14. Living With MFJ......

To tell you one more truth, I never like MFJ …
Oh! Oh! Sorry for this acronym. By MFJ I mean Mixed Fruit Jam.

I have been a hosteller during college days, then passed through a long phase of being ‘paying guest’ and even some time as a 'non-paying guest' (my friends always welcomed my stay with them) …… but it was always someone else’s home. So whenever I had to go on treks, picnics, and travels the easiest thing to carry with was bread and jam. Butter was not available easily (because I like only Amul butter!!) and it melts so packing was always a problem.

Luckily in every group, there are always people who like MFJ with Bread. I gladly exchanged my food with them – it was a two fold benefit. I was able to get away with my MFJ and in exchange I always could get good, testy food. In addition, sometimes I earned goodwill of MFJ fans.

I never have purchased a bottle or a sachet of any kind of jam. The canteen people at my workplace have the habit of preparing jam-butter-bread pieces. On one piece of bread they spread jam and on the other piece butter and they serve the two pieces together. Whenever I have a breakfast at the canteen, I remove all jam pieces and eat only bread with butter. I avoid jam in all food items, at all places and at all times.

Life was going on well without this ‘jam’ until very recently. In October, I received a gift of MFJ bottle from one of my colleagues who facilitates ‘Food Processing’ activities in tribal area. I just did not know what do with bottle full of MFJ. One of my friends suggested that I give away this bottle to someone who has MFJ fixation.

But I have a very typical psychology regarding gifts. Whatever is given to me, whether I like it or not, I use it as I appreciate the feelings of the persons who have given it to me. Any Tom, Dick and Harry does not throw gifts at you, there is an ‘invisible’ value to the gift one receives. The gift is meant for me, and so whether I like it or not, I use it till it lasts. In this way I have worn clothes of certain colors that I do not like, I have read books which were boring, I have used luxury items which I never needed and so on.

I spent lot of time on planning strategies for dealing with the MFJ bottle. Then I put it away and forgot it.

But alas, the disaster has not ended. Today, one of my friends presented me one more (and bigger too!) MFJ bottle. I was trying to tell him that I do not like MFJ and I already have one unopened bottle hidden somewhere in the kitchen. But it did not work. Now I have two brand new MFJ bottles, which is scary.

Ok.

Any ideas on jam recipes? Do anyone make jam paratha or jam chutney? Any wild idea would help me. Why don’t you just drop in to my place? Entry restricted to MFJ fans only. You can stay with me as long as MFJ lasts. If you are not MFJ eater, don’t come at this time. I might be tempted to put all MFJ in your plate. If you can help a bit, do come. I am looking forward to rescue.

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