Z : Zebra / Jebra

My mother-in-law pronounces Z / Za as J / Ja. I always have fun with this fact, at her expense of course. When she comes to our place, I often ask her, what would she like to eat. And I wait for her to say Pijja (Pizza), for cheap laughs. Now she knows my routine, so she doesn't respond. She is one spoil sport.

In fact, every time I see a Zebra Crossing, I ask her to tell me what it is. Some times she obliges me, by blurting out Jebra crossing and I laugh out loud. But over the years, she has become conscious and thus Zindagi became Jeevan (Life) and Pizza became pata nahi (I don't know). My wife thinks I deliberately needle her. But she doesn't know, that such linguistic jokes have always been source of cheap laughs for me. I remember the time, when my younger brother had to write an essay on "My Mother" in school. In that essay, he was supposed to write one line that went like, "My mother runs the house very wisely" . Instead he wrote, "My mother runs in the house very wisely." For many years, I kept pulling his leg for this hilarious error. 

My own writing isn't that great. And when I read my old posts and mails, I cringe at the mistakes I had made. 

Coming back to my mother-in-law's pronunciation issue, let me give one clarification here. If a person, in India, has not learned Urdu or English, they will pronounce Z / Za as J / Ja. Because in Sanskrit and Hindi there is no letter Z / Za. 

Therefore I promise to my wife through this post today, that I will not crack jokes on her mother's pronunciation anymore. But that doesn't mean I will score her high on cooking. You can't have it all. Haha.

Y : Yumdude

Yumdude is my handle / user name on Zomato. 

For the uninitiated, Zomato is a leading food ordering, restaurant search and review app in India. They are present in other countries too.

For the ones, who are not aware of Indian mythology, Yama is God of Death and Doot means messenger. Yamdoot is Yama's Messenger and my handle is a play on that. I thought I was being original and relevant while keeping this name. But, to my disappointment, much later, after I made this handle, I discovered a T - Shirts brand called Yum Dude and Snapdeal did a campaign with a character called Yam Dude. Huh! One can never be sure in today's world. And I think being original is going to be increasingly difficult.

If I haven't lost you already, let me tell you that this post is not about originality or Zomato handles. I am a foodie and I wanted to document my love for food in some way. I have done almost 100 restaurant reviews under this handle and I feel my journey has just begun.

They say a Punjabi's adventure gets over at the last Sher-e-Punjab Dhabha on his journey. I don't know if that is true, because I enjoy all kind of cuisines. When I eat somewhere, I don't add ketchup or salt / pepper to what is served. I love to eat food the way the cook wants it to be eaten. I had heard somewhere, this is a respectful thing to do for your host or chef. Over the years, due to this habit of mine, I developed a taste for different cuisines. Yes, some foods are still off the table, like pungent smelling foods. I won't ever have reptiles and insects. I will never fall for the fad of eating live food. But I mostly try everything otherwise.

I can't name my favorite food, but I have a weakness for sweets. I remember every time my school results would come, I would ask my mother to buy a Bengali sweet called Chena Murki (made with Sugar & Cottage Cheese). So this sweet reminds me of success. 

Whenever I smell, a mixture of flour, ghee and sugar being roasted, I get reminded of my grand-mother, who used to prepare delicious Pinnis. No one can cook Makki ki Roti and Sarson Ka Saag better than my mother. I think every proud Punjabi son thinks the same about his mother. But the memory associated with this food is so strong, that every time I go home, I know my mother will cook it for me. And I think I get a dopamine hit in anticipation, before I even reach home.

While I enjoy all my fine dining experiences, if I have to choose my best food moments, they are not related to a very costly restaurant or any complex dish. Chena Murki, Pinnis and Makki ki Roti with Saag will be at the top always. And there are few places / food moments which are etched in my memory very strongly. 

Once during our school vacations, my father took us to a trip to Kullu and Manali. A long stretch of the journey was along the river Beas. Beas had gushing ice cold water. We sat at one such spot and got some mangoes chilled in that water and then we ate them by the side of the road on the banks of the river.

On yet another trip to Manikaran Sahib, we had a breakfast of hot stuffed parathas with butter and really sweet tea at a road side dhabha. Cheap, yes. But at that time, it was the most heavenly food.

There was a shop near my home that served Chhole Bhature. I used to go there often, but my favorite part was when the cook used to keep two fresh pieces of paneer on the plate. That was like a reward for eating there.

I discovered cheesecake very late in life. I was on my honeymoon, and we were shopping in Kuala Lumpur and we saw a cheescake shop. I had never tried it before. And when, I had the first bite, I knew Chena Murki and Pinni had a strong competition. After that I tried cheesecakes everywhere. But I got my best experience at the Cheesecake Factory Dubai Mall. This is what I had there. If food can kill, this is the way I would like to die. Tell me your food story.

X : Xeroxed

During my engineering, I was the class batch topper. In fact, I think I used to get highest ever scores in the history of that course. I completed my engineering on a scholarship and swept all possible awards at the convocation. Well, generally I am not that immodest. But this post required this introduction, I believe. 

Every time, semester exams neared, the demand for my class notes increased exponentially. My notes were xeroxed multiple times. My close friends would photocopy my original notes and give them back to me, so that I can also prepare for my exams.  And then copies were made from these copies and distributed further. I have heard stories that xerox copies of my notes and project work were kept at the photocopier's shop itself (near Gate No. 3 of our university) and people just used to go there and get a copy for themselves. As if this was not enough, the enterprising shopkeeper used to save a copy of my main projects, to reproduce and distribute next year for my juniors, of course at a price. I came to know about this, when after many years of completion of my engineering, I went to that shop for getting xerox of some documents. That fellow not only recognized me, but also showed me copies of my projects, I had done years ago.

What I used to find amusing was that the people who attended regular classes or those who missed few, will also get my complete notes xeroxed. For all the subjects. They used to spend more money, on getting photocopies of my notes, than buying actual books and studying properly. In fact I didn't use to study my own notes that much before exams, because I never took down complete notes. I only wrote those things which I found important. My writing was not that great. For newbies, it wasn't that legible too. I used to write in corners or margins, and not at all in a linear fashion. There were lots of doodles and arrows in my notes. I don't know how did my classmates study from it. I would not have topped the class, by studying my own notes. So, what were they trying to achieve. I followed three key mantras, which always helped me in studies. 

1. I was highly attentive in class. The objective was to study as less as possible, post classes or during exams, so that I can watch all the movies I want to, in my free time and also party with all my friends anytime. So, I used to ask lot of questions in the class and get all my concepts cleared there and then. So during exams, I studied only for few hours late in the night or early in the morning.

2. I used to read from books rather than only notes during exams. During the semester also, if something is unclear, I would refer books.

3. I never used to refer to anyone else's notes. 😼

During third year of my engineering, I participated in lot of debating and speaking competitions, so I used to travel to other universities across India. At that time, I missed few classes. So I decided to get someone else's notes xeroxed. I came to know, that when I used to miss classes, people used to get MT's notes xeroxed. So I borrowed her notes for the missed classes. Her handwriting was beautiful. She used to write everything, that professors spoke or wrote on the board. In fact she had learnt basic shorthand, to ensure that she doesn't miss even a single nuance. I used to wonder why she was lower on the pecking order than me, when it came to getting class notes xeroxed. The answers were pretty obvious. People were lazy. My notes could be read faster. They were able to complete the syllabus on time. If they wrote only the important points that I used to note down, in their exams, they tended to score higher. This is my interpretation. Thankfully, most of these engineers, never practiced and went on to do an MBA or Sales. Otherwise, my xeroxed notes, would have been held responsible for the collapsing bridges.