Argumentative Us

 This year, like the last year, we celebrated Thanksgiving at Sanika and Pallavi’s place. The invitation email was sent out by Pallavi a couple of days prior to the actual evening. It was an email no one else could have written, no one else but Pallavi. It was a manager’s email. Me and Manan commented “We have lost our friend to the Managers!” Well, that is a good thing. After all she studies at one of the finest management schools. Soon after the email was sent, people started replying to the email with the dishes that they were going to come up with for the dinner. Ok, this post is not about the dinner... :P So, enough of that now.

This post is about the discussion we had after everyone had left, well ummm, everyone but the argumentative six or seven of us. Everyone else had assignments to take care of. We obviously had far more important things to care about. Assignments could wait. Sleep? It could wait too! The debate started at around 10:30 at night over bowls of ice cream and went on till 4 in the morning. We argued/discussed/fought about everything from eating cows, the west's perception of India and Indians,  Anna Hazare and what not. 

It is not for no reason that Amartya Sen calls Indians argumentative in one of his finest works - not that I have read any other of his works. He gives historical records of how Indians have been arguing and trying to reason about everything since times immemorial. I think our ancestors will be happy to find out that we are continuing this glorious tradition even when we are thousands of miles away from India. My dear ancestors, we follow all the Indian traditions, mind you. We may eat beef once in a while, but we can argue and prove that it has been an Indian tradition to eat beef since before you were born. So let us not go there.

There were points during the discussion when the tempers rose high. But they never rose higher than where another helping of the delicious caramel pudding could not reach and cool things down. It is not important to know what issues were raised and discussed. No one will remember it after a few days. What is important then? The quality of discussions we had? Naahh... it was not very high. Oh come on! Then what? I think it is just the fun that we had and the feeling that left me wanting for more. More debates. More caramel pudding.