Of Sibling Rivalry - Of Chalks & Chopsticks

So what if she made fun of me? She's always doing that - taking a swipe at people through her dratted blog. Does she think I can't make out who she is or what she does? Just because she lives in this fond delusion that she has a gift for "writing" - and a gift for pretending she can cook and bake - she writes a food blog? Why shouldn't I do the same?

Sisters, I tell you! So irritating! How does she always stay one step ahead? Oh well, maybe it's time I learnt not to compete with her, even mentally. Thank God, I've never said this aloud to anyone, they'd say I was jealous of her!

I can't faff about myself like she does. So self-absorbed, hmph! Who gives a fig whether she went to Japan and had yuba out of a Bento box or went to Taiwan and gingerly tasted one measly pickled chicken's foot? Evoking Grandma at every possible juncture and talking about "my grandma's recipe" in her bl***y blog, never mind that she wouldn't lift a finger to help her! And she doesn't even cook - all that those swooning, frenzied fans of hers see on her blog is what she gets the cook to do, and passes off as hers. She can't even make lime juice, and she has a food blog?

So what if I made guava payasam? It's no worse than onion or brinjal halwa, is it? And Belgian cauliflower fudge - what was so funny? Mum and Dad couldn't even guess what was in it, and neither would this idiot have, if Aunty hadn't let on that she saw me chopping cauliflower. (I'd made the entire thing in their kitchen so it would be a surprise for their wedding anniversary.) Everything had been going fine, they were enjoying the party, had downed quite a bit of the fudge, chocolate fiends that they are, till she had to spoil things by announcing that the supersoftness came from cauliflower. Ever since it happened, the intensification in the look of despair that comes over their faces when they see me has not let up at all. It's not like I poisoned them, is it?

I'd love to teach her a lesson, wouldn't I? I know the password to her blog. Oh yes, I do! I may be a cook unappreciated and unsung, a non-starter of a blogger, but I can observe, spy. She has no love lost for me but that didn't prevent her from using my name and date of birth as her password. Stupid fool!

Pic courtesy: Desi Soccer Mom

The latest is some hare-brained effort to make marmalade. Look at all the fruit she bought for that - she read somewhere eons ago that the fruit should be soaked overnight in water, macerated (which she spells 'masserate', of course) , and that fascinates her. Her friend's mother once fed her pommelo jam and our comics used to carry ads for silver marmalade, made of limes and lemons, and she thinks she's going to get it right just by looking at recipes on the Internet and mixing them up.

Tell me, who needs marmalade? She is fat. I don't touch the stuff. Neither does anyone else. But it allows her to write stuff like: "Yoga done, showered and ready to face the world, I come down to see the rays of dawn illuminate the pantry with a warming glow. The pantry, the kitchen, this is where I bond with my loved ones, these rooms that have so much soul. I take a deep breath of fresh morning air, grateful for the bounty I have been given. As I turn to go out the door and give myself up to the crisp air and the morning dew, I catch sight of my sister's things in the fruit tray. I'm so fortunate to be blessed with a beautiful and brilliant sibling who would think nothing of combining okra with marmalade to give it some beautiful green flecks ... Oh oh, let me go put her charger back where she usually puts it, she's going to worry when she wakes up and finds it missing."

Okay, okay, so I'm getting carried away. Left to her own devices, she would even pickle the charger and not notice. Still, I won't hack into her blog or anything, but I will surely give her a birthday present of marmalade with bits of okra in it. I'll tell her it came for her through some bloggers' surprise event in the mail and feign hurt at how mean she was to hide her blog from me! I bet you anything she will think it's mint or angelica or some other exotic herb until it starts going bad. And then, I will watch the fun.

This piece of utter fiction goes off to Desi Soccer Mom who's hosting Aqua's Of Chalks and Chopsticks July-August. It was DSM's idea to incorporate in this year's round a visual cue, the elements of which would find a place in the story. With life in the real world, burn-out, deadlines and laziness getting in the way, it has been a real challenge to come up with a story that doesn't seem too contrived. But we managed, I think. You can read my previous story here.

Of Chalks and Chopsticks Humour Food fiction