ABERDEEN AND THE AFTERMATH

My friend Dr. James Dodgson, and I were travelling in a Rajdhani Express from New Delhi to Calcutta. He was on his way to a medical seminar in Bangkok and was breaking his journey to spend a few days with my family. We could not get a flight because of fog in Delhi and other technical snags. Early next morning the train stopped somewhere in Bihar. Looking out I saw scores of people defecating on and near the tracks unmindful of their proximity to one another and also to the train.  I did not want Dodgson to see that and I hastily drew the curtains. But he drew them aside and asked, “Som, what are these people doing?” I said, “They are answering a call to nature”, as is euphemistically described in India. “Ah, Nature worshippers”, he said to which I had to reply, “No, they are just crapping.” He was much surprised. Well, this is a blot on India, but we can’t do much about it till the common people are provided with toilets.

Dodgson was my classmate in the Royal College of Surgeons in Edinburgh. He is a Scot from Glasgow, about 6’ 4” and weighing around 100 kg. He was always called Simpkins; how the name came up we don’t know. There were five of us, my childhood friend Ashish Bannerji (now my brother-in-law) and two others who always stuck together. Everyone would have been ready to lay down his life for the other four. We used to go to Aberdeen, a sea port on the east coast for our holidays. In Aberdeen we could get the most awesome dark ale and affordable fish and chips. On one of our trips, Simpkins got into conversation with the bar maid and drank an enormous amount of ale. These bar maids are given incentive to make the customers drink as much as possible without them getting drunk and abusive. There were a couple of bouncers who could throw even Simpkins head over heels if he misbehaved. When we realized that Simpkins was breaching the limit we left the bar. Then there was a problem. He wanted to empty his bladder and could not find a toilet. In Aberdeen there are underground toilets which can be accessed by a flight of stairs at the edge of pavements. These are marked for “Men” and “Ladies”. Simpkins dived down one such toilet and we were horrified to find that he had gone down a “Ladies”. In a couple of minutes, two ladies came running up crying, “Help, help”. Soon Simpkins himself came up holding his trousers half-way up. The cries of the ladies attracted the attention of two cops who had just turned the corner. They ran up and caught Simpkins who tripped himself with his pants. Crying, “Hey, we caught you feller, didn’t we! Now come with us to the station and if you make trouble we will knock you down.” They marched him along to the police station. The four of us marched behind them. At the station there was a sergeant (something like our sub-inspector) and to him the cops said, “We caught this feller misbehaving in a “Ladies” and two ladies were crying aloud that they were attacked by him.” Just then the sergeant got a phone call. Making sit in a corner guarded by the two cops, he rushed off saying he would be back in a few minutes.

This was a serious matter for us. Attacking ladies in a “Ladies” was a serious crime and attracted prison sentences and heavy fines. Any one reading Wodehouse books must have found how a few members of the Drones Club were hauled up before the Beak for stealing policemen’s helmets and so on. Perhaps, because there was no evidence about the ladies were physically assaulted, he would be charged with ‘misbehaviour’ and ‘misdemeanour’ and not violent crime. That would attract only heavy fine. I thought of the scenario next morning when Dodgy would be produced before the magistrate, known as the Beak in common parlance in Britain. There would be a few cases and then Simpkins would appear with the two cops. One of the cops would report, “M’lord, last evening Thomas here and I hearing the cries for help from two respectable ladies at the “Ladies” at the corner of South Main Street rushed to their help and caught this man Dodgson red-handed. He was fully drunk up to his gills.” (That would be a lie; they didn’t catch him, he tripped up getting mixed up with his pants). The Beak would look down at Simpkins and ask him,”Dodgson, you had a hilarious evening yesterday, disturbing the peace in the city and attacking respectable ladies. How do you feel now; have you regained your senses?” Simpkins would reply, “Fine, M’lord, thank you” .The Beak would say, “Exactly what I have in my mind; Ten Pounds. Next case.”

This was the scenario we expected. But we did not have 10 Pounds, only about three pounds and ten shillings in cash. We had our five watches, but no Scottish pawnbroker would give more than a pound each for them. How could we extricate Simpkins from this mess we did not know. Should we go to our regular bar and ask for a loan stating that we lost our money to a pickpocket and we would return it as soon as we reach Edinburgh. That was a highly unlikely possibility. Then a sudden idea struck me. The sergeant had returned and was writing down the details of Simpkins’ case. I told him, “Officer, this fellow Simpkins, sorry, Dodgson is a cancer patient. He has bladder cancer and that was why he could not control himself and had to rush down a toilet before he noticed it was a “Ladies”.  He needs special medication that is available only in Edinburgh. If you keep him in a cell tonight, you may find him a dead man in the morning.” The sergeant asked, “Who says so?” I showed him my ID card of the RCS, Edinburgh with my photo and name of Dr. Soumya Roi, M.S. The sergeant examined it for a few minutes and took his time before saying, “You can take him away. But if he makes any more trouble we will arrest all of you.”

Thus were we released from the clutches of the Law. On the way to the station, Simpkins said, “Let us celebrate this with a drink”. We held on to him tightly, two on each side and marched him off to the station, found our train and safely reached Edinburgh. By a strange twist of irony, Simpkins is now an eminent urologist and has his consulting rooms in Harley Street, London. He is also “By Appointment to Her Majesty’s Service, Consultant Physician to the Royal Household”. He has been given O.B.E and is expecting a Knighthood in the near future, he will be Sir James Dodgson, O.B.E.

In the Rajdhani Express, Simpkins said, “Som, old boy, I will always be grateful to you for rescuing me from those cops in Aberdeen.” I asked, “Simpkins, do you really treat the Queen?” Simpkins replied, “Not the old hag, but old Phil. He has as much difficulty in emptying his bladder as I had in retaining it in Aberdeen. We laughed.

MACHU PICCHU PART - 2

PART 2

"We enter with reverence because all here is sacred."

 

The months of December, January & February are traditionally known as the wet season in the highlands of Peru. Last year the rains started early in November and the rains in January were the heaviest for the last 25 years. As a result, the rivers in the Cusco region were swollen and burst their banks flooding adjacent low-lying villages causing damage to bridges and the railway line between Aguas Calientes (the town closet to Machu Picchu) and Ollantaytambo. The only way for visitors to get from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Calientes is by train. Damage to the track on the 24 January left nearly 1500 tourists stranded in the town of Aguas Calientes. There has been no damage to Machu Picchu itself or to the Inca Trail. The road from Machu Picchu down to the bridge crossing the River Vilcanota appears to be in good condition as does the bridge itself. There is damage to the road running parallel to the river from the bridge to Aguas Calientes which may take until mid-March to repair. The railway to Aguas Calientes will be open from the beginning of April and access via road between Hidro-Electrica and Santa Maria will take at least 2 months to repair because of the need to construct two tunnels to help stabilize this section of the road. This effectively means that there will be no way to get to and from Machu Picchu until the beginning of April.

This was the situation we faced while trying to get to Machu Picchu from Cusco. Thanks to Colonel Javier Alva, we were able to get on to a carriage on a rail test run to Aguas Calientes from the starting point of the railway at Poroy, about 15 minutes drive from Cusco. Actually, Machu Picchu is at a lower altitude to Cusco, which is at 3,600 metres (11,800 ft) above sea level, while Machu Picchu is at 2,430 metres (7,970 ft) a.s.l. The train runs mostly on a flat track, but the view is fantastic. At a few points, it is right at the edge of the cliff and the valley far below is about 2000 feet below. There are terraced fields which protect rainwater run-off and saves the top soil of the mountains. The train we travelled ran slowly to test the track and to inspect the bridges and we had plenty of time to enjoy the scenery. Finally after about four hours we reached the small town of Aguas Calientes, 104 kms from Poroy. In the small town are lodges and restaurants for the tourist, but most of them were closed now. A couple of shops were open and we bought some bread and sausages and water bottles. From the town we had to trek about 6 kms to Machu Picchu along a winding trail. The two soldiers who were escorting us also came with us. We had to spend the night right on Machu Picchu, a privilege only very few could expect.

Machu Picchu, in the Quechua language, still used in Peru means "Old Peak". It is a pre-Columbian Inca site located 2,430 metres (7,970 ft) above sea level. It is situated on a mountain ridge above the Urubamba Valley, which is 80 kilometres (50 mi) northwest of Cusco and through which the Urubamba River flows. Most archaeologists believe that Machu Picchu was built as an estate for the Inca emperor Pachacuti (1438–1472). Often referred to as "The Lost City of the Incas", it is perhaps the most familiar icon of the Inca World

Machu Picchu was constructed around 1450, at the height of the Inca Empire, but it was abandoned as an official site for the Inca rulers a century later at the time of the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire. The Conquistadors defaced sacred rocks in other locations but they are untouched at Machu Picchu.  Although known locally, it was unknown to the outside world before being brought to international attention in 1911 by the American historian Hiram Bingham of Yale University. Since then, Machu Picchu has become an important tourist attraction.

Machu Picchu was designated as a World Heritage Site in 1983 when it was described as "an absolute masterpiece of architecture and a unique testimony to the Inca civilization" On July 7, 2007, Machu Picchu was voted as one of the New Seven Wonders of the World. The World Monuments Fund placed Machu Picchu on its 2008 Watch List of the 100 Most Endangered Sites in the world.

The Inca builders knew how to construct buildings which are quake proof. The central buildings of Machu Picchu use the classical Inca architectural style of polished dry-stone walls of regular shape. The Incas were masters of this technique, called ashlar, in which blocks of stone are cut to fit together tightly without mortar. The Incas were among the best stone masons the world has seen, and many junctions are so perfect that it is said not even a blade of grass fits between the stones.

Some Inca buildings were constructed using mortar, but by Inca standards this was quick, shoddy construction, and was not used in the building of important structures. Peru is a highly seismic land, and mortar-free construction was more earthquake-resistant than using mortar. The stones of the dry-stone walls built by the Incas can move slightly and resettle without the walls collapsing. Inca walls show numerous design details that also help protect them from collapsing in an earthquake. Doors and windows are trapezoidal and tilt inward from bottom to top; corners usually are rounded; inside corners often incline slightly into the rooms; and "L"-shaped blocks often were used to tie outside corners of the structure together. These walls do not rise straight from bottom to top but are offset slightly from row to row. The Incas never used the wheel in any practical manner. Its use in toys demonstrates that the principle was well-known to them, although it was not applied in their engineering. The lack of strong draft animals as well as terrain and dense vegetation issues may have rendered it impractical. How they moved and placed enormous blocks of stones remains a mystery, although the general belief is that they used hundreds of men to push the stones up inclined planes. A few of the stones still have knobs on them that could have been used to lever them into position; it is believed that after the stones were placed, the Incas would have sanded the knobs away, but a few were overlooked.

The space is composed of 140 structures or features, including temples, sanctuaries, parks, and residences that include houses with thatched roofs. There are more than one hundred flights of stone steps–often completely carved from a single block of granite–and a great number of water fountains that are interconnected by channels and water-drains perforated in the rock that were designed for the original irrigation system. Evidence has been found to suggest that the irrigation system was used to carry water from a holy spring to each of the houses in turn. According to archaeologists, the urban sector of Machu Picchu was divided into three great districts: the Sacred District, the Popular District to the south, and the District of the Priests and the Nobility.

Located in the first zone are the primary archaeological treasures: the Intihuatana, the Temple of the Sun and the Room of the Three Windows. These were dedicated to Inti, their sun god and greatest deity. The Popular District, or Residential District, is the place where the lower class people lived. It includes storage buildings and simple houses. In the royalty area, a sector that existed for the nobility includes a group of houses located in rows over a slope, the residence of the Amautas (wise persons) was characterized by its reddish walls, and the zone of the Ñustas (princesses) had trapezoid-shaped rooms. The Monumental Mausoleum is a carved statue with vaulted interior and carved drawings.
The Intihuatana stone is one of many ritual stones in South America. The Spanish did not find Machu Picchu so the Intihuatana Stone was not destroyed as many other ritual stones in Peru were. At midday on March 21 and September 21, the equinoxes, the sun stands almost above the pillar—casting no shadow at all. Researchers believe that it was built as an astronomic clock or calendar.

In 1912 and 1914–15, Bingham excavated the treasures from Machu Picchu—ceramic vessels, silver statues, jewelry and human bones—and took them from Peru to Yale University in the United States for further study for a period of 18 months. Yale has retained the artifacts until now under the argument that Peru didn't have the infrastructure or proper conditions to take care of the pieces. The National Geographic Society, which co-sponsored Bingham’s explorations, has acknowledged that the artifacts were taken on loan and is committed to seeing them returned to Peru.

Vicky, Ashy and I spent the evening walking around the structures. By then the sun had set and we found a couple of shelters to spend the night. The two soldiers used one of them and we three the other. Soon the equatorial darkness set in and the twinkling stars over head were like diamonds in the sky. We made a fire from the shrubs growing at the edges and heating the bread and sausages, we had a good dinner. It was bitterly cold, but we had warm clothes and blankets in our knapsacks. We sat under the stars and talked about the wonders of the world. Finally we slept on the stone floor of the shelter and slept well. Early morning brought another marvellous sight with the sun flooding the structures with a magical light. Then we trekked back to Aguas Calientes and had breakfast in a restaurant which was open. The train was about to start on its return journey at 9 AM. We got into it and returned to Cusco.

We went to meet Colonel Javier and found him absolutely fit and healthy. He gave us all the details and photographs which are being used in this blog. At noon, we travelled to Lima, the capital of Peru. It is a great city, but beautifully laid out. We spent the night there and took the morning flight to Buenos Aires.

MACHU PICCHU - PART 1

Introduction by Caroline Bennett: This was a post in Uncle Gaurav Karunakar's previous blog: PAMMIE'S WORLD. This was posted by Soumya Roi in April 2010. I requested Uncle to repost it now. Now let us get back to the blog itself.

Magnificent Machu Picchu (By Soumya Roi)

Ever since my tenth birthday when I got a geography picture book from my parents, I have had a wish to go to Machu Picchu, the Lost City of the Incas in Peru, South America. The opportunity came when along with my brothers-in-law Vicky and Ashish, I went last month to Chile for relief work for the quake victims there. After we finished our work, we had plenty of time in our hands and Peru being so near to Chile, we decided to go there. We travelled north from Santiago and arrived in the town of Cusco, the region where Machu Picchu is situated, but were told that no tourists were allowed to go there, because of the dislocation of the railway line due to the rain havoc in January. The road is also blocked due to landslides. The only other mode of travelling there was by walking along a jungle trail for four days with the help of an experienced guide. We were disappointed that after coming all the way to Peru, we could not go to Machu Picchu.

Peru is a democratic republic, bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia ad on the south by Chile. On the west is the Pacific Ocean and the land rises towards the snow-clad Andes in the east. Huascaran is the second highest peak, 6,788 metres (22,205 ft) in the Andes. Peru has the fourth largest tropical rain forest in the world after Brazil, Congo and Indonesia. The main language spoken is Spanish. Peru has a high Human Development Index, much more than that of India.

We stayed at the very decent Inkatera Hotel at Cusco, hoping to get special permission to proceed further. We met the Garrison Commander, Colonel Javier Alva Giampictri and told him that we were quake relief workers from the U.S. and requested him if he would allow us to go to Machu Picchu, even if we had to trek for a couple of days. The conversation was mainly carried on between Vicky and the Colonel. Vicky speaks fluent Spanish, while Ashy and I can manage a little bit. The Colonel was sympathetic to our cause, but he cited rules and regulations from the higher-ups. When we were talking to him, we noticed a growth on the right side of his neck about the size of a small lemon. It was just below his right ear. It must have been very inconvenient for him as well as being a disfigurement.  Ashy told Vicky to ask the Colonel about the lump and how long he had been having it. He replied that he was having it for about fifteen years and it had gradually become bigger and bigger. Ashy requested him to allow him to examine it. He gave his card and the Colonel was mightily impressed. He said that he was planning to go to the U.S. for surgical removal of it. There were few doctors in Peru and also in the neighbouring countries, who could treat him and that it would require a lot of money to go to the U.S. and to have treatment there. Ashy offered to remove the growth surgically then and there. It would not take more than an hour at the local hospital. The Colonel was in two minds, whether to accept Ashy’s offer or if it would be too risky. Finally after discussing the matter for some time, the Colonel agreed to accept Ashy’s offer. So, in the afternoon, we all went to the local hospital. It was much cleaner and better organised than most Indian hospitals in our second tier cities. I was Ashy’s assistant. We took an X-Ray and after administering a local anesthetic and a sedative, Ashy began his operation. It is always a delight to see Ashy performing his surgery. With delicate, neat strokes he opened the skin and soon removed the lump, sutured the blood vessels and stitched it up. It did not appear to be a malignant growth, but we took a sample for analysis later in the bio lab. After putting on a dressing on the wound and setting up drips, we came out. The whole operation took about forty minutes. The Colonel was still drowsy and sleeping peacefully.

Frankly speaking, it was a risky operation. The Internal Carotid Artery and the External Jugular veins lie just half an inch below the lump. A careless jab with the scalpel would have resulted in a disaster. That was why most surgeons were hesitant to carry out the surgery. I have heard of an inexperienced doctor trying to carry out an appendicitis operation. He mistook the inferior vena cava to be the appendix and cut it out. Blood spurted up to the ceiling and the patient got drowned in his own blood. But Ashy is made of sterner stuff. He is supremely confident and knows the anatomy of the body like the back of his hand. His students at the University of Minnesota worship him. Pannu is another such great surgeon. She can divide a human hair lengthwise into two halves. I can never reach their levels.

Vicky was waiting outside and was also very nervous and a little bit pessimistic. He said that if the Colonel had died or had serious problems, we three would be marched off to the nearest cliff and executed by a firing squad. “You know what happened to Che Guevara”, he said and concluded with the view,” I may not be able to see my forthcoming baby”. He might have been joking. I told him not to worry. Peru was a decent democratic country, much more peaceful than India. Perhaps we would be sent to a prison and a prison life with the clean air and with a view of the Andes would be better than living in Delhi.  Only Colombia in South America was having a lot of trouble due to the drug trade. In Chile, since the days of Augusto Pinochet after he overthrew Salvador Allende with the help of the CIA, there were no dictators in South America, who would torture and execute ordinary citizens. I added that the Colonel would be up and about in a couple of hours. True to my statement, the Colonel woke up a couple of hours later and had no trouble at all. Ashy gave him another sleeping pill and allowed him to go to sleep again. We told the nursing staff to keep watch and if there was any problem to the Colonel’s breathing and a drop in his blood pressure to contact us immediately at the hotel nearby.

Early next morning, a message came from the Colonel asking us to meet him at the hospital. Vicky was in tenterhooks, not knowing what the outcome would be, whether to be shot or to be conferred with gifts. There he was smiling and shook hands with us. There was no swelling on his neck, only the piece of dressing on his neck. We examined the wound and it was quite healthy. He told us that he had no pain. We changed the dressing and finding his condition to be perfect discharged him from the hospital. He profusely thanked us. We could see that he was as pleased as punch. He might have been thinking that his problem had been solved in a jiffy and that he had saved a lot of money by not having to go to the U.S. for his surgery. He went back to his military quarters and invited us three to have breakfast with him. We had a nice breakfast with bread, butter, cheese, eggs and the best coffee we had for a long time. He gave each one of us two medallions, one of the emblem of Peru and the other that of Cusco region. Then he told us that a railway train was being test run to Machu Picchu in a couple of hours and asked if we were prepared to go there. He said that it was quite risky, the line having been laid new. We accepted the offer with alacrity. Two hours later we were on the railway guard’s coach attached to a locomotive chugging its way up to Machu Picchu. He also provided us with an escort of two soldiers.

What a wonderful sight awaited us when we reached there after a thrilling ride of five hours! I will write later about that fantastic experience. 

Terraced fields in Machu Picchu

OF FAKE SWAMIS AND AFTER-SHAVES

A highway robber became a sage. Was he masquerading as a sage to deceive people? No, he became Valmiki (the man from ant-hills) and wrote the Ramayana. Let us get back to the blog. 

Pammie was in a belligerent mood. She threw down the newspaper she was glancing through and exclaimed,” I want to hang every fake swami on the lamp posts on a long stretch of road. It will be known as Gallows Street or Jack Ketch Avenue”

I said, “You are dashing my hopes to the ground”.

She looked at me with those smouldering eyes which were reminiscent of the fire-breathing Chinese dragons. A fake swami or two coming in the line of fire would have been vapourised in a matter of seconds. She asked, “Who is dashing your hopes to the ground?”

“I was thinking of growing a beard, putting on saffron robes and turning into a swami. It is the most respected profession at present apart from being a politician. But I do not want to make a vertical exit from this world according to your plans”.

“Vertical or horizontal is not the issue. Really, these swamis deserve much more drastic punishments like garroting or quartering which were used in old days. But what will happen to the after-shaves I gave you, if you are going to grow a beard? I gave you Ralph Lauren, Dunhill Limited Edition, Jean Philippe Imperial and other high quality stuff and not the cheap ones you see advertised on TV and newspaper supplements. I shopped for them in Fifth Avenue in New York, Penhaligon in London and Sephora at Avenue de Champs-Elysees in Paris. And I think I gave you some beautiful shirts and other things as well. They will not go down well with your saffron robes.”

(To tell the truth, if I have a weakness, it is for deodorants and after-shaves, only the best will do and Pammie had provided me with these) 

“Thank you for those lovely things. But I will have to regret not using them. But I can bring up these beautiful bottles from my stomach and offer them to my favourite devotees, who are clean-shaven, when they come to seek my blessings.”

“You will need special training for doing that. Perhaps you can go to Serengeti and meet the wild dogs and plead with them to teach you about regurgitation. That is how they feed their very young. The wolves in Alaska do the same, but you cannot go there dressed in your saffron robes. You will be turned into an orange ice pillar”

Pammie was a wildlife enthusiast and knew more about wild animals than the forest officers and guides making the present Tiger Census.

I said, “But there are other compensations for eschewing the products of luxury. I will have devotees ready to serve me in whatever way I want them to. I get cramps in my legs during the night. It will be nice to have a female to massage my legs and give the regular doses of vitamins I take.”

“What you will need under those circumstances is not a vitamin tablet, but another one, the name of which also begins with Vi………..”

‘Tut tut. What a way to talk to elders!”

“I don’t consider you as an elder any more. You are a fake swami. Perhaps even school girls know more about that tablet I mentioned than I do”

“The truth is that there has been a drastic fall in moral standards. In my new avatar as a seer, I will strive to raise the moral standards of everyone in the world. You will see the whole world at my feet improving their minds by every passing minute.

“What we will see will be a media telecast of a video on your sleazy activities and nice families watching a proper movie will be stunned to see an unwanted interlude midway. That is what happened to my friend Nirupama the other day. Her children were shell-shocked to see what came on the screen. She said it was most ‘disturbing’. She has sold off her TV. We don’t want to see any such stuff.”

“In the most unlikely event of such a telecast, I can say that I was in a trance and did not know what was happening because I was in samadhi. I will say that frequently my soul disengages from my body and goes off in search of the eternal truth. That was what happened to Adi Sankara of Kaladi. Having acquired all the knowledge available in those days – not much, I am afraid-, he still had not experienced the carnal pleasures of the mundane world. He was visiting a kingdom and found that the king had suddenly expired and the queen was in mourning. He made of this opportunity with his quick thinking. He went into samadhi and detaching his soul from his body, entered the dead body of the king thereby reviving him, albeit for a few days. The queen was delighted and had a second honeymoon with her king, but really with Adi Sankara. After a few days he resumed his own body, leaving the king as dead as before he played the dirty trick. No one dares question this piece of historical truth.”

Pammie appeared to have been stunned by my deep knowledge of religious history and my eloquence. For a moment she had nothing to say.

I continued,” But finding a convincing explanation for a particular situation I may be facing needs some time, which I may find by going to Haridwar or Timbuktu.  But I will also prevent Trojans entering my camp. Security will be tightly enforced. Days will be passed with devotees thronging about to see me in my saffron robes and at night it will be peaceful to go to sleep listening to Mozart and Haydn, while having a massage.”

“Ha-ha! Mozart and Haydn along with your favourite Kenny G will not be heard in your so called ashram. Most of the time you will be listening to the chanting of the Vedas and bhajans.”

“Oh, my god! I did not think of that. I cannot endure that for five minutes. Thank you so much for reminding me that the best things in life are free. I think I will have to give up my plans. Are you happy now?”

“I am perfectly happy, my Guruji!”

HOW TO SAVE THE 1411 TIGERS IN INDIA?

My niece Pammie said,” Just 1411 are left”

I said,” yes and no”.

She asked, “What do you mean by saying ‘yes’ and ‘no’? I said that only 1411 tigers are left in India. That is what everybody else is saying.”

The conversation went on like this:

“You are repeating parrot-like what M.S. Dhoni, Baichung Bhutia and a few film actors say on TV. Yes, I have heard it, but No, the number 1411 is highly inflated like the Indian economy. The correct figure may be around 411.

“Don’t say so. You want to make me cry.”

“I don’t. The number 1411 rings a bell. Yes, when I was very young and had fever – which was quite often – my mother used to apply a muslin cloth soaked in a bowlful of water and eau-de-cologne on my forehead. The brand of eau-de-cologne was 4711 – Four Seven Eleven – and it came from France. 4711 was the number of a house on Champs Elysee in Paris where this was manufactured. That was during Napoleon’s time. It came in lovely crystal bottles.”

“Your mother must have kept oodles of the stuff, considering that you always had a feverish brain.”

I disregarded her snide, sarcastic and provocative statement and continued,” What do you feel about the saving of the Tiger?”

“I feel that I should do something about it. Shall I go on an indefinite fast?”

“Who cares about your fasting or feasting? Are you like the politicians who have many goons to set buses on fire and destroy public property?”

“I am not a politician and I will never be one.”

“I like that. If you are really interested in saving the Tiger, I will tell you what to do. Have you got a gun licence? I know someone who can get you a gun licence. How much cash have you?”

“About one thousand. But what has that got to do with this situation? I am not going to shoot a tiger.”

“On second thought a gun licence is not required. But you must get a powerful repeating rifle, an AK-47 will be ideal. You know what goes phut, phut, phut, like what Ajmal Kasab did in Victoria Terminus during 26/11. I think I can get one for you if I go to Kashmir or the North-east.”

Pammie reached for the Telephone Directory. I said that ‘Getit B2C Yellow Pages’ would be better to find a gun dealer.

“I am trying to find the nearest mental hospital. I think you have gone off the rocker.”

I said,” I am perfectly sane and don’t call a loony doctor to examine me.”

She said,” You are talking loony stuff”

I continued, “And the next thing you must do is to get hold of a forest guide who will take you to a sanctuary without letting anyone to know about it. Deep inside the sanctuary where the tigers congregate you must build a ‘machan’.

“What is a machan?”

“It is a kind of a wooden platform built on a tree out of reach of the tiger. You can tie a lamb or buffalo calf to the nearest tree. Its bleating will bring the tiger to your presence.”

Pammie reached for the T.D. again and I took it away from her.

“Listen and don’t jump to conclusion. While waiting for the tiger to arrive, you can listen to your iPod, but keep the volume low. The tigers have sharp hearing. In the old days there were no such devices and the maharaja spent the time up on the machan drinking Champagne and eating the exotic dishes prepared by his personal staff. And when the unfortunate tiger attracted by the lamb or buffalo calf’s bleating came he let go with his magnum rifle and lo, the poor tiger was dead. The Maharaja of Vizianagaram shot 1000 tigers in one season in that way.”

“Oh, my god! 1000 tigers! Is he still alive? I would like to put 1000 bullets into him!”

“Now dead as a dodo. But one bullet would have been enough. Now as you told you are up in the machan and the tiger is coming. What will you do?”

“I cannot shoot a tiger. I would like to come down and stroke his head. So cute!”

“But the tiger may misinterpret your intention and it may become a woman-eater. But the tiger will not be the only one that will be coming. Behind it the poacher will come. You shoot him. That is all. The tiger will run away and can live another day. A dead poacher is worth a dozen tigers alive.”

“One shot will be enough?”

“The poacher will not come alone. A politician or two and a few corrupt officials may be waiting in the background. Hearing the shot and hearing no cry from the poacher which would have told them that the tiger got him first, they will come along to verify the size of the dead tiger and the amount it will fetch them in the Chinese market. And you shoot them too. Dead people tell no tales.”

With a single leap like that of a tigress retrieving her cub from the jaws of a hyena, Pammie snatched the Telephone Directory from my hand, ran out, closed and bolted the door. I could hear her calling, “Hello, is it the mental hospital? There is a mentally disturbed person here. Please send someone immediately. The address is ……”

I wanted to make my exit like the tiger when he heard the shot, but I was trapped inside. Luckily I found an open window and though it was at a considerable height above the ground below – and I suffer from Acrophobia – I managed to get down, shakily though, and stalking among the flower plants like a tiger went outside and into civilised society.

CATS OR DOGS?

“Cats”, said Pammie.

“Dogs”, I said.

“Cats are a lot better than dogs”, she replied.

This may look like the beginning of a Mulliner story in which a girl and a boy were arguing about the relative merits of cats and dogs and it need not be mentioned that the girl won the dispute hands down.

I was visiting my niece Pammie, who had lately taken a fancy to cats. She had not less than a dozen of them living in her house. Reminds me of the Wodehouse story of Bertie Wooster finding 23 cats in his bedroom. She had a dog, Rover, a few years back and I reminded how fond of the animals she was.

“Ah”, she said, “Rover was one in a million and you won’t find another like him.”

The argument went on for quite some time. I said, “I like dogs because they show their affection for you in their eyes, wag their tails when you come home and try to clamber over you. Cats only stretch out more luxuriously on the sofa and do not even acknowledge the fact that you are back home. One cat looks like any other cat, while dogs have their individual good looks.”

“But cats are intellectually superior to dogs”

“Do you mean cats have more academic degrees than dogs?”

“The owners of cats have more academic qualifications than the owners of dogs, a study has revealed.”

That must be true, because Pammie had more academic degrees than she could count, while I was the possessor of a scrap of paper that had no value. The owners have an advantage that cats need very little attention – just a feeding in the morning and in the evening, while dogs have to be brushed, taken for walks, given baths regularly. Obviously, cat owners have more time to study and get higher degrees than the dog owners.

Just then an enormous orange feline entered the room, grinned at me and went on to rub himself on Pammie’s legs.

“Hey, watch out! Is this a creature a Bobcat, Caracal, Clouded leopard, Lynx, Margay, Ocelot, Puma, Serval or something from the underworld?”, I asked her.

“He is Lal Kishen, the leader of the gang here”, she replied in a dignified way. “I named him so because he has a close resemblance to a senior political leader.”

I knew and with the silvery whiskers he had, there was a striking resemblance to the person she referred to.

“Now tell me, are you for the cats or for the dogs? If you say ‘dogs’ I will ask Lal Kishen to make faces at you.”

“I will make a secret vote and the result will come out after a month like the Indian elections. By then I will be far away from you and Lal Kishen,”

What are the eating habits of dictators all over the world?

The moment of death for a dictator. Nicolae Ceausescu former dictator of Romania and his wife Elena being executed by a firing squad in Bucharest on Dec. 25, 1991.

Many dictators have had violent deaths, the recent ones being that of Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Gaddafi, the dictator of Libya. Like their unusual ends, the dictators also have unusual eating habits motivated by their unlimited powers they used to wield. Here are some accounts mainly gathered from BBC sources. 

You are what you eat - but also how you eat and who you eat with.  Food can affect your mood, your bowels and your world-view. In this age of the foodie, the gourmand and the gourmet, we have taken a fresh look at some of the worst dictators of the 20th Century by subjecting them to culinary scrutiny. Without seeking to mitigate their crimes by humanising them we wanted to cut them down to human size. The line between man and monster can be very thin.

Although forced to conclude that evil-doing and delusions of grandeur cannot be attributed to the consumption of any single food or any one physical constitution, hints of patterns did emerge.

As many dictators aged they grew more and more obsessed with the purity of what they ate. North Korea's Kim Il-sung had all his rice grains individually selected and created an institute whose sole purpose was to devise ways of prolonging his life.

The Romanian Communist party boss Nicolae Ceausescu irritated foreign leaders he visited by bringing all his food with him - Tito, head of the neighbouring state of Yugoslavia, was shocked by his insistence on drinking raw vegetable juice through a straw, avoiding all solids.

The vast majority of our dictators came of humble, peasant stock which meant that their favourite foods tended to be anything but Cordon Bleu.

For all his lavish hospitality to royalty and stars of stage and screen, Tito loved nothing so much as a slice of warm pig fat, while Ceausescu - when at home - had a weakness for a stew made with a whole chicken… feet, beak and all.

Portugal's piously Catholic Antonio Salazar loved the sardines that reminded him of his impoverished childhood. He recalled having to share a single sardine with a sibling.

Some of our most infamous subjects - Adolf Hitler, Mao Zedong and Benito Mussolini - found the stress of the gigantic responsibilities they had taken upon themselves took a heavy toll on their digestive systems.

Hitler's chronic flatulence may have accounted for his becoming a vegetarian and to his allowing a quack doctor named Theodore Morrell to dose him with as many 28 different medicines, including one made of extract of Bulgarian peasants' faeces.

On the other hand, famously flatulent Muammar Gaddafi seems to have been untroubled by his affliction. Midway through World War Two, a failing Mussolini was examined by a Nazi doctor who pronounced him dangerously constipated.

Mao Zedong, a passionate carnivore, was a lifelong martyr to his bowel movements: "I eat a lot and I excrete a lot," he happily reported in a letter to a comrade in his early days. Much later, on a visit to the USSR to meet Stalin, he would find to his fury that he could not excrete at all - the squatting type of toilet he was used to was unavailable in Moscow.

Comrade Stalin must have had an iron constitution to match his steely name. Around a table groaning with delicious Georgian specialities, mealtimes at his Kuntsevo dacha were prime time for bullying power games.

Lasting five or six hours, from 11pm until 5am for example, they became a refined form of torture thanks to obligatory participation in drinking games, sing-alongs and dancing.

Over-drinking, paralysing fear and cruel teasing once turned a diner like Nikita Khrushchev into a staggering incontinent wreck. Comrade Tito of Yugoslavia could only keep up with the toasting by vomiting into his jacket sleeve.

Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos seem to have enjoyed a slightly less brutal form of power-play than Stalin's - Imelda once commanded the Philippines' entire military top brass to dress in drag for one of her husband's birthday parties.

Evangelically vegetarian, Hitler apparently engaged his eating table companions in chit-chat about goings-on in a Ukrainian abattoir, a topic so revolting that his carnivorous guests were unable to finish their food.

It is hard to imagine Jean Bedel Bokassa of the Central African Republic, Idi Amin of Uganda, or Francisco Nguema of Equatorial Guinea - all of them strongly suspected of indulging in cannibalism - turning a hair at such talk.

We of course do not provide a recipe for the human corpse stuffed with rice and flambeed in gin, cited by Bokassa's former cook, who was somehow unable to recall the sex of the corpse he claimed Bokassa commanded him to prepare.

Food tasters were inevitably de rigueur and highly valued among the cruellest and most paranoid of our subjects. Hitler had a team of 15 female food-tasters on hand throughout the war years - nothing was delivered to his table until the girls had survived for 45 minutes after eating.

Saddam Hussein's delinquent son Uday was beaten up and hurled into jail for the crime of killing one of his father's tasters. Romania's Nicolae Ceausescu never travelled without a high-ranking Securitate officer, who was also a chemist, equipped with a mobile food-testing laboratory.

Ultimately, of course, all the food-tasters, chemists, faddiness and fussiness in the world could not save these men. They all died in the end - and many died violently.