The Language Wars

The languages and their beauty is a subject close to my heart – and thus, any controversy against any particular language is a bit disheartening. The recent attacks against having Hindi on the Bengaluru metro sign boards (http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/hindi-signboards-on-namma-metro-opinion-is-divided/articleshow/59348066.cms) does not make sense to me. It is surprising that this campaign got such momentum, and for a moment I couldn’t believe it. The issue first came to my attention through an opinion piece on NDTV (http://www.ndtv.com/opinion/how-to-read-the-anger-over-hindi-signs-on-bengaluru-metro-1716331). However, I dismissed the article as biased right from the first sentence – using a non-issue to attack a political party. However, this does not seem to be a non-issue after all. The chief minister of Karnataka, who heads the Karnataka development authority directed the metro officials to strike out the Hindi signs. One might get an impression having the signs in Hindi caused a bias against Kannada. That’s obviously not the case as the sign boards had all the three relevant languages – English, Hindi and Kannada.

Bengaluru as I know it – is extremely cosmopolitan – accommodating people from all over India. There are not three, but five languages that I see being used on the streets – Telugu and Tamil being the other two languages. Hence, it is beyond comprehension that there is no strict opposition to a campaign such as this. As a Bengalurean, I would like the city to be friendlier both to the residents and tourists. At the major tourist attractions and the modes of transport – the signboards should make economic sense i.e., they should cater to most if not all the people who visit.  One may not have sign boards in – let’s say – Gujarati or French. But, I doubt that opposing having Hindi does anyone any good – even to those that the campaign seeks to side with.

It is not always a bias against Hindi – there is obviously Hindi bias at other places. For example, in a flight that flies from Bengaluru to Kolkata, why aren’t critical announcements made in Kannada and Bengali? I find passengers who do not speak English or Hindi being left clueless. These flights proudly announce that the crew in the flights speak English, Hindi, Punjabi and Marathi – none of which are local to either the source or target destinations. In fact, on the flight from Hyderabad to Vishakhapatnam, there were no announcements in Telugu neither were there crew members who could speak Telugu. Ironically, the British airways flight from Bengaluru had made announcements in Kannada. Also, you often see Hindi speakers start interacting with the cab drivers in Hindi without checking if the cab drivers knew Hindi and without attempting to speak a word or two in Kannada.

While it is totally understandable to promote Kannada, it should not come at the cost of opposing other Indian languages (no one opposes English). The companies and institutes could provide Kannada classes to people who move to Bengaluru. The school’s curriculum should provide exposure to Kannada. And, the Kannada movies could come subtitled in English or Hindi.

My mother tongue is Telugu, my dad grew up speaking Tamil and my wife is a Hindi speaker. I grew up in Kolkata acquiring fluency in Bengali, and I picked up French in Grenoble. English remains the language where I am most comfortable in writing among all. The knowledge of many languages gives me great scope of connecting with people of various language groups at a personal level. This has been the great asset – far more helpful that taking excessive pride in any one language!

From Anna to Modi

Finally, the elections in India are over -- after such a long wait. In general, living away from India seems to give one a good sense of optimism, that things in India will change for the better. You don't experience some of the problems that one can encounter everyday, while fantasizing that some of these problems can indeed go away. You are also more and more emotionally attached to the country, remembering mostly the nice things back home. One is also extremely motivated to do whatever you possibly can, at least morally supporting the great things happening while expressing disgust at the negative events. It has been three and half years since we have been living abroad, and this period has been extremely busy politically in the country -- and I have followed as much as I could about the happenings in the country. This was also the period where my political thoughts have gone to all kinds of places, being influenced by numerous sources. I try to recollect this journey in this note, while giving background of my political inclinations prior to this period.

In 2009, UPA was reelected with a bigger mandate than in the 2004 elections, and in a way I did not have a strong opinion against the incumbent government. It was functioning as governments in India usually function, maintaining status-quo on controversial issues while making slow progress with massive social welfare schemes. However, it was a bit upsetting the way our PM was remote controlled by Mrs. Gandhi, but he indeed showed some courage by standing by the nuclear deal with the US. The massive farm loan waiver was depressing, but it seemed to work wonders for the congress party in the elections. I must confess that before 2004, I had been a fan of the Vajpayee government, and even in 2009 I had retained my affiliation and had hoped BJP will come back in the centre to fast track India's development story as they had done from 1999 to 2004. In fact, I had voted for BJP in 2009 in my constituency where BJP had not even the minute chances. Of course, my wife was a BJP fan too and so were, fortunately, on the same page there.

In 2010, I didn't think much politically except a yoga camp that I and my wife attended. It was the yoga camp of Baba Ramdev where we went to get motivated with doing some yoga. However, in the camp, Ramdev kept giving a political message in between our bouts of Pranayam. He was basically talking of getting rid of corrupt politicians from the country, and supporting honest ones. My political idol, Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan of Lok Satta, was also there during the yoga sessions and he emphasized this aspect. Ramdev also talked about launching a movement (Bharat Swabhiman Andolan) to promote honest politicians and to get back the illegal tax money stashed in banks abroad. All this was music to the ears, and listening to it at 5am in the morning in the open ground surrounded by people with great intentions doing yoga was immensely rejuvenating. On a different note, 2010 was also the year of scams, the commonwealth games scam, and the mega 2G spectrum scam among others.

In 2011, we arrived in France, and it was also a time when we started using social media (facebook) more often than before. It was when for the first time, we experienced something that could resemble a revolution. There was predominantly a particular kind of message on facebook those days, all which was in support of Anna Hazare's fast for bringing Lokpal bill in parliament. It was a tsunami of sorts, and I started doing research like many others about who was Anna, what was Jan-Lokpal bill (Anna's version of Lokpal) about, what was the organization India-Against-Corruption and who were the members etc. Like lakhs of Indians, I felt that the government should quickly pass the bill that has been pending since decades, and the bill that has been deliberately killed everytime it comes for discussion in the parliament. So, I did all the 'likes' I could do on facebook, and re-posted lots of relevant messages. This was also when one of our friends, Hemant, decided to organize a protest in Grenoble in support of the Lokpal movement. So, on one fine day, 20 Indians in Grenoble assembled, made a few banners with catchy phrases, marched to a park in Meylan, and sat there on a dharna. Hemant recorded a video with each of us expressing their frustrations, which Hemant planned to send to someone as the show of support from Grenoble. It was a moment of pride for us, for being able to support something good for the country. Anna's fast finally ended when the government agreed to form a committee to draft the bill with half the members from the civil society. Anna's fast was followed by Baba Ramdev's fast, possibly for his parallel movement against corruption to stay relevant. His fast ended a bit dramatically, and I was not greatly impressed by the statements that Baba Ramdev made such as 'the government conspired to kill me' etc.

The rest of the year 2011 passed with government showing that it was shameless. Many deadlines were set and broken. Government, instead of bringing a strong anti-corruption bill tried to discredit the movement as well as the character of Anna Hazare. It was so clear, that I felt extremely frustrated. Anna pushed the government to bring the bill in a couple more times by fasting, but government did nothing.  All that the government tried to do was to kill the movement and not take the demands for Jan Lokpal Bill seriously. Their confidence was so amazingly high that they felt that this movement that enjoyed such public support can also be killed by procrastinating, and trying to discredit members for unrelated reasons. It was so frustrating seeing what the Indian government and our elected representatives were doing. It was funny when the ruling party at one time remarked that the movement was possibly a conspiracy from abroad. Finally, under pressure, a weak Lokpal bill was introduced in the parliament which passed through one house but not the other, given some well planned strategy of the legislators. The year ended by Anna resolving to campaign against the ruling party in the elections, and to enlighten the stubborn government that public opinion was definitely against it. This came partially true when in a by-election where Anna campaigned against Congress party, it came a distant third.

In 2012, as expected nothing much happened with the anti corruption bill while Team Anna and the nation kept waiting. Team Anna released a list of ministers who were blocking the bill. And, he again sat on a fast when the government refused to set up an enquiry. Government was more stubborn even against such a definite public opinion, and realizing this, Anna and his team quit talking to the government. For me, this was significant as I had lost hope with the Anna movement, and my focus like many others shifted to the strategy of Kejriwal. Kejriwal, one of the members of team Anna had started a political party, AAP, to take the anti-corruption fight to the polling booths. I was excited but thought it won't make much difference. What was also exciting were the continuous press conferences that Kejriwal and team gave to make allegations against people with apparent documentary proofs. The most interesting one was on Robert Vadra's land deals. The BJP was joining the chorus of these allegations, and it seemed they were helping BJP till Kejriwal laid allegation on Nitin Gadkari. Consequently, Gadkari had to step down as BJP president. It was an amazing period, as it appeared that things were changing for the best in India. This was also a time when I had lost a bit of faith in the BJP because of their continuous parliament interruptions. I was becoming more and more a fan of AAP, and would have become more so like Amit and other friends unless I was pulled out it by Anil. 2012 was also the year of Satyamev Jayate by Aamir Khan. It was the only show for which we waited eagerly to appear on Youtube every Sunday.

In 2012 and a good portion of 2013, I used to go for lunch with Anil and Markos. Anil was a pakka Congress and Kejriwal hater. Hating congress was obvious but not the one directed towards Kejriwal at first. For Anil, AAP was a party of leftists who were incapable of improving conditions in India. A few among them were also anti-nationalists such as Prashanth Bhushan who advocated referendum in Kashmir, and they were apparently being funded heavily by external agencies such as the Ford foundation which made their intent suspicious. Anil was also instrumental in initiating my perception change towards Modi. At one point of time, I used to be pretty much anti-Modi. This was a natural outcome of the negative air against him in the media. I had also even read a portion of a book in the library that spewed venom on Modi. In fact, once upon a time, I had debated intensely with my wife Shilpi about Modi back in 2008 justifying the US action in not granting him a Visa. Anil kind of convinced me that some of my opinions about Modi were in-conceived. Anil usually has a great deal of information, and for a few things where I had not believed him initially turned out to be true in the end. Anil drove home the point that most of the negative perceptions about Modi were because of relentless media campaign against him. Anil brought to my attention the fact that the special investigation team led by brilliant RK Raghavan had decisively rejected the claim that Modi didn't do enough to stop the riots. So, my perception about Modi slowly changed from negative to neutral. Even, Markos who is Greek, said he would vote for Modi if he had a chance :) There were also other influences from Anil. I started using twitter more enough and began following other people rather than the "biased" media organizations. Also, based on a Anil's recommendation, I was introduced to the website www.firstpost.com and the supposedly objective articles that it contained.  Anyways, through this website, I started getting more and more opinions of people, some of which were pro-Modi and some anti-Modi, but I was becoming more and more convinced with the pro-Modi opinions.

2013 brought a big shift in my political inclination. This began with a news that I heard of an event where some of the top industrialists including Rata Tata praised Modi as if he was a superman. It generated a bit of curiosity in me and I wondered what this guy was doing which earned him such praise. A bit of research resulted in the observation that Gujarat was apparently doing much better than rest of the country, and was attractive good investments. Also, the administration in Gujarat was so much more efficient under Modi. He seemed to have a similar image as ChandraBabu Naidu of late 90's. Soon after this came his speech that he gave in Shri Ram College of Commerce. Given the great reviews that this speech received, me and my wife watched the speech and we were spell bound with his oratory skills. His speech emphasized that India needed development politics, and the tone of the speech was very optimistic as far as I remember. Many months later, after he became PM candidate of BJP based on his popularity, I tried listed to as much speeches as possible that he gave throughout the country. And, with every speech, my admiration of him only increased rapidly. He talked of development to get India to a rightful place in the world, and talked that development was the only solution to inclusion as was evident from Gujarat where even the minorities were prospering. Every speech talked of a new problem, and the will to solve it. I remember his speech somewhere in UP where he talked of cleaning Ganga, and that the attempt of the previous government at cleaning were mostly restricted to board meetings. He talked about promoting tourism when he visited beautiful places in India. These speeches were largely nice, except that understandably, they always included some rhetoric against dynastic politics and our meek prime minister. And there were some other speeches where he made mistakes with historical facts that earned him the name 'feku' by his critics during the election campaign. I remember the republic day speech, and there was absolutely no comparison between his speech and our prime ministers speech. Of course, not everything that he mentioned resonated with me such as his speech in Assam where he spoke against the Bangladeshi immigrants.

During my enhanced perception of Modi, my soft corner for Kejriwal still remained. To me, he looked like an extremely genuine guy representing a change in politics that India so much needed. His interviews were emotionally so touching, for example the interview he had given to Rajdeep Sardesai before the elections this  year. However, I strongly felt that Modi was the person India needed and that AAP needed to prove themselves as someone who can give good governance, and also disclose their policies at the national level. I was so happy with the unexpected Delhi results, but then the days since then made me lose faith in the AAP style of politics. It appeared that all they wanted was to be in the prime time news in order to reach out to all the people ahead of the lok sabha elections. So, for the time being my heart stayed with Modi.

In the last days of elections in mid 2014, the interviews of Modi with Rajat Sharma and then with Arunabh Goswami just solidified my desire that Modi should become our next PM. I eagerly waited for the election results after such a long period of campaigning, and hoped that there was indeed a Modi wave which some people labelled as a myth. And, the results days was a very happy day for me. In fact, we celebrated that evening with some of our friends.

NOW, The first few days since Modi became PM have been extremely promising, as pointed by this Shashi Tharoor's article for which he is facing a lot of heat from within Congress (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/shashi-tharoor/narendra-modi-shashi-tharoor_b_5434302.html). I hope Modi delivers on his promise of good governance, and we see a different India five years down the lane !! As Rajnath Singh says, I hope "HE WILL" !

The magical mornings

The mornings are the favorite part of my day, so much that I feel there is something magical about it. The prospect of doing something early morning is more exciting than the activity itself. My first walk of the day, it's so refreshing and uplifting, that drains out any miseries in my mind. There is a feeling of utmost calm within myself, only to amplified by the fresh air, chill and the positive energies of people.

The best days of my life were the ones where I started the day early. It certainly makes me nostalgic thinking about those days, or rather, mornings ! Interestingly, even some of the boring work like waiting, such as standing in the tatkal queues -- both railway and passport -- have been enjoyable when done before the sun shone hard. I would like to share some of my excitement about this early period of the day.

I have always been excited by the idea of regularly exercising in the mornings, but unfortunately it always remains just an 'exciting idea' and not more because of the obvious reasons. However, there have been occasionally spurts of time when I did manage to do it regulary and have felt that I should be doing it forever and forever. In IIIT, in the summer of 2008, I did manage to do yoga with Sushant with great regularity. The fresh air, the chirping sounds of the birds, the trees around dancing to the tunes of the wind, and the amazing revelation that your body can actually flex was great. And, I used to feel the same energy throughout the day. In the summer of 2009, we used to play cricket every morning, probably because on the facts that cricket reminds you of good old days in your childhood, that it was less taxing on your body, and that it involved as much chatting as running. These cricket sessions were an achievement because half of us who assembled had never woken up in the mornings so regularly. We used to start when it was foggy, and used to end when the sun positioned itself well above the trees and the buildings. This summer was more exciting because this was a summer when Shilpi and me both exercised together, me playing cricket and she doing yoga. In the winter of 2009, Shilpi and I attended a couple of exercising workshops in the morning, one by Baba Ramdev and the other by Art of living. I was a great experience, probably one of our best sessions. We felt healthy and peaceful in our minds, and felt we shall keep doing it forever, but alas ......

Another great things about these exercising sessions in the mornings was the thing that followed, the breakfast !!! If there is one meal (or thing .. to be more generic) that I won't miss every day is the breakfast. In IIIT, after the exercise sessions, we used to assemble in the canteen and ummmm ..... I have always loved breakfast, and the fact that it is positioned in the mornings makes it more exciting. I have always held on to my friend Sesh's quote 'Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a queen, and dinner like a pauper'. I won't comment on whether I eat dinners like a pauper, but I certainly have a quote to defend the excitement that I show on the breakfast table. The breakfasts in the summer of 2005 were the best, with Sesh, Balu, Suman Karthik and Rishi in IIIT. Balu used to stay at home that year, and he would skip breakfast at home to come and eat Uttappams with us.

The mornings have also been very kind to my spiritual and devotional side. Similar to the case of 'exercising', I have always liked the idea of doing 'meditation' in the mornings. One of the facts that I can certainly bet on is that meditating helps. It has helped me immensely whenever I have done it, in keeping my mind peaceful and also helping with my concentration. Unfortunately, it still remains 'like the idea' and not 'do it regularly' for me. I have also enjoyed going to temples in the mornings. It feels extremely peaceful inside the temple. The occasional beats of the bells, the rhyming of the mantras, and the positive mindset of people around makes the whole atmosphere spiritually uplifting. Even the trips to Chilkur Balaji temple in Hyderabad early in the mornings has been a great experience. It was good, firstly, because it is about going there way early in the morning :), and secondly because it reminds you of the simple positive wishes of the people around you. Everyone assembles at this great time of the day, before the sun has risen to pray to god and wish a good life for themselves. Not to add, I like the idea of doing Pradakshanas (the revolutions) around the temple, makes you physically fit too !

For me, the early morning is the best time to make a journey. Firstly, there is escape from the sun. Secondly, you get the enjoy everything that's good about mornings at multiple locations, the chai-valas making the tea, the cool breeze, the fog, the heterogeneous morning lights (in contrast to the the afternoon plain bright light that's all around), the shops that are about to open among many other things. So, it is always exciting to me to hear that the time of the journey is 6am, or 5 am. Another good thing about the morning trip is that everyone gets ready for the trip thinking solely about the exciting trip that lies ahead. In IIIT, I loved going home from college every weekends early in the mornings. It was an amazing feeling experiencing the empty buses, and the cold breeze .... and, there was the anticipation of an amazing breakfast at home ! Some of the early morning treks have been memorable. Recently, the trek in jungle bells near Vizag with Shilpi has been amazing. The trek amongst the nature to reach the summit of the hill to see the sun rise was a great experience. And, I also cannot forget the bird watching trek in HCU organized by Ashwini.

Even the relatively boring act of studying has tended close to become an act of fun during early morning. The mind appears amazingly receptive during this period of time, and not only the text one is studying, but also the big picture (the positioning of the current text with respect to my current knowledge) also appears to emerge during this period. During Ph.D., planning to understand some difficult paper early morning made sense. In fact, Prashanth and I did some of those sessions together too which were great. Also, I enjoyed occasionally reading texts with some philosophical bent during the early hours of the morning. While preparing for entrance exams in school, I still remember waking up at an unlikely hour of 4 and brushing up my concepts. And then, I used to wait for the newspaper to come, and I would eagerly scan it through from beginning to end enjoying a cup of tea sitting on the staircase in front of the house. Though not at that level, but I do wish I can keep up the habit of reading something useful (newspapers are no longer useful any longer containing loads of crap) in the morning every day.

During my dating days too, mornings played the cupid :). And when we fixed our next meeting time, it always used to be a time that you might easily guess by now. Shilpi does remember how crazily fascinated I was with listening Suprabhatam or Bob Dylan songs during the first hours of the day. During my childhood too, early mornings used to be a time to play, or to plan an adventure. My brother, Jayaram, has continued our shared interest in mornings even today, and we had enjoyed very much the jogging sessions in 2010 along the Infosys-HCU road in Hyderabad. Doing this is certainly on my agenda for my next vacation.

A great thing about early mornings is that my love for it transcends the boundaries of location and season. The idea of doing something early in the day would be a idea that would be agreeable to me (at least in my mind) irrespective of 'the place I am in' and the season. I remember the chilly mornings days of Delhi and Kanpur, and I still liked them. The opaque fog, the extreme chill, the thick razais, the hot chai, the aloo paratha make it amazing. I guess the idea of 'a morning' seems to even transcends reality and virtual-reality. A dream or a movie with the backdrop of a morning is also enough to bring cheer to my heart. The morning backdrop for the movie 'Anand' (in telugu) seemed to bring along it some freshness.

I had wished the whole day had the ambiance of the early morning, but maybe, it was good it was not. Otherwise, mornings wouldn't have remained so magical !!!

Lokpal and it's mess

It is so appalling to see such a mess being made of the Lokpal bill. The bill was finally tabled in the parliament by the government. Of course, it may not have been the best version of the Lokpal because of the obvious insincerity of the government, and that it was under immense pressure to pass it.

It was shocking to see the bill not getting passed because of political interests of opposition parties and allies. BJP did not support the bill because it did not want the credit of the Lokpal to go to government -- acted like a true opposition or rather political opportunists. CPI didn't want the lokpal passed because of it's stupid ideological reasons. Ideology becomes so important to them that it surpasses national interest. SP and RJD did not support the bill because they are so corrupt that they don't see anything beyond their interests. It is so funny to hear a statement from Lalu Prasad saying that the present Lokpal is not strong enough to combat corruption. I remember Mulayam and Lalu Prasad had given similar reasons during the debate on women's reservation bill .... such as, we will not support the bill unless there is reservation for women for backward castes. Trinamool congress is an eternal nuisance. She was the cause the bill got postponed because she wanted an amendment regarding change of name, and removal of the lokayukta clause in the bill --- which i fail to understand why . It does look choreographed by all, aptly mentioned in the article by Santosh Hegde,

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/no-party-wanted-lokpal-bill-passed-in-rajya-sabha-hegde/893924/

A sad day, indeeeed !

Useful Ph.D. Advices

There are lots of advices that people give during your Ph.D., but here are a few some that stuck in my mind .

"Being FOCUSED is most important." - Dr. Narayanan

"Make your day COUNT" - Raghavan

"Research is about your CREATIVITY in combing information from various disciplines to solve problems" - Dr. Sangal

"Good research is about understanding why something did not work, instead of getting disappointed" - Dr. Joshi

"Constantly communicating your work and getting feedback is essential" - Dr. Joshi

"What to solve is more important that How to solve" - Dr. Sangal

The story of Pragyan's Birth - January 6, 2011

(picture taken on 28th January, 2011)

This is a long pending blog that I am finally writing. It was a wonderful journey for both Shilpi and me, and worth telling.

We were all very excited at the news that Shilpi was carrying. It also explained Shilpi's weakness and vomittings. She spend the next few days taking rest, and visiting our ayurvedic doctor (Dr. Vinaya), and taking advice about the diet among other things. In the meantime, I also made a trip to US. There, I bought the book on Pregnancy 'What to expect when you are expecting', and started reading it. I was really excited to read it, and made some points. It was good, and it gave me some broad idea of what to expect.

We were clear about one point, we wanted the delivery to be natural. It was an easy decision because we wanted the child and the mother to be healthy in the long-term, and going 'the nature's way' is the most logical thing to do. Surprisingly, what is natural has become uncommon today because of the greedy practices in the hospitals and the inclination of some mothers to avoid the natural pains if possible. We preferred not to go see an gynecologist unless it was necessary, because it would have led us to the trap of unnecessary pills and tests instead of being able to follow the traditional dietary practices in case of pregnancy. So, we only decided to make regular visits to our Ayurvedic practitioner, and finally, visited the obstetrician only in the fifth month when we thought it might be good to take the ultra-sound scan and get an assurance that everything was well.

In the seventh month, we had to fix our birthing center. For that, we had two options, one was to continue with our present obstetrician, and the second was to consider an option suggested by one of our friends, Vinish. With the first option, there was no guarantee of having a natural delivery because it was a corporate hospital and the trends weren't encouraging. So, we decided to go with the second option, which was to consult a mid-wife instead.

Our friends strongly suggested a place called 'Healthy Mother' http://healthy-mother.com. It was supposedly a place where they strongly encouraged natural births, and also conducted classes called 'Lamaze Classes' that aimed to prepare parents for the delivery. This midwifery model at 'Healthy Mother Birthing Center' seemed an appropriate choice for us, and so we decided to fix it after meeting Dr. Vijaya Krishnan from the healthy mother center. The meeting went went and we decided to go for it.

Our decision was definitely the right one, and now when we think back, we are extremely glad to have taking this route. In fact, we would recommend any couple who come to us for advice to strongly consider this option. Taking this route made us aware, empowered and confident during the entire journey, and made the entire journey pleasant. In this model, I was also able to participate very proactively.

The first thing that was good about this route were the Lamaze classes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamaze_technique). These classes conducted for six weekends are about various things related to pregnancy such as, awareness of the process, exercises for the mother, diet, and instructions during delivery. All of these were extremely helpful. It made us quite confident as opposed to being anxious.

Shilpi's delivery was expected in the third week of January. However, we surely knew that it could happen sometime before or sometime after. Shilpi first experienced pains on January 4th early morning at 3 a.m. The first thing that we did was to time the contractions. They came at about one and half minutes apart. We kind of felt that this was the day, and we might have to rush to the hospital anytime soon. We waited for the contractions to become 15 seconds apart . During this time, we slowly, but comfortably started putting everything into the bag, with everything that we would need in the hospital, including some snacks :). Shilpi used to pause during her contractions, and during the rest of the period, she reminded me of the things that I should put in the bag. At about 6 a.m., we felt that the contractions were somewhat near (2 minutes apart), and so I called our doctor Dr. Vijaya, explained her the situation and asked her about when we should plan to come to the center. She then talked to Shilpi, based on which, she could assess that it was not necessary to come to the center right away, and that we could wait till the pain become more frequent and intensive. So, we waited, and saw that the pain actually subsided a bit. It stayed on at least till afternoon, during which, Shilpi carried out her usual work and only paused the contractions. They become quite less in the evening. For dinner, Shilpi wished to eat Italian food very much :). I brought home some lasagna from an newly opened Italian restaurant.

The next day, the pains started again at about 4am. We again timed it, and again, it became quite intensive but was not so frequent (about 15 minutes apart). We waited so that we can call after they became more frequent. But, it again subsided in the afternoon. We had called our doctor. She asked us to come over for a check-up. She checked-up and said that the dilation had started and it was progressing. The active labor could happen anytime soon. The rest of the day passed as usual with a few walks and exercises.

On January 6th, the contractions started again early morning. However, they seemed to get progressively more intensive and frequent (5 minutes apart). When it became unbearable, we called our mid-wife, Marianne, and asked her if we can come. She said we could wait for another hour, and then start to the center. We then planned to have our lunch and go to the center, but it became so intesive for Shilpi that we packed our lunch and left to the center. It was getting quite painful for Shilpi now. We reached the center at about 3:00 pm.

At the center, Shilpi found it hard to lay on her back. Our mid-wife checked her and said that her dilation (2 cm now) was progressing quite quickly now. The center is quite well equipped, the hot water tub being one among them that could be used for pain relief. Shilpi tried out the tub, and for the rest of time, I and the assistant to mid-wife, Sapna, kept rubbing Shilpi's back. She also kept doing some of the exercises and the breathing patterns that Dr. Vijaya had told us during the lamaze classes. This kept going on till about four hours. The mid-wife kept measuring the dilation from time to time, and said that it was progressing slowly but well. The doctor came at about 6:30, and then took over. Shilpi was in lots and lots of pain by this time. She checked Shilpi and said that the baby was in the back position, and that it would hurt Shilpi very much if the baby stayed in that position. She suggested Shilpi to take certain postures, and she kept calming her all through this process.. She kept saying that everything was going very well., and also asked Shilpi to keep repeating the phrase 'I can do it', among several other phrases. In some time, the pain eased a little bit and Shilpi was now able to manage it much better, even though it was quite intensive. I could see that she was experiencing lots of pain, but the only thing that I could do her was to rub her back so that she felt fine. This continued for another couple of hours. By about 9, Shilpi felt the urge and started pushing the baby out. Pragyan finally came in the world at 9:55pm.

It was an extremely happy moment for everyone, to see the baby and also to see that Shilpi was fine and had done it well. I was glad to hold the baby right after the birth (see the picture) while the Dr. Vijaya and Marianne attended to Shilpi. Amma, Jayaram joined us, followed by Suman and Prashanth.

The baby was placed on his mother, and he found a comfortable and cozy position there. Shilpi was nursed, and then we stayed in the center in the night. We stayed the next day in the hospital. On January 8th morning, Shilpi was ready, and we left for home.



The natural delivery had surely caused a very speedy recovery for Shilpi. Going to healthy mother birthing center for lamaze classes and delivery was definitely a great decision that we made. We are extremely grateful to Dr. Vijaya and her team for consulting us in a right manner during this important phase, giving us all the strength and faith, and for making the truly natural birth happen. And, hats off to Shilpi for showing great courage.

So, that was the story of Pragyan's birth.

"నా దాన్లో పుల్లగా ఉన్నవి ఏమి వెయ్యొద్దు"

(don't put anything sour in food that i ordered)

Among the many fine things of Jaggu,  i was particularly

impressed by one that i wanted to blog about.  When we

go to a restaurant or international fast-food joints, before 

anything, Jaggu asks the person who takes the order 

whether he is fluent in Telugu. Most of them give a faint

smile and say they are.  We then start giving our order 

in Telugu and the bearer also interacts extremely 

comfortably.

Most of the waiters in these restaurants (in the metros) try 

to speak English with great difficulty while taking orders, 

and speak out only the phrases that they are probably 

trained on. This makes the experience somewhat unreal. 

In such circumstances, Jaggu's gesture encourages them (or 

anyone else) to speak  in the language they are comfortable 

in (telugu/hindi) while making sure the opposite person is 

comfortable in that too.

How much Dumber can you get, Palin ?

I was just reading an interview of Sarah Palin on CBS, with Katie Couric.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/09/30/eveningnews/main4490618.shtml

This inteview perfectly revealed how dumb, artificial and spoon-fed Sarah Palin was. I could not stop laughing as I read the above interview. She was asked a question about which newspaper she read, and for this she replied 'I read most of the newspapers'. And to this, she added that she reads the news articles with special appreciation for the press and the media :). LOL. Then, she was asked to name a specific newspaper among all. She says

"Um, all of them, any of them that have been in front of me all these years."

Then, she was asked to name a few of the newspapers that she read.  For this, she replied how people of Alaska were aware of things that happened in the rest of Washington, D.C. How dumb !! Did she not know the name of any single newspaper ?? :). Or was she trying to prevent any particular newspaper to get  highlighted ? Don't think so .

She was asked specific questions on abortion and she seemed to give such vague and unrelated answers.  And, she replied to things saying things like "my positions that I am pro-life .....". Felt like she had a bunch of advisors who gave her hints like "these are your views on these topics".

It looks as if she is an average american mom. In politics, she hasn't dealt with anything much beyond Wasila and Alaska.  And, she is running to be the vice-president of the most powerful nation.

It reminds me of an interview that George Bush had given before the presidential election in 2000. At that time, he didn't know where India was !