Sweet Jesus, give me patience, I thought; and though I was inclined to give the old finger to my mama in return, I refrained from such adolescent behavior. Hell, one of us needed to act like a responsible adult. Gritting my teeth, I snatched my purse off the seat, opened the Honda’s door, slammed it behind me, and headed for the diner.

The sign over the door said, “Maurice’s Place,” and painted on the plate-glass window was the boastful proclamation, “Best Burgers in Moose Pass.” Probably the only damn burgers, I thought as I pushed the door open and stepped into what I could only describe as a scene out of some old movie about the Yukon set at the turn of the century.

The walls were covered with assorted heads, not human, thank God, but almost as bad, especially considering the sheer number. In fact, there were probably at least 50, maybe more, that had once belonged to deer, elk, beavers, lynxes, and other assorted wildlife, all now starring down in glassy-eyed rage from every possible angle around the walls. And the tables were covered in red-and-white checked oil cloth, well-worn and faded; and each table was adorned with condiment containers – everything from salt to ketchup to Tabasco sauce – along with an old bottle covered with melted wax and out of which protruded the nub of a long-spent candle.

My eyes almost immediately began to water since, obviously, Moose Pass was a smoke-free town, although not in the usual sense of the word but in the sense that everyone was free to smoke and do so with reckless abandon. In fact, it seemed that everyone in Maurice’s was smoking, if not cigarettes then a cigar or pipe; and the smoke in the room was literally as thick as fog. Yet, despite the smoke, the odor of frying onions permeated the air; and adding to the ambiance was a jukebox in the corner, which, at the moment, was playing some old country song by some old country singer I didn’t recognize and didn’t care to recognize, but I had to admit the tune was appropriate: it was North to Alaska..

I saw my mama. She was refilling the coffee cups of two guys who looked liked bears dressed in woolen shirts and corduroy pants.

As she turned around, Mama shot me a glare and stormed toward the kitchen, which was located through a doorway behind the counter.

I watched her pink-clad posterior swishing as she disappeared through the swinging doors. Be that way, I thought. See if I care. Ignoring all the dead animals’ stares, as well as those of the patrons, mostly men, although there was one woman, I walked over to an empty booth and slid onto the seat. Sighing, I met the blue-eyed gaze of a burly man whose face was hidden beneath one of the fullest beards I had ever seen. In fact, his beard was so full and so thick that it covered almost his entire face, to the extent that his eyes looked like two blue buttons sewn onto a teddy bear’s head.

Nodding, he smiled, exposing a mouthful of gold teeth.

Not wanting to give him the wrong idea, I didn’t acknowledge the smile. Instead I picked up the menu.

“Francie,” someone yelled. “You got a customer in your station.”

I glanced up. The person doing the yelling was the cook, although I had a feeling he was also the owner, Maurice. Don’t ask me why. Maybe he just looked like a Maurice.

Carol Culver Rzadkiewicz
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He wasn’t tall, perhaps five-eight at most, and fine-boned and slim. Fact was, he looked rather delicate, almost effeminate, but then I noticed the corded muscles in his arms and decided he was what my daddy would call “wiry and tough as whet leather.” Daddy also said such men were, more often than not, the kind you didn’t want to get riled because they would come out swinging and ask questions later.

Deciding I might as well eat (it had been a long while since breakfast), I opened the menu, which, much to my relief, offered a list of traditional foods and not barbecued bear or stewed sea lion.

“What’ll it be?”

I jumped.

It was my mama. Frowning, she said, “The burgers are the best-”

“I read the sign,” I said. “They’re the best in Moose Pass.”

She shrugged. “If you don’t want a burger, try the fried liver.”

“You know I hate liver. Hated it as a little girl, but you kept fixing it anyway.”

“But I never forced you to eat, now did I? I always fixed something else for you.”

“Sure, like a peanut butter sandwich.” I remembered having to sit there at the table, gnawing on my sandwich, while the rest of the family enjoyed a hot meal.

She rolled her eyes. “And was it my fault you were such a picky eater?”

“Mama,” I said. “I did not come all the way to Moose Pass, Alaska to talk about my eating habits.”

Another roll of her eyes and she said, “So why’d you come?”

“You know good and well why I come and-”

“It’s why I came, not come.”

I gritted my teeth to keep from screaming. “Mama, don’t start that with me. All you wanna do is change the subject.”

“No, I don’t,” she said. “I just want my daughter to speak like she has at least some education.”

“Mama, it don’t matter.”

She sighed and shook her head. “See, there you go again. It’s ‘doesn’t matter,’ not ‘don’t matter.” She tapped the pad with the pen she had in her right hand. “Are you going to order or not? I have other customers, you know.”

“Oh, all right, then bring me a burger, fries, and a large Coke.”

Sniffing, she said, “Not unless you ask a little more politely than that.”

It was my turn to roll my eyes. “And since when does a customer in a diner have to ask the waitress to bring her anything? I’m supposed to place my order, not plead with you to bring it to me.”

“Then get it yourself,” she said, whirled away, and sashayed toward a nearby table.

Oh, good Lord, I thought; this is going just great. Why on earth had I bothered to come after the hardheaded woman? At this rate, it’d be spring before I could get her even to sit down and discuss the situation. Then again, I knew I at least had to try. And knowing this, I decided to swallow my pride. “Please bring me a burger, fries, and Coke,” I yelled in her direction. “Pretty please with molasses on top.”

All conversation ceased and everyone in the place turned to stare at me. The silence was palpable – thick as pea soup.

Mama also looked at me.

The seconds ticked by.

“All right, Constance,” she finally said and shrugged one pink-clad shoulder. “I’ll bring you a burger. But you don’t need any fries, and you’d best have a Diet Coke.” She turned toward the kitchen. “Need to start watching your weight. Looks like you’ve gained a few pounds.”

To be continued

Sakhya was in possession of just a tanka and twenty paisa, his guru’s recommendation letter and a fake identity when he reached the capital city of Puri. He was only three days from the Rudra Deva bravery championship and he had to make fifty tanka by then. Fifty tanka was no small amount, considering that one could have a sumptuous meal at a good inn and end up poorer by only two paisa.

Sakhya desperately needed to get into the championship. He knew that if he got in he would be unstoppable. His guru had said so and considering his guru’s credibility, his confidence wasn’t misplaced. If he couldn’t get in… he just didn’t want to think of that situation.

Sakhya searched for a small room on the outskirts of the city, the cheapest of them available.

“A tanka a day. You have to pay three tankas as advance,” said the landlady of the supposedly cheapest lodge he could find. A short, portly lady in her forties but looking fiftyfive, she was dressed in a sari without a blouse.

“Actually I was looking for something cheaper,” Sakhya said, almost whispered, as if by that the landlady won’t know of his poverty. “Don’t you think this is way too costly?”

“Now listen boy. This time of the year you won’t get any room for even a tanka. Visitors are coming from all over the country and from abroad. Don’t you think I am being too generous?”

“Ma’am, I have only a tanka and eighteen paisa,” Sakhya pleaded “But I am not any visitor. I come here to participate in the game.”

“You mean you have this much besides the fee of fifty tanka?”

“Actually no… but I will work that out.”

The woman gave him a sarcastic look.

“Listen, boy. I am too dumb for a Vaishya woman. That’s what people say. I may not have good business sense but the way you try to fool me is dumber.”

“Trust me mausi. I am here for the fight. I am well-prepared and am expecting one of the top honours. If I win the championship in any category, I shall pay you double the rent and acknowledge you in front of the whole city.”

“There is a good chance that Gajapati Sasankavarman would propose to me before the tournament starts. If he does, I may accommodate you in the royal palace,” the woman mocked.

Sakhya paused for a moment trying to evaluate the alternatives. It was the peak of winter and Sakhya didn’t want to risk his health just before the championship.

“Fine then. Here is a tanka. Let me stay a day and try to figure things out. If I can’t pay by tomorrow I will get out myself.”

The woman looked at the coin apprehensively.

“If you don’t get out and try to make trouble, I have my boys in the lane. They will throw you out.”

“That situation won’t come. I am a man of honour, and will keep my word.”

“You Kshatriya?”

“Yes… yes of course,” Sakhya’s tone became a little nervous, which the landlady didn’t fail to notice. He wasn’t used to lying.

“What caste?”

“Khandayat. Khandayat Paika.”

“Paika? From where?”

“Ah… from…” Sakhya fumbled “From Balijhari, Cuttack.”

“Anyone in Puri who can be your reference?”

Smarak
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The landlady was still suspicious. She sized up Sakhya. Tall, broad shouldered and well-built, he wasn’t exactly good looking, though his demeanour gave an impressive feel that quite compensated his looks. More black than brown in colour, he had a wide forehead and an intense gaze that betrayed his hesitant self. He was wearing a cheap, untidy grey kurta over an equally untidy dhoti, an indication that he had come from quite a distance. A voluminous travelling bag was hanging from his left shoulder.

“What’s in that?” the landlady asked, pointing at the unusually large bag.

“Just regular stuff.”

“Show me.”

Sakhya promptly opened his bag to show an elegant bow and a long, sharp sword. These were the only things he was proud of, besides his mentor. He removed the sheath to show her the sword. Made of a special alloy not known to most sword-makers of the day, it was a pride handed over to him by his guru. Its shine was blinding and its edge looked deadly.

“Wow,” the landlady couldn’t help gasping “You sure are a paika. That would fetch you enough to buy my whole place.”

“This is not for sale.”

***

The landlady had driven a hard deal. Even after taking a tanka she had thrown him with another fellow, a Brahmin. The room was just enough for two. There were just two rugs, an earthen pot of water and a copper lota. The Brahmin was already snoring away, a leg generously spread over Sakhya’s part of the space. The Brahmin was clean-shaven except for a patch of long hair at the back of his head. He was wearing a saffron dhoti and was bare-bodied, except for the sacred thread.

Sakhya was a little frightened at the prospect of sleeping by the side of a Brahmin. Nothing would be more sacrilegious than that. He had heard that some Brahmins had a special power by which they could see through things and recognize an untouchable in their vicinity by smelling the air. He wouldn’t normally be frightened of getting busted – he could take on a fifty in combat. But this time he needed money for his family and he didn’t want any trouble lest he be not allowed to participate in the tournament. The only words of consolation for him were his guru’s words, “Nothing but the sensate is real.” He was a genius, nevertheless an eccentric atheist, “I never met God, so can’t say much about him.”

Sakhya poured some water from the pot into the lota and drank it. Not in a mood to disturb the Brahmin, he accommodated his huge self in a very limited space.

To be continued

“So,” I said, looking at the beaming face. “I can see something good is brewing… Won’t you share it with me?”

There was a laugh. A blush, rather.

“No?”

The blush, again…

“Aw, come on… no secrets between us! We’ve never had secrets ever since we were best friends… I know everything about you, and you about me. Out with it!” I begged, almost.

“Hmmm…” the response.

“You… you… this is unfair! I have never seen you blush so much! You keep chatting on the phone 28 hours a day! You are constantly messaging, even while asleep. You have this look around you that says… you’re in love! Tell me…”

A nod of the head. And the blush again…

Vijay Premkumar
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“Damn, you! You turned dumb or what? Why don’t you open your mouth, and talk now, you ass? Can’t you see I am trying to have a conversation?” I chided mockingly.

Still the blushing continued.

I was annoyed.

“Okay, I will check things out myself… I will get to know myself… wait, you… you… you…” And I walked out, throwing the largest pillow in the room at my best friend.

***

I was in the kitchen, trying to make some hot tea when I felt a hand on my shoulders.

I turned around, to see the back of a photo thrust into my face.

I quickly snatched the picture, ran to my room, switched on the light and fan and plonked on my soft bed.

As I turned the photo around, I froze. For a while, and I do not know how long, time froze. It seemed like the end of the world. I just could not believe it… It could not be… It was… it was… devastating.

Indian colours have always tended to be bright. Eyecatching. Along came the British and toned us down into milder versions of them. We city dwellers now stick to pastels and pales.

We just painted our house and I wanted to paint it in bright colours. People were rather amazed and shocked that I was into hot pinks, brilliant greens, sea blues and bright golden yellows. As we get older, we want life to be lighter, happier, more colourful and less inhibited maybe.

Dealing with painters is a form of Russian spy versus spy with both trying to outguess and outwit the other. I’m afraid he won most of the time. Some days there were two guys working, some days there were three and some days there were six. I had to stay home for three weeks and deal with these guys day in and day out. Just keeping track of what was going on and trying to decide shades was nerve-wracking.

Kalyani Chidambaranathan
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I decided to paint a mural on the outside wall to keep myself occupied and as a stress-buster. I looked at sophisticated sun pictures but thought that bright colours were what I wanted. So, I did this in truly rural style, with lots of blemishes and overruns.

In rural India, the women paint the walls of their homes in one day and decorate it the next with whatever is handy, like shards of brick, charcoal and lime. And I’ve done just that. With the colors used inside the home.

This is the sun god or kathiravan, as the kids in my neighborhood call him in Tamil. So far they’ve been my only unabashed fans. They hang around to say ‘super’. And beg for colours to try it themselves.

During our long dreary monsoon months, the sun’s cheer is what we need. And I’ve got a bit of it!

Hallways silent; a lonely footstep echoes
Where it would normally be stifled.
As I walk the narrowed halls the students are packed away
Silent in a trance; reading 8 year old textbooks.

 James D. Ardis
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“I love Pizzas,” I yell
But hubby gives me hell
“They’re junk,” he says
I scream at him always!

Pizzas are not junk food
I think they’re very good
Made of bread is their base
I could live on them for days!

Pizzas come with cheese
Rich in calcium and manganese
And vegetable toppings too
Which, a lot of good, can do!

 Mina Dilip
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I like my pizza hot and spicy
Chilly flakes will do nicely
I add some Italian seasoning
And then I stop reasoning!

Farmhouse or Deluxe Veggie
Country Special or Fresh Veggie
Each time, I choose a new one
’Coz pizzas are so much fun!

A passenger on board the Golden Chariot luxury train is reported in The Hindu as saying that tourists in Vienna get to dine in the palaces there. She wished the Karnataka train tour organizer had lined up some such thing at the Mysore palace, instead of taking her and other tourists around the place for a couple of hours.

The tourists on the train, paying between $2,000 and $3,400 per head for a week-long tour through Karnataka, come to Mysore on Tuesdays. The official Golden Chariot website mentions dinner at the Lalitha Mahal Palace Hotel. But this is small beer in comparison to the prospects of dining at the real place, as the tourist from Vienna suggests.

Maybe the Maharaja (erstwhile, that is) who lives in the palace could be persuaded to join them whenever he is in town. His wife, who is into fashion design and branded soap-making, can only benefit from such interaction with five-star tourism. The Karnataka State Tourism Development Corporation and the Mapple’s group of hotels, partners in running the luxurious Golden Chariot, need to devise more imaginative programming than just taking their high-paying guests to the Ranganathittu bird sanctuary or Chamundi Hills and putting them through a cultural show at Rangayana – which surely can’t be billed the best or the most exciting show in town.

Not every passenger on the train would want to be part of the same package. In Mysore, Golden Chariot passengers could be given other tour options, at least for part of the day. For the passengers not keen on doing the usual touristy rounds, organizers could line up a programme for seeing Mysore as the locals do – the agrahara, the local markets, a visit to the grand old banyan on Baden Powell schoolyard and some other heritage trees, historic temples, the Idgah, Bannimantap and other such interesting spots.

G.V. Krishnan
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Such tours are best done on bicycles, the green mode of transport that has been revived in eco-conscious Paris and many other cities in Europe. Golden Chariot passengers could opt for the alternative Mysore tour while booking their tickets. Organizers could consider proposals in this regard from locally knowledgeable groups that are enterprising enough to take on such off-beat tours.

The class of passengers Golden Chariot seeks to attract is the one that is sought after by tourism promoters in several other countries. An agency that caters to this class of tourists – The Luxury Train Club – lists 14 other train tours on offer the world over. They include two such super-tourists services in India – Deccan Odessey in Maharashtra and the Palace on Wheels of Rajasthan. According to Simon Pielow, a founding member of the club, and a self-confessed ‘trainvangelist’, train tour operators would do well to listen to the suggestions of ‘outsiders.’

My sense is those who take luxury train tours look not for routine tourist fare, but a lifetime experience that they could recall to folks at home years later. Some of us in Mysore reckon that the Golden Chariot tourists could be involved in the greening of our city, by persuading them to plant a sapling each, at a designated place, to mark their visit to Mysore. They could take back with them, as souvenir, the green certificate from a thankful Mysore.

Another suggestion from passengers on the inaugural run of the train was that organizers should improve in areas such as food and information sought by the travelling group. In this context the official website on Golden Chariot luxury tour should go interactive. It should feature passenger blogs where those travelling on the train could log in and post their impressions and experiences on the trip. The blog posts, besides being a feedback channel for the tour partners, would make interesting reading for those planning holidays in Karnataka.

It took almost two weeks for me to get to Moose Pass, Alaska, mainly because I stopped off in Pierre, South Dakota for two days to visit an old friend from high school, Madeline Bowers. In all honesty, I was curious. I wanted to see if she’d been telling the truth in her e-mails about how she’d married a rich rancher and was living high on the hog. Besides, I figured since Mama had such a head start on me, there was no need for me to rush; and given my luck, she was already in Alaska by now and had consummated her relationship with her Internet lover.

Madeline and I had a good visit, caught up on old times, and just enjoyed each other’s company. Of course, I did learn that she’d been lying, all right, that was, unless you considered a 40-acre pig farm living high on the hog.

When I finally reached Moose Pass, it was everything I’d expected, meaning it wasn’t much of anything – just a few stores, a rustic-looking diner, a greasy-looking auto-repair shop, and assorted, rather rugged, outdoorsy looking characters wandering about the street. I said “street,” singular, because there was only one main thoroughfare, although it was pot-holed and probably way past salvation by any highway maintenance crew. The rest of the “streets” were narrow, unpaved lanes leading to ramshackle houses, where I imagined all the rugged, outdoorsy looking characters went in between spells of wandering up and down Main Street.

I parked near the diner, and as I sat there in my Honda, glancing around, I wondered if one those rugged, outdoorsy looking characters might just be the Bozo who had caught my mama in his net, or maybe on the Net would be more appropriate, given the circumstances under which the two of them had met.

Carol Culver Rzadkiewicz
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I expelled a long sigh as, just for the heck of it, I pressed the code to call my mama. I figured, what the heck? Maybe she’d answer. Maybe she wouldn’t. At that point, I was pass caring. After all, I was more than a little aggravated with the woman, since, in my opinion, it was her fault my dear old daddy was now the talk of Palmetto, Georgia – well, him and that floozy, Alice Collins.

Much to my surprise, she answered on the third ring.

“Mama,” I said. “I’m in Moose Pass.”

“What?” she said.

“You heard me. I’m here in Moose Pass.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“Would I kid about something like that?” I sniffed. “As if I ain’t… I mean… as if I haven’t got better things to do with my time.” Since I didn’t want her to hang up on me again, I figured it wouldn’t hurt for me to use correct English.

“Why?” she asked.

“Why? ‘Cause I’m gonna take you back home.”

“The hell you are.”

“Now, Mama, I-”

“Don’t you ‘Now, Mama’ me.”

I heard myself emit another sigh as I wondered, Why me? Other women my age didn’t have to put up with crazy mamas, at least not any that I knew of off hand. All my friends had normal mamas, mamas who knitted, cleaned the house, belonged to the Ladies Auxiliary, and maybe played bridge twice a week. Their mammas didn’t go running off to Alaska to be with some man they’d met on the Internet. Then again, their mamas had always been normal, never crazy like mine. Even when I was a child, I had recognized just how different my mama was.

She said, “I can’t talk now. I’m at work.”

“At work,” I echoed. “You mean you already have a job? You’ve only been here, how long, a week?”

“Humph,” she said. “I had a job lined up before I arrived. Do you honestly think I would hightail it for Alaska without making plans in advance? How could I survive without a job?”

“What about your boyfriend?” I asked. “Won’t he take care of you?”

Stone-cold silence.

“Did you hear me?” I said. “I asked-”

“Yes, Constance, I heard you,” she said, taking that tone she always took with her children when she thought they were being a bit too uppity for their own good. “But I’ll have you know that what I decide to do with my life is really none of your business, nor is whom I decide to date or-”

“Date? But you’re a married woman,” I reminded her.

“Not for long,” she said.

“What do you mean, not for long?”

She disconnected the call.

Oh, Sweet Jesus, I thought as I tossed the cell-phone onto the seat. What next? I glanced toward the diner.

And there she was, my mama. She was staring out at me through the dirty plate-glass window. Dressed in a pink waitress outfit, with her newly dyed black hair pulled back in a ponytail, she was giving me the finger.

To be continued

Newton’s Third Law: “Every action has an equal and opposite reaction”.

When an informed layman draws conclusions on international affairs, he is always at the risk of over-generalisations. The case is worse given the non-linear dynamics of international affairs. Yet, some patterns can be found in the chaos that international relations are. I have observed that the dynamism of international relations can be comfortably viewed as an action-reaction sequence. Let me enumerate this perspective with a few instances from India’s foreign policy and some general views on International Relations (IR).

• Henry Kissinger once said that we should learn from Nehru ‘how not to run one’s foreign policy’. He had observed such in the context of the fact that India’s foreign policy in initial days was heavily ideology driven rather than oriented towards national interest. Today, many believe that foreign policy should be driven solely by pragmatism towards fulfilment of national interest. But then, how do we define national interest? Is it political consensus (in the context of democracies) or is it following hedonistic realism, not bothering about any ideal at all?
• Dr. C. Raja Mohan reasons that India doesn’t have reservations towards a strategic alliance with US, yet won’t ever play a second fiddle to it. Unfortunately, it has yielded under US pressures and messed up with some very close friends. India’s vote against Iran at IAEA, for instance, didn’t have much impact on the outcome itself but was symbolic of a strained relation with a strategic player in India’s extended neighbourhood. This trade-off between nuclear deal and Indo-Iranian relations was in India’s interests, according to many strategists. But how will it augur for India in the long run. Iran happens to be not just a friendly country but India’s neighbour’s neighbour. It has been India’s lone supporter on Kashmir issue in diplomatic circles of Islamic countries.
• India has often been perceived as a big bully among the countries of Indian sub-continent region. Group psychology tells us that the tendency for this is high when one group is overwhelmingly larger and more resourceful than other groups. People in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal, etc. have a very negative attitude towards India. It is natural for Pakistanis to have such an attitude towards India…former foreign secretary J.N. Dixit has observed how anti-Indian feeling is embedded in education and socialization process of Pakistanis. But why Nepal and Bangladesh? Inevitably, there was something wrong with how India handled relations with these nations. They have often complained of India meddling with their affairs. This lack of confidence between India and its neighbours is creating problems of regional integration, so also of better economic co-operation in SAARC.
• Since 1992, we have had a major shift in our foreign policy. Starting with a hands-off policy towards neighbours, we now follow the Gujral Doctrine that states that we should show unconditioned positive regard towards neighbours and mustn’t ask for reciprocity while doing favours. India has become very responsive to Pakistan also. Vajpayee even went so far as inviting Musharraf to Agra after his (or was it Nawaz Sharif?) misadventure in Kargil. According to Vajpayee, “We can choose our friends, we can’t choose our neighbours”. A majority of my fellow citizens, among those in my personal contact, don’t favour this ‘moderate’ posture towards our smaller neighbour and prefer India getting aggressive.

Here is my view on IR. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Difference between Newtonian force and diplomatic action is on the issue of objectivity. While reaction to a force is impersonal, a diplomatic action’s impact is more psychic. Every action in bilateral relations produce an impression of the country (let’s say India) in the eyes of (a) the political elite and (b) the citizens of the other country. The attitudes of the country are shaped by diplomatic actions over a period of time. This attitude guides the recipient country’s behaviour (reaction) towards India.

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The reaction is opposite in the sense of reciprocity. Equality criteria can’t be easily ascertained in political science unlike physical sciences. However, we can risk saying that the reaction is subjectively equal to the action. When a heavy ball (resource rich India) collides with a light ball (say Bangladesh), the force on both is same and opposite. The momentum of (effect on) lighter ball is, however, more than that of the heavier ball. Resource here includes all kinds of national resources, plus military strength plus diplomatic skills of the country. In light of this action-reaction sequence, let us discuss the four points mentioned above again.

National interest doesn’t lie in ideal-typical realism. Some degree of idealism is necessary. There is a poem, written in the context of Hitler era, which roughly goes thus:

“They went after the Jews. I ain’t a Jew, so I didn’t help
They went after the blacks. I ain’t a black, so I didn’t help
They went after the trade unionists. I ain’t one of ‘em, so I didn’t help
Then they came after me. There was none left to help me”

We can’t afford not to notice US hegemony. As per the action-reaction sequence, ideal typical realism will be harmful to India in the long run. There is nothing personal in international affairs. But it should be remembered that other countries deal with India based on their subjective perception of India over a period of time. According to Dr. Raja Mohan, Nehruvian non-alignment had given India significant diplomatic space at a time when our resources were scarce. We still command goodwill of third world countries; these countries perceive India as their leader in multi-national forums like WTO.

I personally appreciate India’s ambiguous stand on relations with US. This way, India is able to reap the benefits of allying with US without repelling its traditional third world base. This in deed is a tough task, but our diplomats seem to be quite consummate at it. A major problem with this can be US itself. America wants unambiguous support. The pressure on India to show symbolic support to US will be more in days to come. Condoleeza Rice had recently even called on India to discard NAM! Many retired diplomats have observed that foreign relations should be managed with a right mix of idealism and realism. We can denote this as a continuum with ideal typical idealism and realism at the two ends.

The Gujral Doctrine is in deed a great step towards normalizing relations with our neighbours. People in India’s neighbouring countries have formed negative attitude towards India due to Indian action over a period of time. Effect of Gujral Doctrine will also be seen after a period of time. After all, attitudes and beliefs don’t change in a day. In the meanwhile, there have been tempting suggestions from various sections of society to confront our neighbours. Whenever there is a terrorist attack, there is a debate on what India is doing towards it. Should we also go for covert military action in Pakistan? Should we use pressure tactics to make Bangladesh dismantle the anti-Indian elements from its soil? Pressure tactics don’t work. Pakistan acts with terrorism. We react with violence. Pakistan reacts to our reaction with more terrorism. We react to Pakistan’s reaction to our reaction with increased confrontation. This may ultimately escalate to a full fledged war, a war in which Pakistan will lose more nevertheless we will also lose. Bhutan flushed out India’s fifth column from its land just because of the special relation it shares with India. Hence, if India shows unconditioned positive regard towards its neighbours, it will be effectively reciprocated in due course of time.

Consumer psychologists and marketing managers often cite the case of the Hare Krishna Society

to demonstrate how reciprocity works. Members of the Hindu organization offer flowers to people in public places before asking for donations. Donations are voluntary. Yet the recipient of flowers feels obliged to donate handsomely! Such is human nature. The Gujral doctrine is a masterstroke in policy-making. By this doctrine, we do favours without demanding reciprocation. Yet, in the long run, we will be reciprocated by a subjectively equal reaction. Zardari’s recent comments on putting Kashmir on hold and release of Kashmir Singh can be viewed in this light.

A tedium-filled wait in a queue, a triumphant dash into the bus to Ooty and a huge struggle with two fat bags through an aisle crowded with people trying to go both ways, and finally I’m settled in a window seat although right above the hump of the wheel leaving me little space for bags and legs. Still, who can complain in the height of the tourist season?

People can. When a man with a gold watch settles in the seat next to me, I say with true Tamilian spirit that I would prefer a woman sitting next to me. In smooth-over-things businessman style he says he will move when a woman turns up, and settles himself comfortably.

A minute later, I’m up and running. My cell phone is missing. It must have fallen from the special slot on the outside of my handbag. I struggle through the crowded aisle again desperately looking for it; jump off the bus and look for it on the ground, and then run after the bus which has started off and leap on!

Kalyani Chidambaranathan
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The situation explained, people take the number and start calling. No results in the bus. The conductor stops the bus. About 10 men get off, we all close into the fascinated queue left standing, and everyone is ringing the number, walking up and down and waiting suspiciously for it to answer from some lout’s pocket. There is no answering call and the men climb back onto the bus, sad that they could not help this damsel in distress! Never mind that just a few minutes ago, they would have climbed over my fallen body to get themselves a seat.

They are further disappointed when they learn that it’s a low end phone that is missing. Not much drama in that. Still they discuss the modus operandi of the gang that now operates in bus stands and skims cell phones in the melee.

Every 5 minutes people try the number to locate it and disturb the thief. I am biting my finger nails now. How can I explain the loss of yet another phone to my husband? How do I get a job soon to earn money to make up for this loss? How do I turn over a new leaf and become more careful? Do I take meditation up seriously to become more calm and organised? Or should I follow higher souls and give up time-wasters like cell phones?

I borrow one from my prosperous neighbour and call home to ask them to check whether I have left it behind. He glares at me.

At a halfway stop I rush to a payphone and call again. Have they found it? They have and it seems to be ringing every third minute! I tell them to switch it off but they have no idea how to. I ask them to ignore it and rush back to the bus. I dare not confess my blunder when people are still commiserating with me. I accept all the condolences and slink back to my seat under the unpleasant eye of my neighbour.

When I get off at Ooty, the conductor calls the phone again and assures me gently that if it is still ringing I must have left it some place. Please go and check. I say yes, smile gratefully, and get off the bus thankful that such souls still exist.