quidnovis61

Our neighbouring town ....yes... the same one where we always go....has a beautiful Square. It is said to be Scandinavia's largest town square. In the very centre of this large beautiful square is a hunting lodge from the early 1600s. It belonged to the local count - Count Magnus Gabriel De la Gardie. Well, it has the most fascinating architecture and looks nothing like what the words "hunting lodge" conjures up in my mind! Have a look...

Well it isn't really the hunting lodge I was going to write about... but the town square - own centre and surrounded by all the main buildings... shops, hotels, restaurants, cafés, the library, pharmacy, post office and so on...

On Wednesdays and Saturdays the town square metamorphoses into a wonderful bustling colourful Farmer's Market...and is called the Market Day. This is a common feature in Europe (not just Sweden). Its a lovely meeting place...and the sights and sounds and smells are just marvellous! What a profusion of colours!!

And being there on warm sunny days it is a pure and simple joy to enthral the most disconsolate of hearts.

Enjoy the pictures!

 

 

 

 

 

Signing off for now.

C.S!
(Cresat Scientia/ May (my) knowledge grow/Må (min) kunskap(en) växa)

Nope...I don't particularly enjoy shopping- (unless it is a book shop or  even better - a SHOE shop of course!). But a lot of exciting things happen en route to the shops and that is such a treat for the soul...

 

I have seen this van parked in the same spot a couple of times in the past 2 summers on our drives to the neighbouring town. In fact it is quite close to the "SwanLake". I never paid any attention... until this summer.... ! I think I must have taken the blue van to be forest workers or a farmer. My visits to the neighbouring town is as erratic as the van standing there and I never really thought much more about it...

Three weeks ago I actually "saw" the yellow sign saying: The Egg Van. We stopped and would you believe it??

In the middle of nowhere...

out in the country side...

on a small dirt-road...

there is this blue van!

It has a fridge mounted at the back. The door to the van is always left open. You just open the fridge and take as many cartons of eggs you want, close the fridge, put the money in a little box just by the fridge and then leave.... it is as simple as that!! And it is as amazing as that!

There is no one to check ... there are no houses nearby...there are no CCTV's....

 

(THE TINY METAL BOX FOR THE MONEY)

No one pinches the money nor steals the eggs. And there are lots of people driving on that country lane since there are small villages and farmhouses all around. Well, of course, I do not know for sure whether there are any "thefts" or not....but simple logic says that the "egg-farmer" would not be leaving his van there if the money in the little metal box did not tally with the number of cartons gone. 

The farmhouse is further down that little dirt-track. The farmer owns fields where he grows wheat/corn and he also has a number of hens and chickens. They are of course free range... and there definitely is a difference in size, colour and most importantly- taste!

 

Now a days we stop by the blue van as often as we can and buy our farm eggs. Our omelettes and boiled-eggs-on-toast now are simply delicious! I always scratch a "Thank you" on the ground and make sure we return the empty carton. It is a tiny speck in the huge spectra of recycling... and I am very happy for my palatable breakfasts!

 

Signing off for now.

C.S!
(Cresat Scientia/ May (my) knowledge grow/Må (min) kunskap(en) växa)

 +39.6ºC.

Hyderabad (in southern India) was scorching. The dry heat (RH is barely 28%) is the only thing that makes it ever so slightly bearable... had it been a coastal town I would have re-booked my tickets or just stayed indoors 24/7. However, the evenings turn relatively pleasant here  - remember, I said, relatively....which means that the temps come down to a less-scorching 34ºC or so... The pollution in the old city area is appalling. Albeit that, I like my forays into the milling, bustling, teeming street life that opens up in the glaring naked bulbs of the myriad shops noisily hugging street after street....spilling out on to the pavements. Its my own gratis Son et lumière show - a treat for the senses!

Parvez(our driver) and I went to Abids- a shopping area in the OldCity to do some shopping. The pollution...hmmm.... literally took my breath away :-/ But there were other 'treats' awaiting that far out weighed the momentary discomfort of rickety buses and auto rickshaws belching out diesel fumes - the unfortunate bane of urban India.

F.D Khan  - my favourite cloth shop - has a collection of cloths that anyone can just dream of. I of course immediately bought a beautiful piece. What is it that Oscar Wilde has so sensibly put? "The only way to be rid of a temptation is to fall for it"... How right he was. And keeping that in mind I bought that beautiful piece that would put a male peacock in dance-mode to shame.  It is, what my American friends would call: AWESOME! Yes, there were some other pretty awesome bales of cloths but I have a personal rule about falling for just ONE temptation a day :-) and so, my daily quota was up!

As is the tradition for Parvez and I - we always stop to have coconut water on our way back home. It is my all time favourite drink. It has just the right balance of sweet and salt, it is always cool no matter how hot it is outside, it is readily available in every street-road-alley corner in India, it is high on minerals and low on fat and carbohydrates  - and the best of all - it comes in its own sterile packaging. What more could one wish for?

I have learnt a lot about coconut water from Parvez.... where the best ones come from (Bangalore) and why (because of the soil and the temperate climate) and thereby most expensive but also having the most water in them... they cost a "whopping" INR 20.00 each (25 pence) as compared to the ten rupee coconuts. I have also learnt where they get the coconuts from (Rythuu-mandi which is Telegu- the local language- for Farmers market) and how much profit they make per day - it isn't really too bad as far as daily earnings go... but the discomfort of standing all day in the hot tropical sun is a tough working environment indeed... if they are lucky they might find a spot under the shade of a tree.... and the top luxury is to have a plastic chair to sit on...

One usually finds the coconut-wallahs (street-vendors) under the shade of a tree with a mound of coconuts on his cart or on the ground. Its a simple business and does not require any paraphernalia... We stopped by the coconut-wallah near the local hospital there was a tiny face with sparkling eyes and teeth looking at me and smiling from under the cart!

He said: Amandee! (Hello in Telegu).

And that was how I met Sai...!

Sai is a charming young fellow! It was a pleasure talking to him.

He asked me how many coconuts I wanted. I saw his father behind him and told him I would like two please.

But, to my astonishment, this young boy jumped up and replied he would get them for me. His father smiled benignly...

Sai could certainly wield the heavy snarling sickle-knife with great dexterity... this was clearly not the first time he was doing this!  He served it to me with a flourish and a grin on his face that seemed to say:

Oh ye of little faith! See! I could fix it, couldn't I?

 We conversed while I sipped the cool liquid that trickled down and soothed my parched throat. Sai is 12 years old. He studies in the VIII standard. And he goes to the small local school everyday except Sundays... what was most amazing was, that his school hours were 9 am to 8pm. I had no idea. It included everything... lunch, snacks, studies, exams, cricket games, playing in the courtyard - and homework for the next day! But he came every night to help his father before bed-time!

He spoke good enough English. I asked him what his favourite subjects were and pat came the reply:

Social studies: that included Geography, History and Civics! After a split second he said with a broad grin:

No...actually the best subject is Cricket! :-)

Boys will be boys!

He told me about his friends... he told me about the innings he had made...he told me about the bigger boys who were stronger and faster... he told me about how he had caught the ball once and the other team was out!... he told me how good he was at "spinning the ball"...he spoke animatedly in cricket-speak that I have long since forgotten... arm ball/spin off/hat trick/LBW/innings...and so on. He jolted memories and sent me spinning 45 years back in time when these words too came naturally to me... when running out into the field, or the cantonment park or the street outside the house meant a few hours of cricket-fun with friends before it was time for home work... I went reeling back all those years as I saw myself in his eyes... it was a run down memory lane - cricket bat, ball, shin pads and stumps in hand.

I remember seeing a cricket cartoon from the July 1920 issue of Punch:

Young Cricketer. "Yes, I cocked one off the splice in the gully and the blighter gathered it."
Father. "Yes, but how did you get out? Were you caught, stumped, bowled, or what?"

I smiled into the warm night in misty nostalgic remembrance....

And what did he want to be when he grew up? He didn't really know he said. Maybe a cricketer! Then he changed his mind and said that would not be possible... so he would settle for being a police.

And then he thought for a while again and said... Nooo, actually what he really wanted to be was to be a teacher in Social studies. He would like to go to the nearby villages and teach them Geography. He would tell them of all the beautiful places there were in the world (=Itna sab sundar sundar jagha hai, he explained in Hindi)...of maps and capitals and rivers and mountains and villages and towns and the people and transportation and clouds and lakes ... and then he would teach them Civics - our duties as a citizen, the government and politics.

There was so much compassion in his voice.

There was Will. There was Hope. There was Determination. There was Idealism.

In young voices like his resides the future of India. From humble beginnings to wanting to teach others to be better - not to hunger just for monetary gains and riches. Education is the key to many of our problems that fester and corrode the very structure of our society - any society.

That evening, leaning against the car, sipping cool coconut water in the dark hot tropical night, I found Hope. Maybe a lot will change in young Sai's life - maybe he won't be able to realise his dreams and ambitions. I don't know. I may never meet him again. I can but hope and pray that Sai and other young people like Sai in India and elsewhere will be able to lead a rich and fulfilling life - educating others and getting educated themselves in the process. Of having their dreams come true.

(I met him once more before I left India)

I wished my coconut water would have lasted even longer...He smiled and waved as he carted away the old coconuts on his trolley - and disappeared into the velvety night in the bustling alley by our flat....

Signing off for now.

C.S!
(Cresat Scientia/ May knowledge grow/Må kunskapen växa)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the way to our neighbouring town (where we go weekly, mainly for shopping or to the town square for the open air market held there twice a week or sometimes just to a cafeteria...) there is a pond. It is quite a "new" pond... and it is a beautiful pond. Just about 5-6 years ago there was only a stream running through the field. There were marshy lands around the stream and beautiful reeds and tall grasses surrounding it. There was an abundance of dragonflies and damselflies flitting about and their shimmering wings on sunny days were like pieces of prisms hanging in midair... there were plenty of other insects as well... lacewings, various moths and other insects that I do not know the names of. I am sure there were (are) numerous fishes, frogs, salamanders...and so on in the stream. It was teeming with life...

The stone bridge across the stream is so beautiful. A work of art in its own right... Most of these stone bridges in Sweden are from 1600-something.

(Notice the pheasant in the background...)

Who built these beautiful small bridges? They conjure up images of life in the 17th century. Families crossing on carts, wives bringing food to the men during harvesting season, young children playing and throwing stones, cows coming home lowing in the sunset, geese squawking in seemingly constant trepidation, hunters returning in the late evenings and tired farmers trudging home to the pale candlelight coming from the cottage in the gathering dusk... And this link to the past is more than just a stone bridge in the middle of a field...

A few years ago we found that the marshy area was getting filled with water...The local farmer had slowly let it "happen naturally" over the years creating an amazing ecological balance and just look at it now! It is replete with fish-insect-and bird-life. On the other side there is a picnic table and one may cut across his field to have a picnic and enjoy the tranquillity of this rural boon.

A month or so ago we were on our way to shop in the neighbouring town and we saw a lone swan on a slab of stone. The most common swans in Sweden are the Mute Swans.He was a very proud young man and simply refused to look into my camera - we tried all the tricks like banging the car door and making squawking noises but he was certainly made of sterner stuff - he kept his head turned away from the paparazzi no matter how hard I tried to catch his attention. It was a male swan. (They are called cob, from Middle English cobbewhich means leader of a group). Well...little did I know that he was a soon-Daddy-to-be Swan keeping vigil...

I found that out two weeks later when we were returning from our shopping spree - I just saw a flash of white among the reeds. We turned the car around and headed back to see what it was that I had seen...and there she was!! A Mummy Swan (they are called pens). And she was breeding her eggs, nicely hidden away in the reeds. I took many photos of Mrs. Swan placidly sitting unperturbed on her nest. Mr. Swan was swimming close by quietly and stoically keeping watch. I wish I knew how many eggs she was hatching! Oh what joy!! Soon there would be a few cute fluffy little things to look at on the pond!!!

(We just call them Mr & Mrs Swan. Swans mate for life spend their lives together - how many years had they been 'married'? How had they met? How did they decide to get together?)

I was delighted to see Mr & Mrs Swan again... the pond was so beautiful with the sky reflecting blue and the reeds making such pretty patterns...there were a few gulls making a raucous and ducks swimming around. They made us all laugh by diving into the water, doing "somersaults" with their backside wriggling in the air!

 And then on Wednesday two weeks later we went shopping again...past the same fields, the same pond, the same bridge, and of course, Mr and Mrs Swan - and lo and behold!

THE LITTLE SWANLINGS had come!!!!! (or cygnets as they are actually called) ....Wowwwwww...eight fluffy grey wonders to cheer me up on my drive....going shopping now is suddenly such unadulterated pleasure.

AND...here of course are a few "family photos" of Mr & Mrs Swan and their eight cygnets......

Signing off for now.

C.S!
(Cresat Scientia/ May knowledge grow/Må kunskapen växa)

Today I ditched fancy-nancy Khan Market. I went instead to the tiny “un-glamorous” vegetable shop behind the house thru a picturesque gully on to a road with life tumbling out of every corner… entrepreneurship and one-man/family businesses to shame any European country… The gully (alley) is teeming with life. People live there in tiny brick-cement houses painted in garish greens and loud blues with paint spilling over on to the ground in great gashes. Fairy lights adorn the walls that I am sure blink in various hues when darkness falls.  

A few little girls of 5 or 6 years play in the front between the “houses” in the gully. They have a worn skipping rope and seem to have loads of fun with it, jumping in and hopping out with squeals of delight - or sighs as they get caught in the twirling rope.

Good Moooornning Aunty they cry in unison when they see me coming.

Good morning girls! I say. Have you been to school today?

Yes Aunty they say again in unison.

Very good girls, I say. Have you done your homework?

No Aunty, all of them in same high pitched voices.

Ok I say, play for a bit now but then do your home work Ok?

Yes Aunty ok! A

nd I say Bye now!

And they all say Byeeee Aunty and wave.

I go on walking with a smile on my lips and their voices ringing in my ears. 

The dhobi walla (washerman) in the corner is busy washing clothes, thrashing them nearly threadbare on a slab of stone…dare any germ stay alive after that vicious beating? A young boy with a cycle cart peels oranges. He has an ancient “juicer” with a hand crank which I am sure is a legacy from the British Raj. As he peels the oranges for fresh juice and waits for his customers he hums a tune to himself. I am sure it’s from the latest Bollywood SRK-film. (Shah Rukh Khan is known as SRK in India). The warm sunny tranquil morning is filled with the tangy smell of oranges and my mouth involuntarily starts to water… 

Then I meet Sushila.

She is sitting on a very low rough wooden stool wearing a lovely bright blue sari embroidered with gold, her back to the sun, her face shielded from the rays. She has a charpoy (the traditional rope bed woven on four wooden legs) by her side. A moss-green satin cloth covers it and on top of it is strewn wheat. Golden dusky yellow wheat. The explosion of colours takes my breath away.

I stop and smile at her. I ask her what she is doing. She has got a whole sack of wheat delivered to her, she says. She spreads them on the charpoy to “kill the germs” in the warm sunshine. She takes a handful at a time on a stainless steel plate and cleans them – sorting sorting sorting with great dexterity. She throws away the tiny stones that I can barely see, that get in the wheat when threshed. When she has cleaned it, it is re-packed and sent away “somewhere” (she didn’t know where) to be ground into flour, put in packets and sold in the shops.

I told her I had never seen this. And she said You don’t live in Hindusthan (India). How will you see such things? I have not seen anything of your outside-country (bahar ka desh/foreign country).We talked amiably and laughed. Where are you going, she asked me? I said I was going to buy some vegetables in the shop on the road. Yes he is good she said. We parted. 

In the “compound” next to her, under shady trees and a lovely clean courtyard are two young women sitting on their haunches. They are sisters-in-law.

They have a similar charpoy of wheat warming in the sun but they are sitting and sorting methi and coriander leaves talking in low tones and laughing.

I greet them and they tell me what they are doing, how to preserve the herbs, how long it will last and so on. We talk a bit. They laugh (very kindly) at my coriander-ignorance and astonishment. How can an Indian woman NOT know about such things, I am sure they are musing. We part company. 

I went past the barber in the corner waiting for customers, the gruesome tools of his trade neatly put on a rickety ledge on the wall, a plywood chair cushioned in white plastic. A pock marked mirror that has surely seen better days hangs lopsided on a rusty nail on the wall. He half smiled in greeting, a bit unsure.

By the vegetable shop is a husband-and-wife team. They were making daal (lentil soup), cabbage and rice. Later she will also make fried noodles. There will be quite a crowd in this street-side restaurant in a couple of hours. I have seen it. It smells tantalizingly good…How I wish I could taste...I would love to… but with a clinically squeaky-clean Swedish stomach this would be disastrous. Alas…

The vegetable shop owner greeted me with familiarity. I have been there thrice before… so he knows me.

Good Morning Memsahab! Good morning I say… What do you need today Memsahab? He gives me a cane tray so I may choose my veggies from his racks. I really don’t have that much to buy today but I take 500gm onions, 500 gms tomatoes, a packet of mushrooms, a small head of cauliflower, a papaya (approx 950 gms) and say Thank you, that’s all for today. And he counts…it is easy maths as they are all Rs10/ kg or Rs 20/kg and so on (even I could do it) …The grand total comes to INR 88.00 He puts in (for FREE!!) a few bundles of coriander leaves and a huge handful of chillies. I protest saying I don’t eat chillies, no point giving me chillies! He lessens the amount to half and says, Take a little bit with you memsahab! It will make your daal taste very good. I say, Oh, ok then….thank you!

I pop in at his neighbours’ – Darshan Store. It is a mini store with mega things. Every inch of his shelves are crammed with the most astonishing things. I buy, on an impulse Haldiram’s Khatta Meetha snacks, a small packet for INR 10.00 for my afternoon tea and a loaf of Britannia bread.

On my way back the barber has a customer in the chair and one waiting on the dusty ground. He is busy shaving his customer with a dreadful looking scalpel… I shudder, glad to be a woman.

Sushila sees me coming and smiles a beautiful smile of pearly white teeth.

So what did you buy? Did you get all you needed?

Yes I said, I did! I bought onions and cauliflower and tomatoes! Shall I get you a chair, do you want to sit in the sun? I have a “proper chair” inside. You dont have to sit on a low stool.

I felt a lump in my throat… I would have loved to sit there and talk to this kind young woman laboriously happily working with minute particles of stones in the comfortable sun. But I told her I had to go as my Uncle would get worried if I didn’t come home on time (which was the absolute truth) and how will lunch get ready, Sushila, if all the onions are in my bag here? We laughed. I said Bye and that she should remain safe and happy. I would see her again in 3 months I said. You come anytime. I am right here, she said.

It was like a blessing. 

Next time I buy a gaily coloured packet of rye flour (atta) in the super market I will think of Sushila in a bright blue sari who kindly and painstakingly cleaned it, sitting in the delightful winter sun in an old forgotten alley in Delhi, laughing and talking. Sharing her life with me...

Today I got more than just a string bag full of vegetables. 

I got blessed.

Signing off for now.

C.S!
(Cresat Scientia/ May knowledge grow/Må kunskapen växa)