20 Years Ago till Today...a timeline for me.........

On my 27th Birthday I decided to make a timeline for myself.Since its a blog as well you are welcome to read it.....Its not a very romantic or action timeline but its true and my honest line.....

20 years ago I . . .
Can barely remember what exactly I was doing. No date wise memory

(2001)10 years ago I . . .

1. I had attained my first board exam ICSE and awaiting the results. I was especially scared about the physics and mathematics. I knew I was going to fail in biology. My Physics teacher was more scared than me. 
2. Finally completed the Unreal Tournament and beaten Xan. Vomited after playing Doom and decided never to play the series in my life. 
3.  Elder brother got married, and I got the privilege of being the groom’s brother for the first time. Got a very dear Sister In Law(I call her Didi till day)Family Member = 9+1

 (2006)5 years ago I . . .

1.  Got transferred from Kolkata to Bangalore to study Engineering.(Against my will) 
2.  Lost both my Grandparents. Dida(2003) Dadu(2006).Family=10-2 
3.  Sitting back at home with Zero morale and trying to find my way back to the College. 
4.  Appeared for an interview with Wipro BPO, got rejected due to lack of proper communication skills. 
5.  Went to Vishnu solutions for an Interview and came to know that being a 2nd Year Pass Engineer, I was overqualified for the job. Though he did agree to get me a job if I would have paid some 10,000 as a security and my certificates as an assurance. 
6.  Morale boosted up once I had cleared the exams(all except one EC32) 
7.  Realized that really women can be deceptive and they can lie for their benefits. 
8.  Gifted with a nephew(Sangsaptak) who became the youngest member in my Family (taking my title...he he).Family=8+1 

 (2008)3 years ago I . . .

1. Brother visited Bangalore and had a kickass time.Those days were like heaven when your brother is there to take care of your financial needs and to lets you to have...ahem many many good things.He was like a guide,philosopher and friend to me that time...We were the perfect bachelors with some of our fellow bachelors.We sort of had an unofficial bachelor's club with my brother being the unofficial president for the club....we had daily meetings and addas..
2. Finally passed out of the college, even with a job in Keane India (then known as Caritor).Though the buggers didn’t called me immediately. 
3.  Joined Wipro BPO (cleared the rounds with highest in comm. Skills and tech knowledge) to earn my pocket money, which was proudly spent on Computers and fruit juice and girlfriend. 
4. Celebrated my first Love anniversary (November), and realized that when you receive gifts it’s wonderful and when you have to give its costly. 
5. Realized that once you get into job it’s really the end of personal leizures, took up my first call as FLA(Front Line Agents more like Front Line A** HOLE) on 23:59 PM 31st December 2008.The lady on the other side was very courteous and offered me cookies to compensate the pain of taking her call on this occasion. Mrs. Mary Mathews, from Ohio.

 (2010)1 year ago I . . . 

1. Have someone in my life to annoy and bother with my actions...
2.  Proudly was going for a dayshift with Sunday as week off and a promotion. 
3.  Handling a team of around 10-15 people. I didn’t know I could do it. Planning to quit the job as well.”Frustration…ami hote chai sensation (TM)” was my motto. 
4.  Weekend Attendance at Ajanta for a couple of Beer(*Contains fruit juice and no added flavour) and Dry Chili Chicken. 
5.  Luckily had received a call from Keane India and Wipro Technology at the same time 
6.  Left home in the month of September and settled for Bangalore then Noida. 
7.  Joined my 2nd Job as a Software Engineer at Keane India (Noida)-Finally got the call. 
8.  Purchased the Nokia X6 on EMI to enjoy the superior photo quality at 5MP Carl Zeiss Optics. Still paying the EMI. The phone successfully survived one snatching event and multiple drops from hand. 
9.  Gifted with another nephew (Panchajanya) who once again becomes the youngest member of the family. Family=9+1

(2011)So far this year I . . .

1.  Been to office and tried to use the office hours for blogging and other social activities. 
2.  Office blocks facebook, Gmail and blogger. **&&**!@@@*!!. 
3.  Got a salary hike (don’t know why) and had little more money to spend on Pizza. 
4.  Missed half of my second brother’s wedding and landed up in Kolkata on 2nd day. Did expected a lot of brother’s Saalis but sadly that’s another story to be narrated later. Got a cute and really nice person as Sister In Law who calls me Bhai. She even reads my blogs dedicatedly(thanks) .Family =10+1 
5. Quit the habit of drinking in weekends and now can stay without a drink for months 
6.  Presently planning to quit cigarette(that’s a tough call)

 (15th June 2011)Yesterday I . . .

1.  Boozed a little to enjoy the night. Managed to drink the entire stuff without spilling even a drop. Record.
2.  Got wet in the rain to feel the nature. Caught cold and had a little fever. 
3.  Watched the movie Darjeeling Darjeeling by Anjan Dutta and tried to relate the characters to my own life(Nope I am the only piece in this universe..single piece sample) 
4.  No cakes were cut and no payesh was made, not even one sweet. Booooo….. 
5.  Realized that I am 27 now. More Booooooooo…………

 Today I . . . 

1. 1. Completed 27 years of my. 
2. 2. Completed the first chapter for SCJP by Kathy Sierra 
3. 3. Promised to quit smoking 
4. 4. Promised to be good to the special lady and not to annoy her(*Conditions apply)

Tomorrow I will . . . 

1.  Again annoy that woman 
2.  Be back at work (full-day) 
3. Smoke 10-12 cigarettes in office.
4. Cook some good food with the newly learned recepie and post the pics on facebook.

 In the next year I will . . .  

1.  Open a new blog about my personal journey to the wastelands 
2.  Start the Optimized Savings plan (Self Designed) 
3.  Try to change the job by the end of the Year.
4. One of my best friend is going to enter the family phase of life.Planning to be there for the fun...

Thats all for today...signing off..

Pyaar Ke Side Effects

Today I thought of looping the article "50 reasons  not to Marry a Bengali Woman" as a ending for the final installment as Bong culture.But I was surprised after going through the entire article in detail.It seems the article has been published just as a  formality against "50 reasons  not to Marry a Bengali Man".

If you want you can read it all here.

Coming back to the main article,the author(who is also a bengali lady-POULOMI BANERJEE AND MALINI BANERJEE)describes "Only in her case, making up the 50 is a bit of a tough job!" and also the first point suggested "And yet, despite it all, she is just too good for you. Sorry men".The first point has been briliantly put at the bottom of the list which actually starts from 50.

As I was reading I felt as if I have been drawn into a Feminist War where females are always been opressed by men and are subjected to social and physical harm.The best part of the story is that we men have been potrayed as typcial bengali jonjal and the fairer sex has been potrayed as the bond that holds us together to enter complete chaos.

Actually I do agree this particular agreement because I feel that a woman plays a very vital role in the family.No wonder she is potrayed as Ma Saraswati,Ma Lakhi and of course Maa Kali.We all have shared a few instances of all the incarnations at some point of time in our life.

So instead of sharing the Top 50 stuff here is a different prespective of love.The material has been consolidated from my personal experience and observation.

True Love and their side effects

But truelly speaking I feel both of them need each other and are incomplete being just alone.My idea of love and relation had been idealized by movies like Basanta Bilap,Hum Tum and of course Dil  Chata Hai.These movies actually had shown me how and why Bengali men  are ofen reluctant to show their affection.On the other side Bengali Women are more aggresive now  a days yet somehow they too expect to hear the magical three word scentence from men.And then comes the most heroic act one man can ever perform.

Proposing to a lady in Bengali culture had been driven by Literature and the cultural essence.That is why Saraswati Pujo is considered Bengali Valentine Day.A day which is chosen by millions of bengali to propose.So here is a summary of the events which are normally followed for a proposal(from a Man's Prespective)..

Step 1:Get a good bath and clean shave.Apply Deodrant.The love lady might just run away if she can sense the holy smell.

Step 2:You may choose to kneel down but that has a possibility of getting backfired.Instead just fix up a meeting with her in the presense of her and your friends.Just in case if either of the party gets a little nervous.3rd party is a must.

Step 3:Chew up some poetry or some romantic quotes.I know you have it in you but I have seen negetive side effects of expressing your own style.

Step 4:Now strangely enough if she has actually come..that means she has already said yes even before you propose.Of course she can also meet you with her friend whom you had misinterpreted to be  another charming lady but turns out to be a huge muscular hunk.

Step 5:So far so good.If you are not left with a dark eye then you have already conquered half of the battle.Rest is all drama.She might actually ask you questions,much like interview questions which can start from :

• How much do you love me?
• What will you do if I leave you?
• Does your mother knows about it?
• What if my dad comes to know about it.

The questions may vary depending on the situation.

Finally she will ask you about your past.Be frank but dont be a open history book.The bengali lady expects you to be honest,but if you become too honest she might actually keep them for use in later quarrels.

And lastly she says yes.Actually she even might say no but in that case you have to followup with phone,email,sms to get the yes.Also be prepared to hear out no and a list of reasons why she says no.(Mostly depends on how good you were at the interview)

 Job Confirmed

Wow you are in love.Enjoy the first year as much as possible because this is like the honeymoon period.The next year is mostly a book keeping job.Here is a list of things to do to ..

• Remember every single detail about your meeting.If possible write and oh the dates and what she was wearing what you ate and where did you go.In emergency always look into her eyes and say "I love you".
• When ever into a quarrel be ready to put down your arms as soon as possible.Because ultimately they have a nuclear weapon that can end the war instantly.Tears.When tears drops from her cheek,there is simply no counter to that.Its a tragedy that men cant apply that to their advantage.
• She wants you to be romantic even when you are hungry.
• They simply dont understand that drinking simply doesnt mean being Matal as potrayed in bengali commercial movies.
• No matter how correct you are.You are always proved wrong.

The Real Truth

To summarize life doesnt really turns out as dreamt a year ago.But to really think about it,actually its a lot better.Now you have someone to share your thoughts.Someone to share the pain and joy.Truelly someone to call at the middle of the night and say "I love you and I miss you".

Its really a different feeling."Jab uske aankh se aaso nikal te hai to yahan dard kyu hota hai",quoting Karan from Hum tum reveals a very sweet pain we all share towards the other kind.It cant really be described by words alone and I know everyone of you have felt it at some point of time in your life.

Shaadi ke Side Effects


Since I am not married I really cant tell what is the real side effect.However going by the numerous jokes about Husband-wife I take it to be very umm...Interesting.....So I will be eagerly waiting for that phase of life..however if you feel that you need to add something up..feel free to add in the comments.

Signing Off
Santanu Ghosal

Sukumar Ray jodi software engineer der jonye kobita likhten

Today Morning when I checked my mailbox I found this really funny email sent by one of my friends Deboshree Ghosh.Thought of sharing it with you guys.Even for the added fun..I panned to make the entire post in bengali.For those of you who cant see the Unicode 8 formatting,I am posting this as a picture blog.(By the way UTF-8 can be enabled from View-->Encoding in Internet Explorer)

This came in the wake of the hot debate 50 reasons not to marry a Bengali Man

 

 

 

 

Signing Off

Santanu Ghosal

In Defense Of Bangali Men

The famous Demented Ratling takes on the defense for Bengali men against the Telegraph article in his own istyle.Cant say that I am enjoying this(Though its a old and ancient feud).Watch Basanta Bilap to get the full feeling and action.Once again "Dada ar Didira this is not my words,I am a mere messanger.So please dont get angry on me."
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In Defense Of Bangali Men

Recently the Telegraph, a Kolkata-based newspaper published what I can only consider an attack piece on Bangali men in the same vein that Karan Johar attacked Marathi manoos by using the “B” word in “Wake Up Sid”.


It is just because we Bengali men do not have a Raj Thackeray in our midst that Telegraph can get away with this. In an ideal world, we would have an army of MNS (“Moonmoon and Nirad Chowdhury Shoinyo”) supporters throwing smelly “shoontki maach” in front of Telegraph offices till the said reporter apologized and the paper retracted this insulting article. But since most Bangalis have no energy left over from burning buses and singing along with Babur Suman to protest on the things that matter, namely the vilification and the emasculation of the Bongosontan, nothing like this will happen.

Given that, let me make my humble attempt to frisk this piece as a representative of those who have been so ridiculed.

A significant number of contemporary Bengali men, unlike their forefathers, condemn fish. Excepting ilish, for the men love it too. “I don’t have fish, only ilish,” many men have been heard confessing in a tender moment. Since they love ilish, they will not care if others do so as well.

Now I know that there are a few Bengalis, the same minuscule minority who detest Sourav Ganguly and support Salgaocar in football, who say “ami maach khai na” (I don’t eat fish) and may be prejudicial when it comes to fish. But I can say, no assert, as a representative of the contemporary Bengali man, that just like our forefathers we not only love ilish but also swear by chingri (shrimp) and kaankra (crab), worship our bhetki and bhola maach, lust for small tengra maach cooked with brinjal and salivate over pabda, parshe, pomfret and rui, in the same manner that we do over Roopa Ganguly. The day we cease to do so, Bengal will become like Gujarat in that there will be development and industry. Since that is not so, it shows that we still love our fish. Of all types. QED.

There is also some other innuendo that Bengali men are petty enough to hog the “peti” pieces and more specifically leave the “stricken with thorns” gada pieces to the women. Alas the author knows not the pleasure Bong men derive from munching on fish bones though yes sometimes they do have a nasty habit of getting into the windpipe. If you ever see a Bengali man silent, then that’s possibly the reason why he is so.

A similar Powerpoint presentation will explain why the leg piece of the chicken is also reserved for the man at     the table. There is an additional reason here. Growing Bengali boys, who keep growing into growing Bengali boys, need more “protein”, which is good for the “brain”. The “brain”, when encased within the head of a boy, is a collective Bengali obsession. Nurtured by his parents, Horlicks and chicken legs, it will be a potent weapon when he grows up: it will be the highest point reached by a man with a steady, decent job, besides being the embodiment of sex appeal. A Bengali man draws women towards him with his “brain”.

Again I do not see where the problem is. According to legend we like to believe, millions of years ago, when the Great Enlightened One (whom we Bangalis call Jyoti-Babu) made the universe, he asked the Bangali man which organ would be like to be made robust and strong. To his surprise, the Bengali man, perhaps to be contrarian, said “My brain”. And from that time onwards, Bongo-sontaans have stayed away from the light in their dark studies solving “sums” from KP Basu and KC Nag and studying the intricacies of gerunds from Wren and Martin while every other children of man have gone about exercising their powerful organs in more pleasurable ways.

Given the choice that the first Bangali man made, what is the problem if he likes his Horlicks and has a Maltova Mom and has a fondness for chicken legs—why should that be a matter of derision? What is the problem if the second most sold medical product in Bengal is the brain tonic Brainolia (the first being Livosin which no self-respecting Bengali with his chronic stomach problems would ever be caught without).

And before I forget. The chicken leg. Every waking hour the Bangali man leads a meek apologetic life, being flattened like sardines in a sweaty public bus, working low-paying jobs under non-Bangali masters, forced to endure the increasing insignificance of our state to the rest of India. Beaten and bruised throughout the day, when he sits for his dinner, his equally bent and ancient stainless steel plate becomes his castle and empire. There he wants to sit, like a king for ten minutes, his hand balanced on the side of the plate caressing the grains of the rice like a tender lover as his hand sensuously gets wet with the watery daal. It is then that he expects and demands that his chicken not be a size zero Kareena Kapoor bird. Is that too much to ask ?

But men actually look down on women for chewing fishbones. Or for eating green chillis on the side with their meals

Bengali men do not have green chilllis? Really? Dear Telegraph author, what kind of Bengali men have you been interacting with? Do you not know that the first quadrant of the Bangali man’s plate, right next to the leboo (lemon) and salt is the region we call “Sri Lanka” ? (Lanka is Bengali for chilli)

Many men still make that slurping sound as they eat. They sneeze, cough and yawn louder.

Here is a question I want to ask the author. Has he/she ever experienced the pleasure one gets from draining the tea from the cup into the saucer and drinking it with a noisy contended slurp? Note the double-standards dear readers. While the newspapers sex columns will advice the female reader to vocalize her pleasure, the standard are different when it comes to men. Cause if a Bangali man, deriving carnal pleasure from his lau-sukto so much as makes a contented slurp then it is derided as downmarket, sloppy and so very “issshhhh”.

In public, they admire Nandita Das. In secret, they want to be Salman Khan

Please do not generalize. I for one do not admire Nandita Das one bit. For me there is only one. Nandana Sen. And as to our desire to be Salman Khan, thank your lucky stars it is a “secret” desire—-if we started taking our shirts off at every opportunity the sight will not be pretty I tell you.

Once they would only be doctors, engineers or IAS officers. Now they will be MBAs. The rest is “same to same”.

Perhaps this is the only place where the author speaks the truth. Bengali men have two dreams in life—-to lord over others and to not do any real work. Getting an MBA allows them to do both.

Romance means lots of poetry and sublimity

Again this is shown as a negative. Evidently things would be better if we said “chalti hai kya nau se baraah” rather than quoting from Neru-Da, Nero-Da (any bald-headed intellectual) Deri-Da and the great Dero-Da (the bearded one—-Rabindranath Tagore). If indeed this be the case, women only need to say it. We will be equally comfortable singing “Challenge nibi na sala, panga nibi na sala” if that is what is needed to get the Suchitra Sens today all warmed up.

Which doesn’t take away from the fact that few Bengali men look good in jeans and a tee. For the same reason, they seem to be rolling on the dance floor. From where they are often not picked up. Understandably.

Don’t make me laugh. Bengali men do not know how to dance? Two words. Tito De. I challenge Prabhu-Deva to do Sukhen Das’s belly dance in “Hoyto amake karu mone nei” or Hrithik Roshan to execute Tapas Paul’s “Jai Baba Phootballnath” jig in as graceful a manner. If there is anyone who can out-dance a Bangali man it is one Gauranga Chakraborty better known as Mithun-da. Oh wait I forgot. He too is a Bangali.

For a video demonstration of the Bangali male dancing style, I ask you to watch this.

They think growing hair on their upper lip will make them more “manly”.

Yes right. All Bangali macho men have hairy upper lips—Uttam Kumar, Soumitro, Biswajit, Tapas Pal, Bumba-da? Right? Wrong. Let me say dear Telegraph writer, if you are looking for a region where the mustache is worshipped you are in the wrong part of the country.

Dressed as they are in their executive suits, they are often sighted at a sweet shop gorging on langcha, mishti doi or telebhaja at the para shops, looking guilty, before returning home from work.

While men from other parts of the country would go for comfort to a female friend, this act of eating sweets and oily fries is the most egregious expression of rebellion against marital authority that a Bangali man will show. Yes that is the sad plight of the Bangali male. From the mid 30s onwards, the Bangali body, not a marvel of engineering at the best of times, starts developing some problems arising out of a lifetime of sugar coursing through its veins both from rosogolla as well as from Subinoy Roy’s syrupy Rabindrasangeet and also from more than a bit of cholesterol accumulating in its plumbing not to speak of the whale blubber that cover the six-packs.

This is when their Bengali wives start “monitoring their diet”. Which shorn off the euphemism essentially means that they impose a regime of healthy eating at home through a series of measures even the Stasi and the KGB would find excessive. And it is to break those strict controls that scores of Bangali men stand in front of mutton roll shops or “mishtir dokaan”, furtively looking over their shoulders, as they bite into a chomchom or a Kobiraaji cutlet with the guilt and a fear of a married man going to a house of ill repute.

Now reading this piece, one would be surprised that this is the case. Cause according to the learned author, Bangali men totally dominate their women giving them the bad pieces of fish, making them do the dishes, being boorish and chauvinistic. Nothing can be further from the truth. In a Bangali family, it is the lady who cracks the whip and while the husband may be granted the odd bit of license like getting the gossip page of the newspaper first thing in the morning, on the things that matter the Bong woman is firmly in control. Of course the Telegraph plays up to stereotypes of the coy and submissive Bangali wife, oozing with sensuality and all eye-fluttering femininity. In reality, the Bipasa Basu thing is only an act and within a few years of marriage, Bangali women reveal their true selves and become a Mamata or Matangini Hajra.

Which brings me to the last line of the article.

The Bengali boy’s mother thinks he’s “flawless”. He secretly agrees.

The truth is slightly different. The Bangali’s “mama’s boyness” which is being lampooned here is essentially a concomitant of his being afraid of women. Before marriage, he is mortally scared of his mother as he is forced to, whether he likes it or not, to become a “khokon sona” . Then he gets married and a power struggle ensues. The wife is pissed at the son’s unquestioned subservience and the mother’s insistence that the son, being a reflection of the mother, is perfection personified—a sentiment reflected in this Telegraph piece. What it misses (mischievously no doubt) is the mother’s perspective as she rues how her son has become “distant” and “different” after marriage. Very soon brass utensils are being banged a bit too loudly, poisonous glances are being exchanged, mother tells son to “stand up and take control” (i.e. listen to your mother) while the wife says “How long are you going to let others take your decisions for you? Be a man” which is Bangali woman-speak for “Worship my every word”.

Torn between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea (which is which I leave to the judgment of readers) the Bangali man sits at the dinner table, looking down at his plate, morosely biting into the chicken leg or the “peti” fish piece with the weight of the world on him, from the peasants of San Salvador and Singur to whether he should wear the punjabi his mother presented him (but wife says “It’s …mm….okay) or the Chinese collar shirt wifey insists looks smart on him (but mother looks and says “Does not bouma’s brother also have one of these?”) for Ashtami dinner.

And it is at this poor Bangali man that the Telegraph author unleashes his/her sarcastic bile , grudging him his only diversions—a bit of extra meat or fish or the privilege of massaging his pot belly or of liberally applying talcum powder to avoid “ghamachi” (prickly heat), a disease he hates even more than the common cold.

Shame on you. Chi chi. Khoob dushtu tumi. Very naughty you are.

[Picture courtesy Abhik Ranjan]


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You can read the original article here.The posts are old but the facts are still very much true and holds good...

To Be Continued..........

Signing Off
Santanu Ghosal

50 reasons not to marry a Bengali Man(The Telegraph-04/10/2009)

eWhile looking for some other information I had stumbled upon this article.While many might argue about the points,the intention for posting is pure humour.Read on......
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50 reasons not to marry......a Bengali man. Metro explores

1. So much about Bengali men is about food. A significant number of contemporary Bengali men, unlike their forefathers, condemn fish. Excepting ilish, for the men love it too. “I don’t have fish, only ilish,” many men have been heard confessing in a tender moment. Since they love ilish, they will not care if others do so as well. Love makes them blind. The men will have the best peti (belly piece), for they say they are afraid of the kaantas, fishbones. Ilish abounds in them, which makes it a challenge. Women, at some point in their life, learn to tackle the kaantas, but confronting them able-bodied men become bashful and tremble. It pays off. Women are left to work their way through the thick-with-bones gaada pieces and men just sit back and allow the ilish to work on them. Eventually, the women get to liking chewing the bones and they are considered sexy while they are at it — remember the photographer-lover looking at Paroma in the film of the same name?

Anyway, if men won’t have fish, why do they relish the best parts of ilish? You see it rhymes, which is not a coincidence. Ilish is poetry — and Bengali men have exclusive rights over both.



They hog conversations the same way.

2. A similar Powerpoint presentation will explain why the leg piece of the chicken is also reserved for the man at the table. There is an additional reason here. Growing Bengali boys, who keep growing into growing Bengali boys, need more “protein”, which is good for the “brain”. The “brain”, when encased within the head of a boy, is a collective Bengali obsession. Nurtured by his parents, Horlicks and chicken legs, it will be a potent weapon when he grows up: it will be the highest point reached by a man with a steady, decent job, besides being the embodiment of sex appeal. A Bengali man draws women towards him with his “brain”. For these reasons the popular Bengali sayings: Maachher muro khao, brain-er pokkhe bhalo (Have fishhead, it’s good for the brain); TV dekho na, brain-er pokkhe kharap (Don’t watch TV, it’s bad for the brain); Beshi khela dhula brain-er pokkhe kharap (Too much sport is bad for the brain); Amartya Sen maachher maatha kheye boro hoyechhen (Amartya Sen grew up on fishheads). Fishheads being another powerful Bengali obsession.



3. But men actually look down on women for chewing fishbones. Or for eating green chillis on the side with their meals. There’s a suggestion of corruption or perversion about these two things — as if a clean piece of fish is morally superior and liking the bones is an unmentionable proclivity. Or liking a hot green chilli is slightly carnal. As a character in Tagore’s short story Khudhito Pashan, dismissive about women, put it: women love hot chillis, sour tamarind and a stern husband. Though he didn’t specify which was the worst for her.



4. Chicken roll.



5. Egg chicken roll.



6. Double egg chicken roll.

7. The Sunday mutton lunch. After which men can only go to sleep.

8. They really don’t want to go to the bajaar, not even to the AC retail stores for grocery or vegetable shopping. Especially the new-age Bengali man. The way he tiptoes through the fish market makes the wife cringe.



9. Many men still make that slurping sound as they eat. They sneeze, cough and yawn louder.



10. They expect women to serve them at the dinner table. At least she should be urging him on to the right bowls.



11. They expect the women will carry the dirty dishes to the sink, clear the table and put away the remnants in the right containers.



12. If they do put the food away, the fridge looks like a battlefield, with several things dismembered, dismantled and oozing liquids. In any case, they would never clean the refrigerator. Ditto for the cooking gas.



13. When they are drunk they invoke Robi Thakur. Then they tend to go for the cosmic, namely, Debabrata’s rendition of Akash bhora surjo tara, after which they have dinner.



14. But then when they are sober why are they still discussing Sachin Tendulkar versus Sourav Ganguly, and backing Dada to win?



15. In public, they admire Nandita Das. In secret, they want to be Salman Khan.



16. Rare is the Bengali man who looks good in a formal suit. He stops midway into it. He looks square. Or round. But proud. If you ask him why, he is likely to say that intellect is inversely proportional to height in his part of the world. He can be smug, very smug.



17. Which doesn’t take away from the fact that few Bengali men look good in jeans and a tee.



18. For the same reason, they seem to be rolling on the dance floor. From where they are often not picked up. Understandably.



19. They want biryani even at a Chinese restaurant. And chow mien at a mughlai eatery. Poor binary creatures.



20 . Only men can get to organise pujas and ignore everything else for four days.



21 .Their genjis.



22 .Their paijamas.





23 .Once they would only be doctors, engineers or IAS officers. Now they will be MBAs. The rest is “same to same”.

24 .Their stock of jokes is small and oft-repeated, especially in family circles. Such as the one on the various kinds of baldness. It ends with the variety in which only a few strands of hair remain. It is called Smritituku thak (forget me not). But as one has heard it since childhood, one has to remember to laugh hard. Outside family circles one common joke is: “Age no bar, caste no bar etc...”



25 .They will wear the dhuti for a wedding, but not before turning the household upside down. The dhuti has to be located first, sent to the laundry, and has to have the gile work done on it. Same for the addir punjabi. Then the gold punjabi buttons have to be located. In fact, every time a punjabi is worn, locating the buttons is the woman’s job.



The wearing of the dhuti itself is an event. There is at least one assistant, sometimes two, to help with it. Some men have worn the dhuti only on the occasion of their marriage — and their relatives still remember it, blow-by-blow.



The end-result is certainly not worth the fuss that goes into it.



26 .Romance means lots of poetry and sublimity.



27 .They think growing hair on their upper lip will make them more “manly”.



28 .Men are reluctant to make the bed, open the windows in the morning or make the morning pot of tea. Most of all they are uncooperative about hanging the mosquito net. It shakes the foundation of marriage.



29 .Their after-work activities include watching soaps like Bou Kotha Kao, Durga, Ekhane Akash Neel and game shows like Dadagiri, Dance Bangla Dance, but they pretend only the wives watch serials.



30 .They part their hair.



31 .They scoff at Dan Brown’s “poor language”, but devour his thrillers anyway.



32 .Dressed as they are in their executive suits, they are often sighted at a sweet shop gorging on langcha, mishti doi or telebhaja at the para shops, looking guilty, before returning home from work.



33 .They not only have an opinion about everything but they think they take the right decision in everything, though this could be a universal male trait.



34 .The television remote lands in his hands the moment he returns from work and stays there till he goes to sleep. But office phone calls don’t end. So he sits there with the remote in one hand and the phone in the other. This could be another universal male trait.



35 .Of course it’s okay to stay with his family. If she does, she is being a good woman in these selfish times. Of course it’s not okay to stay with hers. If he does, he is being a wimp in the traditional sense.



36 .He will insist that she looks beautiful, hot in fact, wearing sindur along with jeans, when she knows she is looking downright uncool.



37 .On online networking sites, Bengali men show a high tendency towards matrimony.



38 .They may not know the language. But they know the choicest Bangla gaalis and use them liberally.



39 .They like to pat their pot bellies in private. Sometimes in public.



40 .All nursery rhyme heroes are boys. Khoka goes fishing, goes to the river of milk, goes to hunt, goes to get married, while Khuku sits at home, learning to cook, waiting to get married or just plain crying. Obviously Khoka will face several adjustment problems when he grows up.



41. They are less chivalric compared with men from other Indian communities, many women report.



42. Many Bengali men think they are from Brazil. Which is why they go rabid during the World Cup.



43. During summer, they will smear their chests in slow motion with talcum powder before going to bed.



44 .If you are going to Digha, they will definitely advise you to have vodka mixed with coconut water on the beach.



45. If he’s there himself, he will drink it, wearing nothing but a beach hat and “baarmudas”.



46.-50 .The Bengali boy’s mother thinks he’s “flawless”. He secretly agrees.

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Signing Off
Santanu Ghosal