'The F Word' by Mita Kapur. (book review)

The

'The F-Word' by Mita Kapur is the book I am reading during my weekly bus trips from Bandra to CBD, Belapur (at home I am too obsessed with twitter n facebook, visiting links and blogs which hardly leaves me any time to read the printed hard bound book, Alas!) and Mita takes us through her food journey with memoirs that are delightful to read.

Excerpt

*"You are greying at the temples. Shouldn't you color your hair?"

"No. I want my age to show. It's about growing old gracefully"

I looked at him. "that quite an bulge in your middle" I saw the picture in his eyes- a girl in a floral white skirt and a flimsy blouse, waiting on the steps of her house. He would arrive the moment Ma left for the hospital.*

Memoirs like these and those of her trips through Lucknow/Jaipur streets savoring the kababs or her trips to Amsterdam, talking about her experience during her travels and their signature cuisine is what makes this book interesting.

*A warm aroma of cocoa beckoned to us from the cocoa-making factory, along with sink-into-the-mouth cream puffs at the charming local bakery. We saw different types of cheeses with their odours and overpowering tastes, and a live show on how wooden clogs are made. We tried them all, the cheese and the shoes. The cheese won, obviously.*

There are many recipes that I have book marked for future use and am planning to try some day, when I have some guests, or maybe when I am invited for 'Share a plate' party.

One another blogger, Monika Manchanda, who is now my friend after our Lavasa trip, also wrote a review at her blog, saying that she heard about this book from her friend Kiran, she quotes

“The first time I heard of this book was from Kiran who said that this book got her into kitchen she was all praises of the book and being a foodie having cooking as one of the hobbies it promptly went into my must reading list…”

But Kiran responded on twitter by saying “I was very upset because I mailed mita kapur a gushy gushy letter about how it had inspired me to try cooking & got no reply”

I had met Mita Kapur during the Jaipur lit fest and knew that she is quite busy woman and she must have recieved lots of fan mails after her book was launched but not replying to her fan mail is quite rude. I think so too.

Anyways, everybody have their own reasons for not replying to fan mails. *Pinching myself to reality*

Where was I?

Ah..this book on cuisine…I was impressed....

Just few more pages to go and then I shall be in the kitchen trying some of those recipes…..come over if you wanna try..I intend to follow the recipe and cook those Mita’s words that skip out from her book into the hot pot….of tasty meals

Potato chipstixs

My co-bloggers and I, we walked on Lavasa promenade, whiling away the evening hours, watching the sun set, clicking pictures in Bollywood styles, freezing the smiles under Sayadhri hills when suddenly we were distracted by the lady at the far end, leaning against the railing facing the lake. She was eating spiral potato twister.

“Hey… What is that”

“let’s go there to have a closer look”

“I think it some kind of kabab on skewers”

“I dare you to go and try her stuff” I said thinking it would be fun if she dared. We were in crazy mood and R went halfway, had a closer look and came back.

“Nah!” she said, “Let’s go and buy it, I am sure it might be available some where on the promenade, there are some kiosks down there.”

And so we walked back towards the kiosk ‘Twisteez’, ah there it was. We watched in amazement as the chef took one large potato, poked a skewer through its belly and put it in the chopper. The potato auto-rolled on its skewer chopped by a sharp knife into a spiral shape. He submerged the spirally chopped potato into the fryer and voila.

A chipstix - fried potato with a twist.

“What flavor you want?” said the chef.

“Dried mango flavor”

“No, let’s try mint powder”

“How about mixing all the different flavors”

Confused, we decided on just salt and pepper

The aroma of the potato heightened the hunger pangs. Potato has a universal admiration from young and old alike. There is no reason to watch the clock or the diet when a lone potato stares at you. I plucked a tiny piece from the skewer and dropped into my mouth.

Hhhmmm! Yuummmmm!! Always the best!!

The crunchy piece melted in the mouth after a soft bite, coating the tongue with salt and peppery taste.

“I wanted more of that chipstik, actually all of it, maybe I should order one more? Huh?”

But the diet clock whispered at the back of my mind “Stop, you just had your lunch one hour ago, beware!”

‘Lavasa Women’s drive’ I was there too..but for a different reason...

Without women, this world wuld be a boring place

When I got an invitation from ‘Lavasa Women’s Drive organized by Lavasa in collaboration with the Times of India’ to celebrate the spirit of modern woman, telling me that my opinion counts, that people care to read what I write, and that there is someone out there listening to me, many random thoughts flooded my mind quizzing my position in cyber arena. I was elated with a false sense of pride for this achievement, thinking that I was filtered out from million of bloggers for some unique reason unknown to me and I happily debated with a bloated mind….thinking.. .. I am a strong woman, I am good blogger, I occupy the popular position in the social world, my writing has weight, bla, bla, bla....duh!.... My ego was in the fourth gear, speeding shamelessly. I wanted to share this news with all the people I knew. I was bragging near everyone who cared to listen, till I discovered the real reason behind this event and the seriousness of this ‘Social Cause’

This event was not about me or my ability to write......

‘Lavasa Women’s drive’ was about the creating awareness for early detection of breast cancer in women….

A message with responsibility……

“OVERTAKE BREAST CANCER”

I was bribed into this event with the perks to cover this event as chroniclers of Lavasa Women’s Drive.  (Which I could easily have blogged for free,) since this is the ‘social cause’ very close to my heart, having lost my 3 aunts in a row and missing them terribly even now. But this bribe was no ordinary one. Besides giving me an opportunity to get free screening for Breast, Cervical and Oral cancers at Tata Memorial Hospital, it would also allow me to enjoy the new city called ‘Lavasa’ free of cost. (a place that I was planning to visit since a long time, and had neatly tucked aside twenty grand for this purpose).

I realized that I had a responsibility of posting my message across that screamed loud and clear that ‘Cancer is curable if detected early’. It was an event to help promote women empowerment.

So, on 27th February 2011, when I reached the venue.....

I discovered that there were very large crowd of women who, like me, cared.

I woke up early at 5:30am (which is quite rare) to be at Bandra reclamation grounds that was bustling with positive energies. There were 350 cars participating in the Rally from Mumbai and (I was told) 150 more from Pune. Every car had a message to share.

It was all about saving the girl child and promoting women empowerment.

Comfortably, we drove for 5 hours, in a specious Inova, following the participating cars, cheering the women drivers and their girl-co-passengers on route whenever we overtook their vehicle (they had a map and certain rules to follow. Later, eavesdropping at the promenade, I heard one woman speak about her fright at speeding at 140) We drove through express highway, some 211 kilometers, via Lonavala, Hinjewadi, Pirangut, driving up through western Ghats, behind the majestic Sahyadri Mountains, along the contours of the Warasgoan Lake to reach a complete new world, a planned city of Lavasa, a city with an European crown.
 

Warasgoan Lake

Once there, the atmosphere was emotive.

Women, women, everywhere.

A carnival of music and dance.

Many of the women enjoyed one day carnival and headed back home but me and five other bloggers (two bloggers went back the same day) along with the members of windchimers, discovered the blogging world as we exchanging our stories of the virtual world in the luxurious service apartments where we spend the night as room-mates. Twenty fours hours ago, we were strangers but forty eight hours later, we were blogger buddies who had exchanged stories worth more than thousands of words.......

On the first day, we walked down the promenade, meeting participants and asking about their experiences

All the women were having fun, dancing and singing.......

And bloggers were communicating in their tweeting world. The virtual world were kept abreast with all the events and happening by live tweets of @shaaqT, @anushankaran, @ideasmithy, @monikamanchanda @kiranmanral and @Cemonde

When they were not tweeting, the enthusiastic bloggers would go yakkiti yakkiti yak yak, making interesting comments, sharing their views of their blogging world, it was the best time ever for me. Thank you girls….you were sooooo very adorable.

Although there was much to see, our one-day-stay limited our tourism. We did drive up to Ekkant retreat which allowed me to commute with nature and we visited a bamboo factory called Bamboosa where I purchased a hand crafted walking stick. But apart from that, we just walked up and down the Dasve town, discovering the European architecture and the scenic natural waterfront. (I was told that there is Nature Trail, Christel House, Xthrill, Boating, plant Nursery, convention hall, and adventure tourism which offer camping grounds, rock-climbing, para-surfing, and other water related sports like jet skis, catamarans, motor and peddle boats, fishing and pool volleyballs.

The city was clean and refreshing, steps and potted plants everywhere, with hundred of steps to climb up and down the hills but unfortunately there were no railings anywhere, (I think they forgot that senior citizens and handicaps need support during climbing up/down the stairs) Being hilly city and easily accessible by road, many would also like to cycle around but there were no lanes for cycling, all the paths lining the driveway were filled with flora and fauna (which looked pretty, no doubt about that) but a thought for a lane for mountain bikers would be appreciated (anybody listening?)

And surprisingly, being an Indian town, there were no beggars! Strange!! But that must be because there were no traffic signals. Not as yet! Hahaa!

It is hard to believe that it’s an Indian city, easily accessible to every Indian, with no visa requirement. All one needs is just a desire to stay with the nature, away from the maddening crowd and screeching horns of busy streets.

Just few hours away by road from Mumbai,

A city of dreams where there is sound of music in the air...

I am motivated to go once again.

Maybe I will,

if travel bug bites……..under my tapping feet.

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Co-bloggers who also travelled with me and then blogged
Anuradha one more and more
Kiran
Nisha, one more
Idea Smith, one more
Shakshi
Monika
Shakti
Lavasa Blog

Blind Faith in Mathura

Temple made of Italian Marble imported from Italy

In Mathura there are more than 600 temples and more are built each year, some of these temples are really beautiful and if you are looking for a good architecture, you can feast your eyes on them.


Unfortunately some people believe that God resides there.

As far as I know, God does not exist in stone structures, neither in temples nor in idols. He is there with us, 24x7, inside us in the form of light and He can be reached anytime when we wish to see Him. We can feel Him, hear Him, know His presence and the miracles that happen in our life are the proof that he exists within us.

Yes, there is need for a guide to recognize God, We all need Master to show us the path to go inside and find Him through a proper channel but the real Master will not weigh you with money to show you the path, he will guide you so that you are able to understand the right method through meditation, the right discipline and then leave you alone to follow the path.

Yet, there is a blind faith of some spiritual people who think that God resides in these concrete structures and can be reached through a medium, either through some spiritual person, or through a pundit. There are many pundits in Mathura who cash on this stupidity of people. Thanks to the blind faith of spiritual people, the pundits own 5-bedroom-villas on the outskirts of Mathura.

Surprised? Well I am not lying because I actually visited one!

The car-rental people have understanding with the pundits and they too have their share for bringing ‘client’ to them. I had warned my family about this but they did not believe me till they got tricked.

The car-rental driver suggested ‘Gokul’ when my family expressed their desire to see temples of Mathura and the family went to ‘Gokul’. They got mobbed by pundits who promised to pray for peace of their loved one who were no more. They came back stunned; each one with empty pockets all had shelled out thousands of rupees without realizing that they were being tricked.

As long as people have a blind faith, the pundits will have a field day. Some will give willingly and some out of fear.

How does one help humanity in a practical way, if the middle person always cheats, dissolving our trust?

Thread Ceremony

“After the thread ceremony, you will be transformed into a Hindu man” I told my sixteen-year-old nephew.

He did not understand.

He sat through the prayers dressed in saffron robes, imitating pundits at every ritual, reciting the shlok after them and chanting the prayers.

After one hour of ceremony, people congratulated him, showered him with garlands and gifts and wished him luck

He smiled

Nothing had changed

Not for that moment.