What I think about when I think about Fasting.

With time, I have become the kind of person who would get hungry at the mere sight of food. Somebody mentions chaat in a conversation, and my brain immediately sends across an SOS to my stomach manipulating to think that I am hungry and I will be specifically requiring a nice plate of dahi puri to satisfy my hunger. The poor stomach has no choice than to follow the instruction, making me head for the nearest chaat outlet to kill the mentally fabricated craving.

It is as much as your story too somewhere as it is mine. It is all psychologically created hunger, just helping us to gain some of that extra unwanted weight at the wrong places. Above all of this forever tiff with me and my mind, my darling mother comes up with this brilliant idea to put me on a fast for a day in accord to a religious occasion. I must say, Mother’s are pretty weird! They’ll never allow us to go on a diet for fitness, but makes us fast in the name of God!

So this time, I decided to fast for a day and prove my mind that I am no slave to it. And to prepare myself for the next day, I ate an entire pizza for dinner so that I do not crave anything tomorrow! Blame my mind!

A new day beckons and I am quite ready to stay hungry. A nice bowl of fruits and a glass of juice - such a fresh way to start my day. I gobbled up all of it and rushed to work with no lunch. An hour into work and my stomach rumbles, asking me to eat something. I decided to ignore considering another of the mind games. Then comes lunch break and as people were opening their dabbas, I am not sure how, but suddenly I gained this temporary superpower to exactly guess the dish only by its aroma! There is dhabewali dal, the Gujarati favourite thepla, somebody has brought gulab jamuns, I see these delivery guys bringing in noodles and punjabi fix thali. The peon is eating tinde ki sabji & roti and I am envious of him right now!

To get away from the saddening aroma, I decided to walk down and get some fresh, un-foodly air. All around me, the only thing I can see is people eating - vadapav, pav bhaji, burgers, people hogging on dosa and parathas. Even the mere smell of chai almost made me cry. At this point, if I was given a day’s old roti, I would have gladly eaten with all my heart’s content. My stomach has been occupied by hungry pack of wolves running hither and yon.

Diverting my head into social media seemed a viable option at that point. With another bowl of fruits in my hand, I started scrolling through my social media feed. And behold! All I see is food pictures, people posting pictures of the oh-so-delicious lunch they have had and how-to-make food videos. Should my eyes be bleeding at this point?

I come home with a sad face and sulk on the sofa. I looked as if I have been starving since ages. My mother calls me to freshen up and hit the dining table. My body had become so weak that I started responding in slow motion to everything. The wolves in my stomach by now have become meek and slept off. As I am approaching the table, I get a whiff of all kinds of good aroma. Even before I could make any sense of it, behold my eyes is a lavish spread of the human created ‘fasting food’ menu.

There is deep fried sabudana vada with chutney, sweet potato sabji with puri, sabudana khichdi, Singhade ki kadhi, farali sukhi bhaji, makhane ki kheer, rajgira ka sheera and dahi. Wait a minute! Is this for real? My mind cannot comprehend what it can see. Let us call it an Indian excuse to hog into these amazing dishes in the name of fasting.

On an honest note, the true essence of fasting goes down the drain. However, if according to our elders, this is legitimate, then who are we to question them! I am going to sit, eat to my heart’s content and drift to a sound sleep with a smile on my face, thinking of whether should I eat Spaghetti or Dosa to break my fast tomorrow!