Ākāśāt Patitaṃ: Many Forms, One Reality
Adi Shankara: The image that's stayed with me forever Sanskrit and shlokas have always fascinated me. The sheer vastness of Sanskrit literature is humbling. There are enough verses, texts, commentaries and traditions to occupy many lifetimes, and still leave one feeling that one has barely scratched the surface. But I didn't think much about any of this when I was growing up. I would recite shlokas in the morning and evening without fail. They were simply part of life. The words were there, the rituals were there, the temples were there—but much of it happened in the background. I was busy with academics. There was no time for Sanskrit or Vedanta. At least, that is what I used to tell myself. Of course, time was never really the problem. I could spend five days watching a Test match from morning to evening and somehow consider that perfectly legitimate use of my time! The truth was simpler: Sanskrit and Vedanta had not yet become priorities. Gr...
Last evening was pretty eventful. As the thermometer was struggling to get the mercury levels rising, the dipping temperature provided us the ideal platform to test our Bajji making skills. The Bajji mavu, potatoes, chillies (rather Jalapeno) and onions were laid on a platter, with one of us cutting the potatoes and onions, and the other making the dough. It is always exciting to try something new and we weren't sure how good the final product would be. Of course, we were smacking our lips by just imagining how good it would be. As the oil in the tava warmed up to a nicety, the potato was dipped into the semi-solidified bajji mavu, propped up beautifully and finally immersed into the frying pan. KccchhhhK! Wow! What a noise! After a long time, it was good to hear the splattering potato in the oil. It was music to our ears. As the bajji emerged out of the frying pan, all of us were eyeing it with a sense of contentment and pride. Obviously! Who gets to make bajjis everyday. The bajji quickly was torn into four pieces and each of us were quick to gulp the miniscule piece in glee. And then, the packet of vadaam (fryums) also emerged from the suitcase. C'mon, if we can make bajjis, why can'y we fry up the vadaam. Yeps! It did sound nice! And so after about 45 minutes of painstaking effort, we had a big vessel containing the delicious jevarisi vadaam and bajjis.
I guess Blonda would have been a better name.
ReplyDeleteWow.. bajji-sojji ellama? Yaaravadhu unna maapizhai parka vandhangala enna?? Cool, you guys seemt o be having fun
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