Tuesday, January 16, 2018

Politically Correct Course of Pranayama




A Pranayama course was going on in our sports ground.  About a hundred people were sitting cross legged on the ground in the semi darkness, shivering slightly in the early morning chill. I was walking along the walking track next to the ground and could hear over the loud speaker, the trainer talking. He was talking about the benefits of Pranayama, pausing every two to three minutes to demonstrate ‘Kapalbhati’. (trademark owned by Patanjali)  That is the usual pattern. I have attended these courses and know how it goes. It is somewhat like this. 

talk….talk….talk….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….talk….talk….talk….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….ugh….blah….blah….blah….ugh….ugh….ugh…. ugh….ugh….ugh….   If you haven’t attended any Patanjali pranayama course till now, do attend one. It is fun.

According to Baba Ramdev,  “Kapalbhati”  is the sure shot remedy for any and every ailment known to mankind. It is also a sure shot remedy for ailments which are yet to be known!

If you have high blood pressure, it reduces it. If you have low blood pressure it increases it. If you have loose motions it stops it. If you have constipation it starts the process required. If you are over weight it reduces your weight, if you are under weight it increases your weight. Sugar, cholesterol etc etc are child’s play to kapalbhati. So on and so forth.  

The trainer tells these ‘facts’ in a very appealing way, explains the technique of ‘kapalbhati’ and demonstrates it.  The desciples try to follow and learn.  (Actually it does not matter whether they learn or not as about 90% of the people who attend the course do not care to practice it later!) They are given a few minutes to practice and the talk starts again. This process goes on for an hour and the day’s session ends.

Whenever anyone speaks about Yoga, Pranayama, Ayurveda etc etc it is customary to exalt the virtues of these practices, which were said to have been (by default!) part of our daily life in the good old days, and decry everything supposedly ‘modern’. As I completed the third round the trainer started on these lines.

“In the good old days people used to eat what was grown locally and we were healthy. Now we eat everything brought from out side, full of fertilisers and pesticides and we are always ill” 

“In the good old days we used home remedies and local herbs to cure our illness. Now we run to a doctor for every minor ailment and swallow chemicals.”

“In the good old days we did our house work like sweeping, washing, drawing water etc etc and we remained fit. Now we have machines or employ others to do them and lose out on the benefits of such work.”

At this stage he got carried away with the good old days - modern days comparison and said,

“In the good old days we cooked and ate inside the house and went to toilet out side the house. Now, we eat out side and go to toilet inside the house”

Just as he said the last word he realized that he was talking against the ‘Open defecation free India’ initiative of our beloved PM, a political blunder from the point of view of his organization and tried his best to cover it

“Of course one has to use a toilet inside the house but one should stop eating fast foods and other stuff cooked out side which are harmful to health!”

I could visualize Baba Ramdev nodding his head in approval!

Note : Before the practitioners/followers of Yoga, Pranayaama, Kapalbhati and Baba allow their sentiments to get hurt, I would like to state that I am a staunch supporter/practitioner  of Yoga and Kapalbhati.  I have been practicing yoga for fifty years and have reached the stage of three hundred Kapalbhati a day. (It is just an ignorable side fact that I also take one tablet of Atorec 10 mg everyday to keep my cholesterol in check!)


Saturday, January 6, 2018

Genes Do Matter


My wife has a reasonably good ( I may call it large, but I will not do so as I do not intend hurting sentiments)  collection of hand bags. All of them carefully picked after painstakingly going through innumerable such pieces displayed in windows, arranged on shelves, hung on hooks, stacked on foot paths etc etc in Goa, Bengaluru, Chennai, Pune, Mumbai and Michigan. And (it has been drilled into my head repeatedly) there is a purpose behind every single procurement. Few of them might also have been picked up because they were on a discount, which is a very very sound reason to buy a bag.

They occupy the top two shelves in her wardrobe and tend to fall over my head whenever I open the door. And open that door, I have to. Because somehow a missing cap, belt or a jacket of mine have been found to have reached there even though they do not have any right or business. Also, some of the things commonly used by the whole family, like the scissors, nail cutter, needle and thread and safety pins etc are usually found in the lower shelves of the same wardrobe.

The following are the utterances she is used to hearing whenever me or my son open that wardrobe.

"Oh God, why do you need so many bags? keep half a dozen if you must, and throw the remaining  out"

"What is this nonsense? If you keep filling the house with bags, shortly we will have to look for another house to live"

"Bags seem to be the major investment in our family"

"You complain that there is no place for the clothes. Why don't you dump this junk in the loft?"

After experiencing the result of my careless utterances, I have tried to control the natural urge and say something good about the bags but have not been able to bring out anything better than "oh" and "ah".

Last week our niece visited us. She inadvertently opened the wardrobe and had a shower of bags. I was reading the news paper in the next room. The following are the excited remarks that I heard.


"Oh, aunty!  what a collection! I want to see everyone of them in detail!

"How cute!!! where did you get this?"

"What a pretty colour! It goes so well with your blue saree!"

"Beautiful! You can never make out it has so many compartments!"

"So elegant! But you need to wear a Mysore Silk saree with this."

"You can either hold this in your hand or hang it on your shoulder. So very convenient when you go shopping."

"Ah, you got this from US. Say that! You just can't find such things here."

Needless to say that auntie and niece spent a very enjoyable hour and a half going through the entire junk. I am sorry. Entire collection.

It needs a female gene to understand a female gene!