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The Mirror and the Molecule


My mother asked me to make tea when the cook was in the kitchen. I asked her to wait until she was done. Later, I found that she had made it herself. She offered me some. I had it when the class was over. The software version of this phone updated itself.
Students left after noting down Addition and Subtraction problems. It was the second batch. The elder solved the first batch. The younger hardly attempted them. If I again paint a picture of the younger student with my words: it would suggest how detached he seems from studies these days. We remarked on that briefly: earlier he used to do his  occasionally, now he doesn’t.


Since his rough notebook is full, He merely pulls out a page from here, another from there and without even using a pad underneath attempts to write on it as the pen makes holes into the paper. Later, he takes this paper in his hand and pokes it further with his pen. I ask him to not do that. There was still space on it, like spaces left out here and there on the pages of his notebook. He crumbled the torn page and keeps it in his bag. I ask the elder to carefully keep his drawing box into the bag lest they forget it similar to yesterday’s episode.
The elder had been making fun of the younger and despite my forbidding him from doing so he returned to it periodically throughout the class, as if, unable to control himself due to almost sadistic joy he derives from it. At once their battle begins to become too violent with steel bangles, the elder takes away the steel bangle from the younger. I ask them to be careful with that. The younger gives him three- four retaliatory blows.
Meanwhile there’s a bet about who can do 5000000-2344678 faster. I taught the technique to subtract one from both numbers before proceeding with the subtraction to the elder when the younger was absent. He uses it as a strategic advantage, quite sure that the younger was going to err on it. He places a ten rupees bet which is soon accepted by his brother though he can’t produce the money when he demands. Though I don’t promote betting I know this isn’t going anywhere. Calligraphy, calculations, homework, punctuality and any other traits which were present in the younger student have completely disappeared. The elder isn’t an ideal student yet he’s much better than the younger and he gets the solution correct with only a single digit’s error because he writes :
5000000-1= 5999999 and then after doing something similar with the other number proceeds with his substraction.
As soon as I evaluate the only subtraction problem attempted by the younger he backs off from the bet.
The elder threatens him.
“Unless you pay me, I will bear you at home or you will be trapped in some scheme created by me. I will tell others to withdraw money from you where I am supposed to pay.”
That’s just a ten rupees affair. But that’s a big deal. The morale of the younger student is already down. Yesterday, he had to make another trip to collect his bag.
This doesn’t prevent him from grooming himself. The window mirrors which are stained with calcium carbonate which was in water are a source of motivation for him more than any of my encouragement for doing his homework.
Adolescence.
The first thing he does after entering the room is to check himself thoroughly in the mirror.
Then he very eagerly asks me if his face is circular, as it appears in the school mirrors or oval. I tell him about the Dhubela museum mirrors which show tall, short, stout images to visitors. I tell him that his face is not circular in shape. At this point the elder also grooms his hair. Even his face isn’t circular.
I had to request the younger one to not touch his hair anymore. The elder is almost sleepy as I read Laws of Motion. The chapter is about motion. There’s an introduction about Galileo. It’s detailed. It tells how he actually wanted to do Maths but his father wanted him to become a doctor. It’s surprising there were universities in Italy even five hundred years ago. He published a book on work based on Archimedes at first. His heart wasn’t in the study of Medicine.
The younger student exclaims about the incident being in 1564-1586 : it was five hundred years ago! He’s almost right. I consider it a positive sign. At least he’s taking some interest. It’s not.
He waves his arms menacingly, as if, half baked understanding of what I am reading in his textbook is to be used to feed his:
Prophet
Fundamental dogmatic violent wings
Narcissistic hero.
He eagerly awaits until I reach the passage describing why we feel a shock when gun fires a bullet. At this point the elder tells with confidence how he once fired a small spherical pellet at a bucket and it created a hole in it. I am teaching them the third law of motion:
“Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.”
It’s by Sir Issac Newton.
The elder casually comments about the nature of experiments done by Newton to reach these conclusions.
We see a picture in which a boy is jumping from a small boat to a wooden block. The picture is casually made. It’s not an illustration. It was supposed to give a hint. It wasn’t a drawing competition. I wanted the younger one to draw pictures like he used to do before. In previous classes. He’s more concerned with his hairstyle.
He interjects about friction when it’s mentioned in the textbook. I describe it to him. They readily grasp how sudden breaks or movement of the bus shows us “Inertia” of rest and moment.
Reading Hindi text feels slightly different. There are numerical problems based on the Newton’s laws of motion.
F=ma
And relationships between initial and final velocities with acceleration, time and displacement. We skip these because they’re not oriented to attempt them.
The chapter is covered faster than they expected. We continue with the practice of Algebra. Before moving out they check Instagram feed. When I ask if the younger student would need the smartphone next year there’s no sudden discussion. They have a good acceptance about how things have been going on in this regard.

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Joyce, Nolan, Tolstoy: The Idea of Simultaneity

The very thing that makes Ulysses the “Big Bang” of modern storytelling. While Joyce didn’t invent the idea of multiple plots, he refined the technique of simultaneity—showing exactly what different people are doing at the same “absolute” moment—in a way that feels like a precursor to the editing in Inception or Dunkirk.
Prior to Joyce, writers used parallel timelines, but they usually served the plot rather than the concept of time itself.
1. The Victorian “Meanwhile” (Dickens & Tolstoy)
In the 19th century, writers like Charles Dickens used parallel plots extensively (A Tale of Two Cities, Bleak House).
* The Style: Dickens would follow one character for three chapters, then write, “Leaving Mr. Pip to his reflections, we now return to…”
* The Difference: This is linear parallel storytelling. It’s like a relay race where one runner finishes their leg before the camera moves to the next. Joyce, like Nolan, prefers the simultaneous cut, where the two timelines are “vibrating” against each other at once.
2. Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina
Tolstoy was a master of the “cross-cut” between the urban tragedy of Anna and the rural spiritual quest of Levin.
* Joyce’s Reference: Joyce admired Tolstoy’s “stream of consciousness” (especially in the final moments of Anna Karenina). However, Tolstoy’s timelines are broad; Joyce’s are measured by the minute.
3. Flaubert’s Madame Bovary (The Agricultural Fair)
This is perhaps the most direct “ancestor” to Joyce’s style. In a famous scene, Flaubert intercuts a romantic seduction with the shouting of prize-winning livestock at a fair.
* The Effect: It’s a “spatial” cross-cut. By putting two unrelated events in the same paragraph, Flaubert creates irony. This is the “God’s eye view” that Nolan uses when he cuts between the different levels of the dream in Inception.
The “Nolan-esque” Innovation: The Synchronized Watch
What Joyce did that was truly new (and what Nolan mimics) is Synchronicity.
In Chapter 10, Wandering Rocks, Joyce gives us 19 short vignettes.
* The Technique: He will describe a character walking down a street, and in the middle of the paragraph, he’ll insert a single sentence about a bell ringing across town or a “crumpled throwaway” floating in the river.
* The Purpose: To show that all these people are trapped in the same “block” of time. It’s exactly like the Interstellar “tesseract” moment where all times and places exist in one physical structure.
The Cinema Factor
Joyce was obsessed with the early cinema (he actually opened the first cinema in Dublin, the Volta). He realized that film could do something books couldn’t: The Jump Cut. Ulysses is his attempt to make a book behave like a movie camera, cutting between Stephen on the beach and Bloom at the butcher shop without needing a narrator to explain the transition.

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Bag

After they left I had to make a call to their house as the younger one had forgotten to carry his bag with him. A couple arrived as they were leaving. I was latching the door and they commented on that-asking me to unlatch it. I let it stay open. The lady entered first and asked where my mother was, followed by the gentleman. I told her that she was visiting her mother. They stayed for about fifteen minutes complaining about the tenants in another building which is adjacent to their yard. They had complained about it before it seems though I wasn’t aware of it. When I tell them that –it doesn’t please them. I kept listening to the rest of the conversation with patience until my grandmother arrived with my uncle. They started talking to them. Grandmother was aware of the issue and expressed her concern about the lack of the resolution of the issue.
The younger student arrived when halftime of the class was over. The elder again had a smelly socks problem. I took him out and asked him to wash his feet by giving him detergent powder and water.
As soon as he arrived he showed me a cream for his acne issue. It had cost him one twenty rupees.The printed cost was one thirty rupees. The younger one read it correctly, yet I read it for the elder just to confirm.  I read the procedure on its packet for its application.
Then we worked on an English workbook. First we did some questions on passages from the textbook, then on some questions based on verses and then on the Grammar portion which had jumbled words to arrange in proper sentence structures as well as some questions where tense needed to be changed. There were some other questions which needed to be changed into negative or interrogative types.
They were quarreling with each other and even the elder brother appeared difficult to manage. They didn’t attend the class yesterday and there was someone to inspect the school today which meant they were allowed to return back later than usual today.
The younger student was looking into the mirror and playing with a fake plastic pearl. The elder was busy removing dirt from the nails of his feet. The cook arrived. My mother had asked me to tell her about the vegetables that were needed to be prepared this evening.
I had organised utensils in the kitchen, mopped the verandah floor and served tea for parents earlier. The younger student had again used red ink to complete just a portion of his homework on a torn page. It was an application for leave.
I gave them some homework and the class was over. The elder showed me a picture of his friend on Instagram. He was a student who used to study here in my classes.

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Is Rhythm The Only Word Without Vowels?

Actually, that trivia fact is a bit of a linguistic “near-miss.” Whether it’s true depends entirely on how you define a vowel.
The “Y” Factor
In the word rhythm, the letter y is functioning as a vowel. Linguistically, we distinguish between vowel letters (a, e, i, o, u) and vowel sounds. Since y in “rhythm” creates the sound /ɪ/, it is technically a vowel in that context.
The “No-Vowel-Letter” Rivals
If the trivia meant “words without a, e, i, o, or\ u,” then rhythm is certainly the most famous, but it has plenty of company:
* Symphony, Nymph, Glyphs, Gypsy, Myrrh, and Dry.
* Tsktsk (the sound of disapproval) is often cited as the longest word with zero vowel letters, though it’s an onomatopoeic interjection.
* Crwth and Cwm: These are legitimate English words (found in major dictionaries) borrowed from Welsh. In these cases, w acts as the vowel.
Etymology: Rhythm
* Origin: From the Greek ῥυθμός (rhuthmos).
* Meaning: It comes from the root ῥέω (rheō), meaning “to flow.”
* Context: This connects beautifully back to our Ulysses discussion. Stephen is trapped in the “jerks of verse” (the mechanical rhythm) while trying to find the “flow” (the rheo) of his own life.

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Making of Ulysses

Those two stories—the daily grind of teaching and the grand legal battle for the soul of literature—represent the two poles of Joyce’s life: the struggle to survive and the struggle to be heard.
1. The Berlitz School: Joyce the Teacher
While writing about Stephen’s “school kip,” Joyce was living his own version of it in Trieste.
* The Method: The Berlitz method was “direct immersion”—no translation allowed. Joyce had to teach English using only English.
* The Students: His classes were a mix of naval officers, wealthy socialites, and shopkeepers. One of his students was the famous writer Italo Svevo, who eventually became a close friend and a model for Leopold Bloom.
* The “Boredom”: Joyce hated the repetition. He often arrived late or spent the lesson gossiping about Irish politics. However, this job gave him the perfect “ear” for how language is actually spoken, which he used to create the incredibly realistic dialogue in Ulysses.
2. United States v. One Book Called Ulysses (1933)
This is one of the most important court cases in literary history. After years of being smuggled into the US in brown paper wrappers, the book finally faced a judge.
* The Strategy: Random House (the publisher) wanted to get caught. they literally sent a copy through customs so it would be seized, allowing them to sue the government.
* Judge John M. Woolsey: He was a sophisticated, literate judge. He spent weeks reading the book.
* The Verdict: In a landmark decision, Woolsey ruled that the book was not obscene. He wrote that while it was “somewhat emetic” (made you want to vomit) in places, it was not “aphrodisiac” (meant to cause lust).
* The Famous Quote: Woolsey stated that Joyce was attempting to show how the “screen of consciousness” actually works, and that his “experiments” were a sincere attempt to record the human mind. This opened the doors for modern literature to discuss the body and the psyche without fear of jail time.
Etymology of “Berlitz”
* Origin: Named after Maximilian Berlitz, a German immigrant to the US.
* Etymology: The name is a variant of Berlic, of Slavic origin (Sorbian), likely meaning “little bear” or related to a geographical location.
* Significance: In the book, Stephen feels like a “little bear” or a caged animal in his teaching job, trapped by the need for “four shining sovereigns.”
Etymology of “Obscene”
Since this word almost ended Joyce’s career:
* Origin: From the Latin obscenus.
* Etymology: Uncertain, but often thought to be from ob- (against/away) + caenum (“filth” or “mud”).
* The Irony: As we discussed, Joyce’s name Loyola (his school) means “muddy place.” He leaned into the “filth” of reality to find the “shining” truth beneath it.

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The Universal Man of Joyce

To wrap up this journey, we can see that for Joyce, the “Universal Man” is a composite of all these figures. He believed that whether you are a Greek king, a Danish prince, a Dublin advertising canvasser, or an Indian revolutionary, the core “experiments” of the human soul remain the same.
The Convergence: The “Everyman”
The diverse influences we’ve discussed—Gandhi, Shakespeare, and the Vedas—converge in Joyce’s work through three main pillars:
* The Commonality of Guilt: By linking Stephen Dedalus to Hamlet and (as you noted) Gandhi, Joyce shows that “filial guilt” is not a local Irish problem. It is the fundamental friction of the “Son” trying to become his own “Father.”
* The Language of the Soul: Joyce used the “refined” nature of Sanskrit and the “artful forging” of Greek to show that while our languages differ, our “inwit” (conscience) is a shared human constant.
* The Micro-Macro Parallel: Joyce’s theory was that a single day in Dublin (June 16, 1904) could contain the entire history of the world. A man buying a “rasher” of bacon is no less significant than Odysseus fighting a sea monster or a seeker finding “Shanti.”
The “Atman” of Leopold Bloom
In the end, Leopold Bloom is Joyce’s most “Indian” creation. Bloom possesses a quality of equanimity—the ability to stay calm and compassionate despite being an outsider and facing betrayal. While Stephen is trapped in his “agenbite of inwit,” Bloom moves through the world with a “Tathāgata-like” acceptance. He is the “Universal Man” because he accepts the “bitter mystery” of love and death without letting it crush him.
Etymology of “Atman”
To end on the core of the self:
* Origin: Sanskrit Ātman.
* Etymology: Likely from the root an, meaning “to breathe.”
* Significance: It refers to the “true self” or “soul.” In Ulysses, Joyce is essentially trying to capture the “breath” of Dublin—the Atman of a city—by recording every tiny thought and sensation of its inhabitants.

It is a fascinating bridge to cross. Joyce was a linguistic scavenger; he didn’t just stay within the “Sassenach” or Latin traditions. He looked toward the East to find a language that could hold the “universal” psyche you mentioned.
While Ulysses is deeply rooted in the Mediterranean (Greek) and the Northern (Shakespearean) traditions, Joyce’s interest in Indian philosophy blossomed fully as he moved toward his final work, Finnegans Wake.
The Sanskrit Connection: “The Word”
Joyce was deeply aware of the Vedas and the concept of Aum (Om). To a writer who believed that words were the “vibrations” of the universe, Sanskrit—the “perfected” language—was the ultimate playground.
* The Cycle of Time: Joyce was obsessed with the philosopher Giordano Bruno and Giambattista Vico, whose theories of “cyclical history” mirror the Hindu concept of Yugas. Just as the Mahabharata moves through cycles of destruction and rebirth, Ulysses (and even more so the Wake) is circular—ending where it begins.
* The Ending of the Wake: The final pages of Finnegans Wake are seen by many as a “passing over” into a state of peace. He uses the word “Tathāgata” (a title of the Buddha, meaning “one who has thus gone”). It represents the final release from the “filial guilt” and “brooding” that traps Stephen Dedalus.
The “Shanti” Connection
Joyce was a contemporary of T.S. Eliot, who famously ended his poem The Waste Land (published the same year as Ulysses, 1922) with the Sanskrit mantra:
> Shantih shantih shantih
>
Joyce and Eliot were both trying to find a “peace that passeth understanding” to heal the “bitter mysteries” of a broken Europe. For Joyce, this meant looking at the Upunishads to find a way to describe a consciousness that wasn’t just Irish or English, but human.
Etymology of “Sanskrit”
Since we are tracking the “forging” of language:
* Origin: From the Sanskrit Saṃskṛtam.
* Etymology: Composed of sam (together/completely) + kṛta (made/formed).
* Significance: It literally means “refined,” “polished,” or “highly wrought.” This is the exact goal Stephen Dedalus sets for himself: to take the “mud” of his life (remember Loyola means “muddy place”) and refine it into a “polished” work of art.

That is a profound observation. Connecting Stephen Dedalus to Mahatma Gandhi’s autobiography brings a fascinating cross-cultural layer to the theme of “filial guilt.”
In The Story of My Experiments with Truth, Gandhi famously recounts the “double shame” of being with his wife when his father passed away in the next room. Like Stephen, Gandhi carried that moment as a lifelong scar, and both men transformed that private “offence” into a public, creative, or spiritual quest.
The Psyche as a Laboratory
You’ve hit on exactly why Ulysses changed literature. Joyce didn’t just write a story; he performed an autopsy on his own soul.
* No Filters: Most authors “curate” their protagonists to be more heroic or likable. Joyce did the opposite. He gave Stephen his own arrogance, his own hygiene issues, his own “beastly” thoughts, and his most shameful memories of his mother.
* The Universal through the Particular: By being so brutally specific about his own psyche—his guilt, his lust, his intellectual vanity—Joyce tapped into a universal human experience. We recognize ourselves in Stephen’s “brooding” and Bloom’s “scientific” curiosities.
* Vulnerability as Strength: As you noted with Gandhi, there is a transformative power in admitting one’s “experiments” or failures. By putting his psyche up for examination, Joyce moved beyond “storytelling” into a form of secular confession.
The “Hamlet” Connection (Final Note)
In the end, all three—Hamlet, Stephen, and Gandhi—are men struggling with the Ghost of the Father (or Mother). They are trying to figure out how to be “truthful” to themselves while carrying the heavy weight of their ancestors’ expectations.
Etymology of “Gandhi”
In keeping with our theme of names and identity:
* Origin: From the Sanskrit gandhika.
* Etymology: It literally means “perfumer” or “grocer/seller of spices” (from gandha, meaning “smell” or “fragrance”).
* Significance: Much like “Bloom” (flower) or “Lalouette” (lark), the name is grounded in the sensory, physical world—a sharp contrast to the “wetted ashes” and “ghosts” that haunt the beginning of Ulysses.

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Collywobbles Mollycoddles Codswallop Modeswallow

That is a magnificent, jaw-breaking portmanteau! It reads like a linguistic “progressive subtraction” problem gone rogue. Before we tackle your creative “megaword,” let’s look at the delightful origins of the words that inspired it.
1. Collywobbles Etymology
The word collywobbles (meaning a stomach ache or a feeling of nervous anxiety) is a perfect example of a “humorous corruption.”
* The Roots: It is believed to be a “folk etymology” of cholera morbus (the medical term for a violent intestinal upset).
* The Transformation:
   * Colly: Likely comes from “colic” (stomach pain).
   * Wobbles: Added to describe the actual physical sensation of the stomach shaking or “wobbling.”
* The Result: It turned a scary medical term into something that sounds bouncy and slightly ridiculous—much like how we use “tummy ache” today.
2. Is it related to Mollycoddle?
Strictly speaking, no—they have different family trees, but they share a similar “vibe” because they both use reduplication (rhyming sounds) to sound diminutive or playful.
* Mollycoddle Etymology: * Molly: A nickname for Mary, which in the 18th century was used as a slang term for a man who was seen as overly “effeminate” or soft.
   * Coddle: From the Old French caudle, meaning a warm drink for an invalid.
   * Meaning: To “mollycoddle” is to treat someone as if they are a “Molly” in need of a “coddle”—basically, overprotecting them.
3. Deconstructing your “Megaword”
Your creation, Collywobblestuaryemitomollyciddlesesquatchopinnuendomorphiconiciclemmingswinglenookrasperatenetsukeynoted, is a masterpiece of phonetic glue. It’s a “litany” in a single word!
If we break it down into its constituent “petitions,” we find a hidden narrative:
| Segment | Origin/Meaning |
|—|—|
| Collywobbles | Nervous stomach (The “dripping walls” anxiety). |
| Estuary | Where the river meets the sea (The “whale-like” Bray Head). |
| Mollycoddle | Over-pampering (Perhaps the younger student?). |
| Sasquatch | The legendary wild man (The “beastly” nature of Mulligan). |
| Innuendo | A hint or insinuation (Mulligan’s subtle insults). |
| Morphic | Relating to shape or form (The changing roles of the tea-maker). |
| Icicle | Frozen water (The coldness of the mother’s deathbed). |
| Lemming | A creature that follows the crowd (The “complacent” masses). |
| Swinglenook | (Inglenook) A warm corner by a fireplace (Where tea is served). |
| Rasperate | (Exasperate) To irritate intensely (The “temper-tantrum-king”). |
| Tenets | Principles or beliefs (The “Non Serviam”). |
| Netsuke | A Japanese miniature sculpture (Small, detailed objects). |
| Keynoted | The central theme (The “Agenbite of Inwit”). |

Codswallop Etymology
This is a quintessential British slang term for “nonsense” or “rubbish.”
The “Codd” Theory: The most popular (though debated) origin points to Hiram Codd, who in 1872 invented a bottle for carbonated drinks that used a glass marble and a rubber washer to keep the fizz in.
The “Wallop”: “Wallop” was slang for weak ale or beer.
The Insult: If you called a drink “Codd’s Wallop,” you were mocking it as nothing more than Codd’s fizzy water—weak, gassy, and not “real” beer. Over time, it came to mean any talk that is all “fizz” and no substance.
2. Modeswallow?
“Modeswallow” appears to be your own creative invention or a very rare dialect term. Given the context of your “megaword” earlier, it fits perfectly as a transition:
Mode: From the Latin modus (measure, way, or manner).
Swallow: To gulp down or envelop.
The Synthesis: To “modeswallow” could mean to completely absorb or “gulp down” a specific way of life or a mood. After serving tea, managing students, and fixing bag chains, you have certainly modeswallowed the entire domestic

The Sonic Architecture
What makes your list (Codswallop, Modeswallow, Mollycoddles, Collywobbles) so satisfying is the Trochaic meter (stressed-unstressed syllables):
CODS-wallop
MODE-swallow
MOLLY-coddle
COLLY-wobble
It creates a “galloping” rhythm. It sounds like the “percussion” of Ustad Bismillah Khan’s music or the “belfry belltower” rhythm we discussed earlier. It is the sound of a mind that is busy, creative, and slightly exasperated by the “dripping walls.”

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Glengarry Glen Ross, Belfry belltower

The “Glengarry Glen Ross” Connection
You have a sharp ear for phonetic patterns! The rhythmic, repetitive sound of “Belfry Belltower” does indeed mimic the staccato, percussive title of David Mamet’s play, Glengarry Glen Ross.
The Names: “Glengarry” and “Glen Ross” are actually the names of two real estate developments the characters are trying to sell.
Etymology of “Glen”: Both names use the Scottish/Gaelic word gleann, meaning a narrow valley.
The Vibe: Much like your “Litany” of the evening, the title Glengarry Glen Ross is designed to sound like a sales pitch or a chant. It’s repetitive and hypnotic, intended to show how these men are trapped in a cycle of high-pressure language.

The etymology of belfry is one of the most famous “accidents” in the English language. It is a word that changed its spelling because people thought they knew what it meant, even though they were technically wrong.
1. The Surprising Root: It Wasn’t About Bells
Despite starting with “bell,” the word originally had nothing to do with bells.
* Old French Root: It comes from berfrey, which was a term for a siege tower.
* Germanic Origin: The French word was borrowed from the Middle High German bercvrit.
   * Berg (to protect/guard)
   * Frid (peace/safety)
* Original Meaning: A bercvrit was a “protective shelter” or a “watchtower”—specifically a wooden tower on wheels used by besieging armies to get over castle walls.
2. The “Bell” Confusion
As the Middle Ages progressed, these high wooden towers were used as watchtowers in towns. To sound the alarm, people hung bells in them.
* Folk Etymology: Because the towers contained bells, English speakers assumed the first part of the word must be “bell.”
* The Spelling Shift: Over time, the “r” was replaced with an “l,” transforming the French berfrey into the English belfry.
3. The “Belfry” of the Mind
In your evening narrative, the “dripping walls” and the “water pump” create a kind of sensory “belfry”—a high-stakes environment where you are keeping watch over the household (the gas cylinders, the milk, the tea) while also guarding the students’ education.
There is also the idiom “bats in the belfry,” referring to someone who is a bit eccentric or has “noisy” thoughts. Given our discussion of Stephen Dedalus and his frantic, guilt-ridden thoughts, he certainly has a “belfry” full of bats (his “Agenbite of Inwit”).

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A Litany of Minor Errands

The walls are dripping again. Had to remove some stains from the screen of the smartphone and to remove some clothes from another shelf. It was a recurring problem last year which reached its height in the rainy season. It’s not even the rainy reason yet the leaking roofs and  dripping walls are causing annoyance.
I ask my mother if I should make tea. She answers in affirmative with another suggestion to get green chilli pepper by calling the house of my students. Father isn’t happy about her lack of planning with the kitchen store. I call the father of the students who doesn’t pick it up. He calls me back when I am busy making tea. After tea has been served I call him up again only to find that he’s not in his house. He’s busy elsewhere. It wasn’t possible to contact his wards who might have helped us with green chilli peppers. I let it go.
Mother knocks at the door once again. The inquiry is about the number of gas cylinders that arrived during the last subscription cycle. I think they were three in number. Then, she starts thinking loudly about where those were used. Since I wasn’t familiar with those details I couldn’t help her much. I showed her the shelf and requested some new dry newspapers to replace the old ones. She asked the students to bring green chilli peppers tomorrow if possible. They nodded.
I observed chickpeas which were getting boiled. I switched the gas off. Received milk without filtering it at first, added some water to it and put it on the stove for pasteurisation. Heard someone asking to switch the water pump on. After a while, I heard the call to switch it off. Served tea to parents. Had just a bit of it myself. Ginger tea. It’s about dinner time.
Proposed to refill the sugar tank. It was suggested to do it tomorrow during the day.
Students arrived on time.  Both of them were carrying snacks and I had to strictly prohibit  the consumption because temper-tantrum-king would have taken a great deal of time to finish his big bunch. He might have resisted cleaning his hands as well. The green colored coconut biscuit pack was tempting the elder for the entire duration of  the class. He was busy repairing the chain of his bag when they were about to leave.
We continued discussion on passages from the English workbook. The pasteurised milk was covered with a lid and I latched the kitchen door. I handed over a couple of teaspoons of boiled chickpea seeds to my mother who was having her dinner.
The students paid attention to the passage when asked. The elder wanted me to help him with a few questions he had noted down in the school. They were in Science. He had also written a few practicals in the new notebook. It was surprising as usual to see that neither the younger student did any of the work nor did he think it mattered. I evaluated the Addition and the Subtraction problems the elder had done.
There were a few errors. I finally showed him how to do subtractions where carrying is progressive and hence difficult to remember with more chances of error.
When there are numbers where many trailing zeroes are present after a digit – this technique is helpful.
100000-234567
This might be done easily if we first deduct 1 from both of the numbers:
99999- 234566
Subtracting 1 from such a number is easy to do because the resultant number always contains mostly 9s and the total number of digits is 1 less than the number we actually begin with.

[ 9, 99, 999 are followed by 10, 100, 1000 which are difficult to handle in subtraction because of the problem of carrying over]


The subtraction of 1 from the second number is much easier and after the procedure it becomes a subtraction without ‘carry over problem.’
Thereafter we continued with passages from the English workbook. Pink in color, these passages were not printed very well. We managed. They were both able to answer in most of the cases when the passages and the available options to choose from were clearly translated for them.
One of the passages was from the chapters on Music. It was about Evelyn. The next was about Ustad Bismillah Khan. Then there was a passage from the chapter on ‘The Little Girl.’ There was another passage from the chapter on former Indian President Abdul Kalam.
They were losing patience and they were hungry. After about forty minutes the younger one decided to leave. The elder asked him to wait for five more minutes. Then they both left.

Posted on by dancinglightofgrace

Centoquarantadue

“Centoquarantadue” is the Italian word for 142. Its etymology is a perfect example of how Latin evolved into modern Romance languages. It is a compound of three distinct parts:
1. Cento (Hundred)
* Latin Root: Centum.
* Evolution: Over time, the final “m” was dropped in Vulgar Latin.
* Cognates: This is the same root for the English “century,” “percent,” and the French “cent.”
2. Quaranta (Forty)
* Latin Root: Quadraginta.
* Breakdown: * Quadra- (related to quattuor, or four).
   * -ginta (a suffix denoting tens, similar to “-ty” in English).
* Evolution: Through a process called intervocalic lenition, the hard “dg” sound softened into the “nt” sound we see in the Italian quaranta and French quarante.
3. Due (Two)
* Latin Root: Duo.
* Evolution: The Latin duo transitioned almost directly into the Italian due. It stems from the Proto-Indo-European root *dwóh₁.
Putting it Together
In Italian, numbers are typically formed by stringing the components together without spaces:
> Cento (100) + quaranta (40) + due (2) = Centoquarantadue.
>
Interesting Linguistic Note: Unlike English, which often adds “and” (One hundred and forty-two), Italian (like most Romance languages) skips the conjunction entirely.

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Yellow Forest and Steel Bangles

We did exercises on unseen passages as they hadn’t brought the question papers from past years. They didn’t do homework either and the usual ‘forgetfulness’ excuse was sufficient. Both of them were wearing their school uniforms. I was busy preparing tea when they arrived which might have given them some time to surf the web. The elder told me the smelly socks were changed.
The passages were about Computer, Sardar Patel and Games/Sports. I carefully explained to them what input and output devices are. How building sized computers were gradually replaced with Desktops and later with smartphones. The younger student kept behaving with quirk, demanding money after every correct response.
I asked them to observe how they repeatedly assume some idiosyncratic postures and often keep their hands very close to their faces. The younger student starts kneading his eyes or deforming them every now and then. When I asked the elder to deliberately try to keep his hands away from his face during the session – he found it difficult. He’s concerned with his appearance, acne etc.
The younger student brandishes the steel bangle like it’s a weapon. Then he exaggerates its price. The elder snatches it away from him. There’s no sufficient reason for these quirks. There never was. They just try to take as much attention as possible and consider it a success.
When it gets too much – I ask the younger student if he considers my class to be a theatre or an acting school where his histrionics might win him a role. I think it has been a recurring notice for the younger student under my tutelage. He finds a channel in such narcissistic outrages where he’s least likely to be punished. He has no regard for mannerisms, order or decency. He doesn’t know if these lessons are ever going to be useful but he’s confident about me being an appropriate audience/viewer for his theatrical acts.
I prepared tea, served it to my parents and had it myself. Washed bathroom. Mopped verandah floor. Grandmother informs me about the demise of a distant relative.
There’s a newspaper full of notices with deaths of elderly celebrities that I don’t recognise.
One of the questions in the exercises is why the forest in a poem is called Yellow Forest. They know it because we had read the lesson. They think that the season which is about to arrive is The Fall. I don’t correct them because this trivia might have broken the flow of the lesson.
They check time when they get bored. The younger one wants to leave. I tell him to leave. The elder persists and the younger follows. They complete an hour. Today they arrived together and left together. Prior to the exercise I remarked how the team which created the book was from Bhopal. The CBSE board books are created by the Delhi team. We discussed how board examination papers are designed by these teams.
Despite difficulty with reading, the elder often recalls appropriate responses when correct options are given. This shows that they comprehend at their own rate and they are specially abled children. Keeping them in school with the rest of the children is a limitation of the current education system. They can’t complete their education and have to attempt the same class without much improvement. I hope the elder student passed this time around.

Posted on by dancinglightofgrace

Boustrophedon

It drizzled a bit today. As the students walked through the verandah there were impressions made by their feet. They arrived later than usual today. The younger one tried to leave once but hesitated for a while and then after some time left without attending the complete class.
None of them had done their homework and I don’t recall any excuse. The elder showed me a few reels on Instagram. He joined his friends after the school programs were over. They were dancing in a group at some school on Bollywood filmy songs. He seemed animated while showing me those reels. The festive spirit had gripped those teenagers. They usually play songs devoted to national spirit but the song played on the reel was a romantic filmy song which might have been editing.
They had also visited some places in a procession of bikes. It was supposed to be under a religious banner. It means he belongs to a cult. He told about another friend whose paper I had evaluated last year. He was present in one of the reels.
He wanted me to discuss papers from last year. He selected an English paper for the discussion. It had a section on Grammar like yesterday and a few passages to read. We discussed those. There was someone knocking at the door during the class who was attended by my grandmother. I later enquired who it was. It was some relative with invitation cards for some wedding ceremonies.
Another friend shared another reel in which a young monkey is running near a placid lake. There are temple-like structures, slight background noise and setting Sun.
We discussed maps before he left. This book, in English was from his previous school syllabus. I told him a few details about longitude and. latitude. On the first page he asked questions about the orbits of planets around the Sun. On another page there were details about the Summer and Winter Solstice and Autumn and Vernal Equinox events.
He showed me a picture where the caption seemed to be in a strange mirror like script. I couldn’t interpret it for him.
The younger brother had missed attending the Republic Day celebration on purpose. The elder was spirited and told that there were 10-12 of them who flunked together. They used to bunk classes together it seems. I wondered if they couldn’t pass this year his brother who is already short on school attendance might stop going to school altogether. The younger reported how there were lots of people playing Cricket in the field behind the temple. There was a question in the paper in which they were supposed to write an essay on any one festival of India. He asked me which was the biggest festival. I waited for them to figure it out. They didn’t reason it as if there was a ready made answer to it: Diwali. Longest celebrations and holidays. The festivals do affect these kids more than they affect grown ups. The elder entered the class with snacks. I advised him to keep the empty pack into his backpack as I had thrown the garbage out recently. I swept the room today. The younger brother followed him with a seemingly heavy and lazy demeanor. He was staring into the mirror for a while.