Sudha Murthy's latest novel.

Having read Sudha Murthy's "Wise and Otherwise" and "The old man and his God" and enjoyed them, when I saw a novel by her in a bookstore I did not hesitate to buy it. "Gently fall the Bakula" is a novel written by her almost 30 years ago, although it has been published only recently. Here's what the synopsis had to say --

"Written nearly three decades ago this novel remains startlingly relevant in its scrutiny of modern values and work ethics. It tells the story of a marriage that loses its way as ambition and self –interest takes their toll. As the story of Shrikant and Shrimati unfolds, we learn how every step of Shrikanth’s corporate climb is laid with Shrimati’s sacrifices and then, it makes one stop and reconsider the priorities that we set in our life."

The book is about 150 pages and chronicles the lives of Shrikant and Shrimati from their school days when they are competing with each other for the first rank, through their courtship to marriage , the intial years of struggle followed by success and then the "different" struggles again.

The story is very close to real life, the career progression of Shrikant in the IT sector and the accompanying wealth and stress and the cost at which these come. The book will defintely touch a chord with wives who invariably have to play second fiddle to their husbands whose careers always take precedence. The friction between daughter-in-law and mother-in-law,also very typical of indian middle class families is brought out well without turning it into anything ugly.

The setting for the story is Hubli, a town in North Karnataka and the families that Shrikant and Shrimati come from are typical middle-class families. As such it will be very easy for most of Indian readers to relate to the environment. The bits on history are very informative.

Though the story is a simple narrative, it often seems to be told from the point of view of Shrimati. Shrimati's character is more developed with her feelings and emotions being brought out strongly. She always gets to take the higher moral ground with all the sacrifices she makes. Shrikant's character on the other hand though is half-baked and other than portraying him as a very smart, intelligent and ambitious husband, the author does not delve too much into his emotions and feelings. The story would have been more interesting if his side of the story would also have been explored in greater detail. Their relationship also could have been developed a little more.

The writing style is very straight forward and comes from the heart. It reminded me very much of all the stories one reads in magazines such as women's era.

All in all the book is a good read, although I would like to classify it in the short-story genre rather than a novel.

Happiness

What is happiness?

Coming home after a walk in the afternoon sun in the summer and having a slice of cool and sweet watermelon.
Curling up with a good book in the afternoon, without anyone to disturb you.
Getting drenched in the rain and coming home to a steaming cup of tea and a plate of hot pakodas.
Waking up late on a Sunday morning. Sitting on the floor with a huge mug of coffee and the Sunday paper. After reading the paper leisurely heading out for a hearty breakfast of fluffy omelets and golden crunchy toast and fresh orange juice.
P and I have always loved exploring places where we could get this kind of Sunday-morning grub. A few years back we headed out to Cafe Good Luck at Deccan for such a breakfast. The food at this place was good, but what was even better was the laid back atmosphere. Our heaven of happiness though, has been bulldozed by time and will be replaced by some impersonal steel and glass ugliness. Sigh!
One Sunday morning P had this urge to eat sausages. German Bakery,- one place we would surely get sausages in Pune, we thought. We had heard quite a few good things about this place from a lot of people. Worth the long drive we thought. So we drove across town to this small bakery-cum-cafe in koregaon park. The place was full of maroon-clad whites. There were a few normal whites as well (normal as in not dressed in maroon). I at once began to feel like an alien. "Why should you?" asked P. Yes, why should I? So we went up to order (this being a self service joint), only to be ignored by the person at the counter. "See, that's why.." I said. We were also told that they did not serve sausages. So much so for driving half way across town.... We ordered the normal eggs-and-toast breakfast. They do have a good variety of cakes, scones, danish etc. We had a tough time finding a place to sit. We waited politely for a table to be vacated. After a long wait and watching others just elbow their way in and grab a seat, we changed our strategy and grabbed a seat where a couple was already seated. The food also took its time arriving. But when it did arrive, all was forgotten. The bread slices where thick and toasted and buttered just perfectly. The omlete was also very fluffy and tasty.
However, that was many months ago and we have never gone back.
Another good place for eggs and toast breakfast is Hotel Vohuman outside Jehnagir Hospital. We walked in to this place one sunday morning when we happened to be in that part of town. A small Irani kind of a place, with a lot of tables and chairs placed close to one another. The place was quite full but did manage to get a table in a corner. The first thing I noticed as soon as we were seated was there were very few women. This seemed to be one of those places men would go for a quick and wholesome breakfast when they are travelling or when their wives are out of town.The place was also not very clean. Just behind our table was a door that opened onto the backyard-cum-dumping area. A stray dog walked in from the backyard and came sat near our feet. This was probably a very normal thing, for neither the waiters nor any of the other customers seemed to be bothered. We too acted like wise. We ordered our usual eggs-and-toast. The service was quick and the food tasty. The prices were very reasonable, with the bill coming to just under 100. (this included coffee and bournvita).
Last Sunday again we set out for a similar fix. This time we decided to head to George's on East Street. This place, also Irani was almost empty when we reached. Good we thought, for the Sunday-morning-breakfast is as must about the leisure as about the food. I stuck to the usual fare of omelet and toast, while P became a bit adventurous and ordered scrambled eggs-on-toast and chicken cutlet. We also order orange and mosambi juice. M, our carnivore daughter aged 3, was already jumping in anticipation of all the yummy food. Getting her to eat normal food is always a huge task, but anything non-veg, even eggs vanish in a jiffy. After a short while the food arrived. While P was dreaming of the tasty, golden scrambled eggs he would devour, the waiter placed some white mass plopped on two big toasts in front of P, which made P exclaim, "Don't you use egg yolk at all?" "We do", the waiter replied, "but this is made in milk and butter". After one mouthful, P wore a very sad look on his face. "I hope the cutlet is better" he kept on saying. M and I meanwhile started on the omelet which was quite okay . The cutlet arrived. One bite and P's already long face grew even longer. The cutlet was thin and rather tastless. So much so that even M(who absolutely loves chicken and can eat it in almost any form) refused to eat it and stuck to omelet. After all this when the bill came, it was close to 300, which we felt was way too high for the crap they had served.
So our search for a perfect Sunday morning breakfast place continues....................

Fish at Srushti

As P and I stepped outside the elevator for a walk, the smell of fried fish greeted us. Immediately our plans were made, we were going to eat out. We were going to eat fish. Right after the walk was over.
The next most question, where do we go? The Bengali joint, Radhika at Baner Road? No, we needed something spicier. Nisarg at Nal Stop? Would be very crowded on a Sunday evening.
In such a moment of crisis, where else would be turn to other than the TFG(Times Food Guide). So P, who has been studying the guide as if it were a work of art, immediately flipped a few pages and gave me two choices, (He has developed a unique system of marking the Restaurants he finds interesting, that I think should be patented. How else could he bring up a shortlist from 100s of choices in less than 5 minutes?) Rahul - one besides the Rahul theater and Srushti at Tilak Road. Rahul I thought too formal..What we want I said is a no-nonsense place, so Srushti it was.
We called them for booking, only to be informed that on Sunday's they did not take any bookings. Lets go late, that way we won't have to wait we said and arrived at the restaurant at 9.45 pm and waited for half an hour. Waited amidst all that delicious smell. We have made a good choice we thought.
When we finally got a table, we were very quick to order, a Pomfret-fry and a Surmai-Malvani-Curry with Amboli (dosas made out of rice-flour) and not to forget the Solkadi.
Fortunately the wait for the food was not as long as the wait for the table. First to arrive was the fish-fry, fried in the malvani style. Now one thing I should mention here is about 6 months back we happened to go to Malvan for a short vacation and ate some delicious authentic malvani fish. So the first thing P said after a bite of the fish was- "Ah, we have been spoiled by Malvan". In short although the fish was good, it just did not match the authentic one. The fish itself felt a little tasteless. Nothing can probably beat fresh fish.
The curry was better and the Ambolis, just about okay. These Ambolis were no match for the Neer-dosa. The bill came to about Rs 350, which was pretty reasonable.
All in all, we had a good meal with our cravings for fish being well satisfied