My Musings

Yesterday (27 Feb 2009) evening we went to an eye doctor at Shekar Nethralaya , JP Nagar 3rd phase, on the 100 feet Ring Road, Bangalore. Later, Ashok suggested we go for an authentic and pure Gujarati dinner - so we went to the eatery, just opposite the Nethralaya. This eatery is part of a house and the family, ofcourse Gujarati, runs the show. Entirely managed (cooking and serving also) by the family members, this presents a nice homely ambience. There are two choices for meals - Ordinary and Special. Ordinary thaali consists of 4 phulkas (rotis), a cupful of rice, dal, aloo subji, khadi, and buttermilk. "Special" has 5 phulkas, a Papad, and curds instead of buttermilk - rice, dal, subji, khadi are common to both ordinary and special. The phulkas were hot and tasty; subji was superb. But I liked the Dal the best. Full of boiled koththu kadalai, it was excellent. The spices used in the subji and Dal are made in the home itself. Khadi too was good. All in all, we had a very s...

ASHOK's LEFT ANKLE fractured, Surgery Ashok met with an accident on the noon of Thursday, the 29 January 2009 . While he was riding his scooter on his way to an eye doctor, a car collided with the scooter in BTM Layout, Bangalore. His left ankle got swollen and after first aid in a nearby doctor's place, he was taken to an orthopaedist Dr BS JAYARAM in Banashankari. This doctor is known to Mr. Ramasubramaniam (Neeraja's father). After xray and checkup, the doctor put a Plaster of Paris cast over the leg and advised review after 10 days. If the fracture doesn't closeup, a minor surgery might be needed, he warned. Ashok informed us at 2 PM on the same (29th) afternoon and Vijaya and I started on 4th Feb 2009 (Wednesday) early morning. As we had to go to Vaitheeswaran Koil for mudi irakkuthal for Sriram, we couldn't start earlier. As we entered Ashok's house, his leg was bandaged heavily and he was hopping on his right leg, using a"walker"(on hire from ...

DHOKLA is a Gujarathi dish, made from besan and curds or channa dal and curds. The mixture alongwith other ingredients is steam-cooked. I like Dhokla very much and when I and Vijaya visited Mumbai - Pune in mid 2007, we ate this there. At Pune, Sundaresan purchased Dhokla (even without knowing its name) from Chitale Bandhu at Bajirao Road. When Sriram (s/o Arun) was born on 7th April 2009 at Royapettah Chennai, someone purchased Dhokla from Rameshwar near the Dr Radhakrishnan Salai flyover. Recently I went to this shop in pursuit of Dhokla, but, the shop wore a deserted look without any Gujarathi cooks or Dhokla! I was disappointed. When we came to Bangalore in Feb 2009, we went in pursuit of this dish, but we were again disappointed. Thus, I am still in pursuit of Dhokla at the time of writing this post ..... Arvind says it would be available in Bombay Sweet House at Luz corner, and Arun says there is a shop in Sivasamy Salai, opposite Sanskrit College, both shops in Mylapore. I ...

Yesterday (4 Feb 2009) early morning we started for Bangalore by Brindavan Express (dep: 07-15 AM). As we reached Central station at 6 AM itself (because of fear of a Bandh), we just ambled around the station. After the customary newspaper and Mangaiyar Malar, we "saw" the shop of Ratna Cafe there, near Higginbothams'. (Platforms no 7-11) We went there and bought Idlis and Sambhar Vadai for our breakfast. Piping hot, litres of Sambhar to go with it. 2 idlies and 1 sambhar-vadai cost Rs 28/- A bit expensive maybe, but the steaming hot and tasty stuff made us forget about the cost. We ate breakfast at 7 AM itself, before these can get cold. Real good. As usual, I liked Ratna Cafe idlies. Incidentally, this is our FIRST travel by Brindavan Express! We haven't travelled by this train earlier anytime. rajappa 1:20PM 5-2-2009

# 1. Seven or eight years ago, when we enter a Bank for any transaction, we have to stand before a particular counter where our account is managed. Normally in the beginning of a month all the counters would be crowded. If and when the counter clerk accepts our pro-offered passbook+cheque (for withdrawal of cash - there were no ATMs those days), he would give us a metal (brass?) token. As there will be more than one counter, the tokens will not be in serial order. We may get token No 217, next man would get 62! The passbook+cheque will be passing hands, from this desk to that, finally to the Branch Accountant who will "approve" the transaction, and pass it on to the cashier for payment. As there will be more than one cashier to disburse the cash, our passbook will land on any of these cashiers randomly; and he would call out the token numbers again randomly. Thus, there are very good chances that we may be delayed for hours!! Now, as you enter the Bank, you press a button a...