Brioche

Culinary enthusiasts, stand clear. This is not a conversation for you if your uniform comprises a toque, a fillet knife and a set of spoons. Also, stay away if you know about more than three cuts of beef, for I can remember none. Oh hell, tenderloin just popped into my head. So did the rib. Shit. Let's keep it short. Cooks, please stay away, especially if you sound, look, or even remotely behave like Gordon Ramsay. He's one Brit I'm petrified of.

Aha, so brioche, as a Google search will tell you, is a type of bread that the French concocted with flour, sugar, yeast, eggs and butter. Loads of butter. It's soft, fluffy, airy, utterly, butterly delicious *Amul*, but wait. It's also the sort of thing that will grab eyeballs at a flashy supermarket near you. Because brioche? What's that? Curiosity kicks in and soon, your shopping cart is cradling this fancily named bread all the way to the billing counter. Higher things in life, you see?

It's humbling sometimes, to have the privilege of experiencing the finer things. Especially when you've seen your family rise from modest means to a life of comfort, if not opulence. But words like brioche, ganache, gateau, au revoir and the likes make your scalp itch. After you're done scratching, I wonder how anyone stays away from Googling what these eclectic words mean. The other day, Farroq Bulsara was crooning over a bottle of Moet and Chandon kept in some pretty lady's cabinet. Heck, who's going to tell you that M&C is a brand of champagne you cannot yet afford? Maybe soon, but goodness, these lyricists, their novel tastes and high-flying lexicon.

Just as a side-note, any song penned by Freddie Mercury will send you sprinting to your rusty-old Oxford mini-dictionary. Fancy words all around, but they paint a stunning picture when you put them into perspective. Back to brioche then. Save for the upmarket name and a little bit of its basic composition, the borderline haughty Brioche isn't that different from the humble paav that cocoons your wada. It's flour, fat, eggs, sugar and yeast. You're telling me that a Modern, Wibbs, Brittania or *insert your favourite bread brand*  can't add some extra eggs and butter to their bread dough and sell you a slightly 'premium' loaf of bread wearing a slightly amped-up price-tag? Apparently not, and strangely so.

Actually, not so strangely so. Think of it. Would you pay Rs 150 for a loaf of bread that has 'Modern' written on it? Or for that matter, any brand that sells a relatively plebian variety of bread? In your head, it would be a bit like paying BMW price for a Hyundai. The Korean underdog is possibly more thrilling than its Bavarian competitor, but you wouldn't buy it. Nor would you buy the idea that Hyundai can make an automobile superior to a German brand. That might soon change, though. You see, the Koreans have smartly roped in ex-BMW staff to give their cars some extra oomph. That rant some other time.

But yeah, the truth is that a brand name could make all the difference to your bank balance. The more tongue-contorting the name, the more substantial the dip in your savings. The chaps even spelled their names wrong. Look at Bvlgari, Versace (sounds Gujarati to me), DKNY (as in Don't Know Why?), FCUK (COME ON! At least spell this right, people!). People gift their credit cards to these folks. Don't even get me started on the ones that sound funny. One second. Jimmy Choo? What were they thinking?

Let's stop here, because it's all in a lighter vein. You really came here in search of the perfect Brioche recipe, didn't you? Sorry to disappoint. Jokes aside, our collective obsession for 'feel-good' products has turned into a bit of a joke; screw the puns. Once upon a time, premium was the amount you paid to save your arse from a stratospheric hospital bill; or your family's arse in case you kicked the bucket a little early. Now, 'premium' has become part of a marketer's nuclear arsenal. Everything's got to be premium. The seat fabrics in your car, the biscuits, the shoe polish, the underwear, ice-creams, cooking oil, goodness knows, even bottled water I suppose. How?

No one asks 'Why', that's how. *fin*

Hurt no more

Back in 1994, Nine Inch Nails, the rock band, gave us Hurt. The song had the makings of a rock number, a fantastic one to say the least. It sounded dark, borderline ominous, and had oodles of bass; an easy choice for the lovelorn bloke who recently had his heart decimated. Eight years hence......

Johnny Cash decided to give the rock elements amiss, took a good ol' acoustic guitar, and proved to the world that older means wiser. The song that gave the impression that it wanted to bite your head off would now bring you to tears. Hurt finally sounded the way hurt felt for you and me.

Now, the interpretation of the song is disputed, and heroin addiction is often considered the central theme. But Cash's version leans towards the rock legend – now in his twilight years – reminiscing his younger, brasher, wilder self, and all that he regrets. Cash's Hurt also brings to light an element of inner peace that stands in the face of dilapidation. Almost as though you stopped thrashing wildly in water after realising that you could float if you stayed still.

So that's what getting older does to you, is it? It humbles the bitter, teaches you how to endure, ]forgive, to hold close what was beautiful and to let go of what pained the heart. Maybe, gratitude, forgiveness, mindful retrospection and inner peace are also perks of a longer stay on this beautiful rock hurtling through space.

Yes, the pain is there. Perhaps, shrouded in the all-pervasive white noise, thinking that it's playing hide-and-seek, but you know it's still there. It pokes, pinches, stabs and jabs at you from time to time, rears its head when you least expect it to. But, it's been in business for long enough to have become part of you.

Ever heard that high-frequency sound that pops up in the ear from time to time? Each time that happens, your eardrum becomes desensitised to that particular frequency; you'll never again be able to hear it. You've become immune to it. Slowly and surely, there will be more frequencies that you will lose the ability to hear, just like the old skins you shed, the people you lose, the people who lose you, and the pains that you wanted to avoid all along.

As Cash says, eventually, you'll lose them all, they'll all go away in the end. Not the loveliest picture to paint, is it?  But when you look back, you'll have tales to tell about everything gorgeous, satisfying and enthralling that made your life worth living. And you there, for I know you're reading this, were one of the best things that happened to me, and I wish to tell tales of how you made life blissful for those few precious moments.

They still call him 'masterji'.

'Master,' what a word. It addresses someone who's in a position of control, someone who's got his act together, and thank grammar, here's a word that is perfectly out of the purview of gender discrimination. Or perhaps, it isn't. You never know nowadays.

It isn't the day or age when you switched on the telly and He-Man popped up on screen and announced that he's allegedly the 'Master of the Universe'. Creativity and lies come in all shapes and sizes, replete with blonde hair, a weird costume, and a pussy-tiger for a pet. (Anyone remember He-Man? Anyone?)

The word Master represents everyone from a little boy, to Master Shifu (Thank you, Dustin Hoffman), to those who shamelessly spend precious time, sweat, blood and resources trying to seduce anyone with half a penny to sponsor their college projects. However, serious respect for the academically inclined, because studies aren't everyone's cup of tea. Oh, for those with kinky inclinations, the master is also a source of sadistic pleasure. *Smack, *Smack, *SMACK (Perhaps, the *WHIP of a lash sounds better. Oh, god.)

In our increasingly fast-food life, where everything needs to be at our disposal like two-minute noodles, the whole concept of mastery seems to have taken a back-seat. Everything NOW. Weightloss - now; food - now; settlements - now; sex - now; Times - Now (Goswami's left, isn't it? Phew); clothes - now. All ready-made, ONE SHAPE FITS ALL. Of course, you can still pick from S, M, L, XL, XXL and a balloon. But somewhere, the tradition of getting your clothes stitched has lost its charm, save for among the true ladies and gentlemen.

The last time I'd gotten my clothes stitched was upon my mom's advice. Mom and little sister took along a shirt that fit me well, chose the colours and materials as per their liking, and handed me a stack of new shirts. They did fit well, I must say. However, it had been a while since I last saw anyone's attire in the making. The sight of the measuring tape stretched taut between the tailor's thumb, his meticulous eyes making mental notes of where the fabric will fold unnecessarily, or where it will push unpleasantly against your paunch, there's an old-school charm to the process. 

I did finally get to witness it, and that too in a shopping mall. Dad has a penchant for tailored clothes, but doesn't indulge too often. The last time he did, I went along just for kicks. That's when I heard the word 'Masterji'. This rather quaint man, narrow shoulders, sunken eyes and all, surfaced when the at the representative at the store called out the name. Masterji. He didn't look the part, but something about the way he spoke, his ability to gauge a man's shape, and the quick movements of his eyes suggested that you would be happy with the clothes you would be collecting a week from now. That reassurance is reinforced further when you realise that they are still called 'masters'.   

That awkward moment

Parents are cute creatures. They believe that their tiny tots, who have turned into bristly adults, can do no wrong. "Oh, what wonderful angels our kids are! They wouldn't harm a fly."

Their love for us blindsides them to harsh realities, that they were confronted with a couple of decades or so ago. If you're a parent, don't even bother telling me, or anyone for that matter, that you have never sneaked out of your home late-night to meet your sweetheart. Or that you never went off the radar for a weekend for some bow-chika-wow-wow, while your folks thought you were at some friend's marriage. Where are the photos, eh? Of the marriage, I mean.

That, quite neatly, brings me to the day when my mom decided to randomly rummage through my bag searching for god knows what. She did find something, and I don't think it's what she was looking for. Two nice, shiny, blue, square packets which had something flimsy and ring-like inside them....

Ahhh.... what lovely things.

These are amazing! Again, I don't get paid to say this, but the 'extra-time' ones, phew. You can last a lifetime on them, try all your acrobatics, and then think to yourself: "Man, junior lasted that long? Nice." Once, I went to the pharmacy (yes, not a fucking chemist!) and asked for a pack of these beauties. The shopkeeper gave the needful to me, I paid, turned around, and realised that a pack might not suffice for the weekend. I went back for another packet. A lady was ordering her own goods during the whole episode, and when I went back for Round 2, the shopkeeper blushed a bit and took me to the side counter so that he could clandestinely hand me the second installment of the 'contraband'. Condoms, people! Condoms! Because conservative society. However, however, now this is the interesting bit. The sly bastard gave me a devilish snicker after receiving his dues. That's because.... fun, you see?
In college, I remember one of the chaps from this group I hung out with challenged all of us to get condoms. Honestly, condoms were a bit of a taboo in my head back then, because heck, I had no game. Not that I'm super slick with lasses today, but now, I can buy myself my stash of condoms without feeling woozy in front of a timorous shopkeeper. Not an achievement, I know. By the way, we got back to our hostels and made water-balloons out of the condoms. That was fun. Not.

Oh, back to my mom discovering the condoms in my bag. Not good. Not good. She asked me "What is this?", half angry, a fourth helpless, and another fourth in denial.
I sheepishly slipped the two packets into my pocket while she pretended not to see. The fact that she didn't meet me in the eye for quite sometime after that episode pinched inside. Such punishment for the kid's little crimes and misdemeanours. Crimes and misdemeanours because:
a) She comes from an orthodox background; not that I'm a loutish libertine.
b) Woody Allen rocks.
More importantly, I wonder what she was looking for inside the bag.

Not for polite company

Life, as we know it, has a tricky way with surprises. Surprises, more to the tune of rude shocks, the kind that can set an existential crisis snowball rolling. Now, time for a question that's (mostly) guaranteed to induce awkwardness. Do you watch porn? It's fun to watch how so many of us squirm at this question, almost as if it's a crime to watch graphic content involving human genitalia and orifices. Come on, that's a lot better than saying 'dick' and 'vagina', isn't it? Too sophisticated you are. I was asked this question at my workplace, that too by a senior I admire. DURING WORK HOURS. "Do you watch porn?"

"Absolutely sir!" I blurted, a little to my own surprise. "Excellent answer!", he replied. I felt a strange sense of satisfaction, pride if you may, that day because there was no squirming involved. Even more so because the rest of the office shifted in their seats uncomfortably.

A few days later, the shocker came. I was watching this gorgeous, voluptuous woman undressing on my screen. This guy walked in, wagging his enormous pecker, and that's when the woman looked into the camera and said something that, for lack of better words, scarred me. She said, "You sit there jerking off while I fuck this gigantic cock for real!"

My world collapsed on itself like a dying star, turning into a life-sucking black hole in the fabric of my existence. Yes, that line was more a blow to my ego than anything else, but boy, that shit hurt. Thankfully, there was an upside to that sucker-punch. I'm off porn, as would be most men who witnessed the abovementioned gorgeous woman's borderline contemptuous, positively scathing remark. Please don't tell me you're into such a thing; boy, where's your self-esteem?

The vision of the woman delivering the dialogue did replay in my head when my girlfriend said tata to me recently. Just that this time, the woman's face was replaced with the face of my girlfriend. Yup, that pinched like a bitch, but that's how inter-gender dynamics are supposed to be I guess. And finally, we are here to fuck, so let's not be crass or bitter about it. That's yours truly partly rationalising a heartbreak, but anyway.

But let's get back to the topic of pornography. It's not going to do you any good. Agreed, you aren't doing anyone any harm, it's just you, your hands, your pecker, or your vagina, the screen and your devices (if you use any) left to your own device. You do the deeds, feel good about it for 5-30 seconds and that's that. Yes, we men have to deal with the infamous post-masturbation dip in self-esteem, but most of us get along after that just fine. Or do we?

Think of this. You're horny, so you pick up your device, go to your favourite site, watch a video, or a string of them, rub one off, and then you pretty much sit back and relax. You have gotten your dopamine hit, the chemical that gives your brain the 'feeling good' feeling with zero effort. Let this routine set in for long enough and you're looking at issues, issues that can cause trouble. Lack of motivation, poor self-control, and if you are a chronic user, deteriorating social skills is a possibility too. None of this is to scare you, it's all from personal experience. Plus, the dopamine hit I mentioned about earlier, well that's got another problem. Dopamine works a bit like caffeine. The more you're exposed to it, the more you need it, so over time, the amount of porn you need for arousal will ramp up,. The first clip, the second, and the subsequent ones that are so conveniently clickable will slowly fail to satisfy you, which means you're losing more time in front of a screen. That's time you probably could have invested in getting better at something, perhaps meeting a real human of the opposite sex. If that's not enough, porn is likely to mess with your relationships too.

Not convincing, I know. And hence, I urge you to do some digging of your own on the effects of porn on the brain. You will be blown away. It's through some digging of my own that I discovered something called the NOFAP movement. The concept of the NOFAP movement, as the name suggests, is to refrain from porn and masturbation. You can have as much sex as you want though, just clarifying. Now, that may sound ludicrous to many, but this shit works. It's no magic pill to your worldly woes, and some of the benefits you get from it are possibly psychological, but come on.

The benefits? Better focus, calmer mind, lesser time on the phone (we all could use this one), more drive to do stuff (since the dopamine now comes only after you have actually done something, so you strive more), and (strangely) a bigger pecker. The last one was a shocking bonus that I felt after about a month or so into NOFAP. It feels good.

Disclaimer: NOFAP is not an organisation, and I don't get paid to tell you, the discerning reader, any of this. Just another human wading through life and figuring my shit out. Take what advice seems useful and skip out on the rest. Here's something I'd like to leave you with.

Go out and do something amazing with your lives, be nice to people, and I will catch up with you later. - Brian Alsruhe (Coolest strongman on Youtube) 

Are you understanding?

Can you see the scrunched up face of your least favourite human already? Don't know, "Are you understanding" seems like the preserve of frustrated teachers. These are the ones who perpetually claim how the students of the other division are way better than the hooligans in your class. Surely, the teachers repeat the same lines next door, but anyway. Mind you, "Are you understanding?" is grammatically incorrect because of some unfathomable difference between present continuous and present perfect tense. Please use "Do you understand?"

Tenses. Phew. School... BIGGER Phew. Wow, school was a good nine years ago. Facial hair, pubic hair, and other bulbous, beautiful things sprouting, weird subjects, scribbly, doodly notebooks, la-la-la, blah-blah-blah, and just like Ringa-Ringa roses, it all came crashing down. Or was it all falls down? Who the fuck wrote Ringa-Ringa? And who, really, who runs with a pocketful of posies? For those of you who don't know, posies are a small bunch of flowers. I didn't know that either, till I asked Google aunty just five minutes ago.

On the 25th of this November, some of us will take up the arduous task of belling the CAT. This is not one of your regular mini-felines. It's a beast that takes no prisoners apparently. But if you tie the bell around it, you will be rewarded. Hope it's not like the "If you ace your 10th board exams, your name will be etched on some obscure wall of fame." burger that our parents fed us. Well, I bet it will be the exact same burger, this time without the patty. Nah, just kidding. The CAT is the gateway to some of the most prestigious management education institutions in India, and also that to a supremely prosperous life. (Pssst.. text copied from the brochure of some MBA college).

Yours truly, like many of you, intends to bell the CAT this year. And to bell the CAT, or as the lingo goes, 'crack the CAT', you need to have some idea of tenses. Yup, it's that aspect of grammar that deals with time. Past, present, future and their many ghosts. Each tense is further divided into four types.
For instance, the Present tense is divided into Simple Present, Present Perfect, Present Continuous, and Present Perfect Continuous. It's likewise with Past and Future.
Let's look at some examples.
Simple Present: He is mad.
Present Perfect: He is perfectly mad.*
Present Continuous: He's getting there, madness.*
Perfect Continuous: Ahh.. this form of the tense is seldom used, so let's chuck it altogether.
*Please do not, even mistakenly, take these for actual examples.

So that's a wrap for Day 1. Goodness knows what monsters the keyboard will unleash in the next 140-odd days.

One Year Hence (Part Three: The morning after)

The drive to Goa had been a smooth affair, and the 600-odd kilometres I had clocked in a little less than 10 hours was a tick on my to-do list. Meeting Deepak and his better half felt like Christmas had arrived early, and eating their share (more like stealing their share) of food off their plates made me realise how hungry I was.

However, something was missing. Not something, nearly 75 percent of the gang was missing. So yes, we were in Goa, the afternoon was scorching as fuck, and while sitting on one of those reclining chairs by the beach with a bottle of ice-cold beer felt luxurious, the scenery was incomplete.
Evening arrived, and so did one confusion: where should we eat? Deepak, Nami and I were Goa nubies, and what didn't help is that north of Goa gets rather dingy by sundown. Solution? Let's go to someplace well-known. Curlies it was. Agreed, it's cliched, but it had the beach, it had the meats, and it had BIRA! Sadly, yours truly was driving, so Bira only for Deepak. Bastard. But holy pig, their pork ribs! You see them and say, let's share the plate. With dinner done and dusted, we headed back for the long night. Long night, because the remaining cast - Arun, Leelu, Krishna, Yasir and Geetus - was arriving at 6 in the morning. And the eight hours that remained felt like a month.

I woke up at 5 because honestly, the anticipation was overwhelming. The gang had pulled me out of a dark corner in my mind the last I'd been with them. They are the ones who had fixed me. And then, of course, there was the other thing. I would see monkey after over a year. This time, for real, not on Skype, or Whatsapp. And we could fight each other again!

Deepak knocked at the stroke of 6. "They're here."
Hmm. Time to play it cool, I guess. Here's something about playing cool. There are those who can play cool, and there are those who can't. I don't want to discuss which lot I fit into, because I fit into the latter. And it's not cool. That's because when you can't play cool and try to, you end up being a flop-show. Because you are trying to conceal all your inner happiness and thinking to yourself that you're wearing a poker face. Sadly, everyone looking at you can see that mile-wide grin pasted on you. Fuck it, who cares. These were my people, and holy cow was I glad to see the fuckers.

Pleasantries exchanged, time to get out of the hotel. Also, time for some food! That means time for more cliched places, and today it was Britto's. The food vanished as fast as it came, so did the beers, but still no beer for me. Because, well, because don't fucking drink and drive.
The best time to visit Goa is smack in the peak of summer. It's hot, everyone is sweaty, and bae feels sexier to hold. And her curves glisten.

Fact and sarcasm aside, ladies and gentlemen, do not, and I repeat, DO NOT visit Goa in summer. You will end up spending more time than you would like in your hotel rooms trying to avoid the heat. That has its advantages, which I shall not get into, but as a rule of thumb, do not visit Goa in summer.
Since we had stuffed ourselves silly with food, an afternoon nap was in order, so back to the hotel rooms, driver! We got back, some struggled in, some snuggled in, and I don't know how, in my room, we fit four in one bed. It's India, people, get used to it. And trust me, it's fun.
Evening came, again, but this time, there was a sense of satisfaction in having a picture full of sexy people. What a stark jump from 24 hours ago, when you wanted each moment to rush by as fast as possible.

The beers were in, along with some exotic spirits from three oceans away, and so was pizza. Lot's of pizza. Somehow, we didn't get that wasted. The hours flew by, the food vanished, and since we were in Goa, we just had to head out for that mandatory walk on the beach. For the first time in a while, I felt an entire lot of people letting their guards down. A couple of us, especially the newlyweds Arun and Leelus, happily walked our time away, while a few unloaded all the weight on our chests. Some let it out in tears, some vented theirs out with hugs, some sprinted the fuck out of their worries, and some of us allowed the receding waves of the Arabian Sea wash our botherations away. It feels nice, I must tell you, to sense the sand slipping below your feet. Like there's new ground to stand on each time a wave of trouble passes over you. Perhaps it's nature's way of telling us all that you can start over any time you like, on a clean slate. Notice that you can never hold on to that sand near your feet either. Best to let it go, like with everything else that wants to, I guess.

I remember that evening, that of the 6th of April like it was yesterday. Good Friday it was in the truest sense. The one that was a jab of adrenaline, hope and warmth straight into the heart. You see, some moments revive your faith in the fact that life will be good, and this evening was filled with them. Yes, there will be hang-ups, you will have to wade through troubled waters, trudge over bad roads, and things may not go as planned. In fact, things seldom go as planned, or so I hear from anyone remotely wise. That said, however, what you have is beautiful, and neither the troubles of the past nor the worries of the future can take that from you.

Part 4 coming in a bit....