Phailin - The Emerald

I got a personal feel of ‘Phailin’, the 'very severe cyclonic storm' that ravaged coastal Odisha on the 12^th October, 2013. It originated from a depression on the coast of Thailand and moved towards India. 

I live in the State Capital Bhubaneswar, which though touched by Phailin, was not seriously affected. The worst hit place was Gopalpur and the rest of Ganjam District. The area adjacent to Paradip Port also was severely affected. Gopalpur was lashed by wind with a speed of 214 kmph. Damages were slightly less at Puri, which faced a slightly higher wind-velocity of 223 kmph. Heavy rains lashed Odisha from the 11^th. Rains and strong winds hit also Chhatisgarh, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Bihar. 

                             The wind in action

The Indian Meteorological Department in Bhubaneswar had forecast a wind speed of 230 kmph and wave height of 12 feet near the coast. The memory of the ‘Super Cyclone’ which had devastated Odisha on the 29^th October, 1999 is still fresh. This time, the State Government was fully prepared and had taken the help of the Army, Navy and Air Force in its preparedness. The National Disaster Response Force also was deployed.The scheduled Government Holidays for Dussera were cancelled. Doctors on leave were called back. Before the cyclone, over 9.90 lakh people were evacuated from areas within 5 km from the coast. Some had to be shifted forcibly as people refused to leave their hearth and home. Hence the damages were less than anticipated. The government’s response to the disaster received commendation from the UN Special Representative for Natural Disasters. At Bhubaneswar, power and water supply, telephone and internet services were disrupted for 3 days. As a safety-measure, power supply was disconnected whenever the wind-velocity crossed 60 kmph. 

About 26 lakh trees were uprooted in the State and about 2000 live stock were killed. The State Govt. has put the total loss at Rs.15,000 Crore.

Phailin and the flood that followed ravaged 18 of the 30 Districts of Odisha. Forty-four persons were reported as killed. The cyclone left a trail of destruction damaging and ravaging more than 4 lakh houses.

       Fast asleep on what remains of her house

Six thousand school-buildings and standing crops on ove 6 lakh acres of farm-land were damaged. 

 Two young teak wood trees planted by me 4 years ago in my garden had grown to a height of 25 feet. These were uprooted. After about 15 years, these trees would have fetched about Rs. 2 lakh or more each.

Named ‘Phailin’

Neelam, Nargis, Nilopher, Sandy, Bijli, Mala, Rashmi, Helen, Priya – these appear to be names of attractive film-heroines, but they indeed are symbols of destruction and disasters. These are the names of cyclones.  

A tropical cyclone feeds on heat released by the condensation of moist air. The latent heat gets converted into kinetic energy and feeds the strong winds emerging out of it. One beneficial feature of tropical cyclones is that they carry heat and energy away from tropics to temperate zones and thus help in global atmospheric circulation.  A ‘tropical storm’ brings in wind-speeds of 63 kmph. When the speed exceeds 118 kmph, it is called hurricane.

Tropical cyclones are named to facilitate the communication between the forecasters and the public. Naming of cyclones started in the 20^th Century. In the beginning, numbers or technical codes were used. An Australian started naming cyclones after politicians he disliked. During World War II, American meteorologists named cyclones after their wives and girlfriends. Then both female and male names were used. Now, cyclones are given names selected by Member-Nations of the World Meteorological Organisation. These names include those of men, women, flowers etc. In 2004, a formula was devised for naming cyclones in the Indian Oceanic Zone. The countries in this Zone are: Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Myanmar, Oman, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Thailand. Each country submits a list of names selected by it. The earlier cyclones were named ‘Neelam’ (by Pakistan) and ‘Mahasen’ (by Sri Lanka). 

The recent cyclone was named ‘Phailin’ (by Thailand). ‘Phailin’ means 'emerald'. The list of names submitted by India includes Agni, Akash, Bijli, Jal, Lahar, Megh, Sagar and Vayu. Among the attractive ones in the Pakistani names are: Titli, Bulbul and Nilophar.

Planting lessons

Phailin has taught a lesson to city-planners about planting avenue trees. More than 20000 trees were uprooted in Bhubaneswar only, many of which were on roadsides. Fallen trees blocked roads. Slow-growing but deep-rooted and sturdy trees like mango, jamun, neem and banyan trees stood their ground against the gale but fast-growing trees like gulmohar, kadamba, eucalyptus, champa and teak succumbed to the strong wind.

TAIL PIECE: Two faces

Phailin united the staff and the prisoners in Chhatrapur (Ganjam) Jail. A 20-metre wall of the jail collapsed by the onslaught of heavy rain and gale; the prisoners stayed put and did not escape, providing relief to the worried jail staff.

Some criminals took advantage of the cyclone and the consequent power-cut and darkness, to burgle a jewelry shop in Bhubaneswar and took away gold and silver jewelry worth Rs 3 lakh.        

 

The Truant Specs

This happened for the first time in the late 90s; my specs played truant. One day, in my Bank, i suddenly found that my specs were missing. Occasionally, i used to put down the specs on my table while working. I must have done the same that day. However, when i looked for it, it was not on my table. I searched for it among the papers lying there but it was not to be found!

 In the Bank, following the Management Concept of ‘Floor Walking’,  i used to occasionally walk around in the Banking Hall, to ensure that the customers were being served properly. In this process, i used to go the junior officers, sit in front of them for a while and then come back. I thought that while doing this, i might have removed my specs and kept it on some officer’s table. So i went around the whole banking hall and searched for my specs. But it had vanished into thin air!

I became sad at the thought of shelling out some money for an expense which was not necessary; however, i had no choice other than getting a new pair. For this i got my eyes tested once again, which also involved some outgo. Sometime before that i had read somewhere, “If you spend a hundred rupees on some item out of your own volition, you will not feel unhappy; if you lose a hundred rupees, you will definitely feel so.” Such a feeling engulfed my heart :(((((((((((

This feeling tapered off in a few days but got revived after some more days when a customer came to me, apologized profusely, took out a pair of specs from his brief case and handed it to me saying that on that day, he had by mistake put my specs which were lying on my table, in his brief case while leaving! He belonged to a far off place and could return it to me only during his subsequent visit!

Did i become happy on getting back my lost property? Or, unhappy at the revival of a sad feeling?

Since then, i have made it a practice, whenever i change my specs, to preserve the old specs to use it as a standby in case the specs in use go missing.

THE SECOND ACT

Five years after that, my specs repeated the disappearing act at another place. One evening, i discovered that my specs had gone missing. The wife and i turned the house upside down, searching for the missing treasure but it eluded us. I tried to recollect the places i had visited that day to think over the possibility of having left the specs there. We had gone to restaurant for lunch that day. Often i used to remove my specs while taking food, for better comfort. So there was a possibility of having left the specs there. I felt lucky to have brought the restaurant bill, which contained its phone number. I was about to call the restaurant when i remembered that we had gone there by car and i had driven it. I could not have driven during the return journey had i left the specs at the restaurant! :(((((((((((((((((((((

Where had the specs gone? Oh, where?

The wife had a flash! It might have gone with the kitchen-waste to the compost-pit in our backyard. What a weird idea, I wondered.

I have a penchant for gardening; wherever I have gone in the course of my job, i have set up a garden in all possible spots, in the backyard, on the roof-top, on the balcony, that is any spot where some soil can be placed. I used to utilize kitchen-waste to fertilise the soil. On my insistence, the wife puts two small bins in the kitchen for dumping the waste; one for non-biodegradable waste and the other for the biodegradable type. Daily, i take the second bin and disgorge the contents in my garden.

The wife felt - I do not know why- that the specs might have gone to one of these bins. The housemaid had already cleaned out the first; so there was no way to check it. So she (the wife) thought that we can look into the other one. The contents of the second bin also had been removed, i.e., transferred to the compost-pit in the garden. She asked me to go and look in the pit. I pooh-poohed the suggestion but on her insistence and because it was my specs to be searched for, i went and examined the pit. As i had predicted, the specs were not there.

The wife does not have faith in my ability to do anything worthwhile. Also, she does not give up anything so easily. She looked at me with disdain and asked our maid to do the search again, promising her a reward if she found the specs. The maid went to our backyard, triumphantly returned after about 10 minutes, with an ear-to-ear smile, proudly holding out my missing specs and demanded the promised reward! The wife threw another dismissive look towards me, took the specs and regally proceeded to fulfill her promise to the maid!! I sheepishly tried to suppress the happiness on my face at the retrieval of my lost accessory.             

Till today, i have not been able to decipher as to how the specs traveled all the way to the compost pit!!!

And, i have also not been able to know why the specs did not go to the other dust-bin, the one meant for receiving the non-biodegradable house-waste. Had it opted for this choice, it would not have been possible to retrieve it as the contents would have gone to the street-side garbage-bin and then, would have been taken away by the cleaning staff of the Municipal Corporation!  I thanked my luck for this.

LAST EPISODE OF THIS SERIAL?

My specs played for the third time recently. The open area in front of my house is of small size and it is filled with flowering plants and creepers. My backside garden is a largish area. I have planted flowering bushes in the area adjacent to the house. The remaining area is used as a kitchen-garden. I have started planting fruit-bearing trees in a part of this area. Sometime ago, I found that a few champa plants appeared there from nowhere. I was pleasantly surprised and have allowed these to grow. They were followed by two kadamba plants. I love kadamba flowers. Kadamba trees remind one about Radha-Krishna rasalila.  I treated these unplanted trees as pleasant gifts from nature to a nature-lover like me. However the kadamba plants grew very fast and became tall trees, overshadowing the fruit-bearing trees. So, reluctantly and with a heavy heart, i cut down one of these. Kadamba trees have spreading branches and large leaves. So, after rather cruelly felling the growing tree, i cut down its branches and separated the leaves. I spread this huge quantity of leaves in the garden to decompose and become natural manure. With all this work, i became tired and came back to the house to take some rest.

Oh, suddenly i discovered that the ridge on my nose was bare! The specs were not sitting there!

I entered the house and told the wife about the disappearing act of the specs. She let go a scream and asked me to go back to the garden and search. Giving up my desire for rest, i rushed back. A look at the big area covered with leaves nipped in the bud any hope of retrieving my lost property. However, I did search the area but soon lost hope and patience. When i came back to the house empty-handed and empty-nosed, the wife dispatched the maid-servant to do the search. Half-heartedly, i followed her. Both of us searched and searched but luck eluded us. She lost patience and started coming back; i followed her almost limping. Then i saw a spark; the rims of the specs, perched on a raised branch of the felled tree, were gleaming gloriously in the morning sun!!! A sigh of huge relief escaped my nostrils.

What was the wife’s reaction? Better i shall not tell.:)))))))))))         

I pray and hope that this will be last Episode in this Serial. 

The First Born

If you utter a word before a baby, it imitates and parrot-like repeats the word. In the same way, when this morning, i received an overseas call to listen the words ‘Happy Birthday’, i repeated the two words.

It was a call from Daughter I, who lives in the U S of A, to wish me on my birthday. I repeated the two words to her as today is her birthday also. Yes, Daughter I and i share our birth day. It is a good coincidence. Both of us consider ourselves lucky for this.

First Born children have certain advantages over their later born siblings. Birth of the first child is a thrilling and exciting experience for a couple. The expectant mother dreams and plans about how she would welcome the family’s new member. The joys of the thought ‘I am going to have a baby.’ have few comparisons.

In Odisha, a special festival is earmarked for the first born child. It is called ‘Prathamastami’ which usually comes in November. On this day, the First Born gets new clothes. She/he takes bath early morning, wears new clothes and her face is decorated with chandan (sandalwood) paste.  The child’s maternal uncle provides these new clothes every year. Puja is performed and special ‘pitha’ (cakes) and other tasty dishes are prepared on this occasion. A special item called ‘Enduri Pitha’ is prepared. It is a steamed item made from rice, cheese, coconut, sugar and other ingredients. The dough along with the stuffing is placed in leaves of turmeric plants and then steamed. In the process of steaming, some juice of turmeric leaves enters the dough and gives enduri pitha its unique and distinct flavour and taste.

 Ou leaves also are used to prepare enduri pitha.‘Ou’ is a typical tree found in Odisha and some parts of West Bengal. It bears round fruits which are sour. The 5 petals of its flower evolve into a fruit. The fruit is added to some curries to give a sour taste. The fruit is also used to prepare a kind of mouth-watering pickles. Banana leaves also are used to prepare Enduri pitha. However, the unique flavour of enduri pitha can be had only by using turmeric leaves.

 The second and the other children are not given this special treatment.

When Daughter I was born, the wife was in her parental home in Odisha, India. I was in U P. The good news was conveyed to me by telegram. I have preserved this telegram (I have added a photo of this in my post ‘Mother Serious Stop Come Soon’ dated 26.06.2013. )

While in the school, she started learning Odissi dance.

  Later, she also started learning painting.

 It was a pleasant job to select a suitable match for her.


 

As in the case of all fathers, my eyes became moist when she went to her sasural.The mother's emotions were less controlled.

When this ‘baby’ of ours had her first baby (a girl), she told us proudly “I have made her.” I told her what i had seen in an advertisement for baby-food, ‘It feels like someone has taken out a part of you and yet has made you complete!’ 

Wish us a happy birthday!                  

Didi

Didi visited us and stayed with us for a few days last week.

She is the elder sister of one of my best friends; if i can rank my friends, her brother would occupy the Top Position. To be exactly correct, i should say ‘occupied’ because he is no more. He succumbed to cancer 9 years ago, when he was in his early fifties. Like him, i used to address her as ‘Didi’ and still do that.

I cannot describe how close we were; I can only say that we were very close. Our friendship lasted for exactly 40 years, that is, till he was called back. We became friends the day we began our College-life. We had the same subjects; we were in the same Tutorial Group. We were together till our Post-Graduate Course. However, our choice of careers made us take two different paths but we were always in touch. First there were letters written in long hand; this gave way to e-mails. Whenever we happened to visit our city at the same time, we were definitely meeting. Whenever one of us happened to visit the other’s place of work, we made it a point to meet each other. And each such meeting would start with a bear hug.

I have preserved most of his letters and print-outs of his e-mails. His last e-mail to me was on the 18^th May, 2003.

Both brother and sister remained unmarried. After the death of their mother and father within a span of one and a half months, she took charge of his household while he remained engrossed in the demands of his job. On the 10^th May, 2003, he mailed me saying that he had undergone an operation to remove a tumour which was found to be benign. So I felt relieved. Four months later he informed me that another tumour, this time malignant, had developed below his knee and doctors were considering the option of amputation of a leg. He was worried more about Didi regarding how she would manage when he won’t be around. Shortly thereafter, the cancerous growth overpowered him.

That was the beginning of Didi’s ordeal. She did not find any encouragement from her uncles and cousins.

This was a trial by fire for her. She emerged as a strong person, steeled her mind and took courage in both her hands. She decided to live her own life and took charge of her life.

He was in Central Govt. Service and was posted in Delhi when the end came. In spite of all the efforts of her well-wishers and his admirers in the Govt. she did not get family-pension or other benefits from Govt., as a sister is not entitled for these as per Govt. Regulations. Meanwhile, compounding her problems, some unsocial elements tried to take advantage of her helpless position and grab her parental home and the land on which it stood.

She was undaunted. She took a momentous decision. She decided to sell it off the sprawling parental house and live in my city which is nearby. God helped her. She found a person who was a good friend of her father and who agreed to let a portion of his building. With the help of some kindly persons, she quickly disposed off her parental house and occupied the rented accommodation. She has been living there since 2004. Another close friend of ours, who was a high ranking Govt. Officer and a couple of erstwhile subordinates of my deceased friend, provided her with moral and logistical help.

The courageous lady lives all alone there and manages everything herself.

My job had taken me all over India. So i had no means for helping her settle down. I retired in 2009 and settled in this city. Sine then, i have been giving her a little moral support to live a reasonably trouble-free life. The interest on funds left by her brother and the sale-proceeds of her parental house takes care of her financial needs.

I shall cite only one example of the grit and determination of this courageous lady, who never admits defeat. She lives all alone and occasionally, memories of her loving brother overwhelm her. On one such time, she felt very depressed and was choked with emotion. She could not swallow the food she was taking. She felt like giving up the effort and just lying in her bed. The next moment, she gathered back her courage and decided to fight the depression head on. She told herself that if she would not take food, she would die and that would be letting down her brother. So after pushing each morsel to the food channel in her mouth, she drank some water to force the food to go inside!

  

I salute the indomitable spirit of this brave lady.

        

Happy Independence Day

Let us celebrate India's Independence Day this year with Vande Mataram in Odissi Dance choreographed by Sharmila Mukherjee!

 

TAIL PIECE
Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half the time. - E B White

Food for Thought

I don’t know when the buffet-system came to India but it has spread like wildfire. A buffet is a meal set on tables from where people help themselves.

Earlier, on events like marriages and other social occasions, the guests were requested to sit on mats spread out on floors to be served the common meal. Plantain-leaves cut to size and thoroughly washed, were laid in front of each person. The different items of the meal were served on this for consumption of each guest. There were servers, each carrying a container filled with an item of the meal, going around and serving it to the guests. They would entreat and beseech each guest to have a little more of the item. The host would go round to ensure that each guest was served well and would tell the server to give a little more of the dish to this guest or that one. He would often press the guests to have a little more. This practice is still prevalent in some rare cases.

Then came benches and long tables so that the guests would not have to squat to have the meal. Servers going around and the host going to each guest, pressing her/him to have a little more continued. Guests did not have to ask to get the meal.

There were occasions when a particular guest would like to have a little more of a particular item. Hesitating to ask openly for an item, she/he would ask the server to give that particular item to the person sitting next to her/him. The server would get the hint; he would give the item to the person for whom it would be asked as well as to the first person. This way, the person would be seen as one taking care of another and he himself would get what he wanted. The joke was that kheer got the synonym of tasmai as a result of this practice. ‘Tasmai’ in Sanskrit means ‘to him/her’. The first person would ask the server to give kheer to ‘tasmai’ (to the other person). This way, kheer got the alternative name ‘tasmai’!

‘Pangti Bhojan’  (sitting in a line and being served) has given way to the buffet system. In this, various items of food are laid in a row on tables. Guests have to move along these tables from dish to dish and pick up the items of their choice.  The sympathetic Hindi equivalent of ‘buffet’ is ‘swaruchi bhojan’ - having food-items of one’s choice. This term refers to the fact that out of the fare laid out on the tables, one can choose the items of one’s choice. The adversarial translation of the term is ‘khade khade khana’ (eating while standing).  

The advantages of the buffet system are that it needs less effort and a little lower expense by the host. It requires less sitting arrangement and less management. Only a few chairs are provided; most of the guests take food, standing.

However, with the buffet system, all the personal touches are gone or are heavily diluted. Guests have to first queue up to get the plates and again queue up before the tables on which the food items are placed. Most of the time, there would be a big rush before the tables and one has to struggle to get food. A guest has to stretch out his/her hands (like a beggar?) to be served by attendants. (Of course in some cases there won’t be any attendant; one has to follow self-service system.) Instead of the food coming to you, you have go to the food! The guest’s woes do not end there; after moving in the queue to be served the different items, he/she has to balance the food-laden plate on the fully-stretched palm of one hand and eat with the other, standing unsteadily all the while! If the attention is slightly diverted or the guest is not very careful, the plate would tilt and the contents would drop either on her/his clothes, or on those of the persons standing nearby. Sometimes, while moving a little to have some space, the guest would trip, causing embarrassment. Of course, a few chairs are provided to enable one to sit and have food comfortably but the number of chairs provided is grossly insufficient to accommodate even a fraction of the number of guests invited. Sometimes, this leads to musical chairs. If after having secured a chair, one leaves to get a second helping, one would come back to find that the chair has been occupied by another struggling guest. :((((

Caterers play a trick to reduce consumption of costly items. They place the less costly items at the beginning of the row and the costly items (including non-vegetarian items) at the end, so that by the time a guest reaches there, his/her plate would be more or less full and he/she would feel embarrassed to take too much of these items.

Many times the rush dissuades a guest to go for a second helping. Often there is an array of less costly but more luring and inviting pre-meal items like pani puri (golgoppa), chat, papdi chat, etc. So by the time one goes for the main dishes, one’s stomach is already full!  However, there are exceptions where more costly and tasty pre-food starters are provided.

Of course, many of these problems are taken care of in buffets organized by people in the higher income group as also in star hotels.

Have I given you some food? Some food for thought?

Bon appetit!       

A Rainbow of Dances

At the start of the 2010 Commonwealth Games, Indian classical dance forms Odissi, Bharatnatyam, Kathak, Manipuri, Mohiniyattam and Kuchipudi were presented in the Opening Ceremony. These presented a colourful rainbow. Here it is.