O Fish!

Why do I always encounter weirdos? I think my problem is that either I attract them (birds of a feather philosophy) or I am just too sensitive.

The other day I took a walk in the Kala Ghoda festival along the numerous stalls selling over-priced junk. There was one stall selling tiny cakes of handmade soaps for Rs.200 each.... and people were buying them. They were so tiny that Chrys wouldn't even be able to clean his big toe with it. At this stall I heard this SoBo types discussing all sorts of flowers, fragrances and spices and their uses on the human body. This guy had an accent which was neither Indian nor Brit and definitely not American. What's with these rich dudes and fake accents. I think when a guy puts on an accent he sounds effeminate. Stick to what you know men! Anyway, this guy ended up buying up almost the entire ensemble of soaps, creams, body butter, hair cream (he had long hair) and what nots. How do I know all this? Well, I had nothing better to do so stood around for some amusement.

Then I went to this stall that was selling stuff which looked like wind chimes and some wall hangings and other knick-knacks. Everything was superbly expensive. There were these bunch of papers cut in the shape of fish that attracted an old lady. There were about a dozen of them tied together and each page had some shlokas written on them. This whole thing was really small (about 3 inches X 2 inches wide) and actually looked quite shabby to me. The lady asked the fellow what it was. He said that these were the names of all the avatars of Lord Vishnu and they brought luck to whoever kept them at home. She then said asked the price. He said 500 bucks. She looked so shocked that I almost laughed out loud. Then she said that she wanted only one page. He said that was not possible. It was a booklet and she had to buy the whole thing. Then what she said was extremely funny and I did laugh out loud. She said, "But, I am a Parsi. I don't care about Vishnu. I only want one fish"

Chrys says that Parsis consider fish and fish shaped objects lucky. I would like to tell the old lady that if she had a grandchild, she could ask him/her to cut out fish shapes from craft paper. That would definitely be neater than the ones at that stall.

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I almost forgot. While I was there, a live performance was on. The singer, a lady (I think) must have had her big toe stepped on by a horse or an elephant on her way to the festival. She just went 'Aaaaaaaaaa' (pause) 'Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa'

I could see the listeners going 'Aaargh!' and 'Egads!' ... like in Archies comics. Since I couldn't understand anything, I just said 'Duh!'

Lessons learnt from the Mahabharat & Ramayan

• Never try to seduce someone who has a sword and a short temper (As Soorpankha found out to the loss of her nose)
• Never chop off the nose of a woman who has a powerful demon brother.
• Never take a vow of celibacy unless you can look into the future (Bheeshma was asked by his step-mom to marry his late step-brother's wives since there was no heir to the throne left after his death. He refused of course.)
• Do not insult a woman with five husbands, you could lose your kingdom and your life (Draupadi's vow to tie up her hair only once she has washed it with Duryodhan & Dushyant's blood was one of the main causes of the war)
• Don't run off to kill a golden deer (Rama) or a magnificient tiger (Pandu) on the insistence of your wife. You don't need to bring back everything she wishes for. As is the wont of women she may change her mind about it later and you may end up with a curse or something.
• Don't trust a woman to follow instructions (Lakshman rekha)
• Sometimes even women cross the line (Lakshman rekha again)
• Don't ask your wife to repeatedly prove her faithfulness. She will go off to her mom's place (Sita asked mother earth to take her in).
• Pancakes taste good with chicken curry ... That's not a myth.