest challenges facing we humans is friction.
So what do we mean by friction?
A dictionary will refer to the resistance encountered when two objects or surfaces come together and try to move. Such as a tyre on the road.
The insights and opinions we offer are about the friction that comes between different people, between people and their institutions or their communities and also between people and the wider world.
Our first offering refers to a particular form of lubrication. It counters the friction we experience in our day to day lives and helps make things happen.
In its simplest form the lubricant is a gift, a thank you.
The team that collect the rubbish and clear the leaves received a tip this morning. A thank you gift. Nothing wrong with that.
In my view when it becomes a requirement for service it starts to become a problem. An example of this is in the US and Canada where the level of tip to someone waiting your table in a restaurant is carefully calculated and absolutely expected. That feels like a supplement to the wage, required because the employer is a cheapskate and underpays their staff. It becomes an extra tax.
In India where I’ve lived for over eleven years we have a lot of experience with a particular form of lubrication, known as bribery.
This takes it to a whole other level.
If you’re a business applying for a business permit from the corporation or a liquor licence for a bar, pay your fee and a whacking great bribe otherwise absolutely nothing will happen.
Politicians do it all the time. Jump ship to another party and be paid with a ministerial berth or some other juicy position with money making promise.
Here are two more examples I’ve discovered just this morning. In my view they are quite unbelievable.
Want a job?
Someone has bribed to get a job at a state run business. On her rate of salary it will take three years to have earned the equivalent of the bribe she has paid.
Want a driving licence?
Don’t bother with lessons or even turning up at the test centre, you never have to get in a car, ever! Just send a bribe through a broker.
This is expected in most situations to one degree or another, it is so ingrained that no one ever expects it to change.
Aadrika the immensely talented artist who created this wonderful portrait of the women in my life visited with Somesh and his six year old daughter Ritu (check her own art here) to photograph the painting so we can have prints made for some of our friends around the world. Whoopeee!
Me and MYCycle 