MANY FISH IN THE OCEAN
Let me warn you at the very outset. This blog is not for the faint-hearted. Specially the ones that belong to the vegetarian variety. Not that I have anything against vegetarians, just that I am not too sure you guys would want to hear me go on and on about fish, specially dead ones.
Like any true blue Mallu, (except for my dad, who is the sole exception in our family) I love fish. The fried variety to me is manna from heaven. I love to eat it with just plain boiled rice much to the disgust of my mom.
My last trip to Kerala, needless to say, was filled with fish of all shapes and sizes. While the ones in the aquarium fascinated my son to no end, the ones frying in hot coconut oil were what my fantasies were made of.
Appu was endlessly fascinated by the whole preparation process. Right from day one he learnt to listen for the sound of the fishmonger’s little rubber horn mounted on a rickety old bicycle and at the first honk would rush to let us know that the fish had arrived.
Then he would squat next to his grandmother, who would clean the fish and ask her, “Ammuma, meenine kulipikyugeyanno? (Grandmother, are you giving the fish a bath?) This would send everyone into peals of laughter and now everyone calls the process “bathing the fish”.
I got yet another insight into my son’s complicated mind with the next incident that again involved fish. The neighborhood children would show my son the fish they were rearing to eat mosquito larvae. The “tank” consisted of sheets of plastic stretched on a frame filled with water. The fish were reared in this shallow pool. One look at the fish in the pool and my son exclaimed, “Aha, meen. Fry cheyidu tinnam!!! (Aha, fish!!! We can fry and eat them). Atta boy Appu, you are a Mallu too!!!
Like any true blue Mallu, (except for my dad, who is the sole exception in our family) I love fish. The fried variety to me is manna from heaven. I love to eat it with just plain boiled rice much to the disgust of my mom.
My last trip to Kerala, needless to say, was filled with fish of all shapes and sizes. While the ones in the aquarium fascinated my son to no end, the ones frying in hot coconut oil were what my fantasies were made of.
Appu was endlessly fascinated by the whole preparation process. Right from day one he learnt to listen for the sound of the fishmonger’s little rubber horn mounted on a rickety old bicycle and at the first honk would rush to let us know that the fish had arrived.
Then he would squat next to his grandmother, who would clean the fish and ask her, “Ammuma, meenine kulipikyugeyanno? (Grandmother, are you giving the fish a bath?) This would send everyone into peals of laughter and now everyone calls the process “bathing the fish”.
I got yet another insight into my son’s complicated mind with the next incident that again involved fish. The neighborhood children would show my son the fish they were rearing to eat mosquito larvae. The “tank” consisted of sheets of plastic stretched on a frame filled with water. The fish were reared in this shallow pool. One look at the fish in the pool and my son exclaimed, “Aha, meen. Fry cheyidu tinnam!!! (Aha, fish!!! We can fry and eat them). Atta boy Appu, you are a Mallu too!!!
posted by newatthis at 10:19 AM
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