Chp 661. Day at the Museum

Let me be frank here. I hate visiting museums. Or any other government run archeological or historical sites for that matter. And this is not because relics aren't my cup of tea;au contraire, I am a huge history buff. I love reading up on anything that has a significant history or biography, and I can watch History channel or National Geographic for hours.

The reason why I don't like visiting such places is because I am a Northeasterner.

We're always told to pay the foreigner's fees at such places (which is usually around 10 times more than what Indians are charged), and even if we tell them we are Indians, they will be satisfied only if we show them our passports or other IDs (and yes there had been instances where they weren't convinced even after passports were shown). At the same time, somebody from Pakistan or Sri Lanka etc can just walk inside without even being asked to provide identification.

Anyhoo, I am not trying to stir up a controversy with this post. Having lived my life outside Mizoram, I kinda see some reasoning into why people get racially profiled, not that I'm saying I support it. Even in Mizoram which has an ILP (Inner Line Permit) requirement, non-Mizo government workers and residents who do not require an ILP are occasionally still asked at the airport to show proof that they don't require an ILP, whereas somebody from Nagaland or Manipur could very well walk past the security counter without being stopped, even though they must have an ILP to visit Mizoram.

So yeah, shit happens :) It's best to deal with it and move on, or else we'll just turn bitter the more we think about it.

And that is why I don't like to visit such places. But recently, my mom and niece were in town, and they wanted to visit some of the historical places in Pune.



I'm so proud of my niece who is becoming just like me, always taking photos of her food :D



My niece wanted to visit a museum, and so there I was, asking my colleagues which is the best museum to visit in Pune. Aga Khan Palace was the first name my friends suggested, but then other people said the only thing to see there apart from the beautiful architectural design is just Gandhiji's glasses.

I'm sure my mom and niece didn't come all the way from Mizoram just to look at our Mahatma's glasses :D Anyway I wanted to show them more of this Maharashtrian culture and history, something that I have associated with and come to love after living in this state for nearly 10 years now.

My colleagues suggested "Raja Dinkar Kelkar Museum" immediately.

And so I applied for leave and took my mom and niece to Raja Dinkar Kelkar museum, located at Shukrawar Peth. And yes, as expected, the officials at the gate told us to pay 200 bucks each instead of 50 for the entry fee (50 for Indians, 200 for foreigners). I told them we're Indians and they looked at us in disbelief, so I sheepishly showed them my passport.

After realizing we were Indians, they told us to pay 50 bucks each for the entry, and then they told us to pay additional 100 bucks each for our mobile phones, at which point I lost my cool and went into a rage, even uttering some unfortunate Marathi cuss words at them (thank God my mom didn't understand Marathi :D ). They calmly showed me a board which stated that photography is allowed by paying a fee, which includes 100 bucks for mobile phone, 500 for a DSLR camera and so on. That was soooo embarrassing! :D 

See, this is the result when one is a frequent victim of racism or being taken advantage of just because of our different looks - we sometimes tend to think everybody's trying to do that to us. I seriously thought they were trying to rip us off because we didn't "look Indian" enough.

I grinned apologetically, and I think they understood where my rage was coming from, because they charged us for only 2 mobile phones even though we had three. They turned out to be nice people after all :)

And so we entered the esteemed Raja Dinkar Kelkar museum.

The rest of the post below is laden with photographs, all taken using my Oneplus 3. Feel free to click on them to enlarge to a new tab, though I have reduced the size to max 1000px each so as to save you some bandwidth.

The first room we entered was at the first floor. I didn't take a photo of what each floor was exhibiting, but I think this floor was about beauty and cooking utensils.



Above is an appliance women used to clean and smoothen their heels :) See, the 18th century woman had charm! 18th century woman was bae :)

And below are various perfume containers.





Mom reading details about the mirrors used in that era.





Above is a wooden sculptor of Pancha-mukhi Maruti (Lord Maruti with five faces), and below is a "wheel of zodiac signs" made of wood and brass.





My niece posing with a statue of Meenakshi, the chief deity at the famous Meenakshi Temple in Madurai. Good to see a mix of Tamil artifacts in this museum.



Below are some 18th century hair dryers, made of iron and brass. I think the women of those days used to comb their wet hair with this until it gets dry (I'm not exactly sure how it works).







Mom as usual trying to read the descriptions of each display, which were a bit too small for her aging eyes. :) This is a statue of Mahishasurmardini, the slayer of the buffalo demon.



Mom and niece posing with wooden statues of people from the 18th century. Great piece of carving indeed.







Below are some roti makers, lemon juice squeezer and rolling pins. Can't believe they had all these in the 18th century. They look even better than the ones we get at a supermarket today!









19th century noodle makers and perforators! Wow. Who would have thought noodles were a big thing in Pune in the 1800's!



This badass looking appliance below is a coconut grater. I'm not exactly able to visualize how it would function, but it looks cool nonetheless.





Again, what you see above are vegetable cutters and unripe mango cutters, all looking much more cool than the ones we have today.





Some kilns and hot water vessels.





I love the appliance below. It's not just a herb grinder, it's a stone grinder dedicated exclusively for "intoxicating" drugs! :D







So after we were done exploring the wonderful first floor showcases, we were told to go to the third floor first before entering the second floor.



I thought there was something on the second floor that would make sense only if we go to the third floor first and see certain items… but, it wasn't because of that.



The third floor was a big disappointment. It showcased the military items, something that I'm greatly interested in, but unfortunately there was some sort of renovation going on, so we could only look at the displays from a distance. Grrrrr…









After that we went down to the second floor, which had handlooms and crafts on display.

Ok the reason why we were told to go to third floor first before entering second floor was because the second floorA-wing connected to the adjoining second floor B-wing which would take us out to the exit below. People going inside second floor first would most likely not go back to the third floor, hence the reason why we were asked to go to the third floor first :)







Wooden Yakshagana puppets from Karnataka, 19th century.





More string puppets from 19th century Karnataka.









Leather puppets, again from Karnataka. I guess Karnataka was big time into puppets in the 1800's.





Below is a quilt belonging to Dr. Anandibai Gopalrao Joshi, presented to her by her American friends, September 1886. In case you don't know who that is, she was one of the first Indian female physicians, and also believed to be the first woman from India to set foot on American soil.





Bronze, Brass and Copper idols spanning from 17th to 19th century.







The second-floor B-wing consisted of mostly lamp-stands (dias) and other interior decorations.





Yo wanna smoke up some 18th century dope bruh? :P



Even back then, the pen was definitely mightier than the sword. Some exquisite quills below.



Fancy locks indeed!



18th century lamps and dias.







I loooove this section, lolz. These aren't just nut cutters, they are "erotic" nut cutters. Look at the enlarged images carefully, lolz. People were so brazen those days, I like it!



We Mizos would love this "betel boxes" to keep all our kuhva hrings :D



Below, from left to right - Standing Lamp (brass), Tribal Lamp (wood and brass) from Madhya Pradesh, Garud Deep (wood and brass) and Guru-Shishya Deep (brass) from Gujarat.



And finally, some exotic looking "Mughal Lamps" from Maharashtra, made of copper and brass.



The lamps below are called "Ship Lamps", made of tin plate and glass, obviously to make it water and wind proof. They are hung on the posts of ship decks.



We went down from the B-wing second floor to the B-wing first floor, which housed different musical instruments, ranging from tablas, veenas and sitars to the first musical Organ in Pune.





So is the musical instrument above a Sitar or a Veena? Apparently it is neither, it is a Tanpura.

Below we have a couple of "Peacock Sitars" and the era is marked as "contemporary".





The musical instruments above are labeled as (L-R) Nagasvaram, Shehanai, Soor, Thavalai Sandhu and Fife (pungi), along with the flutes of Pannalal Ghosh, a famous flute player and composer who popularized Hindustani classical music.



The giant string instruments you see below are known as Gottuvadhyam, a type of Veena used as a fretless lute in Carnatic music. Next to them is a 19th century Harmonium from Maharashtra.





The above gallery is called "Chandrashekar Agashe" and google search says he was a renowned industrialist, not a musician, so I'm guessing he sponsored this section of the museum? :)



Check out the fancy harps in the picture above! 

Below, the musical instruments from L-R are called Saaz Kashmir, Taar Shehnai (both of them), and a Rabab.





If you can't read what is written above, it says - "This Organ, made by Yamaha of Japan in 1910, was brought to Pune in 1912 by a young Mining Engineer V.J.Gokhale, as a gift for his elder brother Prof R.J.Gokhale. This Organ has been the cornerstone of many an evening over the years, appreciated by many generations of music greats, which soon became the primary accompaniment in all Musical drama thereafter".



A Veena made of Ostrich Egg!!!

Below is a 20th century oil painting of a beautiful Maharashtrian woman (no other identification on the description).





And finally, here is the much famed Mastani Mahal!



Mastani was the beautiful and brave wife of Maratha Peshwa Bajirao. She had a special residence at their palace, and when they died, the palace was dismantled, but parts of her residence were rebuilt and replicated at this very museum. This was the main show attraction. All the parts like furniture, mats, diwan etc were from the actual original palace, so it was like walking through an important piece of history.





After this, we went down to the ground floor B-Wing. There were still a few interesting stuff to see, like the games people used to play in the 18th century.







What you see above are 18th century "Playing Cards" from Maharashtra, made of Ivory! Damnnn I certainly don't wanna be the one carry a lot of deck! :P

Below is a chariot sculpture made from Ivory and Sandalwood, Mysore.





And then there was this, the miraculous Jesus who didn't require arms to stay on the cross :P







Different types of 19th century front doors were also displayed near the exit. It reminded me of Hodor so I cried :P





At the exit, there was this concave mirror, which my niece and I took to our advantage.



And with that, we ended our excursion. It was a wonderful experience indeed. By the way, there were hardly ANYBODY ELSE in the entire museum. If you look at all the photos above, you will not see any other visitor, it was just the three of us! I don't know whether to be happy or sad, I'm kinda happy because we had our own privacy and could do anything we wanted, but at the same time I'm also sad because people do not appreciate art or visiting museums anymore :(

My niece was the happiest, so I treated her to this awesome paani puri that makes Kolkata style puchkas and it was the perfect ending to a perfect outing.



Cheers everyone.

Chp 660. Happy Mother's Day!

So yesterday was Mother's Day.

In our Mizo online community, Mother's Day is kinda like Christmas, in the sense that you know it's Christmas season when all the WhatsApp and Facebook groups you're in start arguing about whether the correct term is "Advance Christmas function" or "Advent Christmas function", just like every other year.

Likewise, when it comes to Mother's Day, as usual, my Facebook friend-list was divided into the usual groups -

Group A consisted of people posting about their mothers and appreciating all the love their moms had bestowed upon them. Group B consisted of people criticizing those who did that, saying real appreciation should be shown in real life and not on social media. Group C consisted of people who criticized those who criticized people talking about their mothers saying it was none of their business to talk about what others post on their walls. Group D consisted of those who criticized those who criticized those who criticized those who… you catch the drift?

Yeah, full on drama :)

As a silent observer, I was just smiling at all the heated arguments taking place. I'm pretty sure that was not how our moms would want us to spend the day. I'm not gonna go all cheesy and say, "Hey, every day is a mother's day", but yeah, it is. The amount of sacrifice mothers make for their children is unfathomable. And if there is one day dedicated to them, whether it is a marketing gimmick or not, I'd say go for it. Shower your mom with all the appreciation, she definitely deserves more than that.

My opinion on all these "wishing on social media or not" is simple. If somebody wants to wish his/her mom a Happy Mother's Day online, what is wrong with that? Let them do it. And to the cynics saying some people do that only for show and ignore their mom the rest of the year… again, what is wrong with that? At least they're wishing their mom once a year rather than never, right? :)

I mean, you're not literally going to be there to make sure they pay attention to their mother the remaining 364 days, right? So why are you triggered then? Chillax bro.

First of all, I know a lot of those who posted "Mother's Day" messages and selfies on Facebook do care about their moms the rest of the year too. And sure there may be few who do that only to gain attention without actually caring about their moms, but hey, don't tell me you are offended because somebody's being artificial? We live in a new social media era where almost everything is artificial and fake, from the way we post about what we eat to where we party or hangout with. We wanna highlight this fake persona of ours that is a bit far-fetched from our actual mundane lives. When was the last time you updated your profile picture with no edit, no filter or changes made? See, that's the world we live in now.

Just live and let live, let people do what they wanna do on their Facebook wall, artificial or not, after all, it is their wall.

The reason why I wanted to write a short blog post about Mother's Day is not about this topic but rather about a different issue. It is about some of my dear friends, the single moms.

Maybe it's because I'm getting older, but lately, I seem to be having more and more new friends who are single moms! :D

And having known quite a number of single moms, I know for a fact that they have it much tougher than any other mothers out there with a "traditional" nuclear family. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trivializing the work of other mothers in any way, but for single moms, it is not just the stigma attached to being a single mom that they must deal with, they also have to play the role of the father and provider at the same time. They don't have any help bringing up their child, unless they're one of the few fortunate ones who happen to live with their huge/joint family where their sisters or aunts help them take care of their baby.

I think there should be a separate Mother's Day just dedicated to single moms :)

And while we're on this topic, I would also like to mention and wish all the single moms who are not in possession of their children a belated Mother's Day as well. Sometimes our patriarchal Mizo customary law can be brutal, especially when a divorced mom does not have possession of her baby.

I admit I will never know the pain of carrying a living being inside my body for 9 months, and after an excruciating child birth, spend sleepless nights nurturing that baby, only to see the baby slip away from my grip after a divorce. I can never experience that, but I can sympathize and understand the level of agony single moms who lose custody of their baby must experience.

I don't understand why some of us don't want to discuss this in public. It's not something we should sweep under the rug and turn the other way. Our state has the highest divorce rate in India, ergo it is bound to have the highest number of single moms per capita than any other state. Not to mention the high rate of children born out of wedlock. The question is, what are we doing about it? Rather than help them cope with societal pressures, we label them with undesirable names and stereotypes.

I've recently seen a single mom cry, weep her hearts out, all because she had to complete her degree while her parents looked after her baby in Mizoram. She just kept looking at photographs of her baby on her phone as tears streamed down her cheeks. Another dear friend of mine was admitted in the hospital. Her ex didn't even take their son to visit her at the hospital, that too on Mother's Day. She texted me to say she was fine, but I could feel her messages, stained with teardrops and pain.

So to all you single mommas out there, here is a very big (and tad belated) Happy Mother's Day. Hugz.

Keep rocking. Know that nobody is stronger than you are.

[random thumbnail image source: wallpapersxl.com]

Cheers!

Chp 659. Celebrating My Birthday with Panties!

Due to exasperating farrago of distortions, misrepresentations and outright lies being broadcast by an unprincipled blogger masquerading as a gamer, I wasn't able to find the time to update this blog post. :) :P [cite]

But it was my birthday three weeks ago, and since I was busy with my niece's grand wedding (blog report coming up soon) travelling from Pune to Goa to Bangalore to Mysore to spend some time with her and the wonderful in-laws, I'm able to find the time to write this post now only.

So a few days before my birthday, I realized I was on the brink of a major milestone!

Yup, I had bought 999 games on Steam so far!

In order to make my birthday really special, I wanted to buy my 1000th game on my birthday. And what could be more memorable than buying a game that was really… different and quirky!

Yeah I had already shortlisted this game on my wishlist for a long time. The name of the game is "Panty Party" and as the name suggests, it involves a lot of panties :D

It is an FPS (first person shooter) game with an element of hack and slash, where you control your "character", which is nothing but a panty (better known as pantsu for all you ecchi anime and manga fans). You fly around killing other panties who are the bad guys. And as you progress, you unlock "better" panties that have more effective weapons and power-ups. Man you cannot make this stuff up!

And so, the day of my birthday was the day we were supposed to fly to Goa for my niece's wedding reception. My sister and cousin too flew down from Mizoram to Pune and we all planned to go to Goa together.

Just before leaving for the airport, I quickly made my 1000th purchase.

Yeahhhh Panty Partaaay! :D

Man I'm having so much fun playing this game. I mean, it is so damn silly, the storyline and dialogues are extremely corny but at the same time not lame. I'm sure the developers who made this game had a lot of fun while making it.

And so that was it. My 1000th game on Steam, and it is a self-birthday gift involving panties. Mid-life crisis here I come! :D

Chp 658. Aizawl FC - Champions of India!

What an amazing time to be living in if you're a Mizo or a fan of local football here in India. Aizawl FC did the unthinkable – they had just been crowned India's Football champions! They're also the first club from the North East to win this coveted title.

[image source: inkhel.com]

I'm not going to write a match report on Aizawl FC's road to the trophy as there are a lot of great sportswriters out there who have already covered that, I really suggest you read their articles. Bhargab Sarmah's pre-Finals article Aizawl FC, Khalid Jamil and the making of I-League's greatest underdog story is one of them. Abhijit Barali explains about the complication regarding the AIFF-Reliance merger that could send the champions back to second division. Other related pieces include Vaibhav Raghunandan's article How Aizawl FC broke the Indian football order at dailyO and Rutvick Mehta's article Aizawl's dream is AIFF's nightmare at DNA. And then there were articles such as this at HuffPo where Aizawl FC fans were seen cleaning the stadium after the match, winning the hearts of everyone. I know I didn't do squat, I wasn't even there at the stadium, but it just made me so damn proud of my people! *hugz*

There are many other great articles out there about Aizawl FC becoming the latest Indian Football champs, as this news is not just covered nationally but internationally as well. Below is a video coverage from Football Daily! (video plays from 3:47)

ESPN also did an extensive coverage ranging from how Aizawl FC won the championship to what the quest for 'one league' means for Aizawl FC. Do take a look at this video of the team being welcomed by the people of Mizoram -

All in all, yeah, like I said earlier, it is an awesome feeling to be a Mizo right now :)

The best part about all this is, I have come across so many non-Mizos who became a fan of Aizawl FC! I'm not even talking about other Northeasterners, I have met people from Kerala, Maharashtra, West Bengal etc both online and offline who cheered for Aizawl FC. Everybody loves a good underdog story, and this is definitely one of them.

In fact a lot of people compared Aizawl FC's achievement to that of Leicester City FC. I beg to differ. Yes both had an emotional and overwhelming underdog story, but while Leicester City were promoted to the Premier League and won the title the next year, Aizawl FC were relegated and later included in the league due to Goan clubs pulling out of the league and then won the title the same season! That is by far a much greater glory in my books.

To me it kinda feels like relegated Aizawl FC were added back to the league out of sheer pity, especially since the club had one of the most passionate Away supporters across India. Maybe the suits sitting in their big penthouse smoking their cigars and eating their caviars were thinking, "Heck, let's just promote this Aizwaal team again, they're not gonna make any dent on our future merger plan, as long as MB, EB or BFC wins the title, all izz good. Plus the diversity from their Home and Away fans will add some good masala to our TV viewers. Good TRP. Show me the money! Kaching!"

And then Aizawl FC came along and said, "Challenge Accepted. BOOOYAAAAH!" along with a few other words that Samuel L Jackson would say. :)

Ahhhhhh what an amazing ride it had been. I watched the last match versus Lajong at my friend Sanga's place here in Pune, as he had invited a couple of Mizo students from Spicer college to come over to his house to watch the live telecast. We were actually planning to watch a live screening of the match at Aufside Sports Bar, Swargate, as a lot of other Mizos would be there too, but Sanga later said these students didn't have a place to watch the game and so he played the good host. I love how our tlawmngaihna seems to be everywhere.

The entire 90+ minutes we were just glued to the TV. I mean I couldn't even sit down, lolz. We cheered so hard when we equalized (and also for that other goal which was contentiously declared as offside). I almost got a heart attack during extra time when Lajong nearly scored! We danced and jumped in joy at the final whistle, just like all the other Mizos at the stadium or those watching the match on TV.

Lajong played really well. Before the match there were a few controversies, like how AIFF fielded referees from West Bengal despite Mizoram's protest. And then there was this one photo doing the rounds on social media where a Mohun Bagan flag was flying apparently on the terrace of the main referee's house in Kolkata, while another group was quick to dismiss that as a rumor started by East Bengal fans. Oh the pre-match drama was so intense! :D And of course some fans of the Mariners started saying that Lajong was ready to gift the game to Aizawl FC so as to see a team from the North East win the league rather than Mohun Bagan, but anybody watching the match would know all the players played really well, with no question of match-fixing.

What a game indeed. We celebrated till 6 in the morning, and then continued the same day again as it was a holiday. I told my friends Gary and Sano to go to work as they didn't have a holiday, but they were so excited about the win that they continued celebrating with us :) That's how happy and excited all of us were about this unbelievable fairy tale win.

It would be truly tragic if Reliance and AIFF go ahead with the merger and demote the reigning champions to second division. Forget about it being tragic, it would be freaking embarrassing as a nation if this happens. How profit-hungry are the men in suits? We Indians have been stereotyped as being shrewd and stingy when it comes to business, and demoting a reigning champion just because they don't have the required funds will prove just that.

I don't mean to name-drop, but I think we need a person like Mr. Pratap Nair.

Who is Mr. Pratap Nair?

He's the founder of a little known shipping company called FEI Cargo Ltd.

Back in 2014 when Mizoram became the second team from the North East to win India's most prestigious football tournament - Santosh Trophy, the winning squad came down to Mumbai to play an exhibition match against WIFA XI (Western India Football Association). I had written an extensive report here, feel free to click the link. What I had mentioned in that post was, Tetea Hmar told me the entire expenditure that included air tickets for all 30 members of the Mizoram squad, their accommodation and food at The Leela (5 Star hotel), hiring the Cooperage football stadium, a handsome amount of cheque to support the young boys at home etc, were all paid by Mr. Pratap Nair himself! He's big time into promoting grassroots level football development and he's the type of person our nation needs to make sure Indian football stays relevant.

Otherwise, if we're just going to have only rich clubs or clubs with rich owners (read A-list celebrities) be a part of the new league, the passion is not really going to be there. They treat football more as a showbiz rather than an actual sport. I confess I stopped watching ISL matches a long time ago, I find the entire concept very artificial but I try my best not to miss any I-League matches. History is very important when it comes to football.

Remember the heated Mohun Bagan - East Bengal derbies, or watching Goan clubs like Salgaocar, Dempo and Churchill Brothers play? Remember how excited we were when Shillong Lajong became the first club from the North East to join the I-League. We northeasterners all became hardcore Lajong fans back then :D Lajong was quickly followed by other Northeastern clubs like United Sikkim, Rangdajied United, Royal Wahingdoh and finally Aizawl FC. We were all heart-broken when clubs like JCT and Mahindra United had to shut shop.

All these clubs are all renowned names in the Indian football franchise. They have history. We grew up looking up to these great clubs, revering them, respecting them, and it was the dream of many Mizo football players to play for one of these clubs. Many did. In the current I-League, more than 50 Mizo players played for various I-League teams, making Mizoram the state with the most number of players at the I-League. And just as our own home team not only participated but won the tournament, the entire league is now about to end forever and our champs relegated? No. No freaking way. This ain't fair! Ain't fair at all.

How can the football Gods be this cruel?

I take back my opening statement. What an awful time to be living in if you are a Mizo.