Cutting beans
Early morning scenes were all about rushing through chores and hastily walking out the door for Avni and her dad. Everyday Avni would close her eyes after turning off her 6:55 am alarm wanting to sleep just five more minutes and end up sleeping in for almost half an hour over her scheduled wake up call. This slight variance would throw her off the schedule every day, and she would have to hurriedly brush her teeth while her dad sang in the bathroom enjoying his slow shower before getting dressed for work. Working in the public sector seemed to have it’s own perk she mused every morning seeing how comfortable a schedule her parents had. Probably it was their disciplined life, but who wants that in the FOMO generation. We can cut corners on sleep and grab a bite while travelling to make sure we are up to date on news, gossip and more. THANK YOU.
Thankfully, she somehow managed to cut corners elsewhere and manage being at work on time, everytime. It was a constant struggle between looking good, and feeling good. She could either brush her hair or wash herself clean before going to work, and by now the entire campus was familiar with the choice she made because she would always smell good, but her hair would be a nest of crows with pencils and pens poking out of it as she often forgot her hair pins in haste.
As someone had rightly said, a lazy person often finds fast workable solutions for problems rather than spending time on solving. It was Sunday’s that bothered Avni the most. Not the day in general but the dread it brought in particular. The ephemeral realization that would rise like a zombie every evening of how wasteful life felt, working six days a week for a day’s rest. And Sundays were no rest for Avni, despite her daily woes of getting up late, it was only on a Sunday that her body would decide to be up on time, that is 7:00 am sharp. No matter how much she tried to close the curtain or plug in noise cancellation devices, even without any alarm, she would wake up.
This is another Sunday in Avni’s life and she has already gotten out of bed, done her 5 min namesake yoga session and decides to walk into the kitchen to prepare some breakfast for herself while her parents are probably out for a little morning walk. She takes out a few french beans, carrots, tomatoes and three eggs from the fridge, her special vegetable mix egg or what she called “Eggy Veggy Sandwich”. The recipe was simple, chop the veggies finely and mix with eggs, throw in a few sauce variants and top it with two slices. It was an easy peasy recipe her parents would make for her when she was little. Putting down the veggies on the chopping board she starts but something catches her eye. In the corner, near onions she spots a miniature telephone set.
“Oh dear, such memories.” She bends down to pick up the phone set, when she hears her parents walk back in.
“Ohoo, Aaj late nahi hui. Good. Kya banaya jaa raha hai? Tera eggy veggy sandwich”, Avni’s dad walked into the kitchen with milk, bread and fresh mangoes.
“Papa Aam?” Avni exclaimed excitedly.
“Tera baap aam nahi badi khaas chiz hai. Apni maa se puchh le”. Avni’s dad had a sense of humor like wine, took newbies sometime to develop a taste for.
“Tu pyaaz ki tokri mei kya dhund rahi hai? I thought you did not like onions in egg? Or is that another of your ageing signs too” Her mom chuckled.
“I was getting this, yaad hai? Bhai ne telebrands se order karwaaya tha bachpan mei. Inspired by spy kids. Kitni daant padi thi”, Avnia smiled with nostalgia. Such fond memories from childhood days, the obsession with those seemingly cool gadgets and tools there used to be.
“Maa you remember? The time I saw chopping board on TV for the first time? How amazed I was with something so simple” Avni chuckled.
“Ya, I remember. You made me watch that chef chop beans, cabbage and carrots for what seemed like an eternity and would not let me change the channel lest I upset you. Mere pagle bachche”, Avni’s mom smiled fondly at her.
“You wanna know what changed my mind?” Avni asked wide eyed, her parents did not remember much of the day or how they convinced her to give up the obsession so shrugged at her puzzled.
“Dadi made me realize the futility of the craze” Avni beamed.Her parents listened intently.
“Well, I dragged dadi after you left me alone watching the vegetable cutting wonder, the chopping board with an attached knife as far as I can recall. They had those super fancy names too with prefixes like wonderr and magick for the extra oomph. Anyway, I told dadi what it was and how it worked. She only smiled, went into the kitchen, picked up a daraanti (A sickle used in north indian kitchen usually with a paddle like stand to hold it down with leg support while cutting green leafy vegetables like spinach)
and showed me how it could also cut loads of beans in one go. I was taken by awe.” She finished narrating and sighed. It had been over 10 years since they had lost her grandma, and this little breakfast scene had somehow brought up a fragment of a very old memory, and yet such a cherished one.
“This sounds so much like that African boy in trending videos who mocks the viral hacks by doing them simply”, Her mother laughed, she had caught up fast with the millennial culture and was really fond of this new boy busting viral hacks with common sense.
“Achha wohi ladka jo har bari aise shakal bana deta hai”, Avni’s father imitated the expression of the artist and now neither of them could hold in their laughter imagining Dadi maa bamboozling the Magick chef guy with her chopping skills on her age old daraanti.
Finishing up with her sandwiches she enjoyed a lazy Sunday breakfast with her family sprinkled with generous doses of laughter and fun.We often let ourselves get dazed by the spark of everything new and sparkly, which often may not be anywhere comparable to what we have. Avni in her nostalgia realized how valuable her heirloom kitchen tools were and how valuable her grandma’s lessons were. Not only in daily life usage but also with the hidden wisdom that she could now see with her new found perspective as a grown up.
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