A conversation on coffee art on canvas with a close relative of mine inspired me to pen my love for the brew. The discussion was actually about the shades of brown coffee could take and how concentrated it should be. I thought to myself there couldn’t be a better time to write about coffee than, when the mother of all coffee shops (as in shops serving coffee, not to be confused with their Dutch cousins) recent entry promising to serve India with a coffee passion of 40 years. A 40 year old company bringing the coffee experience to a country which has known, brewed and tasted coffee since the 1700’s!!!
Any show of love for the brew by a Syrian Christian from Central Travancore was always looked upon with disdain amongst my tribe. A Malayalee was invariably associated with tea in Madras, the place were I had my early bearing. Thanks to the numerous tea shops run by the Nair immigrants (or as the legend goes), every street corner teashop was known by the generic Nairkada irrespective of the role a Nair played in it. Hence, a malayalee drank only tea was an unwritten edict in Madras.
Having been brought up in and around Triplicane and later on in Besant Nagar I was fortunate to be living close to Tambram community in Madras. This was instrumental in me being baptised a coffee drinker which still continues to be the preferred non alcoholic beverage. However, what I was initiated to was the filter kappi served in a davara and tumbler and during my younger days I always thought that coffee should only be served with the open end facing downwards. Growing in Triplicane the aroma that wafted through the air during a walk past a Leo Coffee outlet, the legendary coffee bean and powder retailer brings about an olfactory hallucination in me even after decades. Not sure how many of you remember this piece of trivia, the BG score for the Leo ad is what catapulted Oscar award winning musician A R Rahman to fame. Today Leo Coffee has diversified into pepper, cardamom, mineral water and even bananas religiously following the Ansoff’s matrix.
In my opinion Starbucks should have launched their India campaign from Mysore as a symbolic gesture and as a tribute to Baba Budan who managed to carry seven coffee beans out of the Yemeni Port of Mocha all the way to Mysore, and you thought all along, that Mocha was a suave name for a coffee shop and coffee was the invention of the Tambram community of South India.
The filter itself is a device that could shame the top 10 coffee maker manufacturers of today with respect to the quality of the end product. The decoction or the filtrate that trickled to the lower levels of the filter by gravity along with 2 spoons of milk kept your spirits high until dawn the next day. Probably that’s why a spoon was never named a coffee spoon. You always added couple of spoons of milk to filter coffee and not the other way around. The quality of the decoction was also a function of the mix of the quality and quantity of the pea berry and chicory that made the coffee powder. In fact the legend goes that the older matrons of the Tambram community could actually smell the brew and detect the precise ratio of pea berry, its type, and chicory akin to smelling your way to differentiate a Glenfliddich Single Malt 18 year from a 12 Year old.
The Baristas, the Mochas, and the Starbucks have all sprung up as social hangouts where one can meet over a coffee but never for a coffee. In all these outlets the taste and the aroma are secondary it neither leaves your buds wanting more nor does it kindle your olfactory.
Lastly, I cannot thank my mom enough for making this experience of tasting filter coffee each time I travel to Madras, I can be sure a cup of filter coffee awaits me at 4 am which is normally the time I land in Madras which incidentally is the most appropriate time of the day to taste your first brew with the strains of suprabatham from the neighbour’s finding its way to your ears.
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Friday, October 26, 2012
Gangnam Style – The Korean Kolaveri!
There’s a vested interest in the choice of this blog topic. Gangnam Style has been viewed around 550 million times, while, ‘Why this kolaveri’ has been viewed around a 62 million times. So I have strategically titled my blog so that my counter ticks with the left over morsels. If you are one of those who googled for either of these songs and landed on my blog I’m sorry and grateful to you at the same time. I don’t want to disappoint you both, here’s the link to both the songs on youtube.
Gangnam Style
Why this Kolaver di!
I first came across Gangnam style, thanks to one of the audio rounds in a School Quiz show hosted by Derek O’ Brien. Couldn’t answer it and hence came back home and googled and was deeply depressed that this song was heard 383 million times before I did. In fact during the good old days of quizzing, the audio rounds were all about identifying the voices of Lal Bahadur Shastri, Nehru (passages with & without ‘at the stroke of midnight hour…’), Winston Churchill or a piece from Pink Floyd and trivia on identifying musical instruments were confined to a Jalatharangam or Mandolin.
In fact I could sympathise with an average South Korean, since he must have felt remorse and pride almost simultaneously the way Korean language gained worldwide fame, just as Tamil did over an international audience a couple of months back. The irony was the common link of fragmented pieces of English strewn all over in both the songs.
When Chris Gayle and co danced to the tunes Gangnam Style after mauling the Aussies, instead of a Calypso I realised the world of music was skewed. There was a time when a calypso was composed in praise of Gavaskar in the early 70’s,and it was rated the highest honour and almost 4 decades later the West Indians who themselves are traditionally rich in music were celebrating their resurgence to a Korean song.
The sad part is that trash is being recognised as music these days and gets an unwarranted mileage thanks to curious passers by on the net. The quantifying parameter for song popularity is the number of hits it gets on youtube from where it gets catapulted into ‘fame’. Youtube is unfortunately a visual medium where the auditory credentials are overshadowed by visual impact. This is definitely not a platform to evaluate or rank a song.
But some how the mechanics remain the same , Illayaraja a legendary South Indian musician recently mentioned he was surprised at the fact that all the songs of his first movie ‘Annakilli’ almost 4 decades back were hits in spite of him being a novice and without the aid of propaganda mechanisms of today. People identified themselves with the songs that wafted through the air waves is what he said; remember these were All India Radio days with a population of 1 radio per street. The opinions or the hits on the song travelled ear to ear. The speed at which it was relayed was proportional to the distance between the household that had a radio and the one that didn’t.
People identify themselves with / patronise a ‘Gangnam style’ or a ‘Why this kolaveri di’ for different reasons. It’s not out of the love for music but more out of sheer curiosity and wanting to join the ‘been there, done(heard) that, before the 599 million did’ bandwagon. Such songs sure do get more than a million pairs of feet tapping, unfortunately that’s where they stay, never quiet reach your heart, let alone stay there.
Gangnam Style
Why this Kolaver di!
I first came across Gangnam style, thanks to one of the audio rounds in a School Quiz show hosted by Derek O’ Brien. Couldn’t answer it and hence came back home and googled and was deeply depressed that this song was heard 383 million times before I did. In fact during the good old days of quizzing, the audio rounds were all about identifying the voices of Lal Bahadur Shastri, Nehru (passages with & without ‘at the stroke of midnight hour…’), Winston Churchill or a piece from Pink Floyd and trivia on identifying musical instruments were confined to a Jalatharangam or Mandolin.
In fact I could sympathise with an average South Korean, since he must have felt remorse and pride almost simultaneously the way Korean language gained worldwide fame, just as Tamil did over an international audience a couple of months back. The irony was the common link of fragmented pieces of English strewn all over in both the songs.
When Chris Gayle and co danced to the tunes Gangnam Style after mauling the Aussies, instead of a Calypso I realised the world of music was skewed. There was a time when a calypso was composed in praise of Gavaskar in the early 70’s,and it was rated the highest honour and almost 4 decades later the West Indians who themselves are traditionally rich in music were celebrating their resurgence to a Korean song.
The sad part is that trash is being recognised as music these days and gets an unwarranted mileage thanks to curious passers by on the net. The quantifying parameter for song popularity is the number of hits it gets on youtube from where it gets catapulted into ‘fame’. Youtube is unfortunately a visual medium where the auditory credentials are overshadowed by visual impact. This is definitely not a platform to evaluate or rank a song.
But some how the mechanics remain the same , Illayaraja a legendary South Indian musician recently mentioned he was surprised at the fact that all the songs of his first movie ‘Annakilli’ almost 4 decades back were hits in spite of him being a novice and without the aid of propaganda mechanisms of today. People identified themselves with the songs that wafted through the air waves is what he said; remember these were All India Radio days with a population of 1 radio per street. The opinions or the hits on the song travelled ear to ear. The speed at which it was relayed was proportional to the distance between the household that had a radio and the one that didn’t.
People identify themselves with / patronise a ‘Gangnam style’ or a ‘Why this kolaveri di’ for different reasons. It’s not out of the love for music but more out of sheer curiosity and wanting to join the ‘been there, done(heard) that, before the 599 million did’ bandwagon. Such songs sure do get more than a million pairs of feet tapping, unfortunately that’s where they stay, never quiet reach your heart, let alone stay there.
Friday, September 28, 2012
‘Jean’itically modified
Denims are one of the greatest inventions after the wheel by mankind. Attire with a soul, attire that lived your life for you and with you. It was probably the only attire that always carried a social message and promoted a green living much before the world realised. Save water and say no to detergents was the most important message that a pair of jeans not only preached but also practised. One of the biggest value additions a jean brought among many others was promoting creativity.
Graffiti on a pair of jeans was used to express one’s emotions, moods, likes, dislikes etc, in fact your love for someone though originating from the heart could be expressed in a less but honourable location like the thigh, all you needed was a blue Reynolds pen & a pair of reasonably faded and moderately clean jeans. Remember these were pre tattoo parlour and facebook days. You could ‘like’ Gun’s n Roses or you could even spread a social message like ‘Say no to LSD’. The eyeball share it got would compare to the ‘hits’ or ‘pay per clicks’ being proclaimed by the Social Media Marketing pundits of today.
In the past you could walk into a shop look for the waist size alone, the length was also not an issue since a couple of folds to highlight the light coloured side was an accepted norm. Moreover this also gave you a feeling the jeans could really grow on you or even with you. You would need a maximum of 5 to 10 decisive minutes in the privacy of the 4’ X 4’ fitting room. Here you could create a bonding with your partner for a couple of years or more to come and enter into a solemn agreement something akin to the nuptial ceremonies. So basically the buying decision on a pair of jeans was more an emotional event.
The sad part is that the humble Jean has undergone a major makeover over the years; today I walk into a showroom and look for a pair of jeans. To get a jean that is faded to your liking is a challenge these days, that apart, to get a size & fit is an even bigger one. Today knowing your waist size is just not enough, you need to know if you are or you want to sport a low rise slim fit, medium rise slim fit, low waist, slim, skinny and if you are a woman you have an added option of super skinny. Super skinny!!!! You need to be anorexically nervosal to fit into one of those… These were probably a result of erstwhile B school graduates doing a segmentation assignment on steroids. The options were many more, Chino fit, boot cut, arc leg, fit with Swarovski elements (the buttons were Swarovski studded). Sad that you need a Swarovski to enhance your studness when all you needed was a blue jean that could be dirtied over time and allowed to fade naturally over the years. Now they were even offering you an instantly dirtied and a pre faded jean.
The dirty look and the faded shade of the denim took years of hard work and dedicated seasoning, spilt coffee or Old Monk patches were sorted out by a localised wash so that the stains were removed but the memory associated with the event was retained. Today I pick up a Jean and it comes with an instruction booklet advising me on Bio-Wash – ‘Bio washing is a laundering process to which a catalyst substance is added to create a chemical change in the fabric resulting in a very soft finish, smoother appearing surface reduced shrinkage and pilling’. Sounds more like a part of a synopsis from a thesis on advanced Chemistry.
I used to simply wet my jeans (knee below, the depth depended on the amount of rainfall) during monsoons in Madras and dry them during the summer. This was the only laundering advice I followed and this was the most natural way of getting the right shade of faded blue.
Going back to the size and fit, I have forgotten to mention the most interesting of fits was called the Dropped Crotch, as a cricketing buff I read it as Dropped Catch in the first instance. I wondered how much a Dropped crotch and Low Waist Slim Fit would cover of me and made me lament the death of the good old pair of jeans that would fit me right, look good and smell of my memories for eternity.
Graffiti on a pair of jeans was used to express one’s emotions, moods, likes, dislikes etc, in fact your love for someone though originating from the heart could be expressed in a less but honourable location like the thigh, all you needed was a blue Reynolds pen & a pair of reasonably faded and moderately clean jeans. Remember these were pre tattoo parlour and facebook days. You could ‘like’ Gun’s n Roses or you could even spread a social message like ‘Say no to LSD’. The eyeball share it got would compare to the ‘hits’ or ‘pay per clicks’ being proclaimed by the Social Media Marketing pundits of today.
In the past you could walk into a shop look for the waist size alone, the length was also not an issue since a couple of folds to highlight the light coloured side was an accepted norm. Moreover this also gave you a feeling the jeans could really grow on you or even with you. You would need a maximum of 5 to 10 decisive minutes in the privacy of the 4’ X 4’ fitting room. Here you could create a bonding with your partner for a couple of years or more to come and enter into a solemn agreement something akin to the nuptial ceremonies. So basically the buying decision on a pair of jeans was more an emotional event.
The sad part is that the humble Jean has undergone a major makeover over the years; today I walk into a showroom and look for a pair of jeans. To get a jean that is faded to your liking is a challenge these days, that apart, to get a size & fit is an even bigger one. Today knowing your waist size is just not enough, you need to know if you are or you want to sport a low rise slim fit, medium rise slim fit, low waist, slim, skinny and if you are a woman you have an added option of super skinny. Super skinny!!!! You need to be anorexically nervosal to fit into one of those… These were probably a result of erstwhile B school graduates doing a segmentation assignment on steroids. The options were many more, Chino fit, boot cut, arc leg, fit with Swarovski elements (the buttons were Swarovski studded). Sad that you need a Swarovski to enhance your studness when all you needed was a blue jean that could be dirtied over time and allowed to fade naturally over the years. Now they were even offering you an instantly dirtied and a pre faded jean.
The dirty look and the faded shade of the denim took years of hard work and dedicated seasoning, spilt coffee or Old Monk patches were sorted out by a localised wash so that the stains were removed but the memory associated with the event was retained. Today I pick up a Jean and it comes with an instruction booklet advising me on Bio-Wash – ‘Bio washing is a laundering process to which a catalyst substance is added to create a chemical change in the fabric resulting in a very soft finish, smoother appearing surface reduced shrinkage and pilling’. Sounds more like a part of a synopsis from a thesis on advanced Chemistry.
I used to simply wet my jeans (knee below, the depth depended on the amount of rainfall) during monsoons in Madras and dry them during the summer. This was the only laundering advice I followed and this was the most natural way of getting the right shade of faded blue.
Going back to the size and fit, I have forgotten to mention the most interesting of fits was called the Dropped Crotch, as a cricketing buff I read it as Dropped Catch in the first instance. I wondered how much a Dropped crotch and Low Waist Slim Fit would cover of me and made me lament the death of the good old pair of jeans that would fit me right, look good and smell of my memories for eternity.
Friday, September 21, 2012
Siri O siri !
I'm neither tech savvy nor am I a gadget freak but after years of not yielding to temptation, I bit into the apple in the garden of gadgets and for once Eve had nothing to do with it. Basically bought it for the I too factor. So when the iOS 6 was launched I joined the bandwagon of self proclaimed apple quacks in comparing and commenting on the new software even though I had absolutely no clue on its predecessors.
People talked about the Siri every where I went. So before I could pass my expert opinion on it, I started to test it myself. But the only problem was that I was suffering from a severe bout of Pharyngitis which made me sound funny, even to me, but what the heck I was meeting Siri for the first time and thought I’ll impress her with my hoarse, deep and heavily masculine voice. I was instructed that I could say something as simple as Polar Bears and siri would return loads of info on Polar Bears and I went ahead and said the same. It returned Lopez. Guess it recognised the later part of Polar and the first part of Bear in my pharyngitis infected voice. Any day, statistics on Lopez is far more interesting than those on Polar Bears and even more, if it returns images of Lopez's campaign against furs. But my worry was Siri wasn’t working.
I tried something simpler…Recipe for Biriyani I called out.
Cleared my throat and said Recipe for B I R I Y A N I.
Siri: Can I get the recipe for Beady-eyed-me!!! How about a web search
Me once again trying to be clearer
Siri : Can I get the recipe for BNE !!! How about a web search
Realised I was missing the point, after all Siri understands American English and then once again said B I R I Y A N I with an accent of one of the call centre boys back home and tried to execute it like, I had a hot half baked potato stuck to my upper jaw.
Siri : Viviani!!! How about a web search!!!
I realised that both Siri and me were getting there. Fabio Viviani was a well known chef and in fact had a recipe for an Italian Wedding Soup. I settled for that recipe instead.
This does make me wonder if apple should really start contemplating a version for Indian English as a tribute to one of our very own code crackers and name it Suri for the Indian tongue.
Now Siri from a different context, Siri also means to laugh in Tamil and with minor phonetic variations means the same in most other South Indian languages. During my recent visit to India, noticed Dental centres were out numbering normal clinics and the kind of services being offered was interesting. Smile enhancement & smile design were a few of the exotic services being offered. Guess they had de-linked happiness from smile. The only treatment I needed to enhance my smile would be the dentist taking over my EMI’s for a couple of months. Grew up reading laughter was the best medicine but we live in days when medicines are prescribed for laughter. We will soon see dentists prescribing portable nitrous oxide filled cylinders (If you were reminded of Osho it was not intentional) which could be controlled via your I-gadgets and you could simply tell siri to bring a siri to your face. If this has brought one to yours, then my experiments with siri has paid off.
People talked about the Siri every where I went. So before I could pass my expert opinion on it, I started to test it myself. But the only problem was that I was suffering from a severe bout of Pharyngitis which made me sound funny, even to me, but what the heck I was meeting Siri for the first time and thought I’ll impress her with my hoarse, deep and heavily masculine voice. I was instructed that I could say something as simple as Polar Bears and siri would return loads of info on Polar Bears and I went ahead and said the same. It returned Lopez. Guess it recognised the later part of Polar and the first part of Bear in my pharyngitis infected voice. Any day, statistics on Lopez is far more interesting than those on Polar Bears and even more, if it returns images of Lopez's campaign against furs. But my worry was Siri wasn’t working.
I tried something simpler…Recipe for Biriyani I called out.
Cleared my throat and said Recipe for B I R I Y A N I.
Siri: Can I get the recipe for Beady-eyed-me!!! How about a web search
Me once again trying to be clearer
Siri : Can I get the recipe for BNE !!! How about a web search
Realised I was missing the point, after all Siri understands American English and then once again said B I R I Y A N I with an accent of one of the call centre boys back home and tried to execute it like, I had a hot half baked potato stuck to my upper jaw.
Siri : Viviani!!! How about a web search!!!
I realised that both Siri and me were getting there. Fabio Viviani was a well known chef and in fact had a recipe for an Italian Wedding Soup. I settled for that recipe instead.
This does make me wonder if apple should really start contemplating a version for Indian English as a tribute to one of our very own code crackers and name it Suri for the Indian tongue.
Now Siri from a different context, Siri also means to laugh in Tamil and with minor phonetic variations means the same in most other South Indian languages. During my recent visit to India, noticed Dental centres were out numbering normal clinics and the kind of services being offered was interesting. Smile enhancement & smile design were a few of the exotic services being offered. Guess they had de-linked happiness from smile. The only treatment I needed to enhance my smile would be the dentist taking over my EMI’s for a couple of months. Grew up reading laughter was the best medicine but we live in days when medicines are prescribed for laughter. We will soon see dentists prescribing portable nitrous oxide filled cylinders (If you were reminded of Osho it was not intentional) which could be controlled via your I-gadgets and you could simply tell siri to bring a siri to your face. If this has brought one to yours, then my experiments with siri has paid off.
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