Why to seek Wisdom?

 Why to seek Wisdom?

One of the stupid questions that popped up somewhere in my head, when I was a kid! (I was too small to know that there's a physical organ brain, and 2 other confusing entities, mind and me within 😥) : why should I ‘seek’ wisdom? ( The basis = there are elders all around me, all the time, to tell me what-next should I do 👍). 

Question deepened as I grew a bit more 😥. Ravana seemed to be the most_knowlegeable guy in the history of mankind 😓. Not a single degree that he didn't acquire! An aircraft “pushpak” which never says “sorry, no seat available”. Music, literature, mysticism, magic, all forms of sciences(he placed the planets affecting horoscope of his son in its proper constellation at the child birth 😥…. much to the embarrassment of Saturn, the in-charge of past deeds!). Just that he failed only at Wisdom 😭.  Oops! I felt “wisdom is not something that can be ‘sought’ as a boon!.  Absence of wisdom is a ‘bane’ 😓🙏

Slowly, but surely, I inched closer to this fuzzy thing called ‘wisdom’( not that I ‘began’ gathering the damn thing 😜…  Just getting familiar with it, to the possible extent 😭).

Concept_based thinking seemed a bit more practical (practicable, in daily life 🙏) than the vast thing called wisdom.  Concept_based_Living posed a little difficulty ( mostly due to the hard_wired habit in my brain, which obeys a default_instruction of my_mind, about most of the routine life situations…..   example: earthen dam popped up in some ancient brain, when the mind fell silent for a split second, and intellect dealt with the input data “hey! Lets do something about this flooding of river every rainy season, and stupidly watching people getting washed away from the banks of the river” .  Wisdom in action??? Dunno yet 🙏😳).

I stopped chasing wisdom 🙏

But, something bigger posed a problem 😭…. Spiritual Wisdom 😭….  Till then, worldly_wisdom kept me just_wondering (duniyadaari, was a Hindi word for functional wisdom, I thought. Not quite sure, though😓).

Spirit within is itself elusive. Only then to ‘think' of making it any_wiser 😂.

One thing seemed too reassuring 👍. No spiritual master was ever branded/alleged/labelled/etc as an Unwise guy😜.   Another astounding thing I noticed was that spiritually wise guys ( enlightened guys) were not always highly ‘knowledge_abled’. They posed no threat to the world record created+held by Ravana’s knowledge 😜👍…   ( During 1993 or so, a Master in spirituality told us “enlightened guys have the Capability to ‘know’ whatever they Like_to_know….and instantly too !...  That ‘instantly’ bijness intrigued me 🙏😓. Till i figured it out by myself 🙏, but I lack courage to spell it out, since I lack the experience 😓. No point, misleading a reader).

Muscle memory of the mind is like a virtual software, that resides in the cache memory of the organ brain ( my own ‘cooked up’ imagination 😓🙏…  it seems to work inside me, without my consent 🙏).  Sustained+ intense spiritual practices helped me to break the mind's habitual muscle memory effect that deterred my spiritual progress! 

A very bizarre experience ( rather experiences) emerged as a result of such sustained practices 😂. A real example, which the readers are going to find it difficult to ‘gulp down their throat’ , was my experience with a tool, a guided meditation called ‘death’. I didn't know whether I was participating in the meditation or merely listening to the audio tape, after its ½ way through it 😥. As soon as it was over, I rediscovered that I was squatting crosslegged, eyes closed😂, not participating. Wisdom, intellect, mind or brain, or even the muscle memory of any of these didn't help me to ‘know' what I was doing 🙏😥….. 

My fair guess is….. wisdom is a mere label(like the words ‘darkness, cold, humility etc), something to ‘refer’ to, when we are sensible enough to be at our peak levels of inclusiveness 🙏, and the level of wisdom being relative to our experience of inclusiveness 🙏.  Concept based thinking, and living, seems to work for me at least. Awareness and alertness enhances the proximity to basic_life_concepts according to my intensity at it🙏.

See if it seems to find any appeal 👍.

Until I bump into something wiser, I am going to remain stuck to what works for me 😜. 

Unwisely yours,

psn(21 Oct 2026)

Tailpiece:  my peak levels of stupidities churned out a wild imagination where,

I sought an unprecedented kind of boon :” Godjee, grant me Wisdom” 😳😳🙏

God : “ idiot…😡… you already are that. Just remove the layers which obfuscate it”

Unofficial Vow

 Unofficial Vow

Traditionally a vow is understood as “a formal and serious promise (especially in a religious ceremony)”.

My ultiKhopdi (ultikhopdi is a Hindi word, more apt about me, to describe “quixotic” mind in English) … my quixotic mind is unable to come out of the ‘observation’ that a few guys around, when they ‘knowingly’ engage into doing something that is a negative act unto themselves, and they do it repetitively, I am irreversibly compelled to view it as a vow! 😭🙏.    Like somebody habituated to utter nonsense and very routinely says a “sorry” soon after— is he under a ‘vow’ ? He knows “sorry” is NOT an apology 😜.  It's like “sorry to hear that you failed in your examination 🙏”----nothing to apologise to the other🤣.

Eating ‘junk’ food, is like an unofficial vow “I shall do everything possible to make my doctor rich 🙏”

Manufacturing tension, hypertension, even about a situation where we know that it is an inevitable outcome of our own past routine, seems like a vow “I undertake to remain stupid, and therefore I need to create tension within 🙏.  I have to avoid sensibility, which is unavoidable if I remain relaxed_while_ALERT 😭🙏🙏🙏”

I couldn't ‘contain’ it within myself, this stupid curiosity “are they under an unofficial vow, to patronise absence of intelligence?🤔”.    How can I ask someone directly, “are you observing a Vow Sir? That you will avoid sensibility?” 😳.  He would get angry!  If my curiosity “gets the better of me” …. I try something like “why am I haunted by a negative thought that you are capable of doing this better????...  I can see that you are already doing your best👍” Safe question.

I thought, let me compile my “silly questions” and take a safe_risk 😜 ( if it is safe, where is the risk?... I am trying ‘a’ stupidity😂).  A blog “silly questions”...and a follow on… as “silly doubts”.   Stupendous success👍.  No responses to convince me that I am wrong about unofficial vow 😜. 

Ideally, “quality questions” from a student is a sure hint for the teacher to know “this kid is a potential candidate for high speed growth of intelligence 🙏.  But, the volume of syllabus is a deterrent to encourage questions in a modern classroom. Exam-Scores are proportional to expertise in ‘copypaste technology’👍.  By_heart + vomit it in the examination ( again a ‘kind of unofficial vow by the fraternity of academia —” we shall not allow intellect to be nurtured”)

The widely misconstrued version of “freedom is a fundamental right”  suits damn well, such unofficial vows of self_destruction. Nuclei families are shrinking further into living separately together, even within a pair of parents & just a kid 😜.  No intrusion into others mindset 👍🙏

Unpromisingly yours,

psn(19 Oct 2026)

Sweating bijness

 Sweating bijness 

A very close friend asked me about my_experience with my_sweating ..

I wrote..

Sweat is a side bijness of the glands in the skin. Breathing is main bijness ( "skin suffocation" is a word that suggests 🙏)

Sweat is a "response" to some kind of unusual occurrence in physiology.

About 'cold sweat' google says : Physically, cold sweats (diaphoresis) are triggered by your body's fight-or-flight response or a drop in blood circulation. Common physical causes include:

• Heart problems: Heart attacks or coronary artery disease.

• Low blood sugar: Hypoglycemia from diabetes or fasting.

• Infections and fever: Flu, COVID-19, or severe sepsis.

• Shock or severe pain: Injury, trauma, or intense distress.

• Hormonal shifts: Menopause or hyperthyroidism

Normal sweat : we become physically active. ( Table tennis, basketball...easier to trigger sweating)..    body is designed to 'be active' 🙏.... We love AC, couch, etc, so 'gadgets' find a good market 😜

Fan was a gadget which sponsored a 'hate' towards sweat 🙏....  ( Kids say "i am sweating" and elders switch on the fan. Subtle message= avoid tolerating sweat".  Corollary=don't do anything that 'causes' sweating 👍.....  Eventually, doctors 'love' this free advertising against sweating)

I wipe off the sweat, thereby, providing more opporChutney for sweating 👍. When sweating stops by itself, I decide if I need a water_wash. If a car dries 'clean' after a rain, water wash is redundant 🙏.

( I  suspected 'oil' only because I found soap lathering less, while handwashing sweat_soaked clothes. Google said "yes👍".  Mogambo khush hua, because, bad oil is drained out 👍)

Who am I to intrude into the freedom of others, who love to use make_up on skin?.  If they find it better to retain the sweat below their 7 layered skin, it's a fundamental right now under Indian constitution 💪.

( I have strong 'evidence' as well 👍.   Very rarely, I get any encouraging response to my experience I share🙏...   Most of them pray for me silently "may he get_well_soon 😔"...  I am grateful for both.)

Drily yours,

psn(19 Oct 2026)

Madhushaalaa

 Madhushaalaa

"अंधों में काना राजा"

I bagged easily,  a few prizes during the mandatory celebration of Hindi_day in the Coimbatore regional office of my bank.

The Hindi officer was too happy to hear a very funny incident related to this book, and at once decided to ‘gift’ it to me, saying "it is lying UNTOUCHED in our mini_library. You will preserve it better 👍"

Incident:

While I was at Amravati,  a new university was going to come up. "Vacancies" in the Hindi department are sure. 

A close friend of mine decided to 'qualify' for a 'job' in that university.  M.A. in Hindi 😥.

He decided to submit the dissertation on this book. All the 'good' professors declined to 'touch' this book if it was for an academic qualification. Tough.

This friend got a humble professor who said "only my signature as a guide/mentor to fill the blanks. Remember 👍"

That friend surprised me by saying "anyway I am going to slog alone by myself 😜. Why don't you give me company?"

"Just company" was okay by me, I thought.

But fate had something else in store for us.

Within a day, he said "help me with the deeper philosophical sense in the verses(he was asking for a vital organ_trandplant, the 'heart' of the poem 😓)"

I said "on one condition 🙏...   I am not a born_Hindi guy. Tough words. You give me the translated version in the 'local' Hindi that I can understand.  I will give you the deeper philosophical sense in my_Hindi. You re_translate it into literature_wala_Hindi and 'build' your dissertation stuff.

Two days of experience. He decided to gulp 2 pegs of desi daroo and then join me on a hilltop garden( around a huge water tank, catering drinking water to that town).... because, my words were escaping his mind, 😂. ( Chattering incessantly, his mind was engaged into….not listening quietly 🙏. Alcohol quietens, in a ‘measured’ dosage👍)

Daily 10 pm to 2 am... 50 days, winter nights of less than 5°C temperature. 😂

My reward was going to be 'put to use' only 10 years later, during my spiritual bijness ( programs I got enrolled into). The concepts got preserved like an engraved writing in my memory 🙏

Thanks to Shri Bachhan senior 🙏. He 'might' have even blessed me from somewhere high up there, above the skies😥🙏🙏🙏.

A unique experience of the 'book going through me'( usually, 'we' go through a book🙏. But I didn't 😜).

Oh yes….He got his degree and also the job (I was told, because I got transferred down to Cbe by then).

Unexpectedly yours

psn(17 Oct, 2026)

Upholding Sense of fairness

 Upholding Sense of fairness 

I never thought hitherto that I might dwell upon this aspect of our daily routine life 😂

As a kid, I was stupid to assume that “what is true for me, will be true for others also, when it is about a ‘sense of fairness’ 🙏

But, as I grew, the expectations met disappointment.

Today,  are we not scared of hidden conditions, cost, etc??? 😜.   Are they being ‘fair’ to the bare minimum trust level that can be reasonably expected?

The original software, with which we are born, is neither fair nor unfair. It's just an open and receptive mind looking for ‘what works’? Kids learn and quietly imbibe the traits related to ‘sense of fairness’. 😂

Parents ‘realise' their flaws only when they face some kind of emotional blackmail from their own children after they are grown up 😥. The fear of losing the child's bonds is ‘used’ as a threat to get something out of the parents 🤣.  The “awareness” about who is being fair, gets lost. Fear gives in to the blackmail.  

When a pattern emerges where we feel that the other person is not being fair most of the times, mutual trust diminishes 😂🙏

We look for how to rebuild mutual trust, in our non_commercial relationships (usually between close relatives and friends).  Whereas, ‘sense of fairness' is the functional form of trust.  A deep recognition of emotional interdependence is relative to the level of mutual trust.

It really happened 🤣

About 15 of us were freshers, youngsters and novices at the small office of a workplace in a remote town. The main boss and two officers were well experienced in handling the workplace_situation.

When novices are the subordinates, the temptation is to exploit their ignorance about their own basic rights 😜. “Sense of fairness” had totally evaporated in the main boss. We beginners could even ‘notice' the cunningness only when the two guys( our junior bosses) inadvertently grumbled at the”excessess” of their boss( our main boss😜).  That main guy missed awareness of the fact that he has no separate switch inside his brain to be kept on, for maintaining his sense of fairness towards his breed(the 2 officers)😜… 

We needed to find out the best ‘available’ defense material amongst ourselves, to fight the ‘absence of fairness’ in that main boss.

We met in privacy.

I was the unanimous choice. 

I protested saying “I am the junior-most among us 🙏. I lack familiarity with workplace_related rights (based on sense-of-fairness). My personal anxiety is, everyone pays for my error in Judgement 🙏. Please let a senior among us lead 🙏…etc…etc” ( little did I realise then, when I was 22… that I was inadvertently blurting the basics of non_commercial interpersonal relationships 🙏… the cluster of my thoughts at that point of time, were going to end up as my-personal-thumb-rule for the rest of my life 😜)

The others made a proposal which I could not refuse ( same as the dialogue of the hero of the movie “The Godfather” 🙏😜😜)

They said: “Look, whether you commit an error in judgement or any other among us, all of us are going to ‘pay’ for it alike. We are unanimous that… the probability of error is least in you👍. We guarantee unconditional obedience to your decisions” ( probably, those guys must have felt that my “sense of fairness” was better than theirs, and accompanied by my trustworthiness, & ……dexterity of threat assessment (the boss “uses” his vested powers of disciplinary action to threaten us, at the drop of hat 😜. Pure emotional blackmail).

It worked 👍. I never had to regret any of my decisions, especially when the adherence was 200% plus😜. 

My sense of responsibility towards my_breed fuelled an unprecedented speed_of_learning 🙏 ( do we not see instances of illiterates as mega success stories?👍🙏…  Driven to the wall, doubles our moral strength).

This intense life_experience, of evolving rapidly into ‘sense of fairness'... I guess…might have contributed to my high scores in “Jurisprudence” paper 8 years later in my LLB, with zero preparation from books 😜. 

Another decade later, the intense spiritual practices seemed to act like a fuel for spacecraft, in deepening the same ‘sense of fairness' at subtle levels 😜.  ( Obviously, perception ought to deepen!).  That's my experience, for whatever it is worth 🙏. It works for me, and therefore I felt “it might be fair enough to share it” 😜👍

fairly yours,

psn(17 Oct 2026)

Tailpiece:

My brother, a kid of 3 writhing in pain yelled to our dad “belt is biting my waist”.

Dad got annoyed, pulled out that belt, and lashed at the kid. (The pain due to the lash was too small compared to the ‘belt_bite’ and his sobbing subsided 😜). A scorpion jumped out when the belt was pulled by a jerk.

Dad noticed the scorpion and felt a remorse, in having misunderstood the kid 🙏( I still have strong visuals of the powerful expression in my dads face, when he realised that his_sense_of_fairness fell short, when he failed to ‘look beyond’ the limited vocabulary of a 3-year kid, and used the genuineness in pain, displayed by a scorpion’s sting(“ belt is biting me” 😜).

A lesson for life, for me. Dad, a guru 🙏

What is my nature?

 What is my nature?

😂

Perhaps, my earliest question, when I discovered an ‘ability' in myself to ‘ask’ 😜.

I was too small inside my brain to process such a comprehensive question, and therefore I probably ended up with another easier question “why am I unable to answer this question?”.  The easier question stayed, even to keep reminding me of the tougher one 😂

My humble guess was…. other kids were “saved” from giving_birth to such questions 😜.  Those kids were probably kept_busy into ‘becoming something’ which their caretakers decided upon to be 🙏. Shaping the ‘nature' of their wards the way they want 👍

What do wardens/parents want their kids to become?

Anything other than their own ‘nature' 😜

Exampull: A mom doesn't like to eat a particular dish, or doesn't like the ‘trouble' to make a dish, she ensures that her kids end up ‘becoming’ adjustable to suit her_own_likes/dislikes 😂. Her parents did the same 😭

A teacher prefers to sail through the syllabus smoothly. She will shape the students to ‘become' good at parroting her_syllabus. Win_win…

30 years later, I enrolled into a spiritual program.  The teacher asked “what should you do to be just ‘yourself’? ( He added a hint : Right now, you are required to be something else all your waking hours 👍)”

Participants gaped 😳

( I was ‘naturally’ driven to ‘look' for what others are going to say?. This question didn't seem to nudge me 🙏)

Then, after 3 minutes, when no answer came up, the teacher said “Nothing 😂… you don't need to_do anything to be just_yourself ! All your life you are busy trying to be, struggling to be something else, other than your_self, all the time 😂. To be yourself, you just need to drop off what you are not🙏. Whatever gets left, is your self. Welcome to the art of becoming yourself! “

( I felt like”Bah! Is that all?.... And I was being scolded, mocked, scoffed, ridiculed etc… right from my kid age for not_becoming something Else!. I was just myself, the way I was, I am 😥🙏”.   Acquiring skills has nothing to do with becoming something else, in my inner nature 🙏.  I am damn flexible to do what a situation requires of me🙏👍. Other than that I am like animals, birds, worms and other creatures 😭….  I am just my species 😥🙏 .  The teacher gave me homework, which didn't require me to do it afresh now😜😜😜.  I have been on that job long since). 

Let me focus on the ‘practices’ part of the program now👍. 13 days passed.  I became good at the practices.

Most participants spoke on the last day "I feel a tremendous change in myself 🙏, relaxed and peaceful like never before 🙏. Even my family and neighbours ‘noticed' it”.

I didn't speak. Because I didn't change a bit 😜. Guys around me said “you are still the same old fool😂. The program didn't make any dent in you 😥. It didn't work for you (etc)”   I nodded.   I didn't know if it was okay to say in the feedback “Hey, I learnt the practices well 👍”. I didn't speak. But I kept climbing on the practices for the next 4 years at a hectic pace 😂.  It brought answers to my earliest “tougher koschan” when I was a kid. The time tested ancient spiritual tools came damn useful to progress at high_speed on my spiritual journey 🙏.

At 70+ now, I am just myself ( more of it progressively 😂). If a reader is not going to feel annoyed, the simplest way of saying it is “I am not my body, I am not even my mind🙏”. I am whatever is remaining other than my body and mind.  Long way to go , for 😃. But I am at it, post retirement 🙏. 2 ‘square meals’ is almost a’round me. So, becoming ‘something' for ‘earning' my food is not a problem. The needs are slimming fast.

( Retaining that ‘something’ which I am not, as a full_time_job….   😳…  Its side-effects suits medical specialists 😂. Good bijness for them👍. Even LKG kids are becoming patrons of psychological disorders 🙏. Unheard of, since thousands of years 😥.  “Persona” used to be a ‘mask’ for male actors in Britain playing a female role, in 18th century. Now “persona’lity” development program is a costly and customised bijness for using in real_time . Real human roles are assigned to robotics 😂. AI is mere upgrade.)

Just yours,

psn(15 Oct 2026)

Serving a broke master

 Serving a broke master

This was a true story 🙏

I request readers to desist ‘probing’ into the details 🙏( I should not be disclosing personal details of people, which I had access to 🙏).  My purpose is to share personal experience from real life, where situations were extreme 🙏

An employee of a financially weak enginnering firm lamented in a weak voice : “June. School reopening after summer holidays. Heavy expenses, for books, uniform and term fees for my 2 kids 😭🙏”.

I responded: “you should have planned to save!”

He( visibly annoyed): “ you can afford to sermonise sir. Well paid job, AC office, etc. I am getting my small salary 4 months late! My employer is also broke’’

Me (to further infuriate him😜) : “hey, can you buy me a tumbler of tea?”( In South, it is glass tumbler, not porcelain cups at wayside tea stall)

He ( ego hurt, when already engulfed with money problem 😜) : “Oh, it's a question of just ₹2 … i can buy it👍, come…”( 1997, tea was for ₹2)

We both reached the main gate.

I turned to him, feigning an after thought : Boss, we shall do 1 thing, keep the ₹2 separately for me🙏. Tomorrow we shall have tea”

He nodded.

Next day he sobered a bit, and I exploited it 😜 saying : “next few days only , 1 tea for me … keep aside an additional ₹2 daily”

Now….he grew suspicious 😳. But ₹2 is in his pocket yet, so….no mistrust problem 😜

Time is an element, I turn to my advantage when I decide to exploit somebody’s weakness called “ego” ( financially poor guys are generally more sensitive to being laughed at their poverty 😂). I am glued to him till he succeeds 😜. 

30 days…. ₹60… 

I demanded : “ open a recurring deposit account for 60 per month. Remember, its my tea_money of ₹2 from you, daily 👍. I help you daily at my office. I am your-good-friend. You owe me 1 tea daily”

An year later, the humble ₹2 per day, with cumulative interest, became his ‘margin money’ of 25% for a second hand sewing machine. His wife started earning, using the machine. Another year, they saved enough to buy an extra sewing machine, and his wife's next door lady got a job 😂.

This guy says to me, 2 years later: “Sir( a respect has crept in towards me, a stupid clerk😜)... Sir, now I can even quit my job 👍. My wife is earning enough to finance my family 😂”

Side effects: My dear colleague sitting next, tracked the entire drama, and whispered to me “PSN, I too started that ₹2 per day bijness. An RD account of mine too”. This colleague ‘retained’ the idea for 5 more years, and when we met post_retirement said “PSN, that ₹2….now the total amount is a 5 digit fixed deposit 😂”

I retorted 😡 “little drops of water…makes the mighty ocean”

( What I held back from telling other colleagues was : my 2 cents a day of spiritual practices 😜…  now it is a huge balance of spiritual insight in me, since decades. No paisa involved 🙏)

Just yours,

psn(14 oct 2026)

Sources of input, forces data integrity

 Sources of input, forces data integrity

Apologies, if a reader dropped here to data-mine digital technology related concepts 🙏 ( I merely borrowed ‘terms’ that find an instant appeal to present day's ‘hell bent on logic only’ kind of mind😜)

Until even 75 years ago, kids grew up like a frog_in_a_well, as far as sources of info is concerned. (For example, my sister, when in kindergarten, 1959 or so… chanted “waachaa” in a nursery rhyme she learnt. Dad is the only competent ‘authority' to question anything related to ‘English’😂. He needed 5 minutes to ‘decipher’ it as ‘water’ not ‘waachaa’. That teecha/teacher had a temporary problem in speaking clearly). 

Kids didn't need external-insulation(Limited locations of sources of input).

Therefore, the traditional & internal filter seemed redundant 😭

Suddenly, the sources of input expanded ‘3-D’ 😜(crowds around, internet, TV, etc).

The technology involved for internal filters got buried by now.

Insulation from external sources became impractical ( too many holes in the umbrella 😥. Can't ‘avoid' getting wet 😜).

Only 2 options to keep a ‘mind’ healthy 😜. 1)insulate the mind 2)install a powerful filter. Neither options are viable today 😂

The need to install filters is ‘indispensible’

The functional ‘format’ and design of the filter is too complex now, because kids simply inherit overdose of Logic 🤣. Algorithms of logic cannot contain the codes required to process trust 🙏.

How ‘much’ of logic_oriented_codes can a ‘kid's tiny brain’  process????  (How to install an app called “trust” is out_of_syllabus in the textbook of today's-parenting 😜…   meanwhile, the commercial world is hell_bent on spreading mutual_MISTRUST 😥. Like,  Co_pilot suddenly turned out a ‘threat’ to 174 elite passengers of a large commercial aeroplane 🙏😭). 

Building a super_strong (digital Fortress) of self_updating fail-safe & bug-proof logic-based software, to be installed in a human brain…  easy???🤔 ( kids of genZ are swaying/oscillating 🙏😥)

Understanding the ‘problem' is the problem/diagnosis.  Accepting its complexity is the next level of the problem. Finding/figuring out or…outsourcing a solution is the next stage. Compatibility with a logically-confused kids brain is a mega project with unreasonably_short deadlines (lifeLine?? dunno!).

Spiritual bijness focuses on emotional evolution 🙏.  Not a rocket science 🙏. Test check this : Logic divides. Emotions unite. (That simple 😜).

Emotionally networked, yours,

psn(12 Oct, 2026)

A MasterChef’s real headache

 A MasterChef’s real headache.

It's not about his skills. Not about shortages in utensils, spices, or raw ingredients 🙏

It's the level of insensitivity of the taste buds of the fellow who is going to approve his culinary skills 😭. 

Luckily, I am kept away from kitchen ( that's the rule in South Indian kitchen 🙏😥. Females seek to retain their relevance, only by banning the male from filling even a “purely temporary vacancy”😜).

Had I been asked to participate in a cookery contest, for sure, I will INSIST on a certificate, signed not earlier than 1 hour, by 2 specialist doctors —tongue specialist & a neurologist 👍.   A coated tongue can ‘feel' only the hot spicy 🔥. A defective neuro network can't maintain “data integrity” of messages from taste buds to the organ brain. ( Please ‘think’ of the precarious fate of a MasterChef who is an expert in conveying “sensuality” through his dishes, much to the embarrassment of famous lovers, who can bewitch, planting a kiss!!! Taste buds ‘need' sensitivity 🙏).

A very mild entrance exam ( unlike the NEET) for a new bride is when the mom-in-law suggests “dear child, please add salt to the sliced ash gourd cooking on the stove”(that dish has no spice, not even water😥. Salt makes it release the water needed. Among spices meant for ‘taste buds’ salt is the trickiest. And as a sole participant in the dish called “Olan” salt is a dictator 😜.  

I am incompetent to talk about kitchen wizards in cold places🙏.

But, at warmer places, Kerala specialises the-most in pampering the MOST sensitive taste buds 🙏. As we travel north, spices get intense😥. Punjab doesn't need hot pickles at all,😜. Main dishes feel like pickles. In the middle east, the main Judge between the 2- judge-bench( taste buds & nostrils) is the ‘nose’. Spices exuding fragrance wins the contest, not the ones pampering the taste buds.

Kerala ‘deals’ with even the nervous system of vegetables and fruits 😥. Ancient guys name the day(like 7th day) of watering, ( of a particular banana) missed by the gardner. Rings around the main spine of fruit store the ‘data’ of nutrients pumped-up date_wise 😜. Tastebuds need sensitivity 🙏.

Cocoanut tastes very differently when grated, chopped, sliced, ground, pulverized or ‘burnt’ partially 😥.  Traditional Chef-experts display their mathematical_skills in each of these 6 ways of using coconut kernel, in permutations and combinations of other spices, vegetables and ‘stages of cooking’. Mind-blowing number of possibilities.  I struggled perfecting the plain “chutta chammandee” to my satisfaction 😜. ( I don't OUTSOURCE the test by tastebuds 😥. Mine work well, at 70+ still). Chutta chammandee is coconut pieces burnt on wood flame, and ground on stone and pestle, manually with few spices added patiently,  stage wise. 

Kerala specialises in intricacy at subtlety 😜.  Jaggery and ghee( clarified butter) need to hold hands all_the_while, and walk into the ‘core’ of the rice grain which is just puffed up while being cooked, waiting to be fully cooked. These two guys wait in the core of the cooked rice grain till the bite releases them, only to be instantly grabbed by the tastebuds of the diner. Next millisecond, the saliva intrudes to dilute the flavour 😭🙏. This dish is a sweet porridge “nei payasam” and a prestigious ‘offering’ at temples consecrated with mega_sophistication called “Tantra”, a combo of yantra & mantra. Imagine, when a wizard among tantric priests deploys his spiritual powers alongside his MasterChef expertise in a nei_payasam, and energises it invoking the energies from the consecrated deity, and allows the devotees to enrich their body and spirit as neivedya-prasadam 🤣🙏🙏🙏. ( Today, all these aspects are diluted, when the mind becomes hell_bent on patronizing only commercial thoughts 🙏.

As if to complicate the cooking skills further(😭), Kerala specializes in forging unique alloys of 3 to 5 metals, to be used for ‘special’ dishes. Few radioactive substances which got heated at 3000°c in the belly of earth for centuries, spewed out, cooled and became porous red mud-rocks. These radioactive substances became “embedded software” when the mud was used to shape the alloy vessels of brittle and heavy type(bell metal).  Food cooked in such traditional vessels borrow microscopic bits of radioactive substances too! 😥.  I don't know if the neuro-network can ignore completely the effects of radioactive substances, while transmitting taste-data from the tastebuds to the brain 🤣

Well, that was my crazy view point of cooking skills around the place which nourished me 🙏 

Tastily yours,

psn(10 Oct 2026)

PostScript: a private secret .... I managed making a masala with 36 ingredients, twice in my life ( successful both times🙏), and took 6+ hours of manual grinding on stone and pestle each time 😥. Pure magic, when 6 of the ingredients, when ground have only a week's shelf life maximum, but held on for 6 months, in fridge, the taste increasing with time! But my helper was my sister, who is no more 🙏. And masala ain't my bijness 😜

Hiding affection, as a Tool

 Hiding affection, as a Tool

Funny, isn't it?

Especially when the modern trend is to display it glaringly, with a SPLURGE of money, if that person is unsure of the genuiness of one's own affection towards the other( own kid's 😜).

Epic stories convey the concept of ‘hiding affection’ liberally 😜

Ramayana, krishna_avatar( not Mahabharata war), are classic examples where the hero has tons of affection for the ‘villain’ and hides the affection till the last breath of the villain_raakshasa( after_all the villain is a permanent “security staff” of Vishnu… dwaaraPaalaka 😜).

Slightly lower level example is of an enlightened Master 🙏 ( Outwardly ‘merciless’ towards own dear disciple! Master even reincarnates to deploy his powerful tool of MercilessNess to his ‘most’ blue_eyed/dearest disciple😜.  I had a ‘taste’ of this ‘cruelty’ between aug-1992 and Dec 1994😭. After that I was ‘let-off’ to Yenjoy_Life 😜👍).

Hindu way of life….

Hiding affection was the sole privilege of dads, until a century ago 🙏. Moms choose it wisely, only if the situation warrants. Sacred reason= mom has a greater responsibility of imparting the ‘knowledge’ related to ‘equipoise of Emotions’ 🙏. A male isn't designed to impart this_one_skill, adequately enough 🙏, an evolved guy gains the competence, but turns into a Guru, from a biological_dad wala status😥

Genuine teachers of today are under severe constraints of needing to “wait” until the student surrenders explicitly, saying “do what you like with me, but Please mould me into an evolved one🙏” . ( I learnt that this kind of a student is rare and 4th kind of a ‘broad’ classification of types of students 😜).

Stray cases of ‘rags to riches’ via honest hard work, are examples of another similar concept : “any kind of refinement necessarily envisages some kind of self imposed restriction” ( ain't it sounding like: hiding own affection unto oneself?😜)

Allergically yours,

psn(10 Oct, 2026)