From one thread to another..

Ones commitment to learning may be directly measured by ones receding hairline and loss of hair density.

You live, you learn. You learn more, you live less?

There has been a lot of learning on the personal and professional front in the last year. At least that is the annual Avani-avittam report!

Granted the regular sandhyavandanam is restricted to twice a month, plus some days when I feel like it and it is done in the bathroom for the most part, but the avani-avittam thread changing is always done.

Reminds you of good things from the past, and somehow deep down tells you that as long as you keep the learning process alive, all will be well. This ceremony always brings about mixed feelings. It becomes a once a year atonement event, but one has to look past feeling bad for not doing rituals and prayers everyday and go with "work is worship" and "worship is just more worship"!

Vedic learning is not going to feed the kids and it is a given that the concepts have to be fit to context.

My only take on the "being a brahmin" part is somehow we were taught that "knowledge is power". It is very much possible that this is an over simplified myopic filtered view of the caste system scaling down to affect me as to who I am....and this is not the first time this is being said in this blog. At least that view has remained consistent over four plus years of blogging..

In my understanding of 7th grade history of India, we were taught that there were four classes of people who had different interpretations of power and their roles in the world. They were valued in society for their quest for

a. knowledge
b. power, control, territory
c. money and all things material
d. a daily paycheck

Roughly translated for today's urbanite, you would aspire to be CTO, CEO, CFO or a dude doing the actual execution of work... today you can beat the system and be anything you want to be, as long as you don't get stereotyped!

Considering my parents were not well to do and the only thing they pushed me to do was to get grades and their biggest achievement (prior to their getting me married to their top seed pick aka San) was performing our Upanayanam ceremony in a grand way, the choice was very clear. Study and you will get somewhere in life and be valued for something.

That has been sent into deep permanent memory somewhere. So this year the commitment to learning has been extended by another year.

As usual, some pictures..

The little one was slightly upset that there was no "bell ringing" involved in today's occasion, but was consoled once she saw the good eats.

It was just daddy doing prayers and everyone getting to eat vadai, paayasam and sweet poli.

The paayasam was very very yummy and this post ends on that note..and we go eat some more paayasam.

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Watch your feet

You are busy clicking away on your camera, worried that the approaching chariot might run over and your zoom may not be enough to save you and your mom lets out a yelp "watch out!"

You take your eye away from the viewfinder and look down to see a dude rolling on the floor, sorry, rolling on the road.

You missed stepping on him narrowly. The camera doesn't do as good a job of absorbing him as his body is absorbing the dirt on the road.

"Is he a beggar?" was the obvious question.

"Edhavadhu Vendudhalaa irukkum da!" comes the reply.

By that she meant "he must have prayed to some god that he will roll on the road during a temple festival, collect money and then go donate it to the god!"

The sucker for technicality in me immediately responds "His chances of getting money are better if he is at eye level with the people, no?" and mom just moves on. Her face seems to say "to each, his own" and I meekly follow her.

From that point on, started watching my feet after every shot.

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What is a blog without Pongal pictures?

Was so busy with the game that the Pongal photo post never made it through!

Last year we made pongal without the Prayer part, because my aunt passed away.

This year Pongal was a relatively subdued affair, considering it made it on a weekday. When I came home early to do the prayer, there was a pleasant greeting at the doorstep..

There was a prayer, which coincided with sunset instead of sunrise,

and some really yummy Pongal and Vadai!

Note to self : Next year, take the day off and celebrate.

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