Chronicus Skepticus

Firsts

2010-04-14T01:55:00.000-07:00

So, over the weekend, I attended my first ever post-funeral prayer meeting and discovered the following:

1. My wardrobe is hideously ill-equipped to deal with family gatherings of the more serious kind. I’d been asked to dress ‘sober’, which apparently meant 'wear a salwar-kameez, preferably in white or pastels', and not ‘please, please don’t show up like drunken skank’ as I’d first assumed. BUT, since I had only ever attended Sindhi functions which typically call for COLOUR! And DIAMONDS! And SPARKLY THINGS! I had nothing. Not ONE measly outfit in anything remotely pastel-ly. Then, after much rummaging around in suitcases of clothes-that-no-longer-fit-you-but-you’re-living-in-denial-about, I found the white kurta I’d worn to my graduation (along with other stuff, pervs). It was a little snug around the hips but wearable, so some small part of me (obviously not the hips, shuddup) sat through that POST-FUNERAL prayer meeting being delighted about fitting into my pre-30s clothes. Really, It's a wonder I'm allowed into civilised society at all.

2. Man, these Sindhis co-opt *everything*! When the priest started reciting I was all “oh prayers in Sindhi, okay I’ll just sit here in this corner and look serious”. Then he ended a paragraph with the words “Satnam shri wahe guru!” and I was all, ‘What the…?!’ For a few puzzled minutes I wondered if the SB was secretly half-sikh and for reasons unknown, had chosen to hide it from me*. Found out later that Sindhis just take a bit of everything they like from the great celestial buffet in the sky. Bataao.

3. Was stopped by grim old lady in a white sari who asked me, “Tu Mala ki bahu hai?” For about three seconds I was all, ‘Who? Wha...? NO!!’ until it sunk in that wait a minute, I *am*! Was so startled by the realisation that I could only manage a weak smile and a sheepish, “Ji”. See the thing is, I hardly ever hear anyone addressing the MIL by name, and I have never, never been called anybody’s 'bahu'. Freaked me out for a minute, is all. Have since then been fighting the urge to go around asking people “Whose bahu are YOU, bitch?”

4. Despite my tendency to look like a chicken-that’s-seen-pictures-of-a-tandoor when faced with the prospect of attending ‘family functions’, I managed and towards the end, actually got quite comfortable. You know that saying, the fear is often greater than the danger itself? That shit is TRUE, y’all.

So, er. That happened.

* Which would be very twisted because I am one of the few women I know who find Sardars VERY hot. (I blame Rabbi Shergill for this).

10 ways...

2010-03-08T02:36:00.000-08:00

...to drive your friendly neighbourhood editor mad as a loon.

1. When you send in your first ever enquiry mail, make sure your mail features a large variety of fonts in different point sizes, in every colour of the rainbow and then some. No really, nothing warms the cockles of our little editorial hearts than enquiry emails that sear our retinas. Eyesight? Pah! Who needs it?!

2. Pitch your editor story ideas on the lines of, ‘I went to this fabulous place that every single travel magazine has covered about fifty thousand times before! I have no new insights on it at all but hey! This is me! The fabulous-est writer in all of writerdom! Surely you would not deny yourself the privilege of publishing something *I* have authored? I may even let you pay me for it! At higher-than-standard market rates, of course! And yes, you may now weep with gratefulness.’

3. Pepper your pitch with misspellings, atrocious grammar and cryptic acronyms. A generous sprinkling of ellipses is always appreciated. And don’t forget children, commas are the new confetti!

4. Before submitting your story, send your editor angsty pieces about your troubled relationship with your father. (You should preferably be of the male persuasion for this to have maximum worry effect). Then, pointedly ask the bewildered, flustered soul what she thinks of them. You may also accost her on chat and show her pictures of your houseplant / dog / ex. Ask for her honest opinions on these as well.

5. Miss your deadline, preferably by three to five days and make sure you are absolutely unreachable in that time. The window should be just enough so that your editor starts tearing her hair out with worry, but is not quite sure whether it’s worth commissioning another writer because it would mean briefing them, and then begging them to give you the piece by the now-even-tighter deadline.

6. Plagiarise, plagiarise, plagiarise. To do this with style, leave in the hyperlinks to the websites you’ve brazenly lifted from. When confronted by said editor, be absolutely unapologetic. Say things like, “But an Onam Sadya is the same wherever you eat it! I can’t write THAT differently.” When informed by the editor that she will not be carrying your story because it is not, in effect, YOUR story, get all huffy. Send her an angry, indignant mail telling her that she should have TOLD you about the Wiki links so that you could rework it! And that if she’s NOT carrying the story, the loss is HERS. So there!

(This will probably cause your editor to cry big splashy tears into her keyboards, but really, she is stupid and had it coming. What can you do?)

7. Once you have sent in the story, ask her repeatedly what she thinks of it, expecting of course, nothing less than effusive praise. If she has the temerity to suggest changes, get all huffy. Hey, YOU’RE the writer. If she was one, would she be editing??

8. Once your story has been printed and you have received your payment and your magazine copy, mail your editor accusing her of being unprofessional and unethical for editing your story TO HER MAGAZINE’S STANDARDS. The nerve of her!

9. Coldly inform her that you are no longer interested in writing for her magazine ever again. Then, after a month or so, send her an alleged email exchange between you and a friend, which has absolutely nothing to do anything on god’s earth as she knows it. And now that you’ve broken the ice with the aforementioned email, tell her that you’d like to get to know her better. And that you’d like to continue writing for her. Because lame attempts to flirt, especially with a person who is thoroughly spooked out by you, will get you EVERYWHERE.

Ah! And it turns out there are only nine. So far*.

*Oh great proofreader in the sky! I am not trying to tempt fate or anything. I have witnessed thy wrath! Please do not send me any more of the crazies!

Greed

2010-01-13T01:44:00.000-08:00

I'm not a big one for jewellery, but there's a pair of earrings I want. I can't show you pictures of them (I saw them four years ago), I can't tell you where to pick them up (they were hanging from a friend's earlobes) and I can't tell you exactly what they're worth (not much in money, but because I can't have them, effectively priceless).

I can tell you what they were like though. Think dark hair falling in soft waves. Black metal. Not shiny, just, very black. Think art nouveau wrought iron, winding, curling, looping. Distilling the waves from her hair into a dark lattice. Then, hanging from different points in the framework, garnets. Not real ones; just cut glass. But a deep, deep red. Like the arils of ripe pomegranates.

And every time she moved her head, the facets would catch the light, somehow turn it inwards, and glow. Like embers in a dying fire.

No longer skirting issues

2009-12-01T00:07:00.000-08:00

So, last week, I went and bought myself a skirt. Which, if you know me at all, is just mind-boggling because my legs haven’t actually seen the light of day since, oh about 1995 which was my last year in a school uniform.

I don’t know whether this is a result of spending all those years in rape-capital Delhi, but the Skepticus sisters have always been modest (and I’m being kind here – the correct description would be ‘severely retarded’) dressers. If you have ever caught a glimpse of above-the-ankle Skepticus-girl-leg, it is almost certain that you are either a spouse, a sibling, or a parent of the sisters (and we shall not mention the boyfriends of the youngest Skepticus girl (aka, yours truly) because even in those cases, as LONG as her clothing stayed on, it was perfectly modest, thankyouverymuch).

Now while this bizarre sense of fashion would've had the sternest Taliban elder brushing away proud tears from his rheumy eyes, it rather confounded everyone else. The Skepticus parents had never imposed a dress-code on their daughters, so this concerted effort to drape themselves in shamiana-size attire was quite a mystery. They consistently wore shirts three sizes too large, skirts that routinely swept the floors and salwar-kameezes that would have sent maternity-wear-designers rushing for their sketchbooks.

”Show some forearm, woman!” was the kind of exhortation a Skepticus girl got from friends, when she was worrying about boys not noticing her.

This extreme modesty also parented the invention of the Emergency Skirts that prevailed in the Skepticus household through every summer through the ‘90s. The thing was, Delhi summers were non-conducive to the sisters’ Victorian ideas about dressing; sweltering limbs do not a comfortable Skepticus girl make. Now there was no choice as far as public appearances went (because the world couldn’t EVER know they had legs!), but within the confines of their home, they felt liberated enough to don shorts and t-shirts, provided there were no non-family people around. But this created a curious problem, for if all the sisters were thusly attired and the doorbell rang, how would they answer it? So the girls procured a bunch of ankle-length, elastic-waisted skirts in various patterns, with the single common feature that they were all uniformly ugly. Their only redeeming feature was that you could slip them on in half a second over whatever you were currently wearing.

Now the Skepticus mom, being the Skepticus mom, found this fervent modesty hilarious, and proceeded to tell all her friends all about it. Which might’ve been okay, if said friend-list had not included Mrs Chauhan – a lady with the lung power of a particularly accomplished Wagnerian valkyrie (with a pucca UP accent, that too) and a complete and utter lack of tact.

The aforementioned Mrs Chauhan one day decided to call upon the Skepticus household. Finding the door locked (unusual for the Skepticus home), she stood at the doorstep armed with her iron lungs and yelled, “Arre kapde pehenne ki zaroorat nahiiin! Main hi hooooon!” simultaneously scandalising and deafening all of F-block, the sisters and particularly poor, grey-haired Mr Satija (their neighbour downstairs) who forever after looked at the sisters with suspicion and a wee bit of wonder. (The man had four sons – enough to worry about without the disturbing revelation that the house upstairs was home to wanton nudists.)

But age, perspective and the absence of loudmouthed neighbours are slowly bringing about a change in this attitude and it is no longer so unusual to catch a glimpse of Skepticus-girl calf (as in, part of leg, not baby bovine) or even inch-above-the-knee leg. You might even run into a Skepticus girl who is actually wearing a top which leaves no ambiguity (!) as far as her gender is concerned.

And then yesterday, I went and bought myself a halterneck top, effectively laying to rest the ghosts of Delhi in the '90s, four completely daft sisters and the very loud voice of one Mrs Chauhan.

Say hello to the world, shoulders (and legs)! You're going be seeing a whole lot more of it.

Mapmaker, mapmaker, go find another cause, ok?

2009-10-09T05:34:00.000-07:00

It seems that people will still insist on giving me directions even after I tell them I'm navigation impaired. Even after I tell them that I'm just nodding intelligently to make them feel better and nothing they say is actually making sense to me.

I'm wondering if there's something I should do to deal with this. Sticking my fingers in my ears and going lalaalalalaa! is likely to be ineffective, as is an honest admission, so I'm thinking, the next time someone attempts to tell me how to get someplace (despite my cries for mercy), here's what I'm going to do:

1. Listen very attentively. Like, super attentively. Focus my eyes right on their mouths and follow the movements of their tongues. And then frown, like I don't understand why their tongues are moving that way.

2. Lean in, look deep into their eyes and in my huskiest, I-want-you-NOW* voice, say, "Did you mean 'left from Senapati Bapat Marg'?"

3. Smile brightly. Then look away, hurt. Then giggle. Rinse and repeat.

Okay, that's all I've got.

Although anyone who knows me well knows I will have to work REALLY hard at this. Wanting someone usually just reduces me to a goggle-eyed, incoherent, gawkward mess.

Fascinating insights into the working of my brain.

2009-10-09T00:23:00.000-07:00

OR, why people like me ought to have restricted access to the Internet.

I opened a wiki page to research something, and then forgot what the thing was. I have the attention span of a gnat.

I only know of gnats as vaguely insect-like creatures. I have never actually encountered one.

(Not that that stops me from passing judgement on their limited attention spans)

Hey, how do I know I haven't encountered one if I don't know what one LOOKS like?

Wait! I have a wiki page open! I will now find out what a gnat looks like, and consequentially, whether or not I have ever encountered one.

Wiki has no gnat pictures! Now I will never know!

Oh wait, there's google images. Googlingooglingoogling...the hell? Gnats look just like mosquitoes!

Ah! And wordweb implies 'gnat' is a generic term for 'various small biting flies'. Unless you're British, in which case gnats ARE mosquitoes.

So it turns out I HAVE encountered a gnat before. Only, I always thought of them as small, black, shiny, and vaguely beetle-oid. It's strange to find out they're just mosquitoes.

It reminds of my 5th birthday when half the presents I received were in my real name, and the other half were addressed to 'Aparajita'. Because that was supposed to be my 'official' name, though for some mysterious reason, it never quite took.

Now I know how you felt, gnats.

Ah shuddup, you'll live.

Though not for very long.

But I guess that's okay. You're gnats, what the hell do YOU have to acheive in life??

Not that I've done much on the acheiving front.

(Dammit! I can never spell 'achieve' right!)

Which is appalling, considering I edit stuff for a living.

But I DID spell 'appalling' right.

Fuck you, gnats, I bet YOU can't spell 'appalling'.

(I just gloated over one-upping gnats. This has got to be a new low.)

Not that you'd ever need to. I mean, where would you possibly use 'appalling' in a sentence?

"Your haemoglobin levels are appalling, human!"

(But if you can't spell appalling, you sure as hell can't spell haemoglobin.)

And then the human in question would cringe and feel all inadequate about being yelled at by a mosquito.

Though I feel adequate enough; I can spell appalling and haemoglobin and I bet I have enough of it (haemoglobin) in MY blood to feed a large army of gnats. Ha!

I should probably stop typing now.

Ripping off the band aid

2009-08-31T06:24:00.000-07:00

The problem with discovering you’re an introvert late in life, is dealing with all the people who remember you as someone who wasn’t.

Is there an easy, gentle way of telling someone that you’ve outgrown them?

I didn’t think so.

I'm sorry A, I really am. But I don't have the bandwidth for this friendship anymore.

What I did in Goa*

2009-08-17T04:43:00.000-07:00

1. Got tanned. No, not voluntarily. I never tan voluntarily and frankly, I completely fail to understand this new fascination for us pre-browned Injun types to get even browner. I don’t like being browner, hell it’s taken me a long time to get comfortable with being the colour I am. You can go blame it on the little Kashmiri girl I was friends with when I was five. Her name was Payal and she had light eyes and porcelain skin and when in she came in from the sun, her cheeks and nose would be this adorable bright pink that mine never, *ever* turned. Oh how I longed to have cheeks that turned pink! And then because I hated raw tomatoes and my mum is evil, she told me that if I ate one ripe, red tomato everyday for the next I-don’t-remember-how-many years, I’d have rosy cheeks too. Guess who has yet another grudge to hold against their mommies? Meeeeee!!

2. Bumped into friend from PG who is now officially out of the closet. Way to go G! On an aside, gay men are the best huggers. No seriously, there’s none of that awkward arms and legs and bumping-heads confusion. G just grabbed me in a big bear hug and did not let go until I did. Which was nice because I’m one of those horribly clumsy huggers who are so self-conscious about a) displays of affection and b) any sort of physical contact that is not make-out-related that I’m always worrying about how close, how long and get-out-of-the-way-damned-boobs. Yes I know. Shut up.

3. Was air-kissed by cute French guy and discovered that I’m a sucker for old-world chivalry. Not the pulling-chairs-out, the being paid-for or the hold-open-doors-for-me variety (though I think the last is rather sweet), but show me a guy who leans in to air-kiss you, thus giving you a whiff of sexy cologne and brushing a stubbly cheek against your soft one and I’ll show you a girl who’s fast melting into a puddle of mush. Oh and offer me your arm, or gently switch sides with me so that I’m away from the traffic and I will be your slave. Not sexually, but you know, I can get you coffee and stuff.

4. Consumed more than half of Goa's piscine population. I’m almost convinced I have fully developed gills behind my ears. And I’m sorry fishies, but it was you or my taste buds; I picked my taste buds. And shark xacuti? Mmmmmm!

5. Walked along the beach and watched the raindrops stipple the sand around me. Hypnotic, almost.

6. Had the wind in my hair and the sun in my shades as we rode through miles and miles of chlorophyll-sheltered lanes. Chlorophyll makes me haappyyyy!

Next up, What I did in Bangkok. (And no, S, not who, what. Smartypants)

*Goa is now officially the place where I bump into ghosts from my past. Last year it was A, the guitarist ex who I spotted at Thivim station. And then because I’m the queen of awkward and socially inept, I hid behind a pillar. I’m not proud of it, but not terribly ashamed either. Hey, some us are introverts okay?

The body as a temple*

2009-04-08T04:18:00.000-07:00

She wants to get a tattoo too, but she wants it in Mandarin script**. Why? Because in Arabic, it sounds too...'obvious'. I ask her what she wants it to say – her answer, "The divine is." In Arabic, that would be Allah hu.

Of late, I've become increasingly wary of religious people. This isn't religion-specific – almost all of them spook me out now. There's a certain I-am-right-and-you-are-wrong-ness that apparently comes with the territory.

But I can't help feeling a little sad for her. She has faith, but she cannot declare it in the language of that faith. Because it would be too 'obvious'.

The world is a weird, sad place.

*Or denomination-specific house of worship of your choice***.

**Does anyone know the name of this script? Does it have one?

***A question to the believers; have any of you actually chosen your religion? Have you ever thought of switching?

Happy birthday to me

2009-03-22T22:40:00.000-07:00

The full poem here*.

*Although somehow, I liked the last line more than the entire thing.

Cabbies and conversations

2009-02-19T07:00:00.000-08:00

He says he loves philosophical cabbies. He recounts this one time when he'd hurt himself and was walking around with a bandaged forehead. He'd got into a cab and had just settled into the seat when the cabbie asked him,
: Sahab, aapke sar pe kya hua?
: Chot lag gayi.
: Sahab, dil pe lagne vaali cheez chot hoti hai. Jo sharir pe lage usko 'maar' kehte hain.

He's laughing so hard as he tells me this, that I begin to love the cabbie too. Not for being philosophical, though there's that too, but for making him laugh this way.

Disillusioned

2009-02-18T21:45:00.000-08:00

He's a complete and utter sweetheart. Only....somehow, he was a lot more *interesting* inside my head.

You know what I mean?

The stuff of dreams - Part II

2009-02-18T21:20:00.000-08:00

In other news, I dreamt of Amitav Ghosh last night. Yes, THE Amitav Ghosh. In the dream, I’m in some Singapore-like country (and I know this because I have veg hakka noodles for lunch. Ha! How elementary is THAT, Watson) and we bump into each other and, get this, it turns out, he wants to revive our affair and I’m all, no no, I can’t do this, I’m married now! And then he gives me all these accusing-alternating-with-beseeching looks and while on the outside, I’m being all morally-high(ly?)-grounded, there is this one moment, one, when he takes my hand and holds it to his chest and people, I melt (this on the inside, of course).

(On an aside, I am now seeing him in this completely different light. Completely. Not that any actual seeing happens, since he’s Amitav Ghosh and half way across the world and I am, well, me. But you know what I mean)

And then the dream turned into one of those trippy meta dreams where you sort of know you’re dreaming and all I could think of was, thank god this dream-affair didn’t happen before I interviewed him because, well, we all know how composed I am when faced with people who’ve featured in my dreams.

So did I tell you about that interview? Because it was my first interview ever, I was determined to be all professional and non-fan-girly. I researched like crazy, did all my homework, stayed up late and finished the book and drew up a list of questions. The interview went off well-enough (except that I lapsed into ultra-sonic mode a couple of times. I do that when I’m nervous. Charming, I know). He was an absolute darling; all soft-spoken and sad-but-intelligent-sounding and then it came to an end and I wanted to get my book signed and then chaos (of a sort) happened. For some mysterious reason, in the moments leading up to the signing, I was thinking about that one Friends episode in which Monica gets to hang out with Hootie and the Blowfish and one of them signs her bra (no wait, that was the one in which one of the blowfish gave her a hickey. Which was the autographed-bra episode?). And then I started to worry about which bra I was wearing and whether or not it was even remotely autograph-worthy* and of course, I couldn’t remember, so I had the bright idea of somehow subtly trying to figure it out by feeling the straps through my shirt. Well, for those of who are trying this out right now, YOU CANNOT TELL FROM THE STRAPS. So then I figured, well he’s still looking for a pen so maybe I can sneak a quick peek down my shirt; it won’t take more than a second! So I did and when I looked up there was this worried look on his face. I don’t know if it was because he saw me looking inquisitively down my own shirt or because he still couldn’t find a pen.

His autograph says, ‘For CS, with my best wishes, Amitav Ghosh’. The ‘F’ in ‘for’ starts out a little wobbly but is fine by the time he reaches the ‘r’. I think I got away with it. Don’t you?

* Not that I *planned* to ask him to autograph it, but it would’ve been nice to know that I had the option.

Restless

2009-02-13T23:31:00.000-08:00

again.

Holy fuck, what is *wrong* with me?

Worth their weight in gold*

2009-02-13T02:52:00.000-08:00

In conversation with girlfriends who also have 'weight issues':

CS: I don't really care about getting fit, all *I* want is to be thin!
Girlfriends in chorus: Oh gosh! Me too!

Conclusion: Growing old doesn't make us any wiser; it just makes us more honest about – and oddly, more accepting of – how shallow we are.

*Friends who have the same amount depth (or the lack of it) as you. :)

Limerick

2009-02-13T02:13:00.000-08:00

Dedicated to the gentleman who comes to the gym in RSS-style khakhi shorts.

If you want a body like Zeus's
We do recommend that you use
This thing called deodorant
About which we're militant
Because you don't smell like a rose.

Hell hath no fury…

2009-02-03T22:44:00.000-08:00

…like an insomniac awoken.

Dear friends, family and other assorted nincompoops who call me past 10:00 p.m.,

I love you all, dearly, and I would lay down my life for you (not you, assorted nincompoops) in a hot second, but seriously, WTF? Why do all of you persist in calling me only after 10:00 p.m.? Why is the thought of conversing with me appealing only AFTER the clock strikes 10? Do I sound better when I’m groggy with sleep? Does the disorientation in my voice make me more endearing? What is it? WhatwhatWHAT??

I don’t know if you know this about me, but roundabout in 2004, my one-time-good-buddy Morpheus deserted me big time. We were close once, yes, but our 14-hour long trysts are now a thing of the happy somnific past. Dude has walked and left me a raving insomniac. Which means sleep now is something that happens infrequently and with great difficulty.

Where earlier my bedtime was a simple two-step process:
1. Place head on pillow
2. Crash into deep, Kumbhakarna-like slumber from which the devil and his horses cannot rouse me.

Now, it is the following:
1. Place head on pillow
2. Shift pillow around, punch it into shape, shift it around some more
3. Kick off bedclothes, then pull them on, then kick them off again. (repeat one hundred times)
4. Clamber out of bed, adjust fan speed, climb back into bed. Climb out again, adjust fan speed again. (Repeat three times)
5. Toss, turn, toss, turn, toss, turn (repeat till you have pretty much butter-churned yourself into exhaustion and fitful sleep).

And when finally, finally I get to the point where I’m about to drop of the precipice of consciousness and float down on a fluffy cloud of sleep, one of you calls me, the shrill ring cruelly jerking me back to that state where I will have to go through steps 1 to 5 ALL. OVER. AGAIN.

Why folks? What the hell have I ever done to you?

You just called to wish me a happy birthday? Well, that is thoughtful of you, and now I feel like a bitch for telling you this, but this how happy you’ve made me.

CS: Slowly, after many hours of tossing and turning, drifts off to sleep.
Phone: TRRIINNGG!! TRIINNGGGG!! TRIINNNGGG!!!
CS: Shoots out of bed, wild-eyed, crazy haired and disoriented as fuck.
“What the…?! Who the @#$%^&* is calling me at this time of night?! Bloody @@#$%!! Couldn’t it have waited until @#$% morning??“

So yes, happy? I DON’T THINK SO.

See the thing is, I’m not anal about the dates. You can wish me happy a YEAR after the event and I won’t hold it against you. I know remembering dates can be a pain and I forget them myself very frequently (which might explain also why I’m so willing to forgive, but that’s neither here nor there). Birthdays, anniversaries, New Years, Christmas, Diwali, dude, they are all just dates. They do NOT matter. What does matter is being able to have a decent, non-groggy, non-murderous conversation with you under circumstances that we are BOTH comfortable with. Have I ever called you post 10:00 p.m.? Is it ever MY phone calls that rouse you out of bed on sleepy Sundays? No, right? Then why, why this sadistic urge to yank me from my hard-earned sleep and as a consequence, ensure that I spend the next day walking around like bear with a sore head?? WhywhyWHY??

*sobs brokenly*

I understand that some of you live in different time zones which somehow make you forget that your afternoon is my midnight, but it’s not that hard to do, really! So here’s the deal. The next time you’re taken by the urge to hear the melodious sound of my voice, take a moment and think it through. Then stop and think again. Also, for your convenience, I have made out a little checklist of circumstances under which you can and cannot call me after 10:00 p.m.

1. You are dead. Or very close to it. Or someone in our immediate family is in grievous danger. (Yes, call. No, second cousin twice removed does NOT count)
2. There is a terrorist attack in a random part of the world that I have no connection with and more importantly, cannot do anything about. (No. It can jolly well wait till morning)
3. It is my birthday / anniversary / random festival (No. Remember morning? Yeah, WAIT FOR IT).
4. You want to hear the melodious sound of my voice. (No. Call me post 10 and what you get to hear will be nothing even remotely melodious. Trust me on that)
5. There have been blasts close to where I live and you’re worried about me. (No. Unless you hear of blasts specifically inside *my* building. Trust me, I’ll be home safe. If I’m not, I’LL call YOU and tell you so.)

And now that we're clear on that, I would like you to know that if any of you now call me post-10:00 p.m., I am striking you vehemently off my will...vehemently!

With all my love (except to the nincompoops),

CS.

So much for my coffee shop in Coorg

2009-02-02T02:41:00.000-08:00

In the words of Calvin (the six-year-old, not the stoic), "Reality continues to ruin my life."

Dammitall.

Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, serves 1*

2009-01-28T23:17:00.000-08:00

Take ginormous coffee mug, one in number.

From coffee machine, add two small cups of coffee and two cups of hot water. (Yes, in the same mug. No, don’t argue).

From your secret stash of emergency caffeine supplies, measure out two heaped tablespoons of instant coffee (It’s repulsive, I know, but the secret stash has no room for a coffee machine and coffee grounds. Although wouldn’t that be great?).

Purchase packet of hide and seek from crazy canteen lady (Meena).

Into the ginormous mug with the coffee-water-coffee mixture, crumble three hide-and-seeks. Make sure you crumble only the biscuit part and leave the chocolate chips intact (trust me, you’ll thank me for it later).

Stir and sip, stir and sip, stir and sip.

When you’ve finished all the liquid (and got a mother of a sugar-and-caffeine high), spoon out the cookie-sludge from the bottom of the cup. Enjoy the coffee-tinged-cerelac flavour until you come across a chocolate chip (or two). Feel them dissolve on your tongue and send delicious cocoa-and-sugar messages via your neurons to your brain.

Be thrilled**.

*Or, How to completely gross out the coffee purists.

**At least until the high wears off. Then you’ll be yawning like the dickens.

All I want for Christmas

2008-12-30T02:25:00.000-08:00

Dear M,

Stop. Just effing stop. Stop messaging me. Stop wishing me a very happy birthday. Stop sending me occasion-specific greetings and STOP calling me ‘girl’ (I am not a girl, I am most certainly not YOUR girl). Just stop.

I suppose it is partly my fault. I shouldn’t avoid confrontation. I should’ve told you a long time ago that I did not want to be in touch. I should’ve told you to just please, please leave me alone. See the thing is, I kind of assumed that if I didn’t reply to your texts or take your calls, you would, eventually, get the message (it’s been, what, two years?). Now I know you’re not *dumb* (you may be a slimy bastard occasionally, but you’re not dumb) and it can’t be that you don’t get it. So you know I don’t want to stay in touch, you know that I‘d rather have a root-canal without anaesthesia than meet you, but for reasons known only to you, you persist.

By the way, what kind of reply are you expecting to yesterday’s “Hey whassup” message? (On an aside, have you heard of this sweet little thing called punctuation?) What’s up? I’m avoiding you like the plague, is what’s up. And have been doing so for the past two years is what’s up. And stop effing acting like you’re catching up with a buddy with whom you haven’t spoken in ‘absolutely *ages*’. We are not buddies, we never were. We were two people filling in for two other people. We were the two-month equivalent of a one-night stand for each other and for the love of god, M, who keeps in touch with one-night-standers??

And now that I’m done with foaming in the mouth, M, here’s what’s really up. We met when I was at possibly the lowest phase of my life (Maybe I should add a ‘so far’ to that phrase. Not tempt fate and all). Think about it, I was willing to *sleep* my way to a higher sense of self esteem. *Head-lice* do better than that. And you remind me of that time. Is that fair? No, I’ll be the first to admit it isn’t. But come on M, since when have we done fair?

So you can understand why I’m completely baffled by this strange let’s-get-in-touch-with-CS mission.

I don’t resent you, I don’t. Most times, I forget you exist. In the few times that I have heard about you from friends, my reactions can be largely described as lukewarm. Except maybe when S told me about your wedding. She showed me your wedding card, in fact. It’s odd, possibly a sign of my advancing years, that my first thought when I saw it was almost disgustingly maternal. “Awww…M’s getting married!” I believe, was the phrase that flashed in my head.

Excuse me while I throw up.

I’d be lying if I said I wished you happiness. The truth is, I don’t wish you anything. It’s hard to wish someone well (or ill) when you’re actively avoiding thinking about them. So, apart from the occasional bout of nausea (at my behaviour, not yours), all I really really want, is for you to leave me the hell alone.

Do you think you could do that? For old times’ (as they were) sake?

Best,

C.S.

In which we do some fugging of our own*

2008-11-16T11:58:00.000-08:00

Naresh Goyal: (Maybe if I just sit here and smile impishly people will be too charmed to remember that little firing-re-hiring episode.)

NG: Look at me smile! All impish and all! GOD I'm cute! Smile with me! At me! Come on people you can do it. It was all my management guys! Honest! Would this face lie to you?

NG: Oh no! It’s that ~~Virgin~~ ~~Heffner~~ Kingfisher boy again! Look at him, all cocky just because HE didn’t fire anyone. Golly, he *does* look confident doesn’t he? There’s a certain…something about him….I can’t quite put my finger on it. Could it be that suit? It is rather…shiny?

Vijay Mallya: BEHOLD, the magnificence that is me!

Lackey: (in worried whispers) Sir! This is the press conference! We’re not ~~in your bedroom~~ on the yacht anymore!

VM: We’re not? But how does it matter? BEHOLD the magnificence that is ME!

VM: (Man, this suit is so sharp, I could cut myself to ribbons!). Look at me radiating confidence like a supernova. I didn’t have to fire any of my ~~virgins~~ ~~wenches~~ flying models!

VM: ~~Virgins!~~ ~~Wenches!~~ Flying models! Come to me! Surround me with your adulation! And in return, you can bask in the sunshine reflecting off my suit! Come, let's snuggle!

Lackey: Mr. Mallya? Sir? This is to do with the alliance with Jet Airways. You’re supposed to be friends now.

VM: WHAT?! ME, ~~Richard Branson~~ ~~Hugh~~…dammit VIJAY MALLYA get into an alliance with THEM?! But they’re so…staid! And boring and none of HIS ~~wenches~~ crew wear tight, short, red skirts! Where’s the fun in that??

Lackey: Sir? We talked about this remember? We’re doing this because…?

VM: ?

Lackey: …because…?

Lackey: …we’re suffering…losses?

VM: YOU SAID THE L WORD! Off with his head! ~~Virgins!~~ !~~Whores!!~~ Flying models! Take this…creature away from me!

NG: Yes, I think it’s the suit…it has to be the suit. Maybe if I just sidle up to him a little, he won’t notice…some of it might even rub off. It’s all a matter of projection. Projection! That’s it!

VM: Lackey, there is a MUNCHKIN on my lapel.

VM: Maybe if I ignore it it’ll go away.

VM: (Gotta keep smiling, that’s the key. Pretend it isn’t there….OR I could pretend it’s an accessory! Yes! That’s it!) Look, lowly paparazzi! There is a...small stylish...unique little...I have a munchkin brooch! But I can carry it off because I AM ME.

VM: Betcha thought I couldn’t do it, didn’tcha? Well HA! to you.

Why I am not religious*

2008-06-09T01:00:00.000-07:00

: There is this girl I know.
: Yes?
: from TIS. (or she was at TIS, she quit before I did)
: She annoys the *hell* out of me!
: And that's a bad thing?
: Oh don't YOU start now!
: She's a Brahmakumari
: I notice your respectful capitalisation.
: Oh shut up!
: So why does she annoy you, this Brahmakumari (see? I'm playing along)?
: I don't know if it's annoyance, as much as disappointment.
: Explain.
: Well initially, I thought she was rather intelligent. As in, we'd had a couple of conversations and she seemed…well, I don't know, like a sane religious person!
: And you fell for that.
: But she DID sound sane! She actually said stuff like, "The reason most religions fail is because most of them insist on restricted brain-usage"
: Well, not exactly in those words, but that was the gist of it.
: And you fell for it.
: Would you stop saying that?
: My poor, gullible peanut, didn't you notice her clever use of the word 'most'?
: (which obviously implied all religions EXCEPTING her own?)
: No, I did NOT. And *must* you rub it in?
: Yes. (evil grin)
: Look, how many times do you have to have this conversation before you realise it's pointless? You're flogging a dead horse.
: :(
: And DON'T use that face with me.
: I can't help it, that's my default disappointed-in-people face.
: You mean your disappointed-in-RELIGIOUS-people face. People, in general, aren't too bad.
: There's room for improvement, but then, there always is.
: So what (specifically) did she do to annoy you?
: She said I was 'oversexed'.
: HAHAHAHAAAA!
: (glares)
: HAHAHAHHAHAAA!!
: Oh shut up!
: No, I'm sorry, this is hilarious!
: (muffled guffaws)
: Don't make me come over there. (rolls up sleeves)
: Okay wait. (puts on straight face)
: NOW tell me.
: So how did this girl arrive at this remarkably perspicacious conclusion?
: (You didn't get drunk and hit on her did you?!)
: I did NOT.
: I had a conversation with her wrt (a lot of) religions' warped attitude towards sex.
: Like bramhakumari-ism's. As in, they're anti sex.
: I'd asked her what they had against it and she gave me the crappiest reason I'd ever heard!
: And I've heard a LOT of those.
: Being of hyper-vaishnav stock. Yes, I know.
: Tsk! Not hyper-vaishnav stock. Vaishnavism happened to the family later. Just hyper-religious stock.
: (and vaishnavism isn’t really anti-sex. Mostly they just pretend it doesn’t exist.)
: (unless of course, it’s baby-making sex)
: (which is understandably legitimate)
: (the patter of little vaishnav feet and all)
: (which mean greater attendance at little vaishnav temples)
: (and more money in the BIG vaishnav temple-coffers)
: But yes, do you know what her reasoning was??
: Do tell.
: She said, and I quote "We are all the children of one cosmic soul. Which makes us all brothers and sisters, and you wouldn't have sex with your siblings, would you?"
: You're kidding me.
: Nope!
: And you managed to resist the urge to slap her silly?
: I did.
: Pity. You know, sometimes, you should just follow your instincts.
: Especially when faced with such high calibre idiots.
: I know. I'm regretting it now.
: But I also asked her, "So by that logic, your parents committed incest as well?"
: I am pleasantly surprised. YOU followed up a (potentially) confrontational line of questioning? Not bad at all.
: "And EVEN if they did, considering that you are a product of that incestuous coupling, is it necessarily bad?"
: Bravo!
: She was NOT pleased! :D
: I shouldn't think so. :D
: So what did she have to say to that?
: She gave me the standard religious-person's-cop-out speech.
: "You won't understand this now. Tum is raaste pe chalogi, to tumhe samajh mein aayega. Spritually, you're still a child. "
: Ah, THAT old chestnut.
: That only.
: So you're a sex-fiend because you asked her why her religion is anti-sex?
: Apparently.
: (although I also asked her what they had against eating meat)
: (but THAT, she chose to ignore! Hmmph!)
: Also, there was a copy of Summer of '42 on my desk.
: And the blurb said something about Hermie being, 'sixteen, confused and obsessed with sex'.
: And she picked it up, read the blurb and said, "arre! ye to bilkul tere jaisa hai!"
: Dumb bitch.
: Ooh! Invective! She really got to you, didn't she?
: But I can't get over the idea of YOU as a sex-fiend. HAHAHAHAHAAA!
: I know! It's the most idiotic thing ever!
: It's weird you know.
: I don't *want* to be an atheist fundamentalist.
: I don't *want* to think that all religious people are touched in the head.
: But every time I start giving them the benefit of doubt, thinking that maybe they're not all delusional, I meet another moron like this.
: So these people put you off religion.
: Yes.
: And essentially, stop you from becoming a moron.
: I don't like where you're going with this.
: (smug grin)
: You know I'm right.
: I know no such thing.

* And also, why I need friends who are less smug.

Thanks for all the fish

2008-05-12T10:30:00.000-07:00

My mother was schooled at a convent run by Bengali nuns. From what she remembers, the nuns were a nice (if slightly batty) bunch of women with a particular aversion to make-up which in those days consisted of, uh…kajal. One of her most vivid memories is of the nuns telling off a serial-kajal-wearer with a vehement, “Chokher GOO bhore daao!!” ^[1]

This probably explains why my mother never really took to kajal, but not why she developed the inexplicable fascination for all things Bong^[2]. She can read, write and speak the language fluently, has been to Kalighat about fifty-million times, and has assiduously, over a period of seven years, acquired a collection of Bengali sons-in-law that would put your average laal-paar-sari-clad-shashuri ^[3] to shame. Lately, she has even taken to wearing the shaka-pola ^[4] bangles despite being of, and married into 100% Bihari stock (It is apparently (culturally) fluid stock).

Fortunately for us, she kept this fascination largely to herself, except for one distressing episode involving a certain Mr. Pannalal Bhattacharya, who found his way into the Skepticus household in the form of five audio cassettes of Shyama sangeet. The man had a good voice — I’ll give him that — but what my mother did not realise, was that her brood did not want to wake up to the sound of it every sunrise. You know that state when you’re just drifting out of sleep and halfway between dreaming and wakefulness? It was surreal enough on its own, but when you added to it a deep and mournful voice singing in a foreign language, the disorientation reached new heights. Come early morning and instead of the twittering of birds, we would wake up to Mr. Bhattacharya’s sad baritone filling the house and our ears.

As we sat around the breakfast table, groggy and barely sentient, she would translate the songs for us, bringing a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘captive audience’.

And then of course, Art School happened, where 80% of the population (student and teacher) was as Bengali as they come. Robi Thakur was the presiding deity — spoken of in tones of breathless reverence — and Calcutta (if you had grown up there, or Raisina School, if you were Bong but grew up in Delhi), was Byzantium.

So by the time I graduated, I had had it up to *here* with Bangaliyat, and made up my mind to stay away from anything even remotely related to the state for at least a decade. And I managed, to a certain extent, to be Bong-free until about a month ago, when the menu from Meals on Wheels was dropped into our postbox and Oh Calcutta! was on the list of restaurants they had tie-ups with.

Now I've always had a deep and passionate love for that fish-in-mustard-paste dish that Bongs make (yes, even through the height of my stay-away-from-the-state-phase). To the extent that despite being incredibly queasy about handling raw fish or meat (it looks alive okay?!), I tried to make it at home. Many, many times. But there are some dishes that should come with the ‘Do not attempt to replicate at home*’ warning and mustard fish is one of them. Why, you ask? I’ll tell you why. Because if you screw up the proportion of mustard-paste to fish, you’re going to feel like you’ve swallowed fire. I kid you not. And if you attempt to brush your teeth after THAT, people, there is pain. Real, honest-to-goodness *pain* (in your mouth, of course. The next morning might be a completely different story, but for then, the pain is in your mouth). And for those who have never had to deal with a palate and tongue that actually hurt, let me tell you, it is NOT fun...not fun at all.

So now that Oh Calcutta! delivers to my house, I am a joyous little hausfrau (except for the hausfrau bit). I wake up on Saturdays humming happy songs because I know what we’re having for dinner. I smile at my monitor at work** while I dream about the glorious, glorious fish in that heavenly curry. I might drink dishwater-coffee all day long, but my taste buds tingle in happy anticipation of dinner.

I don’t know about Robi Thakur***, but just for the Shorshaay Bata Maach^[5], I’ll put up with any number of Bengalis you throw at me ^[6].

[1] Fill your eyes with poop, why don't you!? (Is the essence of it, I think.)

[2] THAT would be the Stockholm syndrome.

[3] Umm...Bengali mother-in-law who wears the traditional Bengali white sari with a red border.

[4] Red and white bangles worn by married Bengali women. Equal to a wedding ring.

[5] Which is what it is called in Bangla.

[6] Theoretically, that is. If you really threw Bengalis at me, I would probably go hide behind my mommy. Not that she's any good at catching either, but at least she handles them better than I do. Also, YOU should consider an alternate career as a bouncer. Or a Khali competitor.

*Unless you are (at least partially) Bengali.

**Yes, NEW Bawa company has a five-and-a-half-day work week. Yes, I appear to be going through a Bawa phase.

***Okay, I do, but that’s another post altogether.

2008 - The Year of the Nerd

2008-04-23T10:12:00.000-07:00

So, the Boss-crush. Like most workplace crushes, it was awkward, embarrassing and very, very inconvenient. There was perfect coherence as long as we were discussing work but anything else - anything at all, the weather, travel plans, hell, a simple 'hello' - and I was back to being thirteen, tongue-tied and incapable of constructing complete sentences. He just had to pass by me in a corridor and I'd be reduced to a fiercely blushing mass of utter stupidity.

And I don't get it, I just don't get it! The man was (is, actually, but I don't work there anymore) a complete and utter nerd. He had the standard issue nerd-glasses, the weird, high-pitched voice, the lanky, disjointed Pinocchio-walk, but all he had to do was smile and I'd be marvelling at the way his eyes went all twinkly and how his teeth were *just* like 'thirty-two hand-picked chiclets' (Summer of '42 anyone?). And OH when he rolled up his shirtsleeves* and got to work...*dreamy sigh*

And he had the most efficient mental-rolodex I've ever come across. You could walk up to him with any sort of question - tech, content, graphics, code - and you could almost see the cards flipping in fast-forward (and totally making that 'vrrrroooossh!' sound) as he came up with the exact, perfect, without-a-single-superfluous-detail answer to your question. Not the kind of guy you want to look like an idiot in front of, but that's what I did. Inevitably. Every single time he walked past.

THEN there were the highly inappropriate dreams. (No. Not 'fun' inappropriate, just...weird). In one of them, S (colleague, female, motherly), Boss and I are sitting in a hotel lobby. I’m wearing some sort of a halter-neck-y top, which has officially put imagination out of a job. Somehow, all three of us realise just HOW skimpy it is at exactly the same time, and while S subtly whispers in my ears about how maybe I should try and fix the fabric shortage, Boss, absolutely unfazed, actually *points* and said, "Yeah, you know you need to cover up a little. I can see real spillage happening THERE."

So in addition to the crush-induced-embarrassment, every time he walked past my cubicle I'd relive the stupid dream and get even more flustered. The poor chap must've wondered whether beet-red-and-stammering was default-CS**.

It’s all making me wonder if this drastic shift in type is a result of my err…advancing years. See, my teens were spent in the pursuit of surly, sulky boys, my twenties, the artists — singers, guitarists and the odd poet (Not, not odd as in ‘one-off’. Really odd). The thirties are showing worrying signs of being declared as the decade of the nerds.

That, or as Billy Joel said, ‘I've reached the age where competence is a turn-on.’

(Also, apparently, the age at which you start quoting Billy Joel.)

*Yes, I have a thing for rolled up shirtsleeves. No, I can't explain it.
** If he ever noticed my existence, that is…damn him.

Is it still a happy birthday...

2008-04-15T23:20:00.000-07:00

...if you're dead?

I live in an area which the newspapers describe as a Dalit stronghold. Which means that anything to do with Buddhism, Dalit politics, or Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, results in shamianas mushrooming all over the place, very loud music (mostly the nasal-plague-reshammiya variety) and firecrackers all through the night.

But yesterday was Ambedkar Jayanti and all day long the loudspeakers outside my house played:

“Hum bhi agar bachche hote!
Hum bhi agar bachche hote,
Naam hamaare hote Babloo, Paplu,
Khaane ko milte LADDOO!
Aur duniya kehti Heppy Buurrday too yoouuu!”

and

”Tum jiyo hazaaron saal,
saal ke din ho pachaas hazaar!”

Which was refreshing change on the music front, but I wonder how *I’d* react to people wishing me a (very, very) long life if I’d been dead for over half a century.

And dammit! Now I want laddoos too!

In loving* memory of

2008-04-14T20:57:00.000-07:00

Chronicus Skepticus, Instruction Designer
Died 11th April 2008 aged 5 months and 20 days.

Developed an appalling crush on her boss (more on that soon). Had her first (in all five years of professional life) in-office meltdown. Learnt the difference between an em-dash and an en-dash, and the similarities between project managers and pond-scum (and OH SO MUCH MORE ON THIS).

R.I.P.

If my life were a cheesy seventies bollywood movie, this is the part where I’d be in the hospital, shedding remorseful tears over my comatose blog, which is lying on a hospital bed, a white bandage (with a big bloody blotch) around its head.

I’d lean over and sob:
”Mujhe maaf kardo blog! Mujhse galati ho gayi!”

(Nothing. Not even a goddamn curtain-flutter)

"Main fir kabhi kisi job ko tumhari jagah nahin lene doongi!"

(Bastard blog resolutely stays in coma)

”Aanken kholo http (private nickname and all)! Aankhen kholo! Tum mujhe yun chhor ke nahin jaa sakte-e-e-e-!”

(And as a tear falls from my eyes onto blog's peaceful face, there is a slow, delicate flutter of eyelids, and he opens his eyes and says weakly, “Arre CS? Tumhaari aankhon mein aansoo?")

Cut to blog and me, dancing around trees in the mughal gardens. Me in a bright yellow chiffon saree, blog in tight white pants and matching shoes (think Mithun, not Jeetendra. I have *some* standards. So what if they're not very high?).**

Umm...so, yes. This is me, being back.

*Hey, I liked her okay? So she was prone to walking around with bloodshot, mad eyes and muttering to herself, but once you got past that, not a bad sort.

** I did say 'cheesy bollywood movie'. You were warned.

It's over, and my eardrums rejoice!

2007-11-25T20:45:00.000-08:00

Hindu gods are deaf as posts.

No, think about it. You have the Easters, the Ids, the Christmases, the assorted Guru Purabs, but do you ever, ever hear them make such an infernal racket the likes of which the Hindus do?

(And you’re not religionist if you’re bitching about your own religion. Or the one you were born into, at any rate)

A festival (and we goddamn NEVER run out of those) just has to peek around the corner, and we’re at it. Bhajans at fucking full volume, fireworks – at ear-splitting decibel-levels, processions that block traffic for miles around.

What is it with us? WHY must our all our celebrations entail behavior the barbarians would have frowned upon? Come on people, thirty-three-million gods – surely ALL of them can’t be deaf??

***

It’s…let me see, sixteen days since diwali and this weekend, this is the first weekend since the goddamn beginning of November, that I have been able to sleep.

And sleep deprivation does not a happy Chronic Skeptic make. I mope, I jump at loud noises (and since there are so many of those, I’m pretty much jumping every five minutes), and when I can’t take it any more, I lean out of my window, shake my fist and yell at the sons of Satan. Of course, since there’s no chance they can hear me from eight floors up, I’m just shaking my fists and screaming into the night. Which does nothing except worry the neighbours. There’s a reason why their children shrink away from me if I happen to meet them in the elevator.

I hate most Hindu festivals. I hate them in the bitchiest, most horrible, the-bloody-natives-are-at-it-again way. But diwali, now there’s something special. I hate the noise, I hate the pollution and there haven't been religious reasons for a long time now. Lakshmi - the moolah, the dough, cashola - has always come and gone as she liked and Ram, Mr. Maryada Purushottam himself, was too much of an asshole to have his return celebrated.

The sweets are too sweet (and there are too many of them), you have to smile at complete strangers and your goddamn inbox overflows with mass-forwarded diwali greetings (there are few things that piss me off more than mass-forwarded greetings. Honestly, is there a better way of telling me you couldn’t care less if you tried?).

Bombay, Delhi, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Calcutta...it doesn't matter where you go, It's hell everywhere.

But I remember a couple of diwalis spent in Delhi. Oh they started off just the same. The kids would start lighting their phuljadis at around seven, and then the adults would join in, getting progressively noisier, drunker and more competetive as the night wore on.

"Achcha? Unhone do-hazaar-ki-ladi lagayi hai?? Hum paanch hazaar ki lagayenge!"

And they'd go off to collect all the ladis from the neighbouring houses, twist them into one massive string, and then light the fuse.

It would go on forever. The noise, like machine-gun fire.

But sometimes, if you stayed up long enough, till they ran out of their hazaaron-ki-ladiyan, and bombs and fizzy rockets. Till their savage children tired and trooped back into their houses, leaving the streets looking like a war zone. Till the silence slowly settled along with the fog and the smoke, you'd see what was the beginning of winter. You'd see it as it breathed into the night, cold, soft, misty around the edges. Sharp in your lungs, a slight sting your nostrils as you breathed in. You'd see it surround the diyas, the candles or the fairy lights - the ones on your balcony in sharp focus, the rest, fading into smaller and smaller circles of downy soft light.

Jab bhagwaan deta hai...

2007-10-31T11:10:00.000-07:00

...chhappar phaad ke deta hai.

I was, I think, about 7 years old when I first heard this phrase. The mental images which came with it were fascinating because I hadn't a clue what a chhappar was and had promptly mentally substituted it with the similar sounding chappal. The picture in my head therefore, was that of a benevolent (if slightly batty) god, who stored a goonie-esque stash of loot in the soles of his giant Kolhapuris (they were thick-ish soles). On days when he was pleased, he'd rip the insole (upsole? what do you call the upper half of a Kolhapuri chappal?) in two and tip a cascade of treasure into your house from his giant slipper in the sky.

I remember finding this system a little odd, but who was I to argue? He was god, he moved in mysterious ways.

And that phrase (with the chappaR as opposed to the chappaL) pretty much sums up what all of October has been about.

So first, there was the Series of Mysterious Ailments in which a bunch of dastardly viruses decided to make my body their own personal island of fun. My temperature would zip from one end of the thermometer to another, leaving me struggling to either pull on three blankets, or weakly kick them off. Most annoying it was (although for a couple of delirious minutes, just before the shivering set in I'd think, "Ooh...winter! In Delhi!" and get all happy).

Then the fever came down and the deafness happened, only it wasn't real deafness* - just a sort of internal deafness which blanketed all outside sounds but magnified the inside-your-head noises ONE HUNDREDFOLD. To get an idea what I'm talking about, plug your ears with your fingers and chew on a piece of toast. I swear to you, you will never see toast in the same light again. I spent a good three days listening in wide-eyed wonder, to the sounds of my mastication (which, I know, sounds terribly dirty but isn't).

THEN there is employment. Full time, five days a week, with a pretty paycheck at the end of the month thank you very much. It is with a division of the Big Bawa Company (henceforth referred to as the BBC) and so far, after eight days of being an employee, I can say that it's been good. Day 1 went by mostly figuring out the most essential things: where the loos were, what kinda food the canteen served and how many cups of coffee I could drink before people would start looking worried and back away slowly when I started to talk to them (for the record, it's four), and the subsequent days have just been packed.

Employment has come with it's own bunch of insights which have, more or less, nothing to do with the job itself.

Insight 1: Andheri = Hell. Allow me to recount a conversation I had with an auto-walla, one rainy day in August. The autowalla, his auto and I were stuck in knee-deep water (this is 2007, mind you. NOT 2005), traffic hadn’t budged an inch in the last half an hour and horns were blaring all over the place.

Autowallah: (In a voice dripping with weariness) Madam, aapko maalum hai yeh jagah kya hai?
Me: Er...Andheri? Aapko nahin maalum kya??
Autowallah: Madam...yeh jagah...jahannum hai, JAHANNUM!!

(Fierce blowing of auto horn)

Insight 2: Your mother (by which I actually mean mine) was right when she told you to be picky about the boys you chose to play tonsil-hockey with. Because many years down the line, when you find yourself working with one such boy, while on the surface you may be discussing things like lesson plans and scripting and enterprise application training, the one thought running around in your head will be OH MY GOD THIS MAN'S TONGUE WAS ONCE IN MY MOUTH. Disconcerting, girls and boys, is the word we're looking for.

Insight 3: I have turned into my father. After making a career of being a directionless drifter, I have turned into one of those people who *thrive* under pressure and boy, is THAT a shock for MY system. In the last week and a half, I've had deadlines that would normally have me curled up on the floor crying, but the newly-employed me? She is calm and collected. She is going in to work early, making lists (the ailments have obviously affected a chromosomal mutation) and positively burning with a quiet efficiency.

You know you fight it. You're rebellious, you drink, you (try to) smoke, you get tattoos, piercings, and a collection of exes that make you cringe and still, one fine day you will wake up and find that you have turned into your parents. That life, she's got a sick sense of humour.

Oh and by the way god / giant slipper in the sky? Since this is officially the end of October (AKA the Month in which It All Happened at Once), you can go easy now. No, really, I wouldn't mind. NO. SERIOUSLY, STOP IT!

* And smartypants family shall refrain from commenting about how ‘You can’t lose what you ain’t got’. You're all deaf anyway. And maybe I'm not deaf, maybe you just all need to be more interesting? Y’ever think of that?

I Aten't Dead...

2007-10-30T00:36:00.000-07:00

...for all of you (lovely, lovely people) who asked. Just *incredibly* busy. I post tomorrow, god promise (and you know it doesn't get bigger than that. Except for maybe if I said 'mother swear' [which by the way, mine totally does. Like a sailor, when she's in one of her moods]).

In the meantime, read this. With the deal under discussion, it's (just a little, sorta) relevant.

And oh so quixotic.

'Not Cricket'? Is too!

2007-09-24T04:37:00.001-07:00

I remember a time when cricket meant watching 22 white-flannel-clad men do nothing much for hours on end. You could wander away during a match, take a good long walk around the neighbourhood, and come back a day later to find that somebody had made two more runs. It was an age of leisure and the teams believed it too, standing around on the field, adjusting their cod-pieces and occasionally, very occasionally tapping the ball so it calmly rolled about ten feet away. On good day, there even used to be some running.

Now I wasn't much of a sportsperson even back then but I had a feeling that if something is called a ‘sport’ there definitely ought to be more activity happening than in say, Embroidery 1.1 – Lazy-Daisies Made Easy.

So you can understand, perhaps, why I – fresh from a country where football was the dominant religion – didn’t quite get it. Where was the excitement? Whither the adrenalin? Why was nobody screaming at the television screen? The most excited I ever saw people get while watching test matches, was when someone in the Indian team bowled a wicked yorker - there would be genteel applause and murmurs of ‘good ball, good ball’. I’d seen more excitement on my granny’s morning walks.

So for quite a long time, cricket did nothing for me and since the male-female ratio in my household was roughly 1: 50, no-one really cared.

Then, about two weeks ago, a sports-crazy BIL visited. He, of course wanted to watch the match and by dint of living in a 1 bhk, I was forced to watch it along with him. Only this time, after the first over, I was hooked. For the first time in my life cricket was interesting and more than that, it actually made sense. People were running around, that cork ball was hit to within an inch of its life and it rained sixes and fours. This? This was edge-of-your-seat stuff! Bite-your-nails, pray-to-gods-never-believed-in stuff!

Cricket purists complain that 20 / 20 matches are pale, watered-down versions of the game. “It’s ‘not cricket’!” they collectively moan.

Me? I’m going to fetch a chilled beer, a bucket of popcorn and cheer till my throat gives out.

Shoot Ban the Messenger.

2007-09-12T22:38:00.000-07:00

With reference to the Karnataka state government’s ban on mobile phone usage by children under 16, Vani Surendra, headmistress of Jnana Mitra School says “It is good. Nowadays many students are losing interest in studies as they are busy using the mobile.”

Now I’m not in favour of having classes disrupted by shrill ring-tones – it is very annoying, especially when you’re trying to sleep - but I can’t help feeling that this poor, delusional headmistress has completely missed the point. Blaming mobile phones for students’ lack of interest in their studies*, is as daft as blaming them for the increase in under-age sexual activity.

I blame the decadent west! Corrupting our good Indian values like that. Tsk!

*And of course, the hideously outdated curricula with teachers to match, have nothing to do with it at all.

In the Middle of the Night

2007-09-08T05:11:00.000-07:00

It’s been a week of crazy dreams and two, TWO of them have involved me being preggers (and I’m not). The first one was where Bipasha (yes, Basu) and I are in the maternity ward of a seedy little hospital in Hyderabad. She’s slim as ever, yet mysteriously having contractions, and I am one-month-pregnant (though how I know that is a bit of mystery. I mean you hardly ever hear women saying they’re one-month-pregnant, do you? It’s almost as if they go from zero to three overnight). The two cots next to mine are occupied by women who look like they could pop any minute and one of them has an outie that looks exactly like a miniature wiener (ugh! creepy). The one next to her has a five-month-old baby playing at her feet and I’m wondering if she got down to action the moment that kid popped out (I did the maths later – when I woke up that is - and no, it’s not possible. The baby is obviously someone else’s). All of us have identical bright orange felt-sheets to cover us.

So yes, Bips’ friend walks into the room all breathless, slim, flat-stomached, bonsai-assed and she’s all, “My friend! She’s in labour!” and the rest of us exchange looks which very clearly say, ‘Yeah? And what do you think we’re doing here Bambi? Partying?” (Apparently, in my dreams I am quite a bitch.) Friend insists that the doctor be called in and the grumpy mid-wife (played admirably by Sangeeta Ma’am – accountant at PG College) brings in the physician on call and guess who he is? No guess! No? Alright, it’s A.K. Hangal. Yes, Ye Olde A.K. Hangal of ‘Itna sannata kyon hai bhai?” fame. Mr. Hangal has evidently been hitting the gym quite regularly because though his face is still the same - balding, toothless, wrinkled – he is filling out his ancient cotton vest quite nicely. He doesn’t actually say ‘Itna sannata kyon hai bhai?’ but that is possibly because there isn’t any sannata what with women in going into labour left right and center.

Clearly my subconscious has dismissed my freelance-writer-hood as inconsequential, one of those oh-she’ll-grow-out-of-it things and decided that I would be better suited to be either a) an item girl (or two) or b) the person who dodders in after a climactic scene and asks uncomfortable questions.

And if anyone so much as *breathes* the words ‘biological clock’, I am going to be very nasty to them. Even if it is only in my dreams. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Hey Sister, Go Sister

2007-09-05T06:24:00.000-07:00

If there is one festival/institution that has been abused to the point where it has trust issues and thinks everyone is out to get it, that festival/institution is Raksha Bandhan.

According to my extensive research there are three kinds of Rakhi sisters.

Type A: This type usually *has* a brother (or possibly two) and while she has conscientiously tied/sent him a rakhi every year, she has never quite understood what all the fuss is about. This type does NOT go around be-sister-ing every alternate male she comes across and thinks that one (or however many she has) ~~bother~~ brother is quite enough, thankyouverymuch.

Type B: This type of RS has no male siblings. Which means she has never had her dolls dismembered, her clean sneakers muddied and posters of her favourite cine-stars decorated with speech balloons which say, “I’m such a girl! Where is my pink tutu??” This type of RS, for reasons known only to herself, usually wants brothers. She thinks that they will be all protective (if they’re older) and adoring (if they’re younger) and usually picks one relatively sane boy (ha!) to whom she will unfailingly tie/send a rakhi every year. This type of enforced sibling-hood usually means that both parties’ feelings towards each other are severely-platonic-bordering-on-repulsion (which, in any case, is what *true* brother-sister-hood is all about anyway).

Type C: Then there is the Type C Rakhi Sister. This type of girl is frequently named after one of the more annoyingly pious women in Indian mythology, such as Parvati, or Mamta or Shraddha. She hails from a small town/repressed family where hormonal stirrings are frowned upon and can lead to only one of two conclusions: artificial siblinghood or prompt matrimony. (Cue memorable dialogue from Maine Pyaar Kiya – “Ek jawaan ladka aur ek jawaan ladki kabhi dost nahin ho sakte!”) As a result of following these bizarre practices all her life, this girl has no idea how deal with an actual crush on a member of the opposite sex and will promptly be-sister him. Come Raksha bandhan, and with great ceremony she will tie a rakhi around the hormone-affecting boy’s wrist which will enable her to do everything but err…any actual doing (until much later, anyway).

Now apart from the disturbing Freudian fallouts of such a relationship (enforced sibling-hood, i.e.), the Type C Rakhi Sister is a thorn in the side of the Rakhi brother’s hapless girlfriend. No girl is apparently good enough for her brother and while she’s too gentle and *pure* a soul to say anything against the girlfriend (god forbid!), she will drop subtle hints. In her I’m-your-loving-sister-way she will mention how “entertaining” the girlfriend is, such a barrel of laughs! And how she’s still friends with AAALLLL her exes, amazing na? She will give him missed calls when he’s with the said GF and text him endlessly till the girlfriend begins to feel like there are three people sharing that chicken-roll (or sundae or food/drink item of choice).

Initially, the girlfriend will brush it off thinking, ‘Naah, she’s just affectionate, is all’. But one day, she will walk out of class see the boyfriend’s head in the RS’s lap while she (RS) plays with his hair. Her brain will wrestle with her heart and the argument will go somewhat like this:

Brain: ARRGGGHH!! Are you bloody blind?? Don’t you see what’s happening here?
Heart: Well, uh, yes. He’s lying down with his head in her lap and she’s uhh… playing with his hair. Her hand is uhhh…inside his shirt?
Brain: You’ve GOT to be kidding me. Tell me, when was the last time you did this with YOUR brother?
Heart: Euuww!! That’s disgusting! What the HELL is wrong with you, brain!
Brain: (pointed silence)
Heart: (stunned silence)

At this point, a wise girl will realise that if she were ever asked for an example of a lose-lose situation, she would not come up short. Dumping the boy will inevitably lead to the RS ‘consoling’ the boy with many “Koi baat nahin bhai, aisi ladkiyaan bahut saari mil jaayengi”, and asking him to choose would be viewed as colossally stupid (even if perfectly legitimate). Even killing the RS will not be a solution since she’ll just have to live with the ghost of a sister past.

And when many years down the line she will go through the boy’s orkut profile and see a photograph of both of them titled ‘me and my best FRIEND (emphasis, mine) in the whole world’ she will thank her lucky stars she got out in time.

Vijayi Vishwa Tiranga Pyaara!

2007-08-15T01:31:00.000-07:00

Ae mere pyare vatan, ae mere bichhde chaman
tujhpe dil qurbaan
Tu hi meri aarzu, tu hi meri aabru
tu hi meri jaan.

Tere daman se jo aaye un havaon ko salaam
choom loon main us zubaan ko jispe aaye tera naam
Sabse pyaari subah teri, sabse rangeen teri shaam,
Tujhpe dil qurbaan.

Tu hi meri aarzu, tu hi meri aabru, tu hi meri jaan.

My favourite deshbhakti song. Gets me all choked up despite the fact that I'm neither fervently patriotic, nor, in any way, bichhdo-ed from my chaman. Also, in the film, the song was sung by a wrongfully-convicted Afghan trader, who was pining for his country i.e. Afghanistan.

I think my patriotic beliefs can safely be defined as 'schizo pick and mix'.

Yah Number Abhi Uplabdh Nahin Hai!

2007-08-13T01:45:00.000-07:00

Dear ~~blood-sucker~~ ~~money-grubber~~ ~~pathetic wanker~~ Sunil Bharti Mittal,

By the time you read this I’ll have switched service providers faster than you can say “Madam main Airtel ki oar se…”. I’m sorry for doing this…oh wait, no I’m not! I’m thrilled to be doing this. So thrilled, in fact that I just dialed 121 and laughed like a maniac at the poor sod at the other end. There might have been some ‘nyaah nyaah! I’m switching networks!’ thrown in, but I’m not confirming or denying that.

I know this might come as a bit of shock to you since you’ve been so busy managing all the IV tubes that directly connect our (and by ‘our’, I mean the zillion gullible fools – myself included – who use the airtel network ) veins to your coffers, but I’ve had enough. I am done with frantically running around my house and leaning at precarious angles just to be able to complete a five-minute conversation. It is frankly embarrassing to have to tell everyone who calls you to ‘just give me a minute while I get to a window’ and have them worry about whether they’re unknowingly fuelling your suppressed exhibitionist fantasies. Especially when it is a potential employer on the line.

But you don’t know what frustration is until you’ve been disconnected five times in the span of two minutes, in a conversation with an automated switchboard, where you had to dial your card number, your T-pin number, your date of birth and the date of your last transaction, three times. Only to have a rather tinny version of Für Elise* played back at you on loop.

I think you’re a ~~slimy bastard with a moral fibre which is more frayed, rotting wisps of thread than fibre~~ ~~swell guy~~ man, but I don’t think we’re right for each other. You think it’s fun to con people into giving you more money by swamping them with marketing calls when they’re on roaming rates, I get all warm and fuzzy when I think of the things I could do to you with a pair of industrial pliers, some copper wire and an electric socket.

Anyway, I want to switch to your immediate competitor, Hutch. But you know what? We had some good times, at least until the marketing calls started coming in and your entire effing network died on me. And look - I won't even make an issue out of the money you conned me out of, or the fact that so many of my days were made hellish by your underpaid call-center executives.

So take care of yourself - (if there is any justice in the world) you need to be strong for your years in prison.

With ~~sheer loathing~~ ~~utter contempt~~ a burning desire for revenge,

Your totally-pissed-off-EX-customer.

* Poor Beethoven's probably got friction burns from spinning in his grave so fast. Such a pity the dead can't sue.

Chunnu Munnu di Gaddi

2007-08-01T00:13:00.000-07:00

So, Chunnu and Munnu, (by which I mean the SB and I, just in case you were wondering) have gone and got themselves a car. She (the car) is a pretty silver thing and looks like the result of a one of those socially frowned-upon unions (an inter-car marriage?) between a beetle (beetles! I love beetles) and ummm…a bigger car (which also, is the length and breadth of Munnu’s automobile-knowledge. There are beetles, and there are bigger cars).

Chunnu - who used to be a biker and hasn’t really driven cars much - took practice driving classes for about a month before the car was delivered to them. Munnu credits this sensible move as the reason that all three of them (C, M and the G) are alive and undamaged today.

Munnu, however, in all her years, has never seen cars as anything more than things that get you from point A to point B. She has always been supremely unconcerned with things like navigation, traffic rules or even other cars on the road, because you see, it was never her *job* to know these things. Sure, there were the family cars but their ownership was ambiguous; they were never Munnu’s property. Also, there was always a responsible adult (or two) around, who a) drove the car and b) ensured that Munnu got to wherever it is she was going.

As a result of this sheltered upbringing, Munnu is magnificently ill-equipped to deal with the reality of owning a car. When she is strapped into the passenger seat, the responsibility of it all overwhelms her. Her palms go all sweaty and her heart skips a beat every time a BEST bus drives by. She is sorely tempted to jump out of the car screaming and chase all the other vehicles off the road. Or at least out of a five-mile-radius of the Gaddi.

Parking however, is what Munnu finds most stressful, even though she is not the one doing it. Munnu’s job is merely to ensure that the car does not inadvertently snuggle up too close to other cars / pavements / pillars while Chunnu backs it into place. Munnu is frequently convinced that the three feet of space she sees between the Gaddi and the neighbouring car / pavement / pillar is a trick of the light and that any moment, she will hear the not-so-gentle scraping of metal against the relevant immovable object. Every parking episode results in two more of Munnu’s hair turning grey.

Munnu remembers a story she was told as a child, about an aunt who was learning how to drive. Now this aunt lived in Kanpur, which, for some inexplicable reason, had a very high population of pigs. Pigs in general, Munnu’s aunt had no problem with, but apparently Kanpuria pigs were blissfully ignorant of traffic rules, not to mention the law of physics which states, ‘If big metal monster comes in contact with small piggy, small piggy becomes pork chops’. The aunt however, was vegetarian and against the killing of animals (however annoying) and so came up with a solution – she would take the car out with the chowkidar’s seven-year-old son as her only passenger. They would then drive around peacefully until one of the suicidal pigs showed up. The boy would then get out of the car, chase the animal off the road and get back into the car to continue his joyride. It was the perfect arrangement – the boy got a ride, the aunt her driving-practice and the piggy, his life.

Chunnu has suggested that Munnu learn how to drive, to which Munnu cryptically replies, “Our watchman has no sons.”

My eyes! My poor eyes!

2007-07-31T22:15:00.000-07:00

Gentlemen, the world does NOT need to know which way you dress. For the love of all that is sacred, WEAR LOOSER JEANS.

Restless

2007-07-14T01:37:00.000-07:00

It feels like a fizzing, spinning, burning catherine wheel, right in the centre of your rib-cage. Its heat runs through your veins, making you want to rip out these lifelines, just so that you can be rid of it. You can feel it throbbing in your fingertips, lump in your throat, well up in your eyes. And then you feel like a fool.

Because for heaven's sake, who cries out of restlessness?

We do. We even have a name for it. We call it the COA keeda*. All three of us have had it, and continue to have it. It isn’t always bad. Most months it lies low, occasionally erupting in an urge to ‘do something different’. These are more easily dealt with. A good play, a new hobby, a get-away-from-it-all-trip, they work. There is calm, even if it is uneasy. But you know you’re only suppressing symptoms, rather than curing disease (which is the most perfect word for this sickness. Disease: dis + ease). And you know, that like anything held in, when it explodes, there is havoc.

We know better than to offer solutions to the stricken. Suggestions will not, cannot be taken, opinions will be feverishly sought, then ignored, kind words will only lead to teary breakdowns.

So we listen, patiently, as people who have been down that road. We listen to the raving, the longing, the agonised debates, the justifications. And we empathise, but can do little else. It’s like a fever, it will run its course and only then, burn itself out.

All we can do is hope that we survive the fire. Or failing that, that phoenix-like, something beautiful will rise out of the ashes.

* Keeda: bug / worm.

Tagged again!

2007-07-07T03:41:00.000-07:00

By this gentleman, so any questions or protests on the lines of 'Did we *really* need to know that??', and 'Overshare! Overshare!!' are to be directed straight to him.

So, eight random facts about me.

1) You know that idiotic make-a-wish-on-a-fallen-eyelash thing that girls in Hindi movies do? Yeah well, guess what. I know, I know, totally pathetic. But look, I shook off some nineteen years of extreme religion - I'm entitled to one tiny equally baseless belief? Think of it as a nicotine patch of sorts, it might seem a little more tolerable.

When I was a kid, I had a mental picture of this silver-bearded old man, sitting on a pile of clouds, hunched over his worktable, prising open eyelashes with a pair of microscopic tweezers. The eyelash would then roll open scroll-like, and written on it would be the wish you'd made. I have no idea who I should blame for this.

2) I hate long nails. On myself, that is. I completely envy women with slender hands, tipped with perfectly manicured nails (the bitches), but it drives me nuts if mine grow long enough that I can feel the edges.

3) I once dated a neanderthal who said - "मैं चाहूंगा कि मेरी बीवी मुझे कम से कम एक वक़्त का खाना बना के खिलाये" - I was horrified, and argued till I was blue in the face, but I did not dump him. Well, not right away at least.

4) I people-watch to the point where the watchees begin to worry. It's not deliberate - I don't mean to make them uncomfortable, but the thing is that after a while, it's just my eyes that are focused on them; my brain has run off to pick daisies. When the brain comes back from her flower-picking, we have a good laugh about it. And then they (the watchees) worry even more.

5) I hate being tickled.

6) I cannot smoke. I've tried to, oh about a hundred times till date, but I always end up coughing and wheezing like a chain-smoking asthmatic. Oh and pot? Same difference.

7) My second toe is longer (taller? higher? faster? stronger?) than my big toe (on both feet). Superstition says that a woman with this particular toe-configuration will lord over her husband. Superstition is a lying bitch.

8) I think boobs are a bad design feature. Really. I think I might've even been lesbian if it weren't for boobs.

Done! Now I'm supposed pass on the tag to eight people but I'm fairly sure that only four out of eight will do it, so here goes:

Izzy (who I think has done this before but so what, tell us eight more things)
Revealed
Beth
The Ideasmithy

This 'n that

2007-07-02T13:15:00.000-07:00

The rain has stopped, finally. Not that it was affecting me much; it would take a lot more water to flood an eighth floor apartment. But there is the wind. I have to keep all the windows (but one) closed because the moment I open them a crack, it's like I've let a typhoon into the house. Papers fly around, curtains billow dramatically, doors bang, empty water bottles get blown off kitchen counters. So I keep them closed, only, even though they're the sliding glass type windows, they're never *completely* closed. And you know what happens when gale force winds try to force their way through teeny tiny slots?

Banshee karaoke.

The first time I heard the wailing, I thought a bat had flown into the house. After a rather jittery search revealed that it was only the wind, I tried sealing off the windows by jamming in newspaper. It didn't work, at least not in the way I hoped. All it did was lower the pitch. So instead of soprano, my window banshees now wail in a soft contralto.

I should sell tickets or something.

***

On a completely unrelated note, a lovely poem I read over the weekend. Author Anne Lamott calls it a wonderful use of paranoia as material. I agree.

We Who Are Your Closest Friends

We who are
your closest friends
feel the time
has come to tell you
that every Thursday
we have been meeting,
as a group,
to devise ways
to keep you
in perpetual uncertainty
frustration
discontent and
torture
by neither loving you
as much as you want
nor cutting you adrift.
Your analyst is
in on it,
plus your boyfriend
and your ex-husband;
and we have pledged
to disappoint you
as long as you need us.
In announcing our
association
we realize we have
placed in your hands
a possible antidote
against uncertainty
indeed against ourselves.
But since our Thursday nights
have brought us
to a community
of purpose
rare in itself
with you as
the natural center,
we feel hopeful you
will continue to make unreasonable
demands for affection
if not as a consequence
of your disastrous personality
then for the good of the collective.

- Philip Lopate

$0.70 richer than I was three months ago!*

2007-06-28T23:44:00.000-07:00

So, it's been about three months since the day when I - in an uncharacteristic fit of a) optimism b) insanity c) technological curiosity d) all of the above - signed up for google's adsense thingy. I think it is now time to ask the question:

Does anyone know why the stupid sole banner I signed up for, is half-hidden under the half-inch wide blue line that runs across the top of the page? The one that has all the 'SEARCH BLOG', 'FLAG BLOG' and the (modestly title-cased) 'Next Blog' links? Anyone??

* And if THIS doesn't tempt you, I don't know what will.

Normal Programming Resumes

2007-06-26T10:10:00.000-07:00

Despite my incessant kvetching about my parents’ looniness, I had a relatively sane childhood. No, really. I was fed (rather well, for which I blame them to this day), clothed and not forced to break rocks in the burning sun for not doing my homework (an incident which occurred with distressing (for them, that is) frequency).

It was only during my adolescent years I realised, that all this endless parenting (have I mentioned that I’m the fourth of five?) was making the needle on their sane-o-meters oscillate dangerously. The following incident will illustrate how.

The parents had apparently, early in their lives, nursed in their hearts the desire that one of their children would grow up to be an engineer. Not just any engineer, mind you, an engineer from IIT. Their first three offspring being more inclined towards the life sciences and art, the mantle was passed on to me – their one child who showed no inclination towards anything in particular.

The father is an engineer. Now you may assume that this would qualify him to decide whether or not I had an aptitude for the profession, but you would be wrong. Apparently, when you become parents, things like logic, and the ability to see what is staring you in the face, take wing and fly out the nearest window. And so it was with my parents. It was decided one cold day in December, that I, their one child who showed less of a talent for mathematics than your average amoeba (actually amoebae are better off, they can multiply without help. Get it? Get it? Ha ha ha!), would become the next engineer in the family. And this despite the fact that I had, in all my years of primary education (save one - the year of my grade ten board exams), displayed a lack of left brain activity that could only be described as uncanny.

To be fair to them, I did, in the eleventh grade, confuse them a little. I signed up for that deceptively named subject – Engineering Drawing. “If that isn’t the sign of a future engineer, we don’t know what is!” thought my parents. What it was, was a simple case of selective vision; they saw Engineering’ and went “Aha!”, I saw ‘Drawing’ and went “Oo fun!” So while I drew three types of rivets and the occasional cross-section of a crankshaft (without knowing how any of them actually worked), my parents smiled at each other knowingly and dreamed.

As a result of this dream, after I completed the twelfth board exams (with abysmal grades in maths, mind you) I was signed up for those IIT entrance preparatory classes. “But I don’t want to be an engineer! I want to do an English honours course.” I said to my parents. “No,” they replied, firmly yet lovingly, “there are no jobs for English honours students. What will you do once you graduate?” Being, back then, of the species known as Teenageria Cluelessium, I had no answer to that and agreed to the classes with the warning that they were wasting their money. As expected, it fell on deaf ears.

Typically, at this point in the story, the girl’s left-brain awakens with all the force of an active volcano and dazzles all with its brilliance, proving to the world that all parents are always right and gosh! The world might just have its next Einstein! To which I will only say, “Right. And life is a Karan Johar movie.”

I realised after about a week of attending though, that these classes weren’t quite as hellish as I had thought they would be. I still didn't understand a word those teachers said, (except for that one jolly old Punjabi gentleman, who would upbraid his students with a cheery “Hiyou bilaady fooool!”), but I did understand that in a class of twenty-five odd (and some of them were very odd) boys, H and I were the only girls. H was already seeing someone, which left me with sole ogling rights to Jaspreet Randhawa.

Jas, in that entire class of twenty-five young men, was the only one who did not wear glasses, did not dress in clothes his mother might’ve bought for him, did not have his oiled hair in a neat side parting and did speak in grammatically perfect English with all his articles ready and present (ref: grammar, you pervs). It also helped that he stood six-feet-two inches tall, had the softest brown eyes I had ever seen and a smile bracketed by dimples you could drown in. Pretty as Michelangelo’s David, but alive and umm…more substantially clothed (which was sad, but you can’t have everything. Also, Delhi winters, ‘nuff said).

So Jas and I got to doing what awkward teenagers did back then, which was, avoiding each other like the plague. This continued for about two weeks until one morning, as I was walking from the bus stop to class, he stopped his bike and offered me a ride. From then on it was but a small step to chatting in all the breaks and drinking chai at the tapri around the corner.

It would be nice to say that we walked off into the sunset holding hands (no actually, it would be crap. And a bunch of lies) but soon I got into the College of Art and we fell out of touch.

So, although nothing ever came of it (the pretty boy and me, i.e.), my parents did learn that attempts to play puppet-master with my academic/professional life were more likely to backfire. Their subsequent tries at spreading the loony were limited to showing me resumes and photographs of eligible (by their standards) men who were all, by some bizarre coincidence, very religious, hirsute and balding.

Now? They just bug me to make babies. I’m not sure if that’s an improvement – the sane-o-meter self-imploded at grandkid number 3.

So, what was I saying again? Oh yeah, parents. Don't you just love 'em?

Rain*

2007-06-24T02:43:00.000-07:00

Rain should be seen in silver beads,
threaded on soft, dark hair.

It should be breathed in, off skin,
in the nook of a neck.

It should be felt, fingertip to raisined fingertip
Its trail, tracing furrows down a chest.

It should be tasted, teased,
sipped off smokey lips.

Heard, whispered,
against the sound of your name.

Addendum: It should be banned, for moving souls like me,
to poetry.

*Ladies and gentlemen, exhibit (a) of GP. And you can't say I didn't warn you - that profile's been up for ages now.

Television - How much is too much, Part II

2007-06-07T21:55:00.000-07:00

In other news I have realised that being a freelance writer is no less fraught with danger than say, being a crocodile psychotherapist.

The thing is, when I was gainfully employed with a legitimate company, I stuck to office timings. Which meant that my television watching was seriously restricted to about one hour in a day, if that. Now, since I work (using the term loosely) from home I am forced to watch more television that I could ever be comfortable with. (And yes, I mean ‘forced’. YOU try ignoring it when you have to walk past the damn thing fifty thousand times in a day). So yes, I watch a lot of television. Some days I watch so much of it that by the time the SB gets back from work, the couch and I have moulded ourselves around each other and the only movement in the room is that of my thumb, frantically pressing buttons in the forlorn hope that one channel out of 99 will play something that can hold my attention for a whole minute.

It was during one such day that I came across Shekhar Suman’s debut album. And I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the screen.

It starts with a man’s torso silhouetted - framed lovingly, so you can count every muscle - in a window. The camera pans around and it is Shekhar Suman! In possibly the most self conscious ooh-look-at-me-wake-up stretch ever to be seen. SS scans the horizon, looking for, we know not what. But wait! His eyes narrow…he’s spotted something! And the camera sweeps to the beach, where lies a mysteriously abandoned guitar! SS looks around – after ascertaining that no one’s watching, follows the finders-keepers principle and filches it.

He’s dreamily strumming a few chords when suddenly! There is a bikini-clad woman! Lying languorously on the rocks, letting the waves wash over her! As SS blinks in disbelief, she walks towards the camera, then does the standard break-surface-and-toss-hair-backwards thing. After a few more babe-on-a-beach moves, the camera cuts to SS, who has changed out of his pyjamas (but stuck with the vest) and is now wearing jeans. He sits on a rock, strumming the guitar and singing, vanishing and reappearing alternately with the beach-babe until the last frame, where there are two SS’s a strummin’ an’ a singin’.

Babe does some more babe-on-a-beach things.

SS has now ditched his vest for a shirt and a jacket. And put on a pair of I’m-so-cool shades. He sits on some stairs in the middle of nowhere and plays the guitar, while a bunch of random children gather around him. The beach-babe has, in the meantime, put on a pretty summer dress, got herself a bunch of flowers and is running, o’er hill and err…around/away from a church.

Babe finds the aforementioned random children and hands each of them a flower. The children smilingly accept the flowers, probably worried about what the crazy-smiling-lady-with-the-flowers might do if they refuse. SS wipes his hand on his shirt and asks her for one too. She simpers, and obliges. This is obviously a sign that they can now wear colour-coordinated outfits because in the very next scene, SS and Babe, clad in matching-matching pink, are running around trees. Babe decides that she wants to go solo and waves around a couple of yards of diaphanous-pink-fabric.

Swirl, swirl.

It is now night. And SS and Babe are doing the salsa. Or something like it. Only, since babe’s dress has no pockets, she has hung her keys on the back of it. (Not too smart I think; they’re bound to fall off with all that twirling). They salsa for a little while then retire to a bonfire (see? Told you she’d lose the keys) which obviously warrants another change of clothes.

They clink their glasses together and kiss and this is where it goes from just ‘icky’ to the code yellow of ickiness. SS runs his hand across babe’s collarbones and round to the back of her neck, while his elbow rests comfortably on her chestal region (eeuw). His gaily patterned Hawaiian shirt vanishes as though it never was, and babe snuggles up against his bare chest. (Code Orange! Your toes are refusing to uncurl!)

SS wakes up hugging a pillow and wonders where babe went until he realizes that she was but a dream. He sits up in bed and sorta laughs to himself then walks up to his window and lo! There in the distance, is the guitar that started it all! He runs towards in slow motion, picks it up, gives a look-over (decides that well, whaddya know! This one’s filch-able too!), turns to the camera and winks the creepiest, crawliest, make-your-skin-want-to-get-up-and-run wink I have ever seen (Code Red! Code Red!! Someone send in the Haitian!!).

Do take a look.*

*Why should I be the only one to suffer?

Thanking her Lucky Stars

2007-05-30T02:28:00.000-07:00

At a recent drunken gathering I was asked what my will-he-make-it-to-a-second-date tests were. (Which probably just goes to show just how drunken the gathering was, because asking ME for second-date-tests is a bit like asking a kake-da-dhaba-da-butter-chicken eater, whether they want their beluga caviar on crackers or plain chilled. ‘Pointless’ is what I mean). So anyway, I thought really, really hard (I was drunk too) and came up with this:

”He shall not be queasy about street food.”

And then I thought about it some more and I realised that I’m probably at my wisest when drunk. Because you know, not-queasy-about-street-food says so much about a man. No, seriously. I will not date a guy who goes all ‘organic aloos’ on me. A man who is NQaSF is a man who is not afraid to take chances. He’s been there, eaten that, had the jaundice and risen like a phoenix from the ashes. What has not killed him, has given him a stomach of cast-iron and an immune system that pooh-poohs at sissy amoeba.

The NQaSF guy is not just tough, oh no he’s not. This man, much like the perfect vada, is all crispy crust and soft insides. You might not think it to look at him, but ladies and gentlemen, he’s a romantic! This is a man who knows the joys of eating roasted bhutta while walking along bandstand, and the comfort that comes from conversations punctuated with the silent, contemplative munching of corn-kernels. He knows the sense of community that comes with standing around the paani-puri-vaala’s red-cloth-draped matka and struggling to finish the paani-puri in your plate before the lightning-fast vendor starts his second round. He knows the stomach-flipping way of using his (clean) handkerchief to wipe off that dab of imli-chutney from the corner of your mouth (which might sound gross but is actually all awww-inducing when the hormones are a-ragin’).

He knows that nothing completes a rainy day better than a glass of sweet cutting-chai, strong with the flavours of adrak and elaichi, and he knows that the best accompaniment to this chai is piping hot samosas, smothered in green chutney, served in those faded-green leaf donas.

And now, the government wants to ban them all.

It’s a good thing I went and got married when I did.

With Apologies to Nike

2007-05-18T01:43:00.000-07:00

So. In my mother’s endless quest for more grandchildren than she knows what to do with, I have been instructed to buy a panchang. For those of you in the dark (from me, who has had an occasional glimpse of light and winced) a panchang is a Vedic calendar based largely on the phases of the moon with an occasional nod to the sun, the nine* real planets in our solar system and two mythical ones (Yes, we have mythical planets. Don’t you?).

The panchang is pretty much the how-to-live-every-day-of-your-life guide for all good, religious, Hindus (I score exactly zero out of three). It has every single day of (however remote) religious significance marked out on it and if you’re even borderline familiar with Hinduism, that is a LOT of days. There is ekadashi, which happens once every month – I know some people fast on this day, there is amavas, which is essentially a moonless night, so I’m assuming people switch on the street-lights this day, and a whole plethora of other days which I have no clue about. All I know is that some involve fasting, some involve feasting and some involve wearing yellow clothes and feeding cows (unless this one of my mother’s twisted little ways of getting a laugh off her children).

’What does this have to do with my mother’s potential grandchildren?’, you might ask.
‘Apparently, lots’, I will say.

You see, since my mother has realised that mere badgering has done nothing to increase her tribe, she has switched to plan B i.e. tempt your daughter with the promise of “super” offspring. Apparently, doing the deed on days specifically earmarked for er…such activity will ensure that the resultant bundle of joy will be the kind of bundle of joy that is the very epitome of joyousness. As they were wont to say in shady seventies Hindi movies, “Heera hoga, heera!!" (He will be a diamond, a diamond!).

But it’s not as simple as it sounds. You can’t ‘just do it’ (sorry nike) on the days circled in red marker. There is A Process. The two parties involved must first have gone though a period of celibacy (ten days, I think). On the designated day, when the clock strikes the magic hour, both parties must bathe, wear clean clothes and light a diya in front of bhagwaan-jis of their choosing. They must then invoke their individual ancestors, inform them of their intentions to further (deepen?) their gene pools, seek their blessings and then get down and do the dirty.

Because of course, *nothing* gets you in the mood like the mental image of an audience of stern-faced gods and grey-beard ancestors watching you as you get it on.

*or is that eight now?

Not merry, not even close.

2007-05-14T03:53:00.000-07:00

You know what this heat is? It’s insidious. It gets under your skin. You can shed your layers of clothing till you’re naked as a jaybird, and even that won’t be enough, you’ll want to take off more. This heat. It lies low all morning, patient, waiting, pretending to be all ‘oh pay no attention to me, I’ll just lie here in this corner doing nothing at all’ and then, when the sun’s at its peak, it pounces. Runs under your skin like an army of spiders, starting at the back of your neck, then spreading. Across your shoulder blades, down your arms, in the crease of your neck. A million little metallic spiders under your skin.

God I hate May.

And like that’s not bad enough, there are clouds. They’ll hide the sun for a couple of minutes every now and then, fill you with longing, make you turn your face up to the sky in anticipation, and then float away.

If May were a man, he’d totally be the kind all your girlfriends told you to stay away from, knowing all the while that you were too far gone to listen. Because May? May was Bad News. He was the kind who’d never call when he said he would, vanish without a trace for three months and then, without any warning, show up at your doorstep. You’d be all casual because you couldn't possibly let him know, he’d know, but pretend not to.

Crafty bugger, that May.

But I’m three summers old in this city and I know that these clouds mean nothing. I know there’s going to be no rain till June. I know. So you can stop flitting across the sky, stop your hide-and-seek with the sun, just stop with the goddamn teasing alright?

I’m on to you, May.

Warm Fuzzy Feeling

2007-04-25T10:49:00.001-07:00

> Told suspicious security card at college gate, "Hum purane students hain, yaaden taaza karne aayen hain!" Where confident and authoritative failed, bambi eyes and plenty of "Please bhaiyya, bas dus minute main vaapis aa jaayenge, promise!" worked like a charm. Heh, men are such suckers, and no we have no pride.

> Wandered around the place and got completely disoriented because fucking progress has ensured that those lovely green lawns where we'd spend hours bunking classes, have now grown ugly brick buildings like a rash. Goddamn progress.

> Got into TGIF after driving around Connaught Place (and I will NOT call it goddamn 'rajiv chowk') three times, in an attempt to find someplace that served cheap alcohol. After attempt three in a rapidly heating-up car, any alcohol was just fine.

> Went to Janpath and fulfilled the cold-coffee at De Pauls ritual. Ran into THREE other classmates doing the same. Exchanged gossip and phone numbers.

> Squealed at everything that had changed in the five years that I'd been away. Got punched by N and called a b******** tourist for acting like a, well...b******** tourist. Basked in the warmth of authentic punjabi-accented abuse.

Good times. *sigh*

Aandhi

2007-04-25T09:44:00.001-07:00

I walked through a dust-storm today. Cloudy when I left home, and then the wind whipped up. Dust and leaves and the funniest sight - those little cottony balls of fluff that hold seeds, rolling faster and faster down the road as the wind gave chase.

I must've been quite a sight. Lone girl in a red kurti and jeans, hand held up to shield her eyes, the wind whipping up dust devils all around her, her magenta silk scarf struggling to make a break for it.

Not that there was much of an audience.

Just a few measly drops of rain though. And I was praying for hail. Have you seen one of those in Delhi? If you're outside when they hit, you're torn between wanting to take cover (those things *hurt*) and staying out because this is ice falling from the sky in a city that was an oven till a few minutes back.

And if you're indoors, you hear them rattle as they hit the windows, the AC, the mosaic floor of the balcony. When it's over, if you get outdoors fast enough and if it was a big storm, the roads are shiny black and the hailstones look like melting stars.

Nostalgia*

2007-04-19T12:04:00.001-07:00

She sees them from way off. Blue and white against the night sky, black on yellow, white on green. They're lit up by streetlights, headlights and on the quieter stretches, moonlight. She reads, rolling the words on her tongue, testing them, tasting them.

'Mehrauli'. Open-mouthed, soft-exhaled, palate-brushing. 'Motibagh'. Stronger, tongue-pressed-against-teeth, from the back of the throat. 'Dhaulakuan'. A complete tempest of a word.

The air smells of dust and dried flowers.

'Purani Dilli'. She reads, invoking Dalrymple's djinns. 'Shalimar Bagh', 'Hazrat Nizamuddin', 'Neeli Chatri', 'Kalkaji'. 'Hauz Khaz', 'Sarai Kale Khan' and then, 'Chirag Dilli'. "What an absurdly poetic name for a flyover," she thinks to herself. "Light of Delhi indeed!"

But she can't stop looking out the window, like some country bumpkin, trying to drink in a whole city in a half-hour trip. And her steady, senseless half-smile prompts her cab-driver to finally ask,

"Aap bahut dinon baad aayin hain madam?"
"Haan bhaiyya...kaafi dinon baad."

*Or, How to Make *Anything* Pretty.**
** I give her three days, tops. You?

How to make an effective decision-making tool wish it had never been born

2007-04-05T02:56:00.000-07:00

She sits on the cold floor, her back against the wall, her knees pulled up close to her chest and her arms wrapped around them. She picks up her pen, her sketch-pad, draws a line down the center of the page and starts writing.

1. "Lies. (in block letters, underlined twice. The second line so fiercely that the paper tears a little). Lies all the time. About everything. His family, his holidays, even his goddamn internships! Why would anyone lie about something like that?! I didn’t even get an internship, did it ever occur to me to lie about it? No! Lies about his mother, for crying out loud. Says she’s suffering from a life-threatening disease of the spine. And (of course!) she used to be a dancer. "

2. "Steals ideas from Creativity editions and passes them off as his own. I can’t believe how much I praised his India Ink idea, how slack-jawed with awe I was, how stupid I felt for not being able to come up with a concept even a fourth as intelligent as that. And how he was all modest and self-effacing about it. “Oh I was just doodling and it came to me. It’s no big deal.” Arrgh! D, you bloody stupid fool!"

3. "Copies down Robert Browning’s poems and claims he’s written them. Apparently, having the same initials as a Victorian poet implies that you are him. Apparently, he also thinks he’s the only one in college with a library card. And like that's not enough, he denies it so vehemently when confronted, that I begin to doubt myself.

And in the right column, in a much less forceful hand, she writes, “Makes me laugh.”

Hot Chocolate and friends

2007-03-27T00:17:00.001-07:00

They were together for about two months. Two months of dates in which he'd tell her stories of how he'd been with two women (twins, no less!) at the same time, how he'd been the stripper for his friend's bachelorette party, how he'd been picked up by so many women that he'd almost lost count; that he was a loner and 'not a nice guy'. And there she'd be, lying in his bed, in the dark of his room, thinking about the many faces people put on to hide hurt, and of how well both of them played the couldn't-care-less game.

She almost laughed at the fact that she was playing body-double for a girl whose ex-boyfriend was playing her rebound guy. Almost.

But the thing with body-doubles and ghost-exes, was that you knew they weren't the real thing - they weren't supposed to last. It was what they call 'a willing suspension of belief'. You bought your ticket, watched your movie, lived someone else's life for a few comfortably numb hours and then went back to reality.

Which is why when he started calling her again (a year after that movie ended) she refused to take his calls, deleted his number, then re-saved it as 'Bad Idea'*.

And then she remembered that one night when they'd been something like buddies. When they silly-danced with each other on You Sexy Thing - doing the butt-wiggle, the gospel-hands and the pretend strip-tease. For that one night, she had to admit, they had been friends...good friends. The kind who told you to stop whining and get on with your life. The kind that held your hand and fake-flirted you back to smiling, laughing and realising that life didn't stop just because people moved on.

she never did take his calls, but she smiles every time she hears that song.

*Which probably just goes to show that there's no such thing as a completely bad idea - 99% fucking stupid, yes, but hey, how else would you learn?

Oscar Material

2007-03-19T21:47:00.001-07:00

A phone conversation with a friend, with whom I spent all 2 1/2 years of post-grad, just showed me that I am (despite the whole shy, quiet person deal) a frickin’ *brilliant* actress (or is that ‘actor’ now? Man, PC is so not my thing).

She: So I’m going to be in Bombay on Tuesday, and since you’re unemployed (yeah, rub it in, why dontcha? Bitch.) you’re coming out to meet me.
Me: *sigh* Oh alright, but there must be alcohol.
She: Yes, yes, there will be.
Me: Oh wait…you’re with Raymonds…which means, you’re staying in fucking Thane*!!
She: (shocked silence)
Me: (wonders what the hell the ‘shocked silence’ is all about)
Me: (slaps forehead as memory surfaces: this is the friend with whom I spent all of post-grad in Hyderabad)

Post-grad in Hyderabad = 2 1/2 years of not saying ‘fuck’, or c***, or even haraami out loud because the classmates would wince if I said anything stronger than kamina. The word ‘asshole’ would elicit horrified stares and the one day I said ch***** aloud, all the boys in my class - all fuckin’ 28 of them - drew in their breaths collectively and just stopped short of screaming ‘get thee behind me spawn of satan!’ and hiding behind the desks. It was just too tiring to train all of them into accepting that girls occasionally swore too (picking my battles and all of that), so I just switched to doing it in my head.

”Here is the *_______* project, you *_________*, *_________*, excuse for a project partner.”

”Keep your *_________* neanderthal ideas to your *_________* self, won’t you please?”

And I managed for 2 1/2 years. 2 1/2 years of being a ‘good girl’, of being a butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-my-mouth-no-siree girl and a who-needs-their-mouth-washed-out-with-soap?-not-ME girl.

Or alternately, 21/2 years of being the girl who spoke with inexplicable pauses in the middle of her sentences.

*By which I only mean really-really-*far*-from-where-I-live-Thane. I’m not a location snob** or anything.

** I’ve lived in Kandivali and Kalina. The latter, which is guaranteed to elicit looks of ‘Oh you poor thing! However did you *manage*?!’ So no, no location snobbery at all.

Coincidence?

2007-03-16T08:38:00.001-07:00

That the one day in the year that getting smashed out of your skull is legitimate, done, approved of, is the day yours truly was born.

Now I'm not superstitious, but really, coincidence?

I think not.

Happy St. Patrick's all! I'm off to get very, very drunk and pass out on a beach.

Television: How much is too much?

2007-03-15T09:48:00.001-07:00

So we’re lying on the rug in a morning-lit room…my cheek against his back as I breathe in the smell of his cologne. He’s talking but I can’t hear what he’s saying - I’m listening to his voice, soft, low, drawly. He decides that this isn’t enough; I should know what he’s talking about. So he picks up a bunch of post-its and starts writing me notes. He scribbles, folds, then passes them over his shoulder, I open them and laugh. They’re drawings. Anatomical drawings, like the kind you see in biology textbooks.

And then goddamit, I wake up. And HE goes back to being gay*.

*Which is, of course, the only reason why we’re not a couple.

Reeling

2007-03-06T03:33:00.001-08:00

I dodge behind a pillar when I see them approach. I wear sunglasses and avoid eye contact with anyone once I step outside the building. I even take the stairs if I see that the lift is already occupied by one whole person.

You never know whom she’s gone and made friends with.

No, I haven’t suddenly decided to enter the gumshoe business, nor am I practicing writing a bad spy novel. What I am doing, is reeling in the aftermath of the four-foot-ten-inch hurricane of friendliness and outgoing that is my mother.

She was here for two days. Two measly days. And in those two days? She went and befriended, advised and made life-long devotees of everybody within a ten-mile radius of my life.

My frequent admonitions through gritted teeth as I tugged on her sari aanchal, were of no avail. No amount of - “Ma! Stop smiling at strangers in the lift!” and “You don’t have to make conversation with the sabziwalla for christ’s sake!” or even “Please ma, let him drive his cab. Do we really need to know which part of UP he’s from?” - helped. And now she’s gone, and left me to fend for myself against this sea of super-friendly strangers.

Somedays I am convinced that I am a victim of a baby-swapping episode.

In the last one-year, all my lift rides had been spent in a peaceful contemplative silence during which the lift-attendant and I conducted in-depth studies of our personal footwear. I wondered whether my shoelaces were tied into perfect bows, how the pink swoosh contrasted nicely against the dark blue background, whether the soles were bouncy enough…you know? Lift thoughts. Now? I am suddenly and without warning being addressed as ‘baby’ ('baby'??) and asked solicitous questions about whether the house-keeping staff turn up on time, whether my bai is doing her work well and that if I ever need anything, I only need to inform security to send ‘Manoj’.

Every gaggle of aunties I meet now, accosts me with friendly cries of “Hello beta! You must tell your mummy that the boy/medicine/yoga exercise she recommended for my young-female-relative/age-related-ailment/random-joint-pain worked wonderfully! She’s getting married! / I’m cured! /Look at me do cartwheels now!” At which I can only smile weakly and reply, “Yes auntie, I definitely will” because I have no idea who these women are.

The sabziwallas now all flash friendly smiles at me, conduct conversations in Bhojpuri, which I don’t understand and offer me vegetables I don’t know how to cook. When I tell them I cannot understand a word they are saying, they laugh and say, “Achcha aap nahin samajhti hain? Koi baat nahin. Apni mataji ko hamari taraf se namaste kah dijiyega.”

The neighbours, whom till today, I only knew as the people who shifted their furniture at odd hours of the night, now stop me and tell me what a nice, friendly, social lady my mother is.

I have to fight the temptation to lean against their shoulders and brokenly sob, “You don’t know the half of it!”

I’m sure my real mother is a quiet, reclusive academic, who lives in a small, secluded cottage in some remote hill station. And then I wonder how she must cope with her unintentionally adopted miniature hurricane.

***

Update on the Baby Front:
The only thing more horrifying than your mother telling you to start making babies, is when she starts telling you how.

Excuse me while I go and pick up my ears. They sort of melted off the sides of my head while she was talking.

The Mommy Returns

2007-02-23T01:49:00.000-08:00

Be afraid, be very afraid.

I've been practicing the eye-rolling and the exasperated sighing, only this time, the problem is likely to be slightly bigger than grimy masala bottles or recalcitrant maids.

I am being interrogated as to why, after a whole year of being married, I do not have anything substantial (i.e. a baby. or two, or three) to show for it.

My mother is strangely obsessed with babies. Strangely, I say, because people, she has had *five* of her own. Five. And like that's not enough? She now has four grandchildren. It seems that no matter how many babies there are in her immediate vicinity, there is always room for more*.

And whose job is it to fill up the empty-baby spaces? You guessed it! Yours truly.

Now, Yours Truly is rather partial to the creatures; she loves their little pudgy hands, their toothless grins and their small wiggly-ness, but has seen enough of them to know that babies are just little bundles of TNT, camouflaged in cuteness.

So while she might someday be persuaded to see her present life collapse like a house of cards, (only to be picked up, chewed, and drooled over), today is not that day.

And the next three years don't look like it either.

*You could stick my mother in a room full of babies and over the gurgling and crying and cooing, you would still hear her saying, "Send in the babies! We need more babies!!"

Because I am nothing, if not courteous.

2007-02-16T14:00:00.000-08:00

Dear Spambots*,

I wouldn't know what tramadol, diet(?!) phentermine or carisoprodol were if they jumped up collectively and bit me. If they did, I would probably just wonder, "What are these things that have jumped up out of nowhere and why are they biting me?".

Yes, I'm slow that way.

But one thing I do know, is that I have never, at any point in my life, ever worried about my, err...staying power.

So you can stop offering me all the goddamn Viagra.

Sincerely,

The Blogger Who Has Never Had to Worry About ED.

*If there's anybody out there who knows how to block/stop/destroy the damn things, help me! Please?

God is a Surly Cab Driver

2007-02-06T15:50:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, after frantically running around in circles for a cab at Churchgate station, I find one, get into it and a little out of breath I ask the cab-driver:

Me: “Bhaiyya, aap Horniman Circle jaante ho?
Cab Driver: (in slow, deep, deadpan voice) “Main sab kuch jaanta hoon.”

There go my chances of ever getting into The Great Big Taxi in the Sky.

Blog-people, meet Henry, Henry, Blog-people.

2007-02-06T15:43:00.000-08:00

Darlings! We’re back!

And oh it feels good to be back. A little strange also, because now we’re using a new computer (Henry), which is actually not new at all (and we mean that in the best way Henry, you know we always had a soft corner for the older ones), but it is much better than nothing.

Yes, that is it, my precious fluffy kittens. I was away because I was temporarily technology deprived - having quit old job and therefore, its accompanying spiffy laptop - and being back in employment limbo once again.

Somehow changing systems disorients me like nothing else - even if it involves moving higher up the technology pyramid.

I remember how strange it was to switch from a PC to Mac. My right hand index finger began to suffer from an identity crisis, all the keyboard shortcuts had to be re-wired in my brain and I had to get used to the CD drive as part of the monitor. That was the hardest part. I felt so guilty every time I inserted a CD into the drive, like I was violating my monitor in some horrible, unspeakable manner.

But then I got used to it and it got used to me and we got along well for almost two years. Until terminal wanderlust reared its ugly head and I was once again, forced to get used to a new computer – this time, a laptop.

The only thing I disliked about the laptop was the touch pad. I hated the unpredictability of it, the easiness of it. The darn thing worked no matter where you touched it, and even when you didn’t mean to. You know? Like it had no boundaries. You could never get comfortable with a touch pad; make friends with it, because it was always too aloof. There was just no sense of discovery, and…settling in and you know, familiarity. And it was just unnatural to have to use digits from both hands to click and drag things from one folder to another.

But I did love the whole oyster-shell-y-ness of it. The way it closed up and kept your secrets until the time you felt like raising its lid again. And of course, the fact that it took up so little space on our tiny dining table (which we have never, till date actually dined at) on which we keep everything else that that we don’t know where to keep.

So (sigh) I fell in love with laptop too and when it went away, I was beset by inexplicable urges to break my chooris against the nearest wall.

But now I have new-old system (Henry) and I’m happy again! Henry, blog-people, has a CPU! Isn’t that so adorably quaint? And a floppy drive (floppies! Do you have fond memories of floppies? I do)! And a keyboard that goes clickety-clack when I type and has, for some reason which I cannot fathom, a bright red ‘i’ key*. The mouse is huge compared to my last three mice (this sentence is beginning to sound inexplicably dirty to me) and my hand suddenly seems small in comparison.

I know now that the shift key on the right of the keyboard is on the shy side; she takes time to open up. Mr. Mouse is thankfully, not moody at all (unlike the last Mr. Mouse who needed to be picked up and shaken every few minutes to get the cursor to move) and I have dropped ceremonial cookie crumbs on the last row of keys.

This could be the beginning of beautiful friendship.

*A hint, you think? Does it mean I need to start talking about myself more? Is that possible? I think not.

Salaam-e-Ishq

2007-01-29T15:36:00.000-08:00

(Many, many spoilers ahead)

'Tedious, long and requires two aspirin' is how we'd describe this movie.

This is a lumpy-patchwork-quilt of stories from Shall We Dance, Love Actually, Raja Hindustani (why, WHY would anybody do this??) and Pyar ke Side Effects. Nikhil Advani, the director of Kal Ho Na Ho (which we thought was eminently watchable), brings you six love stories in one movie. Most of them badly written, vaguely connected, and interspersed with songs which prove to be the Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy trio's worst movie score so far.

What *happened* boys??

Whither the young-and-in-love perkiness of Kuch to Hua Hai? Or the happy-bollywood-shaadi-ness of a Maahi ve? Or even the eighties-disco-sity of, well, It's the time to Disco? Where has it all gone? Okay granted, there is the title track which is okay (thought it lacks a certain something) and the Tenu leke main javanga* which starts off well, but somehow loses direction after the opening bars. And as for the Babuji dheere chalna remix...*pained sigh*. We don't know what to say anymore boys, really we don't. Except maybe, WHAT ON EARTH WERE YOU THINKING?? It's *ghastly*! You've done absolutely nothing with that song and it's completely pointless to throw in an old song unless you put a new spin on it (think Bluffmaster and Sabse bada rupaiyya).

On to the stories now.

Priyanka Chopra and Salman Khan: KKamini (Priyanka) is an item girl who dreams of being cast in a Karan Johar movie. Rahul (Salman) is a con-man (in the first half of the movie), who plans to make big bucks out of a publicity stunt staged by Priyanka, which involves her falling in love in with a mysterious man who will eventually die. Priyanka is not terribly convincing as the wannabe-bollywood-starlet, but gets better in the second half of the movie. Salman is ...there, doing what he does (I considered saying 'acting' but I think I'd be pushing the word too far).

Ayesha Takia and Akshaye Khanna: Gia (Ayesha), is Shiven (Akshaye)-the-commitment-phobe's long-suffering girlfriend. Hiccups in their relationship are overcome by Ayesha's unwavering faith in Akshaye UNTIL she comes across a video-recording of Akshaye in a drunken moment, telling her that he can't see himself getting married.

A fairly decent performance by both of them. Akshaye carries off comedy better in this than he manages in Hulchul and Ayesha is convincing as the girlfriend who-has-had-enough.

Anil Kapoor and the Bimbo: This story has just about as much substance as clear soup. Vinay (Anil Kapoor) sees bimbo (Anjana) on train and is hypnotised by her cleavage. Bimbo drops diary on train. AK finds diary and despite diary containing no details of address/telephone number/last name, AK manages to locate bimbo who is (surprise! surprise!) a ~~St. Vitus' itch~~ dance ~~carrier~~ teacher to a bunch of foreigners who are attending her class to (presumably) get ~~a nasty skin disease~~ a taste of Indian Culture (ri-i-ight).

(Honestly, if THAT is what mid-life crisis does to you then I refuse to have it. I absolutely REFUSE. Anything that can make you think that extreme dumbness + cellulite + hotpants (aarrgghh!) + graceless dancing + a godawful remix of Babuji dheere chalna = Hot, is NOT something I will have anything to do with thankyouverymuch)

Bimbo, when done with her demonstration of the 'truly horrid things you can do to audiences in three minutes' squeals with joy when presented with her diary and gives AK a peck on the cheek for being such a sweet guy (because of course, guys who ogle at your cleavage are so sweet!), and AK is promptly smitten.

Juhi Chawla, as AK's devoted wife, and mother of his two children, plays the doormat to a T, sacrificing all her dreams so that he can fulfill his. You will be tempted at this point, to wonder if her character is just partially blind or mildly deranged. Apparently, according to the film, she is neither.

Govinda and Shannon Ersa: One of the best/most entertaining stories in this entire film. Govinda is the die-hard-romantic taxi-driver who dreams of falling in love with a white woman. On cue, Shannon enters his life only, she has come to India to win back her Indian boyfriend who refuses to marry her because his family wants an Indian daughter-in-law. Govinda, predictably enough, vows to help her find the absconding boyfriend (because he 'louwes' her!), and together they traipse across the length and breadth of India, where they are met with they-just-left-here stories in all their pit-stops.

John Abraham and Vidya Balan: Johnny boy and Balan play a happily inter-religion-married couple until Balan has an accident and suffers from amnesia. Johnny boy then spends the entire second half of the film taking her to places and meeting people in an effort to get her memory back. Balan is much better in this film and appears to have realised that coy-eye-rolling does not a good actress make. Johnny boy is better than he was in Taxi No. 9211 (which is actually not saying much, but it's the best we can do).

Arbaaz Khan and Isha Kopikkar: Arbaaz and Isha are the frisky newly-weds whose attempts at having sex are thwarted everytime by a. a dupatta catching fire and burning the house down, b. an audience of five children, c. a runaway car and d. an errant rig which holds up Arbaaz's plaster-cast-leg, in that order. We figured that this was an attempt at comedy.

To summarise, watch it if you have plenty of free time. And yes, aspirin.

*And I get that throwing in Punjabi lyrics has proved successful in the past but MUST you force the language down our ears this way? Isn't that the most clumsy set of lyrics ever? What was wrong with saying it in Hindi??

Step up! Step right up!

2007-01-25T10:55:00.000-08:00

All ye who have drunk mothers' milk to participate in these writing contests!

I'm off to get me some coffee.

He Gives Me Fever.

2007-01-19T12:20:00.000-08:00

Where have all the good diseases gone?

Y'know the ones when a girl simply wasted away into a wisp of her former self?

And it's not like I never had them, I did. A whole series of them, in fact. When I was EIGHT. And looked like a stick insect with eyes. When 'overweight' and 'diet' were words which would have elicited nothing more than a supremely blank expression* and tyres were the things that cars moved on. THAT'S when the immune system thought, "Hey! Let's let in all these glorious germs and so what if she doesn't have an extra ounce on her!"

But now, NOW when I could do with a bit (oh alright a *good* bit) of wasting away, what does the immune-system go and get? The goddamn sniffles. So now I have the temperature, the assorted aches and pains, the blocked nose and the sore throat - what I don't have though, is ANY AMOUNT OF WEIGHT-LOSS WHATSOEVER.

I want my money back.

*Although to be honest, 'supremely blank' was pretty much the default expression for most of my childhood. NOT the most 'with it' kid in our brood, the parents would have said**.

** With a puzzled 'I wonder where we went wrong with this one' expression on their faces.

Want a Green Card?

2007-01-09T08:59:00.000-08:00

Think again.

A question that worries me a little though - how do they intend to check?

An Ode to Coffee*

2006-12-28T22:30:00.000-08:00

O noble cup of velvet brew!
We thank each passing day for you,
If not for you our days would be
sad, and spent in drinking tea!

Thou art the friend of workers free,
who have no time for frippery
like dainty sips from china cups
with buttered scones and silly sops.

It's-drink-and-get-to-work with you,
as should be with the perfect brew.
With sleeves rolled up on muscled arms,
no fop can claim to know your charms.

no pish-tosh posing, pinkies raised
and just for that, the lord be praised!
No “Twist of lemon? Sugar? Two?”
You are a self-respecting brew!

From roasted beans you are conceived,
not fragile, shriveled up old leaves
the difference is for all to see,
there is no robustness in tea!

To Chamomile, the odes they sing,
Lapsang Souchong and Darjeeling,
Earl grey, Assam and what have you,
I'll stick to my caffeine, thank you!

They call it ‘liquid gold‘ sometimes
for ignorance is not a crime
Forgive them! For they know not what,
they miss, reaching for a tea pot.

What philistines they are who say,
that the cup that cheers is full of tea.
Tea, that so insipid broth!
that does not banish venal sloth.

Tea does not bubble busily
but steeps for all eternity,
And when it’s done what do you get?
Flavoured water, lukewarm yet!

The scent of coffee reaches out,
it’s tendrils from the bubbling spout
And wafts through home and hearth to bring
warmth, and make the taste-buds sing

O font of joy! O blessed bean!
O catalyst to dopamine!
No day shall pass when I shall not,
gaze fondly at that bubbling pot.

I pour myself a mug of you,
O coffee, truly wondrous brew!
Tea cannot stand up next to thee,
O steaming mug of black coffee!

*I’m (semi) unemployed. I will write odes to coffee.**
**Or whatever else I jolly well please.

One down...

2006-12-15T10:44:00.000-08:00

So, while it's not exactly Romeo and Juliet, here's how far we've gotten.

1) Lasted longer than all ones boyfriends* (save one) - check!
2) Listened** when one needed to talk/rant/foam in the mouth/spew nonsense - check!
3) Showed one sides of one which one did not know existed (icky and otherwise) - check!
4) Been there in good times and bad - check!
5) Got one to meet new people (some of whom one actually liked) - check!

As far as intent goes, one did not start this blog with any plan of action in place (saves one all the guilt of not having stuck to it you see), one is pleased to note that this is still the case.

You 'n me blog, it's been good...well, mostly.

P.S. As for blog-turning-one-posts, this one's got all bases covered.

* By which we mean the boyfriends just turned into ex-boyfriends. They didn't die or anything. We are NOT crazy, psychopathic boyfriend-killers, no, really.

** Or at least, did the blog equivalent of listening (which is basically resigning yourself to your fate because you don't have a choice. OR a voice. Ha! Power!).

Macbeth (I think)

2006-12-04T10:47:00.000-08:00

"Hmmm..." I say to myself, as I watch this new (if slightly lopsided) version of Shakespeare's Macbeth. "Hmmm!" I say again, as I try to hold back my left eyebrow from running into my hairline. It is something I will say to myself many, many times more, in the next two hours. In various inflections.

There's the regular I'm-not-quite-sure-what-to-make-of-this 'hmmm', the mildly inquiring did-anyone-else-see-that 'hmmm?', the what-on-earth-did-he-see-in-it 'hmmm?' and last but not the least, the you've-got-to-be-kidding-me! 'hmmm!!' (Although technically, this is more of a "Whaa..? Hunh?? But, but...how!" and not a 'hmmm' per se, but never mind).

Thing is, Ace production's Macbeth, attempts (for no apparent reason) to draw parallels between Tantra and the plays underlying motifs of the supernatural.

This leads to some rather disturbing results, starting with the very first scene, where the Weird Sisters are doing their whole fire-burn-and-cauldron-bubble-act, only - since Mr. Padamsee has decided that there are parallels between Tantra and Macbeth, they must jolly well be drawn - there is some very disconcerting Tantrik chanting happening in the background.

These Tantrik accents run throughout the play, popping up in the most unexpected places; in Lushin's costume (red and black with ragged sleeves. Tantrik couture anyone?) and in a love-scene between Macbeth and his queen, where they hold each other and sway in half-circles (this is what Sting is such a big fan of?? I don't get it...I just don't get it!).

The actors do a decent enough job, although Lushin Dubey steals the show. She makes a believable (if a little over the top) Lady Macbeth despite the Tantrik trappings of the production. A commendable feat, if you ask us.

It is a sad thing though, that she is the only actor who maintains a consistent accent throughout. Not entirely clipped-Oxford, but somewhere comfortably between that, and the Indian-English we've all grown up with. The rest of the cast pretty much slip-slide through Yank, Brit and (disturbingly enough) Aishwarya Rai* accents.

This is a play that can be watched, provided you have watched many, many other productions of Macbeth. Watch it for the interestingly choreographed scene with the Weird Sisters, for the ghost of Banquo, who appears repeatedly on a bloodied screen (very Ramsay Brothers) and for Lushin's Lady Macbeth.

Most significantly, watch it if you're looking for novelty...in small doses.

* Which is apparently the accent you develop when you've spent only your whole goddamn life in Bombay, been crowned Miss World and acted** in a couple of English movies.

** By which (in this case) I mean, stood in front of a camera and wondered why the hell the darn thing keeps looking at you...almost as if it's expecting you to do something. Stupid camera...!

Casino Royale...

2006-11-30T15:21:00.000-08:00

...or, My what pretty blue eyes you have Mr. Craig!

First, so while he's just not as smooth as him, or as twinkly-eyed as him, he does have a certain, something, no? We don't know whether it's because of the startling blueness of those eyes (such pretty eyes!), or that just-skimming-gravel voice saying, well...anything at all really, but the hormones, they have approved and once they do, there is nothing for the brain to do but play along.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have a new James Bond!

Blonde, blue-eyed and guaranteed to make you want to shove Eva Green out of the shower (out fragile creature!) and sit with your head on Daniel Craig's nice smelling**, broad and ever-so-capable shoulders.

Go watch it.*

*That is, if you can stomach some amount of on-screen violence. I know I spent a lot of the 2 1/2 hours a) cringing in my seat every time some mean bastard battered some other not-so-mean-bastard with less batter(y?)-power, and b) restraining myself from yelling out at the screen, "BoysboysBOYS!! Stop with all the mindless chasing each other up and down construction sites! You're going to hurt yourself (but did they listen? of course not. And *continued*
chasing each other up and down girders like particularly nimble-footed mountain goats)!"

**Alright, so I don't know if he smells nice or not, but would it kill you to leave my dreams alone?

Trading Places*

2006-11-24T17:28:00.000-08:00

My darling daughter,

Today, you turn thirteen.

I thought long and hard about what to get you for this birthday, this birthday which marks your first step into adolescence. The date itself means little; your rapidly expanding mind and your changing body tell me that you are now on your way to womanhood. Still, a birthday is a birthday and birthdays mean gifts.

So what does one gift a butterfly half out of a cocoon?

Butterflies are beautiful but delicate, prone to getting their wings caught and torn, as they flit from flower to flower. And my beautiful, delicate daughter, I would not want you to be hurt in any way.

So I give you, the gift of caution.

You are now at an age where your mind is full of questions. I will try to answer them as best I can.

You ask me why it is I worry so much about you. When I know that you are now a whole thirteen years old and can look after yourself.

I worry, sweetheart, because I know that you don't. I know that you always see the good in people, their honest hearts, their pure souls, and I almost don't want to tell you the truth and have you lose your faith.

You ask me why caution has to mean hiding your face, your clothes, your body, your identity.

(For a thirteen-year-old, you ask some tricky questions!)

To begin with, I would prefer it if we called it 'protecting' rather than 'hiding'. You hide when you are afraid of something. You protect when you are afraid for.

This will protect you.

There are people in this world who are terrified of change. They have lived their whole lives in a certain way and anything (even if it is a good thing) even slightly removed from this way frightens them terribly. They fear that in this new world, where things are different from how they were in their time, they will have no place. This is not true - for a new place is very different from no place, I think you will agree - but it is very difficult to change minds which are set in stone.

Fear makes people do terrible things, child. This will protect you from the repercussions of that fear.

You ask me how things will ever change if we never even attempt to change them.

(my little revolutionary, my changer of the world. I see so much of my younger self in you!)

I tell you that I want things to change as well, but change takes effort and time and patience.

(and blood and sweat and tears but I want none of those to be yours!)

But mother, won't I feel stifled? What if it's really hot outside?

My child, It might be hot occasionally, it might be uncomfortable but if you look at it as a shield, or an invisibility cloak, well, that changes things doesn't it? Can you see how it will be? You can walk around the city all day, anywhere you please and no-one need know it's you! Can you imagine the freedom? You get to decide who you want to meet, have conversation with, befriend. Also, now that you're on your way to becoming a woman, why it works as well as Athena's shield against all that unwelcome attention!

How long have you worn one, mother?
Why, all my life, child! Ever since I turned thirteen, exactly the age you are now.

"So...I can be just like you?", you ask me with a smile on your face.

"Yes, sweetheart, you can be just like me", I reply as I hand you your gift of caution, your shield of black silk, with a small lacework window to the world.

* is a writing exercise** on Caferati (where I have, till date *never* been able to figure out, whether or not I am a member (sorry, Peter!). I take 'technologically-challenged' to new heights, as you can see).

** And I don't think I've managed to do what the exercise intended either, but whoever said this blog was supposed to be a showcase of fine writing? Wasn't me!

Frankly, Scarlett...

2006-11-22T09:13:00.000-08:00

Blog-people, my darlings, my absolutely adorable munchkins!

I have decided to take your advice. And take a chill pill, (or a whole handful of them, what the hey!) and *breathe* a little. And in order to so? I will NOT be going in to work today (Ooo! I *love* being defiant! Take that S & B*!). Because today (so far) is turning out to be too pretty (It's cloudy! And there might be rain!) a day to spend cooped up in a cubicle.

Look at me not giving a damn!

Rhett Butler would've been proud.

* Names have NOT been changed because I couldn't possibly care less** now.

** OMG this is getting addictive! Soon I will not care about anything! "Brushing my teeth? Showering? Who needs 'em!", is what I will say. And alternately, I will also say, "Sheron ke muh kisne dhoye hain!***".

*** You don't go around brushing lions' teeth (unless you're ummm...not very bright).

You know you're really stressed out* when...

2006-11-17T16:15:00.000-08:00

...you get to the counter**, tell the guy to go easy on the sugar, pay, pick up your change, and then forget to pick up the damned coffee.

*Which brings me to the question that is baffling the pants off me - WHY am I stressing myself out over a job I no longer have? It's bizarre, BIZARRE I tell you!

That conscience, you know, she can be SUCH a pain.

**The Fresh & Honest stall at Churchgate station which, despite it's very corny name, has some really good coffee***.

*** And no, they haven't paid me to say that...sadly.

Madraka vs. Mishra

2006-11-15T11:25:00.000-08:00

In all those years and years spent with the family, we often wondered, HOW is it that none of these people look remotely like us? WHY are we the only ones who ever come home drunk? WHY does no-one else in this family say, "Pass the beef please, and the extra-garlicky sauce while you're at it."?

Turns out, we're actually Madraka*.

Thank you, Jai.

*Madraka women, to be precise.

A Special Place in Hell...

2006-11-10T15:50:00.000-08:00

That Jethmalani fellow, is one smart - if completely morally reprehensible - ~~bastard~~ cookie.

In his client's defense, Mr. Jethmalani has stated that Jessica Lall was shot NOT because she refused to serve alcohol, but because she refused to have sex with a random stranger.

And that, according to Mr. Jethmalani, is surely good enough reason to get shot in the head?

And while you're busy being flabbergasted at this pathetic excuse for a defense, notice how he cunningly slips in a 'tall Sikh gentleman (indeed)', - whom no-one seems to have seen or heard of until today - who turns out, luckily for Manu Sharma, to be the killer.

It's a good thing I'm not the judge - I'd hang both the scum-bags.

Of Ancestors and America

2006-11-10T14:37:00.000-08:00

He was a sprightly old thing, my grandfather. Waking up at the crack of dawn, rushing through his morning rituals; the datun, the bath with cold water - and never mind that we were bang in the middle of a hill-station-winter - and the prayers.

The prayers were, to us, the funniest part of the process. We'd actually shake each other awake with urgent whispers,"Wake up! Nanaji's doing puja again!". He'd be putting on his shirt and coat, all the while reciting shlokas at rapid-fire speed. That done, there'd be the frantic whirling of the lit agarbatti in from of the assortment of small idols and photographs in the pasty-green-painted puja room.

We never understood though, what the rush was all about. He'd retired from practice (he was a lawyer) ever since we were old enough to know him, but come every. single. morning and there he was, popping out of bed like toast again.

By the time we'd be groggily sitting around the table for breakfast, he'd be all ready to go. In his black coat, and crisp white suit, wooden cane in hand and impatiently tapping his feet.

He was very proud of us, his 'foreign-returned' grandchildren and he'd show us off to all the acquaintances he'd meet on his interminable walks around the city. "These are my grandchildren. Do you know, they live in Nigeria!" as if living in Nigeria was something so fraught with danger and exotica, that the fact that we were alive was nothing short of miraculous.

But what I remember most about him, is the way he'd speak to us; always in English, and very loudly. Almost as if our inability to speak Hindi rendered us slightly deaf as well.

After we moved to India, he'd visit us once a year, and that one month would be filled with episodes of frantic-spectacles'-searches (which he'd manage to misplace at least thrice a day) and squeals of shock as we'd occasionally find his dentures by sitting on them.

I don't know whether I was his favourite grandchild or not (or maybe just the one who looked like she could do with a good dose of general knowledge, or hell, any knowledge) - he had way too many of them - but I was definitely his first choice when it came to discussing American politics. I use the term 'discussing' broadly though; mostly it would be him asking me questions in his booming voice, "Do you know who is the president of the United States of America?", and me meekly replying, "Yes nanaji, it's Bill Clinton".

He'd positively beam at that, and then go on to expound on the good things the Clinton administration had done for America in particular, and the world in general.

I wondered at some point if my grandfather had ever heard of the little episode with La Lewinsky - his complete and utter adoration of the man never waned in all the time I knew him, but with his generation, you never could tell, could you? The man had two wives and seven (!) children and I never, in all those years, heard him address my grandmother as anything other than saahib*.

He would have been a happy man today.

*Mate/Companion. Also, owner/ruler/lord.

Conversations from Last Night

2006-11-09T07:23:00.000-08:00

Me: Boss, ye XYZ building kahan hai*?
Fruit Vendor whose cart is FIVE STEPS AWAY from XYZ building: Nahin madam, nahin dekha.
Me: Achcha, aap Toto's** jaante hain?
Fruit Vendor: (smiles shyly) Toto's?
Me: Haan, Toto's.
FV: (giggles coyly) Toto's? Toto's??
Me: (beginning to get a little worried) Haan...Toto's.
FV: (Blushes red, avoids eye contact, and frantically re-arranges the fruits on his cart) Nahin madam, main 'Toto's' nahin jaanta.
Me: (walks away convinced that there is such a thing as too much fruit) Achcha...thank you.

* See, I'm *allowed* to be lost even though I'm five steps away from where I'm supposed to be - it comes with being hopelessly navigation-impaired - what's his excuse??
** is a pub.

***

Inside Toto's:

Me: You know, I've never actually seen anyone in that DJ enclosure.
Young man: That's probably because it's not a DJ enclosure.
Me: But it says "No Requests"! Why would it have a sign saying "No Requests" unless, you know, there were going to be...'requests'? Unless, they were expecting requests of the non-musical variety...
YM: (thinks about that for a minute)
Me: (launches forth, driven by rum and a pet grouse*) Don't you just hate it when DJ's say, "I don't take requests". You know, you'd think that entertaining the crowds is their job? But noooo! They're all like, "Oh no, this crowd is so pleb, it is my divine duty as a DJ, to *educate* them. I'm just too cool (weird arm-flappy, raised-hand gesture) to take requests."
YM: They do take requests if you slip them a hundred bucks?
Me: (faking shock) Duuude, noooo! DJ's who take money to play are like, the lowest rungs on the DJ ladder. They have SOLD their DJ SOULS, other DJ's totally look down on them. They're like the...sell-outs of the DJ world!
YM: (giggling helplessly) Yeah, I'm sure Akbar Sami never takes requests.
Me: WTF is Akbar Sami??
YM: He's that guy who remixed Jalwa?
Me: (still driven, still grousing) Which is another thing I just don't get. I mean, so you add a couple of dhinchak beats to some random song and suddenly you're a musician? Explain this to me, please!
YM: You're just jealous that they make a whole lot of money. Why do you think people pay them so much?
Me: Because there are a whole lot of stupid rich people in the world. I mean, how else can you explain Rohit Bal actually managing to sell his..."designs"? See the thing is, when you're really sozzled, you don't CARE what's playing. You're drunk, you're happy, the world is a beautiful place, you love everybody and look! There's a guy behind that glass-shield thingy, wearing headphones! and a bandana! and funky shades! and apparently trying to fly by flapping his one free arm, because the other one's holding headphones to his ear! I think I'm going to give him a warm hug and tell him that I love him.
YM: You know, I no longer remember what we were talking about, but I'm glad this place doesn't have a DJ.
Me: I think this is one of those times when you actually make sense.

* And I don't mean one of these.

Free as a bird...

2006-11-02T14:00:00.000-08:00

...with vertigo.

Today's the day internet!

Today, after (roughly) a year of incessant cribbing about my job, I'm throwin' in the towel, chuckin' up the sponge, burnin' the bra (oh wait, that doesn't work here does it?) and movin' to (hopefully) greener pastures.

In other words, I quit.

And while right now, I'm soaring through the sky on wings of silver? I'm pretty sure it's going to be a bit of a bumpy landing. Mostly because, I don't have another job lined up.

Why am I leaving then? Well, because I haven't done *any* work which I'd actually be proud to show anyone in the last eight months or so (except for, strangely enough, some writing). And I'd gotten so stuck in a rut that my idea of 'risk-taking' (on a good day) would involve setting my iPod to 'shuffle'.

Yeah, THAT bad.

So now the plan is, I'm going to be spending the next couple of weeks navel-gazing (Hello navel! My! You do manage to gather quite a bit of lint don't you!*), reading dreaded books like this one, fighting the completely expected and entirely unwelcome panic-attacks, and trying to figure out what to do next.

Wish me luck? Or failing that, only *temporary* insanity.

*My belly-button does not really gather a lot of lint. It's just that, what *else* can you talk about to a belly-button?

Bombay Blog-a-ween Meet

2006-10-30T09:42:00.000-08:00

Yet another blog-meet was had, and once again, one is the richer for it (partially because of the free alcohol...oh and of course, the experience).

The venue: Sakshi Juneja’s house at Juhu.

One arrived for the meet some two (ish) hours late, thanks to the hordes (HORDES dammit!) of people absolutely *infesting* the entire Juhu-Chowpatty stretch of road. Of course it helped that one is completely navigation-impaired and was of no help whatsoever to this young man, who never once lost his temper despite being plagued by plaintive cries of, “Are we there yet?” every ten minutes.

Remarkably patient, these young men of today.

So we were saying, we arrived, a little later than fashionably - the young man with a mask and a bottle of wine, and yours truly with killer attack of queasiness and a headache that threatened to spit our eyeballs out of our head (yes Sakshi, that little white pill you probably found by the bar was aspirin…honest!)**.

Anyway, headache thus banished, one was treated to a variety of food, alcohol and scintillating conversation (in no particular order).

Every. Single. Aspect of Salman Khan’s life was discussed; His clothes (or their marked absence, to be precise), his women (oh the number of *hot* women with atrocious taste…it boggles the mind), his little habits of drinking and a) beating up the current girlfriend b) running over people and c) shooting black buck. And how at the end of the day, he’s a really nice guy.

Although one’s memories of the evening are a teensy bit fuzzy, little snippets of conversation which stood out:

“No you need to put on a pair of red panties over your jeans, then you can be Superman!”

“Where’s the drunken dancing on the tables??”

“RSS Feeds! Slash dotted!! Google reader! Plagiarism! Feed reader*!!” (Foreign languages sound so dashed exotic, no?)

“Have I or have I not already issued the disclaimers against drunken marriage-proposals?”

“You look so different every time I see you!”

“Oh no! I broke my horns!”
“Yeah, now she’s not horny anymore.”

“You just say, “She’s a bit of a See-Aich” for ‘bitch’ or ‘What a parachute!” with a stress on the, well, latter-half of the word.” (And apparently, her grandma taught her this. Ours, obviously went to all the wrong schools.)

Also, blog-people, there is talk that India Uncut, might or might not have a set of lingerie to match his Borrowed Bunny Ears.

The imagination, she is getting worryingly out of hand.

(“Imagination, how many times we been through this? You will not, NOT conjure up images of men in risqué lingerie! Oh fine! Go ahead and do what you want…it’s your life. Oh wait…not it’s not! Stop it I say! Stop it right now! NOOOooooooo!”)

More reports of the meet here, here, here, here, here and here.

**Which brings us to the other point which desperately needs making, namely that, the next time a blog-meet happens, can we please, please, *please* have it somewhere a little closer to where us ‘Southies’ (South Bombay-ites) live? One is down on one’s knees and humbly pleading.

Pretty as a...

2006-10-25T15:03:00.000-07:00

And this, was the view from our breakfast table. Inexpertly stitched together by yours truly.

I really ought to get myself a flickr account, oughtn't I?

Mountain High, Valley Low

2006-10-15T13:50:00.000-07:00

This time last week, I was in Leh.

I don't remember what exactly I was doing; If this was the day we spent curled up under the thick quilt with purple flowers on it, sliding out our hands only to turn pages on the books we were reading, or if this was one of the many mornings we sat at the breakfast table in the rooftop restaurant and breathed in the mountains.

I don't remember if it was this time last week, that we climbed up a million stone steps to reach the gompas, or if this was the day we walked up to the Leh palace, and from its crumbling facade, saw the little valley town spread out before us, like a postcard come to life.

Was this the day we sat at the banks of the Indus, just watching the prayer flags flutter on the wooden bridge above us?

And that is why I take pictures*.

Because memory is fickle, and pictures are real.

But real as they are, they are not enough. Because they tell you only one side of the story.

That picture of the glass of hot ginger-lemon-honey-tea? You can see the steam rising from the glass in misty curls; you can see the chunk of crushed ginger, sitting pretty on the honey that layers the bottom of the glass; you can even see the amber-goldenness of it, as the sunlight filters through it. But what the picture does not, CANnot tell you, is how it felt to hold that warm glass in your cold hands and feel the life flow back into your fingers. It doesn't tell you about the shock your tongue felt at the first scalding sip; the sweet, the sour, the hot and the spicy, all in one kick-your-brain-awake cocktail of taste and sensation.

Those pictures of the apple-cheeked locals. You can probably count every wrinkle on their weather-worn faces. But those pictures tell you nothing about how, every single day, you will be jolted out of your city-dweller-existence-bubble when you're greeted with a cheerful 'Julay!' and smiled at by complete strangers.

Then there are the pictures of the mountains. Which are pointless really. Because you can neither capture their grandeur, nor your feeling of miniscule insignificance, which is inevitable in the face of these magnificent giants.

Those pictures of the cobbled bylanes. That small wooden door, those flowers in the window. The small Kashmiri bakery, the statley poplars, the purple flowers in the monastery. The leh-berry, the brass temple-bells at Khardung La, the mani walls, the ice.

They cannot tell you what it was like to be there.

The next time, I will just have to take you with me.

*Coming soon.

The Secret of Eternal Youth

2006-09-21T19:00:00.000-07:00

Hello blog people!

One is writing this post from up the wall, which one's maternal parent drove one up, in the three days that she was visiting.

While the said parent has left Bombay, and is now driving the Delhi-based siblings up their Delhi-based walls, one thinks one will just stay up here for a while. You know, just in case she has left behind the ghosts of her drive-your-children-up-the-wall personality.

(And while one realises that one is probably a horrid little thing, one has a rather interesting view from up here. For one, one can see the tops of all your heads. Ha ha!)

One still wakes up in the middle of the night with that measured-yet-menacing voice in one's ear.

"Why are your masala bottles so grimy?! Where do you stack the unironed clothes? Why doesn't the bai clean the dishes well? Why don't you ever tell her anything? What kind of household are you running?!"

And one is, once again, reduced to a quivering, crying broken shell of a woman.

An interesting facet of human behaviour comes to light though, that namely, all quivering and crying is done in retrospect. For the three days that the MP had the run of the household, one had automatically slipped into rebellious-teenager mode.

One did - with much aplomb, mind you - the whole exasperated-eye-roll, the I-can't-believe-you're-saying-that look of horror and the could-you-possibly-embarrass-me-anymore saucer-eyed-expression.

The poor pater, in his characteristically resigned manner, contented himself with talking to the SB about everything under the sun, and buying mountains of fruit*. And occasionally letting out despairing cries of, "Why isn't anyone eating any fruit??"

So it seems, that the secret of eternal youth is (insert portentous silence HERE), "Invite thine parents over for a couple of days" (and thunder and lightning...NOW!).

On the other hand, one wonders what use this transient youth is, if one is going to spend all of it perched up on a wall?

* Which is another 'father' thing. One is beginning to think that in dad-school, one of the first lessons they teach you is, "Nothing says 'I love you' to your offspring, more than a bowl of assorted fruit. Make that two."

One is late...

2006-09-04T15:15:00.000-07:00

...for the silly pic tag passed on by Vulturo, but one had, what is known as, a problem of plenty.

This guy is a clear winner, but one thinks one comes a pretty close second, what?

Oh and this guy has a jolly little gallery of participants.

And I tag Phantasmagoria, Straight Curves, Saltwater Blues, Arthur Quiller Couch (wiggle out of this one Couch!) and Rhyncus.

Because I'm a sucker for...

2006-09-01T15:22:00.000-07:00

...good copy.

And the car looks pretty awesome too, doesn't it?

To sing or not to sing...

2006-08-30T23:00:00.000-07:00

...Vande Mataram, is apparently, the question.

My most recent memories of Vande Mataram are from the A.R. Rehman directed version of it (very soft, very pretty), and then, Shubha Mudgal's knock-your-socks-off rendition (with the absolutely trippy video featuring this woman, who just by the way, would totally be second on the list of women whose babies I would want to have, If I ever turned lesbian. Oh I'm not supposed to say that out loud? Oh shush! You're the internet, internet, and if I can't bare my soul to you, then what use is a soul, I ask you!).

The first time I heard Vande Mataram sung (circa 1988), the only thought that crossed my mind was, "Oh pretty tune! It's the national song? Oh okay."

Was I flooded with feelings of nationalism? No. Did it appeal to the patriot in me? No. Do you know why? Because I hadn't a clue what it means. Nope. Not a one.

The song, you see, is in Sanskrit. Not exactly the Lingua Franca of the average Indian, let alone your average (and that's me being SO generous) eleven-year-old NRI.

And I'd be willing to bet a whole lot of money, that the cretins squabbling over whether or not it should be sung, haven't a clue either.

And yet, there's this.

*sigh*

***

Oh and while we're on the subject of songs, here's one that's been making perfectly seasoned, slow-roasted, melt-in-your-mouth seekh kababs of my heart (and also, not related at all, but I think I'm hungry).

Naina: OST Omkara, Lyrics: Gulzar, Music: Vishal Bhardwaj

Nainon ki mat maaniyo re, nainon ki mat suniyo,
Nainon ki mat suniyo re
Naina thag lenge

Jagte jaadu phukenge re, jagte jagte jaadu
jagte jaadu phukenge re neenden banjar kar denge
Naina thag lenge

Bhala manda dekhe na paraya na saga re
nainon ko toh dasne ka chaska laga re
Nainon ka zehar nasheela re

Baadalon mein satrangiyan bonve bhor talak barsaave
baadalon mein satrangiyan bonve, naina baanvra kar denge
Naina thag lenge

Naina raat ko chalte chalte swargaan mein le jaave
megh malhaar ke sapne bije* hariyali dikhlave
Nainon ki zubaan pe bharosa nahi aata
likhat parhat** na rasid na khaata
saari baat havaai*** re, saari baat havaai

Bin baadal barsaaye saawan, saawan bin barsaatan
bin baadal barsaaye saawan naina baanwara kar denge
Naina thag lenge

Jagte jaadu phukenge re jagte jagte jaadu
jagte jaadu phukenge re neenden banjar kar denge
Naina thag lenge.

Beg, borrow, download, if you have to, but listen to this song. If you loved Gulzar before, this song will make you want to get down on your knees and worship him.

P.S. There is some amount of dispute of about some of the lyrics. I have written what's made the most sense to me, the asterisked (I'm not sure if that's a real word) words according to the internet versions of this song are:

*dije
** parakh
***hamari

A Letter

2006-08-28T19:10:00.000-07:00

To the man who walked his math-impaired daughter down the perilous road from multiplication tables to differential calculus. The personal swimming instructor, raag identifier and consoler of weepy, red-nosed four- year-olds whose heroes have fallen. On celluloid.

That dresser-up of rag-doll-sleepy-school-goers, doll's-arm/leg/head-fixer. Tiffin-packer, chocolate-wafer-adder.

Patient-sitter-through of makeovers by six-year-olds, who think that salt-and-pepper hair in at least six bristly ponytails, with a minimum of three bindis on the forehead, is so him.

Photographer of horrific moments - like fancy-dress parties and clown faces.

Embarrass-er of daughters, by playing ancient recordings of said-daughter's-five-year-old-voice soulfully singing:

"Laila main lailaaaa! Aisi hoon lailaaaa,
Har koi chaahe mujhse, milna akelaaa!"

Hummer-of-tunes, never-singer, non-dancer.

Lover of books, The Beatles, and order. Watcher of every. single. news bulletin.

To the maker of the best chicken curry in the *whole* world.

Happy birthday, Papa. May this be one of many, many more.

I can walk English, I can talk English!*

2006-08-17T15:05:00.000-07:00

This post, and more so the comments on it, reminded me of my own puzzlement with Indian English, when I moved here twelve years ago.

I was sixteen when we moved from Nigeria, right after my grade ten (and yes, we called them grades one to twelve. NOT classes one to twelve, NOT standards one to twelve. *Grades*) board exams. Owing to the bubble environment we'd grown up in, I spoke a strangely stilted Hindi, and very fluent, but very weirdly accented English. It wasn't Nigerian English and it wasn't Indian English. The closest I can come to describing it is, as a cross between Indian and British, with a touch of American thrown in for good (or maybe not) measure.

"But why should you have any of those accents?!", you ask. "I have NO idea", I say.

Hey, I didn't make The Bubble, I just lived in it.

The accent was never really a problem though. At least, not as far as making myself understood was concerned. Getting people to stop thinking I was snooty bitch because I wouldn't (I couldn't dammit) speak in Hindi, was of course, another issue altogether.

But I'm rambling again.

Episode 1:
The first time I was let in on the gossip going around in school, I was told in hush-hush tones that persons x and y were 'going around'.

Me: "Going around? Going around what??"
Random Girl in Class: You know... they're having a love affair!
Me: A LOVE AFFAIR?! But..but they can't have a love affair! They're in school!
RGiC: So?

See, till then, the only time I'd ever come across the words 'love affair', were in Mills & Boons novels and heavens! Love affairs were things that grown-ups had. They were, you know...sordid and occasionally even featured (oh fetch me my smelling salts!) *sex*!

So yes, I was quite scandalised, much to the puzzlement of the RGiC, who began wondering whether Indians in Nigeria were like, really backward, 'cos y'know, like, everyone goes around dude.

When V and I started dating, I proudly informed RGiC that we were 'going out' (by which, of course, I meant that we were seeing each other).
RGiC: Going out? Going out where??
Me: We're not going anywhere, we're just, well...he's my boyfriend now.
RGiC: Ohhhh! You mean you're going *around* now!

Episode 2:
In Indian English, it is understood that when you use the word 'parlour', you mean a beauty parlour (or 'salon', if you prefer).

So I'm on the phone with n and she asks.
N: Haan, so where are you right now?
Me: In the parlour.
N: (after three seconds of confused silence) Isn't this your ghar ka phone number?
Me: Hunh? Yes it is. Why?
N: Tera parlour tere ghar ke paas hai?? Do you have an extension there?
Me: What on *earth* are you talking about?! Parlour ghar ke andar hota hai shaayad? And this is the main phone line...the extension is upstairs.

N thinking: MAN these Nigerian Indians are a weird lot!
Me thinking: MAN this woman makes lesser and lesser sense every day!

And all because English is a very funny language.*

*Part of this dialogue from an old Amitabh Bachchan movie, Namak Halal.

Trial by...

2006-08-17T14:18:00.000-07:00

Why do trial rooms have those strange doors? You know, the ones that look like they ran out wood so they just sort of fitted in whatever they had left over and hoped that people wouldn't be that upset about the world being able to see their socks?

Only, there is a much more disturbing aspect to these doors, which I discovered when I went shopping for a pair of jeans* yesterday.

Woman walks into a store. Woman does not like pushy sales people. As if on cue, she is immediately accosted by one.

Stud Boy Sales Guy: Hi ma'am! Can I help you?".
Woman: I'm...ummm...looking for a pair of jeans.
SBSG: Sure ma'am! What waist size?
(at which point SBSG looks at woman's midriff appraisingly and says, "I know size x**!", and saunters off to get it)
Woman: Actually, I want a size x+1, in dark blue...with a regular rise.
(SBSG stops in mid-saunter, turns around horrified)
SBSG: But ma'am, low rise is in right now!
Woman: Regular, please.

SBSG returns with jeans in hand and skepticism on face. Woman steps into the trial room, SBSG stands right outside, and that is when she realises; SBSG is standing right outside said trial room, which means, he is going to know when Woman takes her pants (trousers, if you're thinking Brit) off. Okay, so he can't actually *see* anything apart from sock-clad feet but still...he knows, and that's enough to make Woman want to climb up the walls, Spidey-style and then face whatever trials (pun unintended, but apt) come her way.

Woman, sadly enough, has never been bitten by radioactive spiders, so climbing up the walls is out. Lacking a plan 'B', Woman decides that a little Houdini-style-flexibility is the call of the hour.

Woman tries to squeeze herself out of line of vision (complicated, when you're in a 3x3 room) and try on jeans at the same time (a difficult maneuver, at the best of times). She is mid-wiggle into the jeans when she hears a voice.

SBSG: Ma'am, is it okay? Is it too tight?
(woman freezes, much like bunny trapped in headlights, only imagine bunny in inconvenient state of undress as well. Woman, however, not being bunny, eventually recovers enough to stammer out) Ummm...a little, yes. Can you give me the same style in size x+1?

SBSG passes it over the door.

SBSG: (at eager-beaver-best) Is it okay ma'am? Can I see?
Woman: (What?! No! You can most certainly NOT see, you dolt! What Woman *says* however, is) Uh...No?
SBSG: Is it tight around the hips?
Woman: (with tendrils of smoke beginning to snake their way out of her nostrils) Look, can I come out and have this conversation??
SBSG: (most obligingly) Ya sure!

Woman steps out and hands SBSG the jeans with an icy, "I don't like them, thank you." and a matching frosty look. SBSG, obviously never having understood the language of icy looks, takes proffered denims and further proceeds to dish out advice.

SBSG: See ma'am, the problem is, in proportion to your waist, your hips are too broad.

Woman first blinks in disbelief, then seriously contemplates whacking SBSG over the head with her handbag. Having been brought up to be polite and infuriatingly non-confrontational however, she regretfully discards this line of thought, instead, switching to that last weapon in the arsenal of the wuss, sarcasm.

Woman: (smiling brightly) Really? Thank you so much! I think you're *wonderful* too!
SBSG: (smiling brightly back, absolutely oblivious to the dripping sarcasm) That's okay, no problem!

And that would be the first, of three times in the last week, that random people have said to me, sentences ending with, "your hips are too broad".

Jeans fit weird?
"Your hips are too broad".
Slipped off the raft?
"Your hips are too broad".
Global warming?
"Your hips are too broad".

Is this fair, I ask you. Is it?

*Which, in Chronicus Skepticus' speak, translates into, 'I walked through the fires of hell', because my GOD, there are few activities* I *loathe* more than shopping.

**And just because you're the internet and know pretty much everything *else* that there is to know about me, is not reason enough for me to let you know my waist size as well. Some secrets are *meant* to be taken to graves alright? Let it go now.

Tag! Or 'Meme', if that's what YOU call it!

2006-08-03T15:02:00.000-07:00

Well, since no-one *ever* tags me (and yes, I'm enough of a blogging newbie to sulk about it) I shall go ahead and tag myself! So there!

Also, I'm suffering from the worst attack of blog-clog *ever* (no wisecracks. I FORBID you to make wisecracks!) and I have read from reliable sources, that a tag is the best way! Cures it right away, it does*. So, here goes.

I'm thinking:
About these lines from the title song in Iqbal -

Guzre aise har raat raat,
Ho khwaaishon se baat baat...

- and I'm trying to remember the last time, if ever, I was this excited, this hopeful about anything (and no, romantic stuff doesn't count). You know the lying awake at night, thrilling with anticipation for the next day? Yes, that feeling. And I'm wondering, will I ever have it again?

And the answer is scaring me.

I said:
"Oh, what the hell!" and went ahead and did it anyway.

I want to:
Be in The Yellow Submarine song. You know how when you're listening to a song, you can see it happening in your head? The yellow submarine, the bells, the marching band, the happy stoned-ness of the whole picture? You can just see them all drinking beer and having a jolly good time, and in the picture? I would totally be the happy high guy echoing Ringo Starr as he sang,"everyone of uuuus (everyone of us!) has all we neeeed (has all we need!)! Sky of bluuuue (sky of blue!), and sea of greeeeen (and sea of green!), in our ye-he-llow submareeenn!".

Don't you?

I wish:
I was oh about ten kilos lighter...and about eight inches taller...and had a sharper nose. Who needs world peace when you're pretty, I ask you!

I miss:
Not caring about consequences. Or hell, not even considering that there might be any. "Consequences Shmonsequences!" is what I would have said, if you'd mentioned them a year ago.

I hear:
Everything wrong. And the few occasions I hear right, I misinterpret completely! I either have a hearing problem, or a perception problem.

I wonder:
At the fact that S and I are friends. It just seems so...unlikely. She's the kind of girl who lights an agarbatti every day in front of her potted tulsi plant. She also believes that if she touches the darn thing during her periods, it (the plant) will shrivel up and die. She's been fasting every goddamn friday for the last ten years and believes, really believes that 'God will take care of her'. Despite all the evidence to the contrary.

She has a room full of (ugh) stuffed toys, loves Madhuri Dixit and (Oh horror!) Hum Aapke Hain Kaun which she's watched FOURTEEN TIMES. Hold me up somebody, I'm fa-ll-ing.

Still, we're friends.

I regret:
Very little. Except the 'Oh what the hell' decisions.

I dance:
Well enough, but not better than n. That woman can *move*!

I sing:
Waaayy better than I dance.

I am:
in a funny sort of place right now. Y'know...in my head. AS IN, my head is IN a funny sort of place right now (and again, let's just skip the wisecracks, shall we?), NOT that my head is funny place to be in. How would you get in anyway?

I cry:
And then I get really mad at myself for being such a wuss.

I'm not always:
Soft-spoken. And those days, I am not a nice person to know.

I make with my hands:
A delicious mushroom and potato subji...and fish in *hot* mustard curry. Oh and music on my guitar...and dog-ears to mark my pages in books.

I write:
Much better in my head. No, honest. My head is filled with thrilling prose, but somehow, it doesn't get past my fingers. Damned fingers. *aside to fingers* I ought to chop you off for being so darned un-co-operative.

I confuse:
People...or so I've been told. Why that should be is beyond me. Far as I know, I'm an open book.

I need:
...do you really want me to get into this again? A NEW JOB!

***

I've been reading a collection of Carl Sandburg's poems, gifted to me by the Crazy White Girl (whom, sadly enough, I did not have the planned angry dance-off with, because the dance-off-erred did not show. Hmpfh.) and while I know that he's talking about Chicago, I can't help thinking that all of his poems seem to fit Bombay just as well.

Sample this:

They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I
have seen your painted women under the gas lamps
luring the farm boys.
And they tell me you are crooked and I answer: Yes, it
is true I have seen the gunman kill and go free to
kill again.
And they tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the
faces of women and children I have seen the marks
of wanton hunger.
And having answered so I turn once more to those who
sneer at this my city, and I give them back the sneer
and say to them:
Come and show me another city with lifted head singing
so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.

Doesn't it sound like it was written expressly for Bombay? Sorry Carl Sandburg, and thank you Beth! :)

*And see? It works! Not only did the tag make me post, it made me do a Long Rambling Post!

Damn I'm Good!

2006-07-20T19:00:00.000-07:00

I cleaned up my desk today.

And that's the most work I've done all. bluddy. week.

Apart from mastering this ancient art, of course.

*sigh*

Heartsick

2006-07-12T14:12:00.000-07:00

I am sick of it all. I am sick of the ‘resilience of Mumbaikars’, sick of their ‘coming together in moments of crisis’ and of their goddamn ‘indomitable spirit’. I am sick of being stoic and cheerful and smiling in the face of disaster.

I don’t want to be ‘resilient’ anymore. I don’t want this city to ‘bounce back’ and I don’t want to display courage. I want this city to shed it’s ‘never say die’ attitude like yesterday’s muddy, bloodstained clothes.

Because you see what’s happening don’t you?

We are turning into victims of the worst kind of freeloading ever. We are being sodomized by the state and the worst part of it is that, we’re getting so used to it that it seems ‘normal’ now.

From the text of statement issued by the Prime Minister:
"The series of blasts in Jammu and Kashmir and in Mumbai are shocking and cowardly attempts to spread a feeling of fear and terror among our citizens.“

The Prime Minister has also appealed for people to "remain calm, not to believe rumours, and carry on their activity normally".

Also:
Shocked by the brutal terrorist attack in Mumbai, Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil, Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav along with other officials visited Mumbai late night on Tuesday for an on-the-spot review of the situation.

'Shocking'? ’Shocked’? Took you by surprise did they, those terrorists? Never saw them coming, did you? Because you know, O great leaders of this country, you’re pretty much the only ones who didn't. The normal people, distressed and horrified as they were, moved right into action like they knew the drill. Like they were born removing mangled bodies from scenes of terror and destruction. Like severed limbs, and blood and remains of human bodies, were things that they’d seen so many times, they knew what to do. They queued up outside hospitals to donate blood; they offered food, water, shelter and solace to each other because this has happened before, and it can happen again.

I wonder if you get what this says about your government.

It says, Prime Minister, that you have been – how does one say this diplomatically? – uhhh, slow. That you have failed the citizens of this country so many times, that they’ve gotten used to it now.

They no longer wait for the ‘authorities’ to rescue them, because if they did, they’d have a long wait ahead.

Mumbai has been put in a state of ‘high alert’, which, according to Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, apparently translates as, “All schools, colleges and offices will remain open and run as usual.”

So, you know, just in case you made it home alive yesterday, you can tempt fate again today.

Read this: ”New York police heightened security on subways on Tuesday after train bombings in India killed more than 160 people, while officials unveiled high-tech devices designed to prevent just such attacks.

Police called the measures -- including increased patrols and more random bag searches -- a precaution, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg told reporters there was no specific threat.”

And in contrast, this: ”The morning after the devastating blasts on the Western railway line, life is back to normal for the ever-resilient Mumbaikars. Train services are running normally and people are not hesitating to take the local trains to work.”

And this move is being lauded. As courageous, and brave and ‘never say die’ (which is ironic really, because you don’t actually get to say it, do you? You just, die) and that's what puts terrorists off, isn't it? They're probably thinking, "Yeah, y'know, those Mumbaikars...they're a courageous lot, so no point bombing them anymore". Likely? You think?

America, is being cautious despite the fact that there haven’t been any threats, but us? Oh no! We’re the ‘resilient’ ones. We shall shoulder on bravely (in an exemplary display of bloody foolishness) because you know, we’re *Mumbaikars*. And pats on the back from the media and the fucking ineffectual government, are apparently, enough to make it go away.

I saw a couple of policemen standing outside the local train stations, but no signs of bags being checked, frisking, security checks, nothing. So for all you know, the terrorists could’ve walked into the station, left a couple of couple of packages of RDX around and sauntered out again.

I think our country's motto should be changed from 'Satyamev Jayate' (and we all know how true that's been) to:

"Live each day as if it were your last, citizens of this country, because you know, it just might fucking be."

More Than a Bird, More Than a Plane...

2006-07-10T13:06:00.000-07:00

(Warning: Minor spoiler ahead.)

I was six years old when Superman flew his one-arm-outstretched-red-cape-fluttering way into my heart. Six feet four in his socks, with his twinkly blue eyes and lopsided-smile, he was warm, and convincing and *believable* (I was six; I believed in everything. Fairies, goblins, elves...you name it, I believed in it).

I remember being fascinated by the way Lois fainted, after Supey deposits her safely on the roof of the Lonely Planet building; the graceful buckling of the knees and the half-circle-sway and I remember thinking that if I ever fainted, that would be the way I'd do it*!

I still remember word for word, the interview-on-the-rooftop scene, and the rife-with-innuendo conversation between Supey and LL, (which was of course, completely lost on me then. Elves, remember?) and I remember going all *mushy* when Supey, with his shy smile, replies to LLs question about girlfriends saying, "If I did, you'd be the first to know, Miss Lane."

All together now, "Awwww!".

That was, however, a very long time ago.

The new superman, via Superman Returns, however, came nowhere close to it (my heart, that is). That Brandon chappie, while tolerably cute, was not a patch on the original Supey, the Supey of my childhood.

Sure, there was the hot bod and the outfit**, but minus the charisma (and the pretty face) of CR, he just wasn't, you know...convincing. Not as nerdy Clark Kent, and definitely not as Superman.

Brandon Routh is everything that the original Superman was not, i.e., cold, insipid and well...fluff.

All the characters, and I mean all of them, were weak, watered-down versions of the originals. And the story had just about as much substance as a diet cracker.

Kate Bosworth had zero, zero spunkiness. Now Margot Kidder wasn't pretty in the conventional sense, but y'know? She had personality. Now there was a woman who looked like she had a brain...and a spine...and a heart. KB was so busy being all dewy and purty and lost-little-girl, she forgot to be Lois Lane. And a Pulitzer for chrissake? For a book titled "Why the World Doesn't Need Superman"?! R-i-i-i-ght.

The kid playing Supey's and KB's love-child was IN-CRED-IBLY annoying. With his look-at-me-I'm-wise-beyond-my-years expression and the now-patented I'm-an-unsure-kid walk, one was very tempted to pick him up and shake him and say,"stop with all the Joel-Haley-Osmont-ing kid, because you're not!".

Then there was the execrable Kitty something-or-the-other, who could be best described as 'ugh'. Not dumb-blonde-with-a-heart-of-gold like Miss Tesmacher, just really dumb.

There were a few watchable moments in the movie though; the plane-landing-in-the-baseball-field sequence (although you'd think KB would be a little more than just wobbly, post all the smashing-into-the-plane's-interiors that she'd done) and the bank robbery sequence. But that was about it.

Superman Returns, is at the end of the day, a movie which leaves you with mixed feelings. Disappointment, that it doesn't live up to Superman;The Movie, but also a strange feeling of relief that, well, at least your childhood memories are untouched.

* It didn't work. The mental note, i.e. The only time I ever fainted, it was more 'Wobble, wobble, wobble...Crash!', than soft-knee-buckle and half-circle-sway.

** The significance of which was explained to me recently, by a well-informed friend. Did you know that supey, being, well, a super man, was supposed to be super in (ahem!) every way? And that contrasting colours (like bright red against bright blue), draw the eye like nothing else? And that poor Supey had to wear some very uncomfortable ummmsubstantiating pieces along with his suit?

Grey

2006-07-04T23:47:00.000-07:00

She was in a good mood that day. Giggling, playful and occasionally, teasing. She watched them, a smile playing on her lips, as they did the silly yet endearing things they were prone to doing on days like these; smiling gleefully at the sky and squinting when their eyelashes caught raindrops, sticking their arms out of windows, doors, canopied balconies, as if hoping to catch a cloud and set it free.

She watched them as they scurried about, looking like colourful mushrooms which had swallowed giant spiders. And then laughed hard as a strong gust hit the mushrooms and flipped them upside down, into a field of swaying multi-coloured, many-patterned poppies on decidedly wobbly stems.

They really were quite amusing.

The others were smarter. None of the pointless running around in flimsy (supposedly) protective skins, none of that they-can’t-get-along-without-me silliness, no exaggerated self of self-importance, which was, in her opinion, the way it should be.

“They should be taking shelter” she thought. “Huddling together in the shade of trees, under rocks, in caves…they should be frightened.”

And slowly, the familiar annoyance of being taken for granted began creeping up on her.

“Enough of being the all-loving, all-caring, all-goddamn-giving one. It’s never enough and they’re never grateful, never even said thank you! Instead, they leach; take what they need right then, never replenish and never, ever clean up after themselves.”

“They need to be taught a lesson”, she thought, “taught that you can’t use others endlessly, with no thought of the consequences”.

“Try this for size, little ones”, she said, seething with cold fury, as she gathered up all the loaded clouds, flung them on the city, and watched them burst…sending them all scurrying, like little rats .

I apologise for the bleakness of this post. I *like* rain (mostly), really I do, but I’ve been marooned at home four days in a row, and it’s getting a little depressing now.

Leeeaaving (or hoping to) on A Jet Plane (and we're taking this hope thing FAR!)

2006-06-23T17:19:00.000-07:00

You travel, we pay.

Isn't that a lovely, lovely line? Why don't people say this to us more often?

Well the finalists are up and we happen to be one of the chosen ones (and by golly we're surprised!).

We have no idea on what basis the final selection will be made, but we have our fingers, toes and eyes firmly crossed.

We're also chasing a chicken to sacrifice at the altar of the OTB gods, but the damned thing keeps getting away. There's a slab of wood close at hand and we're making a determined effort to stay away from black cats, ladders and spilled salt. A string of nimbu and mirchi has been duly hung up on our Macintosh and a horseshoe has been pinched from it's owner (let it go darn hoss! You can get another one!).

We think we're all set now. Oh wait, wish us well, blog-people?

Update:

The results are in and it turns out we're not the one. We're a *little* disappointed, after all, spending other people's money is just so much more fun!

Ah well! For those intent on walking, the road goes ever on...

Chicken Little and Other Stories

2006-06-23T16:35:00.000-07:00

Ever since the bird-flu outbreak, the SB has sworn off poultry in it's many glorious forms - boiled/fried/scrambled/omelett-ed eggs, tandoori/fried/curried chicken and even pastries* which might have egg as an ingredient.

Nothing can convince him. Not the explanation, "But it's been cooked at above 100 degrees Celsius and everyone knows that 70 is enough!"; not the government's declaration of the state's bird-flu-freeness; nope, not even Sanjay Dutt in all his shirtless** (and arm wrestling with an animated chicken) glory.

The SB refers to this unreasonable, unfair rejection of normal-breakfast-food as being 'risk averse'; we, to send home a point, run around the house screaming that 'the sky is about to fall on our heads any moment now and we'd better take cover!'.

In adherence to the non-interference treaty of September '05*** however, he cannot stop, hamper or protest against *our* consumption of poultry. Except for frowning in disapproval whenever we cheerfully call up the corner store to send us a dozen eggs.

Which is why, it is even more fun to call him into the kitchen when we're making breakfast and say, "Look SB! Yummy fried bird-flu!", and watch him turn some very interesting shades of purple.

Such fun!

*Souffles and mousses (in which the eggs ARE RAW!), he is, inexplicably enough, okay with.
**An honour, previously conferred upon Salman the Unbelievably Lucky.
***"I will not presume to know better than you, what is good for you, so help me god."

***

In other news, we have discovered that we're quite terribly susceptible to the enthusiasm-bug. By which we mean, a couple of words at the right time, at the right place, and we're absolutely bubbling over with the stuff.

One (seemingly innocent) conversation with a certain somebody (you know who you are...Yes! You!) about the benefits of fitness, and we're thinking - "Hmmm...he has a point there. You DO feel better after a run...it would be great if we could fit into that pair of jeans again...Oh! Remember that slinky black dress*?! We'd forgotten all about it!! We could wear that!" - and from there, it's just one small step to showing up in the gym all shiny and happy and scaring-the-daylights-out-of-the-gym-instructor.

We are blinded by visions of shopping for doll-sized articles of clothing and slipping into them with nary a wiggle, and don't even notice the rest of the people in the gym, slowly backing off from the earthquake, the epicenter of which is us. We run up to the instructor after every couple of minutes, deluding ourselves that the look in his eyes is the 'you-go-girl! of non-verbal communication, when it is actually the okay!-crazy-lady-on-the-loose-people!-man-your-stations-NOW! of it.

The problem with the enthusiasm-bug is, it lacks foresight, or no wait, what it lacks is near-future-as-in-what-will-happen-tomorrow-foresight.

So now, while we *do* believe that fitness is a good thing, we're pretty sure that being this enthusiastic about it, is not.

Because today, we woke up, no closer to the body beautiful, but with a gait that bore a striking resemblance to the Tin Man's, pre-oiling. And feeling like a herd of elephants slow-danced over us the night before.

Ouch.

* Yes. We do own a slinky black dress. It is tucked away with all the other 26"- waisted (wasted?) outfits in the Wardrobe of Hope.

Picky! Picky! Picky!

2006-06-20T13:52:00.000-07:00

Behind ice lies J&K Govt-Governor chill

For people who have chosen to bow down in worship to a stalagmite, for it's resemblance to a penis*, they're awful fussy.

*And it says some rather worrying things about you, when out of all the symbols in the whole wide world you could have chosen to symbolise divinity, you choose a penis.

Religion is so strange.

On a Clear Day...

2006-06-19T14:23:00.000-07:00

...and if you look really closely at the picture, you can see (no, not 'forever', smarty-pants) a sliver of the sea.

Dating 101

2006-06-07T00:56:00.000-07:00

In response to QS. Gemini's list of dating dos and don'ts, and the posts it spawned here and here, we present to you ladies and gentlemen, an alternate point of view. Note, we do not say right or wrong (although we might think some points are), we say, 'alternate'.

Why we're doing this is a bit of a mystery since our dating days are far behind us (and this is said with a ninety-ten mix of relief and regret), but we felt it was necessary to mention that QSG's list is QSG's list; different women, different lists.

In blue, we have snippets from QSG's post, the rest is our response to it.

1. He doesn't pick you up. Now, we all have cars, and its not about gas prices. There is something romantic about him picking you up and getting the door for you.

We don't expect him to. If he happens to be in the vicinity, then sure, drop by and pick us up but it's a bit unfair to ask him to drive half-way across town just to pick us up and then drive back all the way to the intended date-destination.

If the date ends at a late hour, or specifically at an hour we don't feel completely safe travelling alone, then we expect to be dropped home. Note, this is a situation specific to India. We don't think this would apply to the US/UK (again, this is an assumption based on what we've heard from women-friends who have lived in these two countries) .

We've never consciously thought about whether or not doors are being held open for us; you reach the door, you open it. What's with the waiting? The few times we have had doors held open for us, we have been a little startled and quite amused (in an 'oh how quaint but sweet' kind of way).

We do NOT like having chairs pulled out for us. We're always a little wary of the timing; will he manage to position the chair before our butt descends on it? Will we end up sitting on half a chair? What if the chair doesn't make it on time? What if we end up on the floor?! *sigh* It's a situation that's just *so* much better avoided.

2. He picks a cheap restaurant.

A preferred situation would be if the destination is mutually decided upon. Economics is irrelevant. We'd be equally happy walking along bandstand munching channas, as we'd be at The Saltwater Grill. We think we'd like the channas at bandstand more, though.

If it is a place that the gentleman has chosen, the only requisites are that it should NOT be shady (as in, dark, dingy, with a predominantly drunken male clientele) and said gentleman should be familiar with it.

3. He expects you to pay, or decides to go dutch. Now, I am very independent and make okay money and take care of myself. But, am still old fashioned enough to want my man to take care of me. Is it so bad?

Errr...we think so. We really, really do not want to be taken care of...or, not this way at least. It's in situations like this that the rabid feminist* (as opposed to the normal everyday feminist) in us wakes up and goes berserk. We feel genuinely squirmy and uncomfortable if we're, well...paid for (We know, we know. NOT reasonable, but we *did* say rabid feminist didn't we?).

4. He dresses poorly. Like him to look sharp. Does not mean wearing and showing off every label he has (Tommy Hilfiger, Ralph Lauren - seriously, get over it!)

This is venue-dependent. It would be *most* horrifying if he showed up in designer togs (and we don't like soppy fops anyway) for a walk along Bandstand. It is more important that he be comfortable in whatever he's wearing. Seriously, we would have a lot more respect (and affection) for a man who can walk into a posh restaurant in jeans, a t-shirt and floaters, and feel completely at home.

Any donned clothes however, *must* be clean (no last night's pizza toppings and no, NO sweat stains!). Gentlemen wearing said clothes should (preferably) be showered, shaved (unless you can carry off ze sexy stubble) and at the very least, deodorised.

5. Tries to get too touchy feely. Now, seriously, back off! Women can be very irresistible, but some self control is good!

Agree completely. We know women are often accused of sending out mixed signals as far as the touchy-feely issue goes, but though they might be subtle, the signs (green or red) are there. It is important that said gentleman knows how to read them.

6. Is too cheap to order dessert. Now that is the best part of the meal. That's all I can say!

Maybe he just doesn't *like* dessert? We know we don't. And if you want dessert, then you can go right ahead and order can't you? It is highly unlikely that he will stop you.

7. Ogles at cleavage - yours or someone else's!

Get up and walk out. This is not just a dating no-no, this is NOT someone you want to be with.

8. Boring. Boring. Boring.

Tough one. While carrying on a conversation is your responsibility as well, if you've tried and failed, then maybe you're just not suited to each other. We know we're positively *dead* boring to some people, and too-bubbly-for-our-own-good, to others.

9. Questions include whether or not you have a green card, how much you make, can you cook, do you like to do dishes...etc...duh!

Get up and walk out. Unless of course, you're terribly proud of your green card, how much money you make and doing dishes is a hobby with you (in which case, congratulations! You've found your man!). We like to cook but it seriously pisses us off if we are asked whether or not we can*. Especially if the asker cannot, and insists on making inane statements like, "Oh I can eat!". You can! Ya don't say! You are SO cool!

Bah!

* Again, a wake-up call for the rabidly feministic us. Again, not really reasonable. We mean, we wouldn't be annoyed if he asked us if we liked painting (or anything else). But this question (in our head) just reeks of gender stereotyping.

10. Eyes clearly suggest that he is desperately looking to get laid. Only.

Get up and walk out. Unless that's what you're looking to as well and, well it's all okay then, isn't it?

All that said, when we were dating, our filters were C&H and Terry Pratchett. And we're happy to say, they worked just fine. We have never regretted dating any of the filtered-through, although the memories of the rest of the dated send us running down the what-the-HELL-were-you-thinking-woman-road.

Ah well! You're only young and foolish once. Thankfully.

If I Could...

2006-05-29T18:49:00.000-07:00

I would watch you sleep, see your dreams chase each other behind your closed eyes.
I would listen to the whisper of your soft, slow breath.
I would wait till the morning slid in through the curtains, and gently nudged you awake. Be with you, as you made the journey from last night's dreams to the reality of another day.

I would sit there, curled up and comfortable, on the couch by your bed, and inhale the second-hand-smoke from your first cigarette of the day.
I would watch you, as you threw off the sheets, slipped your feet into your chappals and shuffled off into the kitchen with a resigned sigh; I would smile at that.

I'd listen for the contented bubbling of the percolator, as it prepared your first - of four or more, depending on what kind of day you were having - cup of coffee.
Black, no sugar.

I would relive the countless mornings that we'd gone through the same routine - sleepy mornings, cigarettes, slippers, coffee - and I would wonder; would you do things differently, if you knew I was there?

If you knew all of us were there?

This post, incidentally, is in answer to the question Amit asked, about what you would do if you were invisible.

Mumbai Blogger's Meet

2006-05-20T11:32:00.000-07:00

One's very first blogger's meet was attended, and while one cannot speak for all the attendees, one had a jolly good time.

The words flew fast and furious, as a multitude of topics were discussed - ranging from programming, photography, marriage, sexuality, previous blog meets and of course reservations - disputed and dismissed, sometimes all three at the same time.

We apologise profusely to those bloggers, whom we might have deafened/frightened/horrified with our...errr...vociferous (?) reactions to the issues being discussed.

Our impressions of some of the bloggers (because we didn't get to speak to all of them as much as we would've liked to):

1) Amit was a lot less vocal than we expected. Although to be fair, he would have had to be a lot more than just vocal, to be heard above the din (yours truly being one of it's main contributors).

2) The Idea smithy was all spunk and fire and feminism and SO the kind of woman we'd *totally* ask out if we were a guy. Or gay. Since we're neither, we'll just say, she's awesome fun.

3) Evenstar, dainty and delicate and Juliet-like; one could almost picture her standing in a latticed balcony, leaning her cheek upon her hand. Until she mentioned, in her soft voice, that she'd just gotten back from attending an anti-reservation protest at Azad Maidan (which turned out - as she discovered later - to be a pro-reservation rally, but hey, she was there. Which is more than we can say for ourselves). The things these Juliet-like women get upto these days, I tell you!

4) Sakshi was just like her blog; straightforward and very chilled out.

5) Oh then, there was the mysterious Mr. Gera (whom we find mysterious primarily because we have no idea what his first name is) who spent a lot of time explaining how, if you took the code from the back of his t-shirt, and inserted it into the script on the front of his t-shirt, you would get four small camels.

We're terribly unclear about how exactly this was supposed to happen, but there you have it.

Mr. Gera helpfully added - in between turning round and round to show everyone the front and the back of his t-shirt - that it was 'absolutely useless, but totally cool'.

And you know, somehow, at that point of time? It made perfect sense.

6) The Bombay Addict, as his name suggests, a true blue Mumbaikar. From Uttar Pradesh. We found we had a bit of a wavelength-matching-thingy going on here. Until he played devil's advocate over the reservations issue, after which we screamed and bit his head off. We're sorry we bit your head off, Anupam.

7) Then there was young Akshay, of Trivial Matters who was, pestered incessantly to hire us as his pappu* (person who brings him chai, polishes his lenses, sets up camera...you get the idea), declared undying love to, and proposed marriage to, all within the space of five minutes, under the benevolent influence of two gimlets.

Akshay, displaying remarkable intelligence for one so young (also, one who consumed in succession, one baby milk shake** and two (or was that one?) mojitos), declined all three proposals. Smart kid!

8) The bachpan-ke-buddies from Rajasthan, Parijat and Piyush, were quite unlike what we expected IIT students to be. I mean, you know how you definitely expect IIT students to be intelligent, but not a whole lot more than that? These two were *bright*. And refreshingly laid-back.

9) Vijay. Who came, who saw and who was probably left speechless with horror/shock/disbelief because he spoke all of ten words in the four hours that he was there. Although he did take up the difficult task of typing out all fifteen names and URLs and then mailing them across to all fifteen of us. Thank you Vijay!

The rest of the attendees (whom we *really* wished we could've spoken to more) were, Zack, Saket, Anthony and Selvin.

All in all, it was an evening well spent. To quote a certain famous blogger, fun came.

The trip back home was a whole other story though. The trains were running terribly late, because of something called a 'Jumbo Block' at Borivli. When it did arrive (the train, that is), it was packed closer than a can of sardines and we ended up getting a full-body-massage with essential oils of everybody else (eeewww, I know. Totally). But you know what? This compartment, that's hot and humid and filled with five times more people than it was ever meant to hold; there's no screaming, no tempers flaring. In fact, the women are smiling, some are actually laughing and everyone is helping everyone get some place to stand. Dupattas are being cheerfully disentangled, children are being pushed towards their mothers, single chappals are being laughingly returned to their owners.

Do you see why I love this city?

*Because *everyone* seems to have a more interesting job than we do!
** Which was a disturbing shade of pink.

I Laughed...

2006-05-12T18:27:00.000-07:00

...till I had tears running down my face. And random office people gathering around my cubicle, with worried expressions on their faces. Which made me laugh even more.

This woman (or at least I think she's a woman) is hilarious!

O Happy Day!

2006-05-11T15:07:00.000-07:00

I feel all happy and warm and fuzzy inside, blogworld.

And I'm feeling this way because the Desperate Housewives have been caught red-handed. Or bloody-knived. Or whatever term you use to indicate the end of absolute, utter machiavellianism.

Confused?
Let me explain.

Me: One of the quiet ones. Come to work. Do it. Inform all concerned. Leave.
Key characteristic: Dependable, unobtrusive.

Boss: Sweetheart (in the absolute, complete nice-guy sense). Dream (as opposed to dreamy, although some women do find him that as well) boss - in the sense that, he's got the very rare characteristic of making people *want* to work with/for him*
Key Characteristic: Very intelligent, very perceptive and a great buddy.

Desperate Housewives: The official team-bitches. Average (and I don't think that's bad) workers, above-averagely-intelligent women, both of them.
Key Characteristic: The knives they carry around, sharpened and ready for stabbing, into the first unsuspecting back.

What had been happening blogworld, is that these two, for no known reason, had been using guerilla tactics against yours truly. Nothing very obvious, but things like going up to the boss and telling him things like, 'Don't you think this would be a better way to manage project a?' or, 'project b needs to cover so-and-so aspects, don't you think?', specifically when I wasn't around (a and b, being my projects).

Then there were the standard kitty-party-aunty techniques - the whispering and giggling every time I walked by, or spoke on the phone or even came back to my desk for the love of god (and what on earth is so frantic-whisper-worthy about that??)! Oh and then there was the incessant gossiping on sametime (the intra-office IM. This is significant; it'll make another appearance further into the story).

Now the DHs are widely known as prize bitches - it has been said that if they had MPD? They'd be bitching about their alter-egos. They're that bad.

I had spoken to boss about this and he, in his characteristically sage manner, told me to not give a fuck. He told me that there would always be some people who'd dislike you, even if it's for no other reason than that other people like you. Which was some consolation but not enough blogworld, because, well...I'm not used to being actively disliked. Let alone, disliked enough to be schemed against**.

And then this happened.

After a meeting with the DHs, boss walks back to his desk only find this message on his IM, "Isn't he dum?! i mn he dsn't knw wht he's tlking abt!", and it's from one them.

Boss decides to play along, types back: "Ya I knw..."
DH1: "Ya! Dnt knw hw he got ts job."
Boss: "Srsly"
DH1: *stony silence* (because she notices that DH2, whom she is supposed to be having this conversation with, hasn't been typing)

At this point, DH1 turns saucer-wide eyes to DH2, who's completely oblivious to everything because she had no idea that she was being bitched-to.

DH1 realises the horror of the situation, just as boss bursts into loud guffaws and summons both of them to his cabin.

He shows them the typed conversation and then sits back, and with unnerving patience, listens to their fumbling, clumsy explanations and sorry excuses. And then gives them three kinds of hell. And tells them that if they're so unhappy with how things are done around here, well then there's the door.

Somedays, I absolutely *love* my job.

* Like those few professors in college, whose classes you'd *always* attend because they just made everything so damned interesting.

** I know that sounds really dumb, but see, like I said, I'm unobtrusive. And quiet. And I mind my own business. So...well...get my point? I think it takes a certain amount of *effort* to dislike someone whose actions don't affect your life at all. And that someone would so go out of their way...well, that makes me a little queasy.

Chronicus Skepticus

Firsts

10 ways...

Greed

No longer skirting issues

Mapmaker, mapmaker, go find another cause, ok?

Fascinating insights into the working of my brain.

Ripping off the band aid

What I did in Goa*

The body as a temple*

Happy birthday to me

Cabbies and conversations

Disillusioned

The stuff of dreams - Part II

Restless

Worth their weight in gold*

Limerick

Hell hath no fury…

So much for my coffee shop in Coorg

Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, serves 1*

All I want for Christmas

In which we do some fugging of our own*

Why I am not religious*

Thanks for all the fish

2008 - The Year of the Nerd

Is it still a happy birthday...

In loving* memory of

It's over, and my eardrums rejoice!

Jab bhagwaan deta hai...

I Aten't Dead...

'Not Cricket'? Is too!

Shoot Ban the Messenger.

In the Middle of the Night

Hey Sister, Go Sister

Vijayi Vishwa Tiranga Pyaara!

Yah Number Abhi Uplabdh Nahin Hai!

Chunnu Munnu di Gaddi

My eyes! My poor eyes!

Restless

Tagged again!

This 'n that

$0.70 richer than I was three months ago!*

Normal Programming Resumes

Rain*

Television - How much is too much, Part II

Thanking her Lucky Stars

With Apologies to Nike

Not merry, not even close.

Warm Fuzzy Feeling

Aandhi

Nostalgia*

How to make an effective decision-making tool wish it had never been born

Hot Chocolate and friends

Oscar Material

Coincidence?

Television: How much is too much?

Reeling

The Mommy Returns

Because I am *nothing*, if not courteous.

God is a Surly Cab Driver

Blog-people, meet Henry, Henry, Blog-people.

Salaam-e-Ishq

Step up! Step right up!

He Gives Me Fever.

Want a Green Card?

An Ode to Coffee*

One down...

Macbeth (I think)

Casino Royale...

Trading Places*

Frankly, Scarlett...

You know you're really stressed out* when...

Madraka vs. Mishra

A Special Place in Hell...

Of Ancestors and America

Conversations from Last Night

Free as a bird...

Bombay Blog-a-ween Meet

Pretty as a...

Mountain High, Valley Low

Because I am nothing, if not courteous.