Twenty- five Seven

Vaccinations and Informed consent

September 13, 2013
(Photo credit: Wikipedia

It’s all so long ago that I can’t quite remember whether it was on the last day before school closed for the Summer or if it was on the first day that we returned from the holidays that we were marched off to the school infirmary, class by class to get a TABC shot and a small pox vaccination. All through the day, there was a line of school children standing class wise in height order bravely waiting for their shots.

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Since I was always the shortest in my class I was the first in line but I escaped the shot as I produced an Exemption Certificate having got the shot at home. Injections were my worst nightmare and when I had them at home I used to give everyone a hard time. First they had to chase me all over the house and then hold me down while the shot was administered. And after the shot, I would collapse in a heap, fainting with fright. Of course the hysterics diminished over the years especially when we had TABC parties at home when my father would vaccinate his friends’ children and I had to lead by example. We were around 6-8 of us who would be vaccinated by my father and after the shots were done, the parents would leave us to our devices while they went off to the Club or the Mess for a glass of beer and a night of partying. So while I missed the TABC shot I could not escape the Small Pox vaccination which was administered with a scalpel along the forearm by a Municipal doctor who visited each school. One year I remember there was a Russian vaccine which had to “screwed” into the body with a split needle!

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

And in what seems almost a cavalier fashion, our re-usable needles at home were auto claved in our regular teapot while the ones used in school were jabbed and re-jabbed into a minimum of 25 children before they were changed!

With infirmaries truly a room of the past, Small Pox an unknown disease, typhoid vaccines and reusable needles even more of a taboo, today’s patients insist on disposable needles, individually packed alcohol swabs, doctors with masks, gloves and gowns and also the batch number of the vials used to record for posterity! This attention to detail is restricted not only to regular Medical practice but also to drug trials and research. I was amazed by yesterday’s news article in the Economic Times which said that the new guidelines for Clinical Trials would require a video recorded consent of each patient participating in the research. Not only will this violate the patient’s privacy ( the paper said) but would also entail each doctor or paramedic to be a videographer as well. Honestly, a time will come when the video recording of the consent will in itself have to be video recorded to ensure that there was no “doctoring” of the informed consent.
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Shuddh Desi Romance – Not even remotely funny

September 11, 2013
Shudh Desi Romance is
– Pure garbage
– Pure nonsense
– Pure waste of time

Raghuram Sitaram as true blue as Jaipur Pottery is an itinerant tourist guide in the Pink City. He is also a minor con man who moonlights as a Wedding Guest on Hire (yes – there is such an outsourced service specially for runaway brides and grooms who don’t have their own guests to dance at the wedding) working for the jovial Mr. Rishi Kapoor a.k.a Mr. Goel who also plays cupid, agony aunt and counsellor apart from his real job of recruiting people to sing and dance at weddings. Gayatri is an IAS aspirant who has come to Jaipur ostensibly to enrol herself in Kota’s Crammer but spends all her time smoking ( chee chee and actually sleeping around with various boyfriends for some strange unknown reason). The two meet on the bus to Raghuram’s own wedding where Raghuram falls in love with Gayatri and indulges in some bus seat romancing in which the groom to be is so dazzled by her torrid kisses that he actually stands up the bride by running away via the toilet.

Gayatri ( Parineeta Chopra) and Raghuram ( Sushant Singh Rajput) shack up for what reason I still can’t fathom and we are treated to some really disgusting scenes which supposedly pass off as romantic and funny. Several inane songs later the two decide to get married but this time round it is Gayatri who pulls the plug at the wedding by again making a toilet escape.

By this time Raghuram is contrite and nursing a broken heart and in one Hired Wedding Party trip he comes across his jilted former bride (Tara) who is a cousin of the groom to be. There is a show down of sorts between Tara’s Uncle and Raghuram but Tara saves the day by asking her Uncle not to make a scene and gives Raghuram some money to go home. She also writes down her phone number. Raghuram meets her and again hooks up with her only to find that she was just interested in giving him a taste of his own medicine. But, cupid plays tricks and Tara falls in love with Raghu. But this is not the end of the movie…………..

At yet another wedding Tara and Raghuram come across Gayatri . Gayatri and Raghu are asked to go to the station to pick up the priest and when they return to the venue bump into each other (yes outside a toilet) and there is a showdown between all three. Eventually Tara realises that she is not really in love with Raghu and allows Ragu to marry Gayatri. But…….once again both of them run out on each other (again via the toilet) and land up in their love nest vowing never to get married because they are scared of relationships that bind.

The story was convoluted and silly, the dialogues hardly evoke a smile, the costumes garish and loud, the actors loutish and bad, the direction slow and boring……………

This movie is not Desi because it had
- no parents involved in the weddings
- young people who had not a care in the world but just traipsed around without any apparent financial support
And as for Romance – there’s nothing romantic about it.

Finally,this movie deserves to be banned for perpetuating the myth of the stereotypical single woman who smokes, drinks, lives alone, indiscriminately sleeps around and goes for men who are losers and who play rough. Frankly, I think the Censor Board is terribly irresponsible passing such a film in the light of the current need to educate our boys and men to treat our women with respect.
Bhaji Gully

September 10, 2013

Yesterday I was walking through Bhaji Gully when it suddenly struck me how wonderful it was to walk through a space that was so alive. Every day there is something new that is happening on this narrow street , one of the many side lanes which connect Nana’s Chowk to Grant Road Station. When this road was the road it was meant to be, I’m sure it was a discreet lane with residential buildings on either side. Somehow or the other ( I don’t know when) vegetable vendors started setting up stalls outside the building till gradually it became better known as Bhaji Gully.

As usual it was a mess with the road still slushy thanks to the occasional rain shower. The street was narrower than usual with the huge Pandals erected to welcome the neighbourhood Ganpati. The loudspeakers were blaring songs which though sang praises of the Lord were set to music more appropriate for the traditional folk dances (tamasha or lavani), the lyrics of which are usually raunchy replete with double entendre. In fact I first thought the music was distinctly inappropriate till the vegetable seller asked me to listen carefully – that’s when I realised that they were indeed playing “Godly” songs albeit with a distinctly un-Godly vibe.

But I’m not complaining because Bhaji Gully is truly a living almanac and reminds you of which festivals are round the corner especially during the festive season when it sells specialty produce for the festival to come. Special flowers meant for worship, garlands, bunches of fruit, incense sticks, oil lamps, brass trays, camphor pellets, cotton wicks, masks to assemble idols, bangles and beads, bells and all the stuff that you need to conduct a pooja.

So with today being Rishi Panchami, the vegetable sellers had all the veggies that go into making a special vegetable dish that is only eaten on this day. ( Read more on my blog foodities)