Back on Track

Dilip Babani talks calories

Dilip Babani broke the best news of the morning. He has finally given up dieting after his wife yesterday gorged on aloo-tikkis in front of him at home. “I was unable to resist the temptation and wolfed down some with her,” he revealed with a sheepish grin.
The news was greeted with much relief by friends who felt sorry for Dilip stuck to a crash dieting course. He is a man with a healthy appetite and given his constitution, any form of self-deprivation or sacrifice on food was grossly unfair.
Even Yusuf Rassiwala advised him to give up starving and to lead a normal life. “At this rate, you are unnecessarily causing yourself more grief than good,” he told Dilip.

Siba Prasad Maitra (r) announces party tomorrow for his
daughter who has landed a prestigious job

“Better to die eating than die of starvation,” Siba Prasad Maitra added half in jest.
But Dilip was adamant. So obsessed had he become on losing weight that he had ceased to recognize food as food. A samosa to him was

Kajal Babani: Master stroke

supposed to be a deadly “300 calories”, pakoda “400 calories”, gulab jamun “800 calories”… and so on. Everything was getting reduced to calories – so much so that our exercises in the Garden “would help burn only 180 calories”, according to him.
At home, he said he has been barely subsisting on salads, greens, chapatti and perhaps boiled egg thrown in occasionally, but nothing deep-fried or loaded in cholesterol. “You need 1,800 calories only in a day to survive,” he maintained bravely.
Much as this made sense, we did not have the heart to see a good friend suffer. But any counter-argument to justify that calories cannot be the only killer fell into deaf ears. Finally, it took the ingenuity of Kajal Babani to turn her hubby around and bring him back on track. After all, who can resist the persuasive skills of the wife?
Lt Col Angad Singh (retd):
Too much of anything is harmful. It is better to be moderate with age. Do not starve or overeat. Eat healthy, do regular exercises and above all, keep laughing. Laughter is the best exercise.
Dilip Babani:
Everybody should do dieting for good health.
Karun Sharma:
Let us watch what we eat. During the last session, some of us talked about yoga and other healthy practices. Let us reserve a few minutes every day (or bi-weekly) to improve our mental health. Keeping a time limit and maintaining consistency would be extremely beneficial. Even the mental games we had started are being phased out. This is sad.