For Pongal Festival, I didn't get any holiday in Pune. So I didn't go to my hometown and had to stay in Pune itself. On Makar Sankranti, as its called here, I was invited to my wife's relatives place as they made some special dinner. I asked my wife first what exactly was made as part of that special dinner, as I was a little afraid that I won't like the food. She said it's some sweet made of some millet and we need to mix it with banana pieces and eat. Her vagueness of the description didn't do anything to reduce my fear. As I expected, it turned out to be horrible, at least for me. It was sweet, but not edible after 2, 3 spoons. I struggled and had 3 more spoons then gave up. This incident reminded me of a similar incident in my High school hostel, except there i couldn't simply escape from it. And the incident below:
Flashback(2002-2004): Mystery Sweet
To know a little background about our high school hostel mess, refer the episode 3 blog. Almost all the dishes served in our mess was horrible. Any dish which tastes a little better won't be served the second time. Most of those dishes would be a sweet or snack served during festival days( if you're wondering why we didn't go home for festival days, you didn't read any of any previous blogs). On one such occasion, i don't exactly remember what festival it was, we were served a mystery sweet during our dinner. It looked like upma, but a sweet, but not kesari. It was somewhere between upma and kesari. We were a little surprised that a sweet was being served for dinner.
It was served before main course and once the guys in first line tasted, we could see a delightful surprise in their face. Immediately all the guys from the lines behind asked the guys from first line how the dish tastes. The feedback was amazing. They said its awesome and all the guys were happy and waiting to be served that wondrous dish. When the dish was being served in the 3rd and 4th lines, the guys from 1st and 2nd lines who didn't even finish the first serving, inserted their plates in the other lines asking for the 2nd serving. Even though everybody knew we won't be served 2nd time any dish that tastes good, they were being greedy and took a chance. To everybody's surprise, they were served the 2nd time. Everybody was so happy, they can't believe what was happening. Then every body asked for more and more and got their plates full of this mystery sweet. None of the plate had any place for main course.
But soon our happiness was short-lived. After we had 3-4 spoons of that dish, we couldn't eat any further. It was the kind of sweet you can't eat after 3-4 spoons. Too much cardomom or cinnamon, don't know what the hell they put that in that. We started getting vomiting sensation when we tried to eat any more of that. Everybody was looking around each other to make sure we were not the only ones feeling that way. Only good news was everybody was feeling the same way and soon we were cursing the dish. Everyone started whining as "What in the devil's name is this?", "I wondered why they were serving 2nd time", "I'm about to vomit da, i can't take any more of this" etc etc.
Few people started getting up to throw the food in the trash and headed out of the mess. One more thing to tell you here is that sometimes in our mess, our wardens and tutors would be standing outside between the mess and the place with all the taps where we wash our plates and hands and mostly throwing away the leftover foods. On that particular fateful day, it turned out they were standing outside and not letting anyone waste the food and sent back initial batch of students back to mess to finish whatever is left in their plates. They probably tasted the dish before us and decided to give their sadist mind some fun.
Now we were all stranded inside that island called 'mess' with this thing in our plate, as our wardens and tutors are roaming outside like crocodiles and the only way to get past them is with an empty plate. We were all simply sitting and looking at each others faces crying and laughing in that shared sorrow. Every few minutes we would try to swallow another spoon of that thing and fail miserably. It was getting late and everybody tried to find a way to get past the crocodiles (wardens/tutors) outside. Few students had milk coupons and a cup with them to get milk outside the mess after dinner. They stuffed as much of that thing from the plate into that cup and hid it by keeping it under the plate and got past the crocodiles. Rest of us begged them to come back and give their cups to us so we can also escape in similar fashion.
But the number of students with cups was very less compared to the students without them. So it was enough for everyone to depend on the same escape route. Desperate situations lead to desperate measures. Some students stuffed that thing in their pant and shirt pockets and escaped and trashed them after crossing the crocodiles. Some even stuffed in their mouth without swallowing and walked fast past the crocodiles and spit out and vomited in trash after that. Some of us waited for survivors to return with cups and some simply waited for crocodiles to get bored and leave their positions.
After couple hours of struggle we all survived that ordeal and learned a lesson to never ask for 2nd serving with the desire for taste in that mess and probably a life lesson that don't trust anything which comes easy in life. And thankfully that dish was never served again for our entire stay there.
Links to all hIgh school hIstory blogs:
Episode 7
Episode 6
Episode 5
Episode 4
Episode 3
Episode 2
Episode 1
Flashback(2002-2004): Mystery Sweet
To know a little background about our high school hostel mess, refer the episode 3 blog. Almost all the dishes served in our mess was horrible. Any dish which tastes a little better won't be served the second time. Most of those dishes would be a sweet or snack served during festival days( if you're wondering why we didn't go home for festival days, you didn't read any of any previous blogs). On one such occasion, i don't exactly remember what festival it was, we were served a mystery sweet during our dinner. It looked like upma, but a sweet, but not kesari. It was somewhere between upma and kesari. We were a little surprised that a sweet was being served for dinner.
It was served before main course and once the guys in first line tasted, we could see a delightful surprise in their face. Immediately all the guys from the lines behind asked the guys from first line how the dish tastes. The feedback was amazing. They said its awesome and all the guys were happy and waiting to be served that wondrous dish. When the dish was being served in the 3rd and 4th lines, the guys from 1st and 2nd lines who didn't even finish the first serving, inserted their plates in the other lines asking for the 2nd serving. Even though everybody knew we won't be served 2nd time any dish that tastes good, they were being greedy and took a chance. To everybody's surprise, they were served the 2nd time. Everybody was so happy, they can't believe what was happening. Then every body asked for more and more and got their plates full of this mystery sweet. None of the plate had any place for main course.
But soon our happiness was short-lived. After we had 3-4 spoons of that dish, we couldn't eat any further. It was the kind of sweet you can't eat after 3-4 spoons. Too much cardomom or cinnamon, don't know what the hell they put that in that. We started getting vomiting sensation when we tried to eat any more of that. Everybody was looking around each other to make sure we were not the only ones feeling that way. Only good news was everybody was feeling the same way and soon we were cursing the dish. Everyone started whining as "What in the devil's name is this?", "I wondered why they were serving 2nd time", "I'm about to vomit da, i can't take any more of this" etc etc.
Few people started getting up to throw the food in the trash and headed out of the mess. One more thing to tell you here is that sometimes in our mess, our wardens and tutors would be standing outside between the mess and the place with all the taps where we wash our plates and hands and mostly throwing away the leftover foods. On that particular fateful day, it turned out they were standing outside and not letting anyone waste the food and sent back initial batch of students back to mess to finish whatever is left in their plates. They probably tasted the dish before us and decided to give their sadist mind some fun.
Now we were all stranded inside that island called 'mess' with this thing in our plate, as our wardens and tutors are roaming outside like crocodiles and the only way to get past them is with an empty plate. We were all simply sitting and looking at each others faces crying and laughing in that shared sorrow. Every few minutes we would try to swallow another spoon of that thing and fail miserably. It was getting late and everybody tried to find a way to get past the crocodiles (wardens/tutors) outside. Few students had milk coupons and a cup with them to get milk outside the mess after dinner. They stuffed as much of that thing from the plate into that cup and hid it by keeping it under the plate and got past the crocodiles. Rest of us begged them to come back and give their cups to us so we can also escape in similar fashion.
But the number of students with cups was very less compared to the students without them. So it was enough for everyone to depend on the same escape route. Desperate situations lead to desperate measures. Some students stuffed that thing in their pant and shirt pockets and escaped and trashed them after crossing the crocodiles. Some even stuffed in their mouth without swallowing and walked fast past the crocodiles and spit out and vomited in trash after that. Some of us waited for survivors to return with cups and some simply waited for crocodiles to get bored and leave their positions.
After couple hours of struggle we all survived that ordeal and learned a lesson to never ask for 2nd serving with the desire for taste in that mess and probably a life lesson that don't trust anything which comes easy in life. And thankfully that dish was never served again for our entire stay there.
Links to all hIgh school hIstory blogs:
Episode 7
Episode 6
Episode 5
Episode 4
Episode 3
Episode 2
Episode 1
