Lesson learnt the hard way: old is gold when it comes to Maid In India

It's so difficult to let go of your ego and beg. And yet it is so easy.
Of late I've stopped praying. I don't light the lamp in front of god.
I last went to the temple only to ask God to let my aunt's soul rest in peace and to allow me to sleep at nights in peace.

That's one thing I do very well, shamelessly. BEG.
Even when I'm on one of those trips of "Oh God doesn't exist because he's making my life so miserable", I beg him to help me.
I had already begged my cook/nanny to stay when she threatened to quit. I had begged my father to let her stay...ugh that's a lot of begging.

Yesterday I begged my old maid to return.
Really, she left me cursing I'm sure, that I shouldn't find another.
The last few traumatic days have been spent "interviewing" new help... finding them in the first place. That's become difficult too. (Any woman in India knows what I'm talking about, unless you belong to that one-odd percent who has found Miss. Wonderful)

And they have numerous demands (I believe Bangalore's maids are very different).

And I have no washing machine. So really bad combination.
So they would come home, negotiate exorbitant rates and tell me all those things they won't do -- in various stages of desperation and depression, I gave in to most of their conditions, and to the terms of pay.

But. BUT they just didn't turn up for work on the designated day. Yeah as my fellow mom blogger Aparna (Noida) pointed out, I do have some rotten luck when it comes to maids.

One lady finally seemed to work out and she worked brilliantly for a day -- one of those "experienced" people who know where everything is kept and how to go about their work by themselves and do it well. I knew she was too good to be true. Next morning she called to say her former employer was at her doorstep in his car, offering her a jump in pay that she found irresistible. I didn't want to bargain and out-do the guy on her salary so i resignedly let go.

Yesterday another lady, with whom everything had been settled, (but on whom I had my own doubts because she seemed too old and, well, un-agile, weighed down by her own weight and the amount of gold she was wearing!) worked a bit, decided she can't work at our place because it takes up too much of her time, walked out mid-way!She left behind some unwashed vessels and soaked clothes!

That did it. So off I went, looking for my former maid. Admitted to her she was right all the way -- I can't find another like her. She seemed relieved too (something i didn't expect; I was mentally prepared for some loud abuse, but I still had to ask before moving one with the hunt). She agreed, pointed out how she already knows her work and how it works out best for the both of us. She slipped in quietly this morning into our house and back into her routine. And I into mine.

In the meanwhile I had gone into a tizzy -- I was seriously reading reviews on dishwasher models available in India, how they worked etc etc. I had firgured I had no provision of space/inlet-outlet to get one installed in my kitchen. Even a washing machine will be a tight fit in our teeny-weenie place (I'll probably have to stand on it and bathe!). I had looked up robot vacuum cleaners that you switch on and leave on the floor to sparkle the house on its own. Nothing seemed plausible.

Yes, I know a lot of people manage without any help, I know. I admire them. But I'm not one of them. I DO HATE housework. I never did it ever. My parents, grandparents always pampered me and told me not to enter the kitchen, not to bother with the dishes -- something I gleefully and willingly did in my youthful days and something which unfortunately got engrained into my very being.

It's a horrible feeling-- this being so dependent on someone. But I am. And that's my life. As far as I want to keep my job and remain a working woman (no I can't handle office work and house work on my own. Imagine coming home at 8 to do the laundry while eating dinner). It will be so, till I'm pushed to the point of inevitability -- the inevitability of independently doing all my work by myself. And not cribbing about it.

P.S. : Rama, thanks for poking me into blogging again. :-) I was so frustrated, I didnt even want to blog. Imagine!

A for akshee, B for blob in nose...T for tonsilitis

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
I'll never see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel will I? I mean, I'm forever groping around in the darkness of the tunnel, going around in circles and coming back right there.

If the whole of last week wasn't bad enough for Sunny Boy with the sniffles and the leaky drippy nose, now it's full-blown tonsillitis and a chest congestion. Why-o-why-o-why? The poor soul can barely swallow food. Won't eat much. Keeps sneezing and coughing . I want to really fly up in the sky and pull out dear Sun who's hibernating behind the clouds in Bangalore these days. I mean I haven't seen a bleaker week in my entire life in this city.

But, he's been a good boy and takes in some home remedies very willingly to ease the congestion.

And before I forget, I'm putting down all anyone can do to ease the child during such illness (I keep doing this putting down things for myself, because whenever i ask my mom what she did for me when i was a kid she says she just can't remember. And me being forgetful me, I haven't much hope). I also help anyone else struggling in a similar situation can make use of it and find some relief.

1. Give lots of warm fluids -- ganji/kanjee made of roasted rice and boiled with some daal give sustenance and strength. Is warm soup for the soul and is easy on a swollen throat. Add some veggie from squash family -- pumpkin (white or yellow), or doodhi/sorekai (bottlegourd). Cook it in the ganji and mash so nutrition goes down as masked (hopefully) as possible.
2. Warm water to drink. This must be a fairly cooled down version of water boiled with some turmeric, tulsi and ginger in it -- a light decoction. (Thought he would puke it out. But, as surprises go, he loved it!) Best thing first in the morning.
3. Steam inhalation. Easier said than done. My boy is never going to go through this even if i try conning him, tell him he's going to play with water and steam up the bathroom. That's the ONLY time he doesn't wan to play with water!
4. My friends do this often; I've tried it sometimes and it helps, but my brat just resists everything (so pls understand my frustration as i crib and weep over and over) -- apply some lukewarm milk with a a few strands of saffron as a thin film on chest and forehead. The "heat" of the saffron absorbs the congestion. (For adults we use a mix of ginger/turmeric but that would be too strong on a baby's skin).
5. Another alternative to No. 4 is strapping on a strip of cloth (this is only for the chest) in which you've rolled up some crushed garlic -- some pods with skin peeled and crushed. (I tried this on Sonny Boy, who promptly pulled off strip after much wailing). But if you have a very willing baby (like the rest of the world seems to have) please try it. It eases congestion/phlegm built up in the lungs.

All these are tried and tested grandma's cures used for generations in my or friend's families. Just be careful. Whatever you apply, never near the child's eyes. Best applied after they are fast asleep if they are the rather unwilling kind.

I'm just oh-so-depressed. Can't take leave from work because I have almost none (saving the few for the rest of the calendar year). Can't concentrate on work because I'm thinking of the poor dear. Can't sleep peacefully because I keep waking up when he struggles to breathe.
And just sad, sad sad :-(

Bangalore's weather report reads all grey

Dreary, cloudy, life's all dowdy. Cloudy skies and cloudier minds. Drip drop drip drop wet wet wet. The grey of the clouds mirrored in the grey of my soul, my being. Give me some sunshine, don't give me rain. The pitter patter of raindrops more a tedious tantrum of the rain-gods than a childish rhyme. No romance to these rains. No love. No giddy-headed giggles on water-soaked lips. No filmy white dress to dance in the rain. No dance. Only rain. Only damp laundry. No space to dry out. Cold winds sweep the house, cold floors announce I'm home. Squishy squalour, my world's taken on a pallor. A smile breaks out, quick but striking, like a flash of lighting. The silver lining to the gloomy fluff of clouds.