Cultural roots

     People say that sport is a great leveler, I disagree. According to me, grandmothers are the greatest levelers. Who else has the nerve to call an expensive curved phone a defective piece? My grandmother, maternal to be precise, born and brought up in a small beautiful town called Kollangode in Kerala, is a seventy year old dame. Sporting a turtle framed spectacles. Long grey hair, white sari, wrinkled but beautiful skin, medium -sized temple and beautiful eyes. She definitely is a stunner at seventy, couldn’t help but imagine of how my grandfather would have been the focal point of envy among other guys in his days when he got engaged to my grandmother. Use any adjective that is synonymic to beautiful, and she would fit in.    

You guys have no idea on the number of degrees I did sitting at home. Right from entrepreneurship, interior designing, sarcasm engineering, story-telling, jugaad technology and many more. You know what an awesome student I am (55 percent aggregate with an equivalent amount of KT), I am sure you are excited to know how this child prodigy pulled it off. But be very sure that I will not let the truth spoil the beautiful journey of this twenty-four genius. Ha just kidding, well, this is how.  I did my Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics and Communication, no surprises there. Now the big question, why did a guy like me who does not know to use the television remote properly take up electronics? My mom made me believe “no engineering degree no wedding bells, no girl will ever marry a non-engineer.” Still couldn’t find the logic behind my mom tying the knot with a high school drop-out. Relatives showered support “Choose E&C you can either go into hardware or software”.  But my college called me a misfit and didn’t bother to shape me up. With nothing else to do, I chose to graduate from the university called life, since my life was already screwed (the word which rhymes with duck is what I intend to say), The University called Grandmother was the only option. Not only did this university provide me all the degrees but also fed me at regular intervals.

Most grandmothers are very knowledgeable in various fields and if you are very lucky like me, she can be a banker to the poor (me) unlike the RBI (dad) who lends to other banks (mom, uncle).

The entrepreneurship degree- the whole exercise of watching her sell old newspapers and buying new plastic items from the salesman. Sustainability- using smaller cups when the coffee made is less compared to the people present. Interior designing- getting this degree was a bit scary. I learnt this when she made my hookah pot the flower vase and placed it on the dining table with a feeling of accomplishment on her face. God was so kind that my parents were out of town during the interior designing course. But, the most important lesson is to love even the small things you do, whether making a phone call or serving people food she enjoys it every bit.

My mom caught me red handed while on a date with my girlfriend (ex now) boom started the drama, endless crying, persuasion, mental conditioning and intimidation. I decided to talk to my grandmother about it, told her how serious I am about the girl and she was more than happy to help me out. My new found love guru called my mom and had only one thing to ask “If he shouldn’t fall in love now, when should he? After becoming old like you? ”. My mom hollered “You do not know how to raise a child”. My mom should have known, never battle grandma, grandmother with her sheepish grin delivered the sucker punch “Very true, guilt surrounds me every single time I see you”. This was enough to keep my mom away from my love life forever. The sharing of my love life with my grandmother made her more comfortable in sharing her own story with me. Right from love, pain to the meals she has skipped to feed her children. This made me realize how lucky I am. To be able to eat all three meals every day is in itself a big blessing.

 Thirty-five years old, widowed, five young children to nurture. Most people would have asked for help from relatives or send their children to work. But not this Iron Lady. She had a vision, and it was to provide quality education to her children, when she herself didn’t go to school beyond the second grade. My grandmother starting her own food outlet at the age thirty-five is no less than Ray Kroc at the age fifty-two based on the influence it has brought over my family. Waking up at 4 AM in the morning and preparing the required items for the food outlet, getting her children ready early so that she could go and look after her business. Management experts say managing finances is the toughest job for any start-up, and that is her forte. No business degree, never read a management book. Was she lucky? Was she street smart? No one knows. But it is the same case with other entrepreneurs as well right. More than being called a biz woman, I would call her an awesome leader and a great observer. She is a great lover of cricket and she used to look at all the 20-20 matches and tell me if this format is like a gamble, it is better to select people who could hold their nerves than people with excellent skill. Dhoni said the same thing few months later in a post match interview. You got no idea the goose bumps I had when Dhoni said that. After three years, things started looking up. With her dynamic personality and hardworking nature success couldn’t hide itself anymore. Beyond the money, it was all about giving her children good education and getting them married to the right person. To pull off five Indian weddings is as tough as running the Kingfisher Airlines.

Be it the rhythmic snores, the curious glances at the smart phones, the way she kidnaps the sweet box inside her room, the assurance she gives to my mother, that, I was studying the whole day when all I did was watching football over her delicious bhajjis.  I love it all, so genuine and childlike. Maybe all grandmothers aren’t so much fun. But one thing they are. They are all awesome in their own right.