Bayside Banter
A kaleidoscope of men, matters & moments that make the madness & magic of Mumbai
Onion Antics
With onions crossing Rs 70 per kg, strange behaviour can be witnessed in vegetable markets. Last week, a perfectly respectable middle aged man was doing his morning shopping at a roadside vegetable market in Vashi. He asked for half-a-kg of onions which the `bhajiwali’ duly weighed and emptied in his bag. It came to just five six onions. The man was unhappy and haggled for more. When the woman refused, he simply picked up a couple of onions and tucked them into his bag saying, ``Today is my birthday, so don’t grudge me this!’’ In normal circumstances, the roadside woman hawker would kick up a fuss but she simply glared at the customer and let it pass. Perhaps, this was the first time she had come across such behaviour from middle-class shoppers.
Guest Editor
The office of our sister publication, Navashakti, had an unusual visitor last week. As its journalists were racing to meet the deadline at 10 pm, a Barn Owl flew into its office on the first floor of Free Press Journal House from an open window. The bird, which has an eerie face, created a flutter in the office with staffers running helter-skelter as the owl was trapped in a maze of glass-lined corridors. It tried to fly away but each time it hit a glass partition. People were afraid to catch it given its size, around one-and-a-half-foot, and its sharp claws. Finally, it found an opening at the end of the corridor and flew out.
The Wikipedia says the Barn Owl (Tyto alba) is the most widely distributed species of owl, and one of the most widespread of all birds. This owl could have strayed into Nariman Point from one of the ministerial bunglalows around Mantralaya. A decade ago, a peacock flew all the way from Raj Bhavan to perch on the ledge of a Nariman Point high-rise. The photograph appeared on the front page of a leading newspaper and poet-painter Dr Gieve Patel immortalised it a painting.
Born Again
There was once a time when talking about sex was considered as a taboo in Indian society. But with so much sex education available on the Internet one fails to understand the abysmal level of sex education in Indian schools. Recently, this correspondent came across a 12-yr-old kid whose newly acquired knowledge about how he was born struck his parents like a bomb.
“Why did you lie to me that I was a gift from god? Why did you lie to me? Answer me,” he shouted with pearls in his eyes. The poor parents could do nothing but were trying to make him understand the human cycle.
Every explanation to a child about his birth is hilarious. Some are told that they grow up from the watermelon seeds and that’s why they cannot be eaten. Some are told that when mommies grow very fat they cannot wear their pants, doctor presses their belly button and a new baby is delivered. I’m sure each one of us has their own version of their birth as access to Internet was almost non-existent during those times.
`D’ for Daddy
Children can speak the dandiest things at times, making all except their parents roll with laughter. Recently, this
reporter visited a friend’s place over the weekend . His wife was in the kitchen, busy with the daily chores while their five-year-old daughter came running on seeing guests. The usual chit chatter ensued with the girl and as she had just joined play school, she was eager to show her newly acquired reading skills, showing us her alphabet book she read out, “A for apple, B for Ball, C for Cat“etc. Eager to prove that his daughter was smart, this reporter’s friend asked his daughter “Show uncle which one is daddy. ” Immediately, the child pointed at the picture of the dog !
Food for Thought
A shrill voice caught everyone's attention in the ladies' compartment of a Churchgate-bound train. It was a small boy, barely nine, trying to sell pirated copies of best sellers.
A woman took seemed interested in his collection and asked about the price. ``Only Rs 70’’, he said. "What!" said the lady, we get these books for Rs 60 from the roadside stalls. He started to plead his case, saying that the purchase price was Rs 65, how could he sell it for Rs 60.
Upon which this undeterred bargain hunter pointed out --"The book seems a bit damaged." "No," said the boy, "it's because the books got wet in the rains."
Another woman, overhearing this entire conversation handed the child a tenner. Thanking the lady coyly, the kid moved towards the door to alight. Turning to this reporter, the lady said, "The boy was barefoot, I gave him the money because it's raining and it being a holiday today, he will not find buyers, which probably means no money and thus no dinner for him." At least this chapter in the boy's life had a happy ending of sorts.
Weight and Watch
It was a Wednesday morning and one lift of Shanmukhanand hall was not working due to some glitch. Because of a bank and a medical centre in this building, it has many visitors. As only one lift was working, there was long queue for it. An overweight Punjabi woman in her fifties requested the man who was first in the queue, to let her go first. Considering her age and weight the man obliged. Apart from that lady there was three other people in the lift but the lift would not budge. The liftman was concerned that this lift too would stop working. Saying that a lift can only take 250 kg at a time, he told one person to step out. But the lift still would not move up. Thereafter, he asked the woman about her weight and with folded hands requested her to step out of the lift. The woman got angry and started screaming but as soon as she came out of the lift, it started working.
Tailpiece
The English language has some wonderfully anthropomorphic collective nouns for the various groups of animals. We are all familiar with a herd of cows, a school of fish, a gaggle of geese and a pride of lions. However, less widely known is: a murder of crows, an exaltation of doves, a crash of rhinoceros, a congress of owls and a parliament of rooks. Contributed by Anil Singh, Aliasgar Saifuddin, Arpith Micahel, Chitra Sawant and Sadhna Kumar. Compiled by Anil Singh