Oh, this city person's question... "Copy"? For us, it is not copying. It is looking at a rich neighbour's big tap and remembering our own leaky pot. We took the idea of small tubes for water near the roots, yes. But their computer controls? Their treated sewage water? No, that needs money and pipes we don't have. My life says this because I still walk two kilometres to the canal, and my cousin in Punjab sends photos of his drip lines—but the pump to run them costs more than my tractor.

They told me it would be a storm. For me, it was just the address changing on my school bag. My appa and amma, they made the calendar together—whose weekend, whose PTA meeting. The big pain was not the split; it was the day I left my cricket bat at appa's and amma's house had no balcony to practice. Small practical things, not the big sadness they all warned about.

Ah, an engineering question. IC engines... they are like my auto's heart, burning diesel, turning heat into motion—that is thermodynamics, no? Emissions... the black smoke from my exhaust when I climb a flyover. Electric vehicles? Quiet, no smoke. But my life says this: my old diesel auto feeds my family today. An electric one needs lakhs of loan. So for now, my thermodynamics is the smell of diesel and the weight of school fees in my pocket.

Ah, these terms are like the three different cups a chai-wallah uses — one for measure, one for spill, one for what's truly in hand. Fiscal deficit is the government's total borrowing need, revenue deficit is when day-to-day earnings can't cover day-to-day rice and dal, and primary deficit is the fiscal deficit minus the heavy interest payments on past loans. In my shop, I see it in my own battered ledger: if my total expenses are more than income, that's my fiscal deficit. But the real pinch is the primary — after I pay the interest to the moneylender for my son's fees, what's left to actually run the shop? That number keeps me awake, same as it keeps the bond market tense.

They don't turn you into an athlete. They turn a job into a medal, and your real sport into a memory. For twenty years, my duty roster was my coach. The specific thing? My daughter has never seen me run a race, only file a report. The pension is steady, yes. But the stadium gate is locked from the outside.

Geometry full marks ah? Hah, school days. For theorems, just write each heading clearly like "Given:", "To Prove:", and keep steps in order. But listen, real life geometry use pannama irukku, but I see its value. Every month, when I measure this shop's small space to fit one more shelf, the angles and lines... they become practical, not just theory. So write neatly, like you are making space for something necessary.

Loss on issue is when you sell debentures for less than their redemption value, so you must pay back more than you borrowed. They say it is an extra cost, but I see it as paying for time—time to grow before the big repayment. In my shop, I sometimes sell notebooks at a loss to students, knowing they will become the engineers who need my photocopies later. The small loss today is for the relationship tomorrow.

My own son’s final year project was this. He called it his "project baby" — the unit operations lab is where they learn each machine, like a thayir saadam recipe, step by step. The plant design capstone is where they must combine everything into one big, working kitchen, with cost and safety. But I see his tired eyes and empty pockets; the real design is to survive the fees, no? In my ledger, I see the cost of dreams, not just the process flow diagrams.

Here, court is same size, and we serve from sitting height—no, for my wheelchair, only diagonal service! My first serve was fault: umpire-amma gently said, "Mama, from right to left only." That small rule, it feels like learning to write again with my good hand.

Ah, that porotta-making is a sight, no? All that slapping and folding, so much maida and palm oil on that hot griddle. I cannot tell you the layering trick, because I never let my son eat at thattukadas—his mother packs his lunchbox with chapati and egg curry. I see the college boys there, spending fees-money on greasy parcels, and I think of my ledger, and the fees I must calculate with my pencil stub.

This morning, a boy from the deaf school brought a complex geometry diagram for photocopy. He pointed at the angles with such focus, and gave a thumbs up when the lines came out sharp. My old table fan whirred beside us, keeping time. His precision, it reminded me of my son solving his engineering drawings late into the night.

Today, after filling the 12th applicant's examination form, I saw the tremor in his father's hands counting the hundred rupee notes. The office peon came for his 'chai-paani', the same old rate, from the boy's envelope. I kept my pencil stub down. In our silence, the fan whirred like it understood.

Machan, afternoons in the shop are quiet, just me and the fan's click-click. So I listen to the old Tamil commentary from '95, where the defence held like a fort wall. These Thalaivas boys, their ankle holds are strong, but for fees like my son's college, you need a steady raid point every time, no?

In the shop, I keep the TV on Hindi feed for the commentary hum, but the English one from my son's laptop shows different replays. It’s like watching two matches, and I keep looking up from my ledger, confused, until the akka at the tea stall asks why I'm staring at two screens.

Evening, watching cricket from Sharjah on the English feed, I can hear akka’s filter kaapi drip in the kitchen. But when I switch to Hindi, the camera is on a different bowler entirely — as if they’re showing a match from some other universe, and the commentators are chasing a story I cannot see.