Friday, May 31, 2013

Farmyard Metaphors - 8

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Yesterday I was saying that none of us eats the Indian Crow...for reasons not altogether rational.

But if you live long enough like me, there will be an occasion or two when we have to:

"eat crow"

This American metaphor, I see, is as recent as 1850. It is the colorful synonym of:

"eat the humble pie", "eat your hat", "eat your words" etc.

Essentially it involves a shameful descent from a strong position taken in unwisdom.

When I was a kid of 10, Nehrujee was the idol of our generation. He had the charisma and making of greatness. As soon as the Cold War began post-World War II, America and Russia took antagonistic positions on every blessed thing. And there was this nuclear arms race. While Russia gobbled up the East Europe, America, being far away, started a strategy of surrounding Russia by making arms treaties with pliable nations. There emerged NATO, SEATO, CENTO and the like. Pakistan happily embraced America which confers its bounty on her Islamic friend.

There was tremendous pressure on Nehru to join the American 'string of pearls'.

But Nehru was a socialist and had a soft corner for Russia. But he declined to take explicit sides in the Cold War and invented the Non-Aligned Movement along with a few like-minded impoverished nations. But he imported Russia's Five-Year Plans and, whenever needed, supported Russia which made him their national hero, along with Raj Kapoor...to the chagrin of America.

And Nehru went a step ahead and preached what was hailed: "Panch Sheel", a doctrine with five nebulous ideals like peaceful coexistence, non-interference and such. And China, then a stooge of Russia, joined the Panch Sheel bandwagon...and Nehru became so famous that we were all finding fault with Norway for denying him a quick Nobel Peace Prize...Nehru's pics were often seen with a dove and an olive branch in its beak resting on his shoulder.







And India started pontificating and lecturing America to desist from its war-mongering.

Things changed dramatically over less than a decade and China gave us a memorable drubbing in 1962. And Russia pleaded helplessness saying famously:

"India is our friend, but China is our brother"

meaning "blood is thicker than water".

While the relentless Chinese attack and occupation of Indian territory went on, Nehru had to 'eat crow' and seek the help of Kennedy who obliged with a shipment of battle tanks that could be airlifted to the Himalayas.

I am writing this in such detail since our generation never forgot the shame of it all...and Nehru died of a broken heart in 1964...

Beware of the crow!

Muthukur crows were famous for another of their hideous propensities.

They would rarely loose up their milk-white droppings in their nests. When the urge came on them they would caw and sit on our parapet stocked with our school books and do the job...and it would be our miserable ordeal to wipe the sticky droppings with a wet cloth...unsuccessfully.  

Or, they would fly overhead and aim their droppings on our dumb heads. And then what a mess! We had to go home and take a bath soaping our heads furiously...a thing which we otherwise refused to do for lack of time.

In Telugu there is a metaphor involving the droppings of the crow:

"Samudram lo kaki retta"

Literally it means:

"A crow's dropping in the ocean"

This was used to make us cringe about our feeble charities which we would love to flaunt. Meaning, our Rs 100 contribution to the Prime Minister's Relief Fund is:

"Samudram lo kaki retta"


All in all it was unwise of our nation's forefathers to choose the peacock as our National Bird. For we have nothing to preen about.

On the other hand I would have decided the Great Indian Crow as our National Bird. For, our crow epitomizes our essential national character.


For proof, just read our newspapers with their thrilling stories of our politicians, businessmen, cricket administrators, or even the aam aadmi...

Mark Twain would have agreed with me...heartily.

 

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