Generation Gap – Only age-wise

As a child, the term ‘Generation Gap’ was only that to me – a mere term and nothing more. I grew up in an environment where all my views tallied perfectly well with my parents and grandparents alike. I only ever heard about the so-called gap from my peers and friends. Some faced the dilemma of curfew; some others complained that their folks did not understand the way they thought or dressed, the company they kept and what not.

However, I was quite lucky to be born into an uber-cool environment where my good friends were even better friends to my grandmother. I guess the basic point was openness and trust. I was open about my goings-on in life and that was accepted by my family.

What I wore, or wear, does not raise eyebrows at my home. They always treat my attempts at oddness, or fashion as I liked to call it, with quite a lot of enthusiasm. There is also a freedom to share our views with each other. The views we share both ways are highly respected.

Now I see my younger sisters dress up in a way, I am sure, would raise a hullabaloo in other homes. However, mine tags along to shop for the oddities the malls have to offer today. All this said and done in the small town that I live in, where the slightest thing out of place is not taken too kindly.

Only yesterday, my 19-year old cousin dressed up for a get-together in a way that made my jaws drop. Now THAT could be a generation gap. But the next moment I was all agog with her looks and even gave a flattering comment or two which boys in her friends circle might fall short of making. : P

All in all, now I see that even though there is an age gap between my people, they do not let it become a reason for creating a barrier in our relationships. And that is the best thing about being born into this family.

Misadventures of Travelling the Route Less Taken

Today, one of my colleagues confided in me that he had been trying to find a weekend travel route from Odisha to Indore, but without any luck. There was only this one weekly train on Wednesday which would be too soon for his expected rendezvous and absolutely no other train available barring that. And the flight rates with merely a week or less to go, for a person who earns barely enough to support him, is out of the question.

I was like, huh! How difficult could it be, finding a train covering one city to another within a single country? That too a country as ours, which is full of millions of commuters traveling from God-knows-where to God-knows-where on a daily basis. I was in for a ghastly surprise! I spent the next 40 minutes looking at all the possible railway routes in which one could reach Indore within the stipulated time my colleague had in hand, to no avail!

Imagine, I even tried routes from Odisha all the way to Kolkata, Chennai, Rajasthan and even Maharashtra to look for probable change of trains. But our Indian Railway system proved to be equally adamant. Not one route, no sir!!!

While it would take nearly 2-3 days traveling to the other side of the country and come back to the state of Madhya Pradesh, (Indore is in Madhya Pradesh, which was the neighboring state of Odisha before Chhattisgarh became an independent state) a train connecting Howrah, Nagpur, or even Kota seemed unavailable.

Yes, one could have got down at Mumbai and then found a train back to Indore, but the time of arrival, if delayed (which is quite possible more often than not), would make him miss his appointment. Moreover, the right time of arrival would also have found him look and feel drawn and haggard following a continuous, not to mention arduous, nearly four-day long journey with absolutely no time to get freshened up for whatever reason he would take such pains to commute the whole distance.

It was so frustrating, just sitting there and researching on the probable routes. I have already given it up as a lost cause. As much as I wish good for him, (which is a rarity, wishing good for people other than yourself, i.e.) I think he is better off where he is. I cannot imagine the pain of the equally or even more tiring journey back home. I sympathize with you, my dear work partner.

A review of Doctor in Clover by Richard Gordon

‘Doctor in Clover’ is quite a hilarious book by Richard Gordon which will leave the readers clutching their sides with laughter.

Dr. Grimsdyke is not your run-of-the-mill physician. He sort of stumbled into the profession, for the lack of a better option. After precariously wallowing through the student years, he somehow attained the degree.

However, that’s where the problems begin to hoard up. Being a doctor bores the hell out of him. Urged on by his cousin Miles, he accepts the position as General Physician in a remote region in the countryside in England. However, soon bored with the monotonous lifestyle, he somehow messes it all up with his easy-go-lucky attitude.

Devising a ludicrous plan to get out of one mess, he stumbles into problem after problem with no end in sight.

A peep into his past gives us a humorous flashback of his love-life and hilarious heartbreak(s).

Jobless yet again, he tries a hand at writing but nothing good comes out of it until much later. Meanwhile, he tries to nurse an old Lord back to health who had nothing wrong with him in the first place.

Searching for other openings, anything to avoid the ‘doctor’ profession, he seems to do nothing right. In the end, everything gets pieced together, albeit in a topsy-turvy manner.

A somersault of giggles, laughter, grins and guffaws… the reader will remain hooked till the end.