Stories from Dad

Had time alone with my dad today as the rest stayed over at my aunt's last night. I decided to pop this question if he would miss me when Im gone. Well the answer was known of course but its always nice to hear it from the horse's mouth isnt it. Im a bit worried though, dad always looks for me if wants something done with regards to his business, with me away, he;ll have to depend on my bro for certain things.

We started talking and he was telling me about an experience he had with a stranger last week. This Indian man started a conversation with my dad by asking him if he was tamil,well I get it all the time too. Sameer even said I dont look Indian, he said I can pass off as some Spanish chick. Coming back to my story, so this man asked dad for his caste etc, dad was taken aback as here its not a norm to go into such caste details when talking to someone. So apparently when he told the caste and the sub caste that we belonged to, the Vellaler Pillai, the man also belonging to the same caste told my dad that apparently this caste is 2nd to the Brahmins in India and we should be proud of it. Dad had his own stand on caste issues so I suppose he gave the guy the his 2 cents worth.

Next were stories from his days in VanDaHorse (think I got it right). He was telling his experience as a union leader working with the Germans and British. Dad was a smart guy, good looking as well, til today and I suppose I got certain genes from him and of course not to mention his leadership traits ;-)

Then came the story about Christopher Columbus. Apparently he was asked by some Queen to go to India and look into Spices to preserve food and for trade I suppose. So Christoper Columbus set off and landed wrongly in America, there he saw men with faces painted in red, thinking he was in India, he referred to them as the Red Indians. Interesting eh, now I should start reading some history :-)