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I hate Upma! Not what you expect when the title of this is Upma- The saviour of Mankind!; don’t get me wrong but in our house we (read mom!) used to make Upma only when there is no good food to make (read more oil based and tasty!)!

My mom just hated Upma since it was what she used to make when she had no mood to make anything else and just needed a rest from the kitchen! It was like how many make khichadi or Pongal! Also it was the dish to make when someone was ill or not well.

In Bangalore though Upma is a delicacy and the residents here are known to put every possible vegetable in the concoction and of course the humble Upma is one dish which can digest any vegetable! No other fast food dish can come accept the variety of vegetable which Upma can take! Noodles comes close but have you ever put potatoes in noodles!?; I have and if you like potatoes then you can manage but Upma can take even potato like they were good buddies!

Another reason why I hate Upma is that during my stint in Calicut medical college, there was not a single day when I had not eaten Upma! This was because it was cheap and available all the time and the most important is that it was filling and godsend for a vegetarian like me! But eating this everyday for five years will make anyone hate Upma! Another dish I hate for the same reason is peas masala! But I still vividly remember those late night visit to the cart shops where our constant guy used to make hot Upma in minutes! The way he used to fry some onions and then add the rava and masterly parcel the plate in a plantain leaf parcel! I used to eat one plate then and there and save one for later! All for less than ten rupees and we have solved the food problem for the day! But do that every other day for five odd years and it will drive you insane or at least angry over the same old Upma!!

My mother also did not like Upma because it meant that she, a great cook had made Upma! It’s like Sachin Tendulkar scoring less than 10 runs! But then she was the Sachin Tendulkar of cooking! So even her Upma was one of the most tasty Upma in the world!
She used to make that with small onion and lots of ghee and always accompanied by a chutney and tomato curry! The combination was so tasty! That was the only Upma I used to eat but mom never used to make Upma for me since she knew I don’t like Upma and no mother will give Upma to her kid normally when she is cooking something special for him or her! I make Upma only once in a blue moon but when I do it is always like my mother and luckily it normally gets over when I make it and I do not have to run behind everyone to eat it!

My dad and wife Minu are big fans of Upma though! You give them any type of Upma any time of the day and they will gobble it up happily! Minu of course makes Upma typical Kannada style Upma and in her endeavour to make up for the fact that she is making Upma she will put all the vegetables which she finds in the vicinity and she will be happy that she is making something healthy for the kids! Then come me and my daughter (who is just like my mother!) and we look at the Upma and just pretend to like that but mentally we are thinking that lets just put this in the mouth and get it over with! Just like a bitter pill we have to swallow!

Lately though I tolerate Upma since the love Upma crowd have increased and in a democracy it is always better to go with the majority!

In any emergency though Upma is your saviour! The other day when I went to have dinner with dad, he embarrassingly accepted that he did not make much food and was planning to just eat some fruit. Then I made his favourite Upma in a matter of minutes and made sure he ate with relish (he saved some for next day also so I knew that he liked it!).
In Karnataka is is always served with the sweet version called the Kesari and in Kerala it is taken with their standard banana! The combination is called Chow Chow bath and the first time I heard it I felt that it was some foreign delicacy only to see my nemesis in a different name tag! I should have anticipated this since one other time when I was dining with my friends in Calicut; I decided to try on a dish called vegetable chow chow! When it came, it was all partially cooked vegetables in big size dipped in some kind of white sauce! My friend who came with me then commented that, “I think whatever vegetables were left after cooking the biriyani they have just put like that only in the left over batter of some pakoda!”
An instant tip there my vegetarian friends in Calicut; if in doubt just stick to Panneer butter masala or tomato fry in any mixed hotel!!
Then again during my experimental phase of Bangalore Dharshini I saw a meal called Khara Bath and this I ordered with high expectations only to be served with Upma albeit with chutney and more vegetables! No matter how you coat it; the fact of the matter is that it is still Upma nothing else!

Mothers and Upma always have a connection in that if you don’t have anything to make, you can always make Upma! It is one dish which is easiest to make and very difficult to go wrong! At the end of the cooking you can always eat it no matter how it tastes since the expectation has been reduced so much! In fact Upma is a very humble dish who takes every insult thrown at it and still serves to please!

That may be the reason of it being called Upma; a combination of salt and mother. When she was there it was sweet and there was no place of Upma constantly but now since she is not there, the salty tears have been transformed into Upma…

Just before he was born he was scared of coming into this world. He could not see but only hear what’s happening around him. He was floating in water of some kind so he used all his feeling and called out to God.

“Where am I God?”

“You are in the womb of your mother my child”

“Why did you leave me alone like this! Who will take care of me now!?”

“Don’t worry my child, your mother is a form of me only! She will protect you and love you forever! And once I feel that you can manage then I will call her back to me!”

“You will ask me before you take her right?”

“Yes my child, and God thought hopefully he will stop needing her when he grows old”

The child never stopped needing his mother. Whether it was the growing days or the lonely days of school or those days in college when he would be alone and home sick. Even when he got married his love and devotion to his mother only increased! When his mother had the first attack his affection only increased.

Then after a very fulfilling life one fine day God took away his mother!

That night after crying himself to sleep he had a talk with God in his dream…

“How could you do that to me God?, you had promised that you will ask me when I don’t need her and only then you will take her! You cheated me!”

“Yes my child, I could not wait for your permission to take her,  I realised that you will always need her and you can never let her go!”

“I know but at least you could have kept her with me for some more years! She was hardly 70 when you took her! That is a very short life if you ask me!”

“Short you say!? Don’t you remember your own thoughts which you used to put in the mornings or late night!? Life must be big and not long! Your mother had a big life! She was loved by all! She had all her desires met and she was finally and truly happy! Is it not better to go on a high?!”

“But what about me!?, how will I leave without her!?”

“Her love and memories are enough for your lifetime! The love you had for her give an extra to people younger to you especially your daughter! Did you not say when she was born that she reminded of your mother?! And the respect and concern which you had for her you must give to your elders especially other mothers and daughters! And I am sure that will really make your mother happy!”

“If I had known when you will take her I would have been prepared!”

“You were prepared my child! I can take every mother anytime so make sure that you are always nice to her! You never want that last thing you said to her was rude or would have made her sad! But you should have no complaints! Even till the end you were nice to her and she was happy for you without any regrets or remorse!”

“All this is fine but still this is hard!”

“Of course it is! That only shows how much she was important to you and how much you loved her!”

He got up with a start, looked at his daughter and thought to himself, “her eyes are just like my mother!”

It is hard, but that’s life…

My first sketch after that tragic break… Of course it goes without saying that my mom was much more beautiful than my stretch…

Good night all…
God bless… Miss you mom…

Book review

Genre fictional drama

Rating-5/5 for the research and recreation of the dark times! It may not be accurate but then there is no way to confirm that! 4.5/5 for the ending! 3.5/5 for the stretch it took to reach there!

This like most of Ken’s drama book is also a big mammoth of close to 920 pages! With moderate print and smooth language it does go fast though! Great credit must go to Ken for having combined real events of dark ages and infusing them with fictional characters without altering the relative authenticity in the process! He did this best in the World trilogy and Pillars of the earth and here also he does not disappoint!!

Spoilers- None that will spoil your joy of reading a Ken!

It has always been a pleasure to read a Ken novel! He is like Sidney Sheldon of the dark time with enough spice in between to make you wanting for more! Of course in the recent times George Martin is the one author who has done so much work in fantasy fiction Game of thrones and the back story of each character is so detailed and exhaustive! No wonder with such a mountain of work he may never finish the seventh one and the sixth one will be a close call!

Coming to this one, Ken takes off where he left A column of fire though not in chronology since this one is a prequel to the Pillars of the earth which is still his best work yet. And this one does not come close to it by years!

Kudos of course to Ken for giving strong character to a female character in most his novels and this was also the pattern in many of his novels! But in the dark ages being a woman however strong willed or intelligent or skill full, you would still be abused and treated as dirt even if you are royalty! You just cannot compare those times to this since rules and regulations where non existent in those times and it was every man over woman to himself or herself!

The one thing which is consistent in all ages and book and novels is that the rich are powerful and the poor may be pious to an extent but still abused and powerless!

Since I am still in awe of Tom builder there are some references to building and builder who is in fact the main male protagonist Edgar who is a talented Boat builder who loses everything to a Viking attack (Vikings are popular nowadays!!) and then he tries to rebuild his life first as a farmer then as a builder all the time juggling with his very terrible love life which is practically only in his mind in most part of the story!

The female protagonist or the chief other player is a Norman Noblewoman Ragna who starts with a bang and in the middle of the novel becomes an abused tormented shell of herself! In one hand Ken tried to show that she was different than other girls of that age and very intelligent and in the very next moment she would do something utterly stupid even for a girl that age! She has never shown to be acting clever or prepared (except in the very end when it was ABOUT TIME!). She is finally shown to be someone who loses her heart to a utterly Macho Ealderman who is in fact married and event after event she is relegated to a corner like a timid girl from a peasant family!

You also have a righteous Monk who desperately tries to fix the right in the world around him which is difficult since no one fears god or punishments and all the sins are done with impunity! Of course it has been shown what finally happens to the sinners but then that is in the novel! In real life we have no idea!

You have an Oaf for a husband who is maybe the one eyed guy in the city of blinds who still has all the vices of a noble man or rather a MAN but has some guilty consciousness at least occasionally!

His two brothers and his mother play the role of villains quite convincingly and then it is just a soap opera of the dark ages and it is a battle of wits and power between the two teams!
Of course the curses of the dark ages at least in a fiction Nobel goes to the sinners so the most gruesome finish is reserved for them!

Of course you have the Ken dose of brutality, clever crooks, some mystery as the true identity of the highway robber!, sex is like a walk in the park for Ken and the descriptions follow that principle! And finally when all hope is lost; like a typical Ken novel you have some redemption in the ending and that really makes up for the wait! Then you feel it ended so soon only after 900 pages!

Kudos also for trying to create a feel of the dark ages, of the disparity, of the poverty, of the powerlessness of the king, of the state of slaves, of the status of women (worse than slaves sometimes!), of the state of religion especially church and other places and how even in the times of dark, money still shines bright!

Don’t miss it if you have read the Pillars of the earth series or if you are reading this first then anyway this is a prequel so don’t miss the sequels Pillars of earth, world without end and the last one columns of fire which are really good reads especially Pillars!

First family by David Baldacci

Book review

Genre- Fictional thriller

Spoilers-None that will give away the story!

Rating- 4/5 chiefly for the ending!

Whenever a regular person is given a pen or a pencil to test whether it works or not, he or she will most probably write his or her name or sign his or her name! It’s the same with the mirror! If you see a mirror while walking then you will definitely see yourself even if it is a glance!

Of course there may be exceptions and they are special and different and in the same way a book or a novel is different because as you read you tend to discover something different! That’s why we read novels or watch movies to see something or read something that we have not seen or read before!

I took a long time to read this one and this was worth it since it was a roller coaster ride with revelations which come out of no where! Just when you are lead in one direction on who the culprit is, it turns out in a way you would never expect!

The story starts with a kidnapping of the daughter of woman who gets killed in the process and then the game begins! The woman’s sister is the wife of the President of USA! Hope that got your attention! Then I did wonder why go to all that trouble and not just kidnap the president’s kid! Ponder on that for a while!

Then our home grown sleuths with a myriad of problems of their own are bought in the case as Sam is kinda close to the president’s wife! Now they must race against the FBI and the secret service to solve the case and literally put everything in danger!

Add in a little death which later becomes homicide in the side and that also takes some time to get solved with the classic misdirection! This was really better than this main case!

Then they tell you the story of a man who served in the defence whose daughter gets in to big trouble for which she suffers for years and this forms the whole premise of the kidnapping and the murder and finally revenge!

Just remember that somehow David does not like the first family especially the first man!

Of course in life you may not have happy ending but this is a novel so all’s well that ends really well and I was real content with the ending for a change!

Though the novel could have been cut short of at least a hundred pages to make it short and fast paced! Time is precious and ain’t that the truth!

Did you know that both Graphite and diamond are molecularly the same!?

You read it right! For a saint or a swami, I guess they may be the same even otherwise!

But you will be surprised to know that they both have the same atomic composition in being the form of Carbon!

But can you imagine putting a piece of graphite on your ears or nose or hang it over your neck?

Diamond is rare and is special only because it is unique, it does not care what others are which means that it is not a part of the crowd! It stands apart and shines so much so that everyone want a piece of the diamond. Plus the fact that it is one of the hardest substances known also makes it a more valuable component!

And of course you also need to consider the fact that diamonds are forever!

But unlike gold which shines even in the deep parts of the earth, Diamond needs a gem cutter, a specialist and an equally capable person to get its shine! The best diamonds have been rendered useless by a single wrong cut but with the proper cutter and shaper, a diamond can shine like the star and then some!

So even if you are a diamond you do need a good cutter or a motivator or a recogniser of talent who can carve out the shine out of a

Now diamonds are a girl’s best friend and you can see how they decorate everything with diamond and gold of course but you can never see them decorate themselves with graphite!

So what do you think is valuable?

Of course your answer is diamond only but that was till graphite was just a piece of black dust in the mud! But when Graphite was made a part of your average pencil was the day it became not only precious but sometimes more costly than diamond!

That was when it was seen in the hands of kids trying to learn a new language or any new thing! It became priceless when it was held by an author who wrote his or her first script or draft of a story which could be a runaway block buster or when it was held by an inventor or a scientist who made a pathbreaking theory or revelation!

Graphite also became precious when it was held by an artist who made a best selling sketch with black and white because those were the only colours he or she needed to make a masterpiece!!

Also graphite knows the meaning and importance of partnership and being a part of society and when it becomes a part of a group it can do a lot of things!

You can also see that graphite becomes diamond when it it under tremendous pressure and very high temperatures! So when you are under stress and heat then you can either melt or like graphite you can become diamond!!

So you can see that even if you are graphite you should not lose hope! You can still shine and even become more powerful and richer than diamond!

And if you are diamond do not assume that you will anyway shine! You have to endure the process of cutting and polishing before you can shine!

Remember that graphite can over a period of time and pressure become diamond but once you become diamond you can become dust but never graphite!

Diamond or graphite…you decide. Since there is no black or white in the world today, everything is Grey…

First of all I really liked the movie and frankly it was better than Shakuntala Devi. With all the Nepotism debates going on it is difficult to digest a movie starring the daughter of Sreedevi and Boney and also the fact that the movie does show Indian Air Force in a bad light which was unnecessary.

No spoilers in the movie and my rating is 3/5

The whole truth by David Baldacci

Book review

Fictional thriller genre

No spoiler

Rating 3.5/5; like most David novels it starts with a bang, loses steam in the middle and then gears up for a delayed but great climax!

The first book in Shaw series apparently

This book was before the finale of the Camel Club series and I had to break the chronology and my rule by reading this book not in series!

There was this huge guy in Camel club and you can imagine Shaw to be the personification of him. Shaw does remind me of Reubin Rhodes, big huge hulk Of a man who works more with his muscular brain rather than actual brain!

News what we see now cannot be believed is the crux of the story! There are firms nowadays who can create news or the TRUTH! We have already picked up our sides and we have become so used to propaganda and news which fit our original belief that it does not matter what the truth is!

Now this firm tries different means in its armamentarium to create news and videos to create a conflict between the trigger happy Russians and the new emerging threat China!

Of course this was written years back and after the COVID phase every thing in the world will change! No one will forget this years for centuries to come! 2020 has been a very unforgettable year and the world has got different opinion about China. The basic viewpoint has been the same and this only acts as a fodder to the controversy starved brain!

In the middle of all this we have a crazy rich guy who feels that all this will lead to a an arms race and countries will buy weapons like crazy! This is of course after the fact that he is stinking and very powerful!

I guess the charm of being in command is so high that you can never be satisfied!

Then we have our hero Shaw who is a mix of Rambo and Ethan Hunt who is trying different missions to keep the world safe although his world and life is literally screwed!

Just when he thinks of letting it all go and settle with the love of his life Anna, he gets the biggest shock of his life and his biggest mission which quickly becomes personal and vindictive!

He is joined by a journalist Kate who is a double Pulitzer Prize winner and is starved for proper stories and somehow she gets this big scoop right into her lap and very soon she is the very centre of the whole mission!

Then you have the typical chase and bodies piling up in typical David Baldacci style and some neat misses and finally the grand climax straight out of a James Bond novel!

The novel moves at a fast pace and there is not much dull moment, though it took some time this was a breeze to finish since there was no beating around the bush and the language was simple and direct!

All in all a good start to another series but in all fairness it really is better if you finish one series and then start another!

Rest assured though, when we pick up a fiction it is understood that we don’t necessarily need the whole truth!!

Hells corner by David BaldacciBook reviewRating 4/5 only for the ending cause it is a completion of sorts without actually completing it…!Spoilers None but a good spoiler is that the Camel Club is safe! But if you have not read the previous books in the camel club series then you must stop right here and finish them first!The series is like this
The Camel Club: The Camel Club (2005), The Collectors (2006), Stone Cold (2007), Divine Justice (2008), Hell’s Corner (2010)This is the last book of the camel club series and this could very well have been the best if it can gone the Jeffery Deaver way. In Rhyme series, he is always one step ahead of the criminal and that’s what makes him the best detective ever!As soon as the camel club was introduced the most prominent and chief member has been Oliver Stone or John Carr and after the first two ones where others get some importance, the other book are mainly Oliver all the way.This one starts with a redemption of sorts for all the injustice done to Oliver in the hands of the government and senior officials in the CIA. So Oliver is given a task in the true re instatement of his work as an agent and he is supposed to go over seas in a suicide mission of sorts.Just when that could happen, there is a rapid gun fire and a guy runs and falls in a pit which supposedly had a bomb and a big explosion happens just few feet away from the US president and the UK Prime minister.Then the investigators Oliver from US and Mary from MI6 London join hands to decipher the truth.
Anytime though they get close to the clue they are either killed or vanishedA simple planting of a tree in the garden becomes a national security issue. Then you have the added dose of new technology courtesy Nanobots and you are completely lost by now since the bodies are getting piled up like no tomorrow in a typical Baldacci style of course!Except the members of the camel club you can be rest assured that everyone else is in the suspicion radar no matter how big or small he or she is!After a series of failure the partial redemption occurs when the whole team in spite of being out of commission save the president and in the nick of time. Alex gets seriously injured and the whole situation looks grim.In spite of getting to know who is the culprit, Oliver still messes up the chase and for the umpteenth time some members of the camel club are kidnapped and the whole climax is like a James Bond climax where you attack the super villain’s den!Even there things do not go your way or do they?And here come the kicker climax two incidents which pushed my book rating to 4! A fitting climax of this series which was stretching to a point of no return but now it done and dusted!Sayonara Camel club…The next is to finish the King and Maxwell series

Book review

Fictional thriller genre

Rating 4/5

Series Camel club number four

Spoilers Anyone who hasn’t read the first three camel club series can stop right here! The story moves forward from Stone cold and there are spoilers of the previous book…

So Milton is dead and Oliver in the rage mode has killed the senior director Gray of CIA and Simpson, a senator! Although they deserve it, it is still a homicide and this one is how he escapes the long hands of the law or CIA!

The fact that he had killed ten odd agents in close combat feels like a smaller issue I guess!

Oliver for all the training of staying away from notification and prominence does little in those lines!

He is always in the news and always gets attention drawn to him!
And when someone asks for ID he behaves suspect! So pardon me if it doesn’t look convincing!

Many recent movies are in similar theme like John Wick or Equaliser or Jack Reacher where a man with shady past is in his retirement period and then something gets him out of the dormant phase to the full blown volcanic eruption!

David’s narration is simple and fast paced with interspersed humor and shocks here and there!

In the first two Camel club, the group were in the wrong place in the wrong time! And they had to make things right! In the third and this one, they are the centre of the problem and solution!

Oliver runs to a simple village with a disturbed boy which was reminiscent of his Wish you well novel but then even this simple town is not so simple as we get to know! He gets into the murky drug and coal business of the town and gets sucked in!

Then you have a tracker who tries to catch him earnestly first and then reluctance creeps in as he questions his life choices and his superior who happens to be the chief villain!

Close on the tracker is the Camel club remaining members lead by Annabelle (not the ghost doll but equally scary!) And they close in on the mystery in their own quirky ways!

Helping the Camel Club in the confused secret service agent Alex ( I feel Alex is now the epitome of a confused guy! Alex in grays anatomy is confused and Alex cross in cross series by James Patterson is confused!!)

Just when the mystery reaches a cross roads of sorts, you have a jail scene similar to the simple Genius novel where you are shown what torture is and this is the time when we realise that any big institution like he jail or CIA can be manipulated by the whims and fancy of one ego maniacal tyrant!

With so many characters there is bound to be some deaths and in David Baldacci novels they are so common like the fruit flies on an old banana!

Of course in the end there is some justice and calm which is a relief since the last camel club novel did leave things hanging so to speak!

Till the last camel club, Hell’s Corner which was written three years later! So of course that’s my next read!

In between that David has written three more novels including a king and Maxwell series!

David, please finish one series and then do next! Can’t expect us to remember everything in the previous one if read long back right!?

At least in this one though there was some divine justice!!

Stone cold by David BaldacciBook reviewGenre Fictional thrillerRating 3.5/5This is the third book featuring the Camel Club and there are three more to go so it’s safe to say that the members of the famed club will be there in the next one! Or will there be new ones?Spoilers None!You must read the book The Collectors before this to understand the flow and get to know the characters.Of course you must have finished The first camel club to know The Collectors!David gave a gap between the novels and writes another series (king and Maxwell) in between so it is difficult to get back the story so far at first!Once you start though it all comes back to you!
How a group of four elderly men form a boys club called Camel club and then give membership to others! And how they land up bang in the middle of a soup or the other!I have been reading David Baldacci books in order so that I get a feel of the growth of the author and I don’t like to jump!Like any David novel, the beginning is simply awesome and shocking! The killing and bodies pile up like a traffic jam during the rush hour!
His narration is both slick and funny sometimes!Sometimes the most complex kills are made so effortless while sometimes the simplest ones get complicated!So you have a guy called Harry who works as a man who tries to find security flaws in systems and in places! That part how he gets into the plane is simply awesome!He also routinely kills old CIA agents in innovative fashions on the instructions of her mother!Then you have the Casino owner and who as in the last book was relieved of millions of dollars by Annabelle and now is chasing her like a dog whose bone was snatched by the kitty in the last minute!While the two stories collide due to common characters, the end could have been more dramatic is what I felt!
All what we learnt in the previous novels is digged deeper and more truths are revealed!The most interesting character is of course Oliver Stone aka John Carr and he is an amalgamation of John Wick, Nick Carter and Jason Borne! So he can do no wrong and he can kill like no tomorrow and he cannot be killed or taken prisoner!How the villian of the previous books Simpson and Gray come back to wreck havoc is also shown! Hope they are settled for good now at least!There are two tragic deaths in the end and one of them was very unexpected! It was really shocking for me!…So it is a fast paced thriller with never a dull moment and this is like the third John Wick movie! All fight and not much talk!David regulars will love this!The next novel by David is not a continuation of Camel club apparently! He waited for couple more years to do that!
But I have decided to break my rule of chronology and get the next novel in Camel club aka Divine justice as my next read!Read away Camel club readers!