Thursday, October 25, 2007
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Oh no. No no no no no.
What did i do? What did i bloody do????? I just called him after years, and i feel like scum!!! I shouldn't have, i shouldn't have! Blame my passport application for it!
I turned my room upside down, inside out last evening in search of my degree et al certificates, and found a couple of things from a phase of life that has never actually left me. It got me thinking yesterday, for the first time ever - how did i manage to do something like that? Where did the courage to do those things i did all those years ago, come from? And as always, i wanted to find out what he'd thought i was like then, what sort of an impression of me had i left with him. So i got to office today and shot out a mail to him.
Like that wasn't enough, i had an urge to call him. So i did. And his wife picked up. And it was awkward, not so much because well...it was a woman calling, but because it was a strange woman. Strange, since he didn't have my number stored on his phone!! I don't even know if the phone belongs to him or his wife!
He came on the line (i heard whispers in the background, something like him groaning at the thought of having to talk to me) and i could hear the place echoing, and a bit of traffic. So he comes online and says, "Hey i'm in traffic. Can i call you in some time on this number?" Oh God, it was so awkward. So, so, so awkward. I feel like the earth should split and i should get swallowed right now. I'm thinking his lie was fairly obvious, thanks to the echoes and the pause during which his wife communictaed to him, his voice replying in the distance. I'm taking it that he doesn't want to talk.
I feel miserable. More like, ashamed. I think i have this sado-masochistic streak in me that makes me do these things.
(I generously copied this from a friend's blog. It is exactly what i feel like right now.)
I turned my room upside down, inside out last evening in search of my degree et al certificates, and found a couple of things from a phase of life that has never actually left me. It got me thinking yesterday, for the first time ever - how did i manage to do something like that? Where did the courage to do those things i did all those years ago, come from? And as always, i wanted to find out what he'd thought i was like then, what sort of an impression of me had i left with him. So i got to office today and shot out a mail to him.
Like that wasn't enough, i had an urge to call him. So i did. And his wife picked up. And it was awkward, not so much because well...it was a woman calling, but because it was a strange woman. Strange, since he didn't have my number stored on his phone!! I don't even know if the phone belongs to him or his wife!
He came on the line (i heard whispers in the background, something like him groaning at the thought of having to talk to me) and i could hear the place echoing, and a bit of traffic. So he comes online and says, "Hey i'm in traffic. Can i call you in some time on this number?" Oh God, it was so awkward. So, so, so awkward. I feel like the earth should split and i should get swallowed right now. I'm thinking his lie was fairly obvious, thanks to the echoes and the pause during which his wife communictaed to him, his voice replying in the distance. I'm taking it that he doesn't want to talk.
I feel miserable. More like, ashamed. I think i have this sado-masochistic streak in me that makes me do these things.
(I generously copied this from a friend's blog. It is exactly what i feel like right now.)
Monday, October 22, 2007
A for Abuse. (Statutory Warning: Parental Supervision required for people below 18.)
Isn't that something most of us have experienced in our childhood? Things that we repress for so long that they feel like a figment of our imagination? And that come back to us one day as we dwell and dwell on an incident of the past for no apparent reason?
I have been through abuse quite a few times in my growing-up years, and those times were pretty traumatic. They were all by complete strangers; in time i learnt to treat each as just another episode in life, and move on. These experiences are not something i am proud of because they have taught me something, yet i think about them from time-to-time as a third person would about a friend who's been through it. It was during one of these sessions that it came to me that i had experienced one such incident in all its severity when i was...oh, a toddler maybe. Around 3 or 4 years old. And my neighbour had put me through it.
The funny thing is, i never told my parents about it. Because it didn't feel like abuse then. I wasn't even old enough to think such thoughts. We moved out of that house and i met the guy 12 years later at another neighbour's wedding. Let's just say he completely avoided me, and by then i knew why. Even then, i never told my parents about it. What was the point then?
I was reading a book - Listening Now. I don't quite know how to describe it, but it's full of thoughts of female characters who play different roles - mother, wife, lover, daughter, daughter-in-law, sister... and the funny thing is, each one of them has been through some form of abuse or the other. All, in their formative years. Some, after they have turned into full-blown women. I think that's when it's the worst - because you feel the shame, the pain, the hurt and the desolation in full force. It's not something you can talk about then, because you will be held responsible for everything that happened to you. As a child, it's easier to deal with these things because these emotions are not fully formed then, and yet those incidents have an uncanny ability to taint your perspective about certain things forever. Like a dear, dear friend of mine was telling me.
She's been through some in her childhood, and she never realised these things had happened to her till she was in her late teens. They came back to her in her sleep. The night it struck me, she said, i cried till morning. After all those years, i couldn't remember anything except that this man took me to his room and the lights were switched off. I guess i understand now why i hate being touched. The good thing is, those scars have been blunted by the passing years, and she's been able to carry on with life.
Not so with another friend who seems to have had it very, very bad and refuses to talk about it. What rankles about him is his attitude - 'I have been through so much, i have seen so much' - a sort of justification for everything he does. Or doesn't do. To him i have just one thing to say - Buddy, move on. The severity of our experiences might be different, but when it comes to feeling violated, torn and dirty, we all sail the same hole-infested boat. We just chose to swim when the time came to get out of the flotsam. You should too.
Us abused but moved-on-in-life ones still have mechanisms to avoid further incidents - mechanisms that i shared with a friend yesterday, and discovered - to my amusement - that they were quite common. Like spotting a man walking the other way on the footpath, and moving as far away as possible; or slowing down to let the man behind you pass up to get ahead. Little, comforting security measures. My young cousin had one too. She'd just begun to feel the weight of womanhood upon her slender shoulders. When she walked, it was like she would cave in to stop people from staring at her sprouting chest. It distressed me, because she was letting the world get to her - a man's world, a world created by society, by everything her elders held sacrosanct. So i did to her what a man i completely love to this day did to me - told her on the face in all frankness that she coulcn't help what was happening to her, or what she had. So why not be proud about it? I remember it worked wonders for me, and i think it did for her too - i've never seen her slouch after that. I'm hoping that this incident sort-of broke the ice for her to come and talk to me whenever she feels like something wrong's happening to her. And that it helped her feel better about being a woman.
I do have plenty of other growing-up cousins too, many of them girls. And i constantly live in the fear that something might happen to them some day, and they might not be able to talk about it. I constantly worry about what i can do to make it easier for them, how i can watch them always without intruding on their privacy or their life, protect them. And then i think, i'm being a parent already. And i understand, for once, why there are so many rules and regulations garrotting a baby girl's growth into a woman.
P.S: I'm okay with talking about incidents from my life because i'm able to distance myself from them. They are extremely personal, yes. But they are used in this piece in an effort to reach out to all those who've experienced things of this sort, and to tell them, you're not alone.
I have been through abuse quite a few times in my growing-up years, and those times were pretty traumatic. They were all by complete strangers; in time i learnt to treat each as just another episode in life, and move on. These experiences are not something i am proud of because they have taught me something, yet i think about them from time-to-time as a third person would about a friend who's been through it. It was during one of these sessions that it came to me that i had experienced one such incident in all its severity when i was...oh, a toddler maybe. Around 3 or 4 years old. And my neighbour had put me through it.
The funny thing is, i never told my parents about it. Because it didn't feel like abuse then. I wasn't even old enough to think such thoughts. We moved out of that house and i met the guy 12 years later at another neighbour's wedding. Let's just say he completely avoided me, and by then i knew why. Even then, i never told my parents about it. What was the point then?
I was reading a book - Listening Now. I don't quite know how to describe it, but it's full of thoughts of female characters who play different roles - mother, wife, lover, daughter, daughter-in-law, sister... and the funny thing is, each one of them has been through some form of abuse or the other. All, in their formative years. Some, after they have turned into full-blown women. I think that's when it's the worst - because you feel the shame, the pain, the hurt and the desolation in full force. It's not something you can talk about then, because you will be held responsible for everything that happened to you. As a child, it's easier to deal with these things because these emotions are not fully formed then, and yet those incidents have an uncanny ability to taint your perspective about certain things forever. Like a dear, dear friend of mine was telling me.
She's been through some in her childhood, and she never realised these things had happened to her till she was in her late teens. They came back to her in her sleep. The night it struck me, she said, i cried till morning. After all those years, i couldn't remember anything except that this man took me to his room and the lights were switched off. I guess i understand now why i hate being touched. The good thing is, those scars have been blunted by the passing years, and she's been able to carry on with life.
Not so with another friend who seems to have had it very, very bad and refuses to talk about it. What rankles about him is his attitude - 'I have been through so much, i have seen so much' - a sort of justification for everything he does. Or doesn't do. To him i have just one thing to say - Buddy, move on. The severity of our experiences might be different, but when it comes to feeling violated, torn and dirty, we all sail the same hole-infested boat. We just chose to swim when the time came to get out of the flotsam. You should too.
Us abused but moved-on-in-life ones still have mechanisms to avoid further incidents - mechanisms that i shared with a friend yesterday, and discovered - to my amusement - that they were quite common. Like spotting a man walking the other way on the footpath, and moving as far away as possible; or slowing down to let the man behind you pass up to get ahead. Little, comforting security measures. My young cousin had one too. She'd just begun to feel the weight of womanhood upon her slender shoulders. When she walked, it was like she would cave in to stop people from staring at her sprouting chest. It distressed me, because she was letting the world get to her - a man's world, a world created by society, by everything her elders held sacrosanct. So i did to her what a man i completely love to this day did to me - told her on the face in all frankness that she coulcn't help what was happening to her, or what she had. So why not be proud about it? I remember it worked wonders for me, and i think it did for her too - i've never seen her slouch after that. I'm hoping that this incident sort-of broke the ice for her to come and talk to me whenever she feels like something wrong's happening to her. And that it helped her feel better about being a woman.
I do have plenty of other growing-up cousins too, many of them girls. And i constantly live in the fear that something might happen to them some day, and they might not be able to talk about it. I constantly worry about what i can do to make it easier for them, how i can watch them always without intruding on their privacy or their life, protect them. And then i think, i'm being a parent already. And i understand, for once, why there are so many rules and regulations garrotting a baby girl's growth into a woman.
P.S: I'm okay with talking about incidents from my life because i'm able to distance myself from them. They are extremely personal, yes. But they are used in this piece in an effort to reach out to all those who've experienced things of this sort, and to tell them, you're not alone.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Meet Red.
His innards show that he was conceived quite some time back in a Maruti workshop in Shivajinagar. But he was delivered on Friday, September 21, 2007.
He's christened Red. And i love him. Absolutely love him.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Seeing Red.
I have absolutely no respect for people who taunt or pass snide remarks for no reason.
In the past twelve hours, i have had such remarks thrown at me not once, but twice. And i must say that i'm fast losing respect for both these people. But that's really not what's bothering me. What's got me livid is that their words found their way under my skin - while they have no right to do it or basis for it, i'm assuming they feel churlish enough to say things that actually hurt and make you feel like scum from the bottom of Ulsoor lake. I can understand one's insecurity and the childish barbs that result from it, but i cannot understand the other's sarcasm. The sarcasm is still alright, the barbs are not because those digs have been happening for a while. I've ignored them this far but i can't anymore because they are really, really pissing me off now. So much so, that i have to get it out of my system so i can get down to finishing some work.
I could get even by getting down to their level, but i don't want to grow immature in the process. The satisfaction and pleasure of slinging words where it hurts most would soon be overshadowed by an overwhelming sense of guilt, and it's the guilt i can't live with.
Maybe i just need to talk to somebody about it. Maybe i will. But sweet heaven, if they try that thing with me again, it won't be long before they experience hell. Bloody, bloody hell.
In the past twelve hours, i have had such remarks thrown at me not once, but twice. And i must say that i'm fast losing respect for both these people. But that's really not what's bothering me. What's got me livid is that their words found their way under my skin - while they have no right to do it or basis for it, i'm assuming they feel churlish enough to say things that actually hurt and make you feel like scum from the bottom of Ulsoor lake. I can understand one's insecurity and the childish barbs that result from it, but i cannot understand the other's sarcasm. The sarcasm is still alright, the barbs are not because those digs have been happening for a while. I've ignored them this far but i can't anymore because they are really, really pissing me off now. So much so, that i have to get it out of my system so i can get down to finishing some work.
I could get even by getting down to their level, but i don't want to grow immature in the process. The satisfaction and pleasure of slinging words where it hurts most would soon be overshadowed by an overwhelming sense of guilt, and it's the guilt i can't live with.
Maybe i just need to talk to somebody about it. Maybe i will. But sweet heaven, if they try that thing with me again, it won't be long before they experience hell. Bloody, bloody hell.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Baby on board!
Sometimes you're just so glad things happen the way they do.
I didn't get an auto even after half an hour of waiting outside office, appearing to all and sundry on the roads like i was waiting to offer my 'services' to the right one who came along. Desperate, i thought of everybody who could possibly take me home safe, away from prying eyes. N's name popped into my head and i called her. Got an auto easily enough to her office. I told N about S being in town, and how i had been trying to get in touch with her. What ensued was a long-drawn phone call to S, where she claimed she didn't care if i bothered to meet her now, i 'didn't really matter anymore' etc. etc. And that's how we came to meet her last night.
S is close to eight months pregnant with her second baby. As we sat and caught up - S giving me these 'i-know-what-you're-upto' looks once in a while that and N adding fuel to the fire - S gave a start and said, "Hey, you want to feel the baby move?"
I can tell you, it is the most freaky sensation ever. Surreal. I could feel the little one's heartbeat go dub-dub (yeah, i know it's supposed to be lub-dub but what the heck)... feel her kicking furiously against mommy's belly, like she was practicing karate with her little feet. It was lovely, lovely.
I sort of know now why those macho men make those puppy-eyed 'awwwwwww' faces in the movies when they feel the bloated stomachs of their pregnant wives.
I didn't get an auto even after half an hour of waiting outside office, appearing to all and sundry on the roads like i was waiting to offer my 'services' to the right one who came along. Desperate, i thought of everybody who could possibly take me home safe, away from prying eyes. N's name popped into my head and i called her. Got an auto easily enough to her office. I told N about S being in town, and how i had been trying to get in touch with her. What ensued was a long-drawn phone call to S, where she claimed she didn't care if i bothered to meet her now, i 'didn't really matter anymore' etc. etc. And that's how we came to meet her last night.
S is close to eight months pregnant with her second baby. As we sat and caught up - S giving me these 'i-know-what-you're-upto' looks once in a while that and N adding fuel to the fire - S gave a start and said, "Hey, you want to feel the baby move?"
I can tell you, it is the most freaky sensation ever. Surreal. I could feel the little one's heartbeat go dub-dub (yeah, i know it's supposed to be lub-dub but what the heck)... feel her kicking furiously against mommy's belly, like she was practicing karate with her little feet. It was lovely, lovely.
I sort of know now why those macho men make those puppy-eyed 'awwwwwww' faces in the movies when they feel the bloated stomachs of their pregnant wives.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Alone in a crowd.
The story goes that one day, a poor woman was left behind by her out-of-town friends who watched a movie she was dying to watch too, without her. Sentimental psychopath that she was, the hurt at not being part of the foursome pricked her and rather than sit around and mope, she decided to do something about it.
Which explains how she ended up at a theatre on a Friday afternoon to watch the same movie. Sans company.
It was a completely new experience for her - she'd only dreamed about doing things like these alone, never actually done them. Having excused herself with some lame explanations from the place she was supposed to be at at the appointed hour, she rushed to the closest mall to buy herself a ticket to the movie. With two hours to kill before the drama started, she decided to do what she did best: eat. So she headed to the steak house in the mall and dug into an... omelette. Rather, an apology for one. From there, she headed to the only bookstore around and bought Lemony Snicket's 'A Series Of Unfortunate Events - Book 2' and perused it to kill some more time before the show began.
Undecided whether to buy popcorn or slush or nachos or Pepsi, she went with the option she was second best at: spending time in the ladies' room. Here, she clicked what she hoped would be one of her many entries into the Tasveer exhibition.
There done, she headed to the screen at which the movie was being played and prayed that the chairs next to her wouldn't be occupied. More so by men. Poor, poor woman, her prayers went unanswered. A bunch of pimply, lanky, college-going students filed into the seats beside her. I can handle this, she thought. They're just kids anyway, I'm way older than them. 20 minutes into the movie, she jumped out of her seat and scooted to the row above where there were plrnty of empty seats with a fabulous view of the screen. Sighing with pleasure, she parked her tush into the seat and watched the movie in solitude - laughing when she wanted to, shifting sides without worrying about disturbing people on either side of her (because there were none!), eyes agog at the slick transformations of the Cybertrons.
As the movie came to an end and the people spilled out, she couldn't suppress the smug smile of satisfaction at having done something so...ridiculously unlike her. It sure beat depending on others to watch a movie with, though. Besides, she enjoyed the alone-ness.
As she got into the auto to head home, she decided she would do this more often.
Which explains how she ended up at a theatre on a Friday afternoon to watch the same movie. Sans company.
It was a completely new experience for her - she'd only dreamed about doing things like these alone, never actually done them. Having excused herself with some lame explanations from the place she was supposed to be at at the appointed hour, she rushed to the closest mall to buy herself a ticket to the movie. With two hours to kill before the drama started, she decided to do what she did best: eat. So she headed to the steak house in the mall and dug into an... omelette. Rather, an apology for one. From there, she headed to the only bookstore around and bought Lemony Snicket's 'A Series Of Unfortunate Events - Book 2' and perused it to kill some more time before the show began.
Undecided whether to buy popcorn or slush or nachos or Pepsi, she went with the option she was second best at: spending time in the ladies' room. Here, she clicked what she hoped would be one of her many entries into the Tasveer exhibition.
There done, she headed to the screen at which the movie was being played and prayed that the chairs next to her wouldn't be occupied. More so by men. Poor, poor woman, her prayers went unanswered. A bunch of pimply, lanky, college-going students filed into the seats beside her. I can handle this, she thought. They're just kids anyway, I'm way older than them. 20 minutes into the movie, she jumped out of her seat and scooted to the row above where there were plrnty of empty seats with a fabulous view of the screen. Sighing with pleasure, she parked her tush into the seat and watched the movie in solitude - laughing when she wanted to, shifting sides without worrying about disturbing people on either side of her (because there were none!), eyes agog at the slick transformations of the Cybertrons.
As the movie came to an end and the people spilled out, she couldn't suppress the smug smile of satisfaction at having done something so...ridiculously unlike her. It sure beat depending on others to watch a movie with, though. Besides, she enjoyed the alone-ness.
As she got into the auto to head home, she decided she would do this more often.
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
I love my Sony Ericsson K750i.
Unfortunately, i couldn't paste the SE blob on the title - that would have made it more in keeping with the campaign. (Alright, sorry, sorry!) I started the day deciding that today i would transfer all the pictures i had taken with my K750i camera onto my PC in the office. Man, am i impressed.
The photographs have come out really nice. The resolution and picture quality is ass-kicking. The night mode isn't all that great, the pictures turn out quite grainy. Or maybe it's how i clicked. Anyway, this is a sample picture. (2.5x optical zoom, the max i could go. I was trying to take the eagle perched right on top of the tree.)
If you'd like to see more of these, follow this link to my flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/7610705@N04/sets/72157601854312750/
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Cloud Nines and Seventh Heavens...
I got back from Hyderabad half hour ago, after six days of rain-soaked, shot-glassed, palatable, super sonic, blissful pleasures.
We took the rains along with us the day we left - A, Amb and I. It poured non-stop for two days and the weather was absolutely gorgeous. What added to it was the locality and the home where i was staying - open, quiet, very residential. I bonded with cousins, visited relatives, got plenty of sarees, lazed. Moved bags to Secunderabad on Day 3 and the madness started. Dinners, lunches, UNO, Moksh, paya soup at ITC Kakatiya, Dublin - with a kick-ass DJ, for whom i even left a note, Lifestyle - where i picked up sexy shot glasses for A, Deli 9, office and its terrace, late-night TV, a chance rendezvous or two, blood-shedding fights...Woo hoo, it was one maniacal roller-coaster ride.
To top it all, i could take pictures on my return flight (i went berserk with my phone camera) - i saw complete fantasy parks in the sky, dinosaurs, giant turtles, men at war, the works.
Sigh. I regret getting back to work, but i return a happy woman.
We took the rains along with us the day we left - A, Amb and I. It poured non-stop for two days and the weather was absolutely gorgeous. What added to it was the locality and the home where i was staying - open, quiet, very residential. I bonded with cousins, visited relatives, got plenty of sarees, lazed. Moved bags to Secunderabad on Day 3 and the madness started. Dinners, lunches, UNO, Moksh, paya soup at ITC Kakatiya, Dublin - with a kick-ass DJ, for whom i even left a note, Lifestyle - where i picked up sexy shot glasses for A, Deli 9, office and its terrace, late-night TV, a chance rendezvous or two, blood-shedding fights...Woo hoo, it was one maniacal roller-coaster ride.
To top it all, i could take pictures on my return flight (i went berserk with my phone camera) - i saw complete fantasy parks in the sky, dinosaurs, giant turtles, men at war, the works.
Sigh. I regret getting back to work, but i return a happy woman.
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Urge.
I want to get back to being who i was.
But then maybe i can't because this is who i'm supposed to be.
But then i'm not happy with being this,
so where does that leave me?
But then maybe i can't because this is who i'm supposed to be.
But then i'm not happy with being this,
so where does that leave me?
Monday, August 13, 2007
O Weekend Wonderful!
A good weekend after a long time. Good because i had a lot to do, and i enjoyed every minute of it - even the 'M' word comments that my aunts kept inserting subtly into our conversations.
Let's start with Friday night. I finished early, hung around waiting for an auto, spotted two colleagues going into Casa's for refreshers and joined them. (Warning: Only if you have a really sweet tooth must you try the Chocolate Marble Cake.)
Got home, dragged dad to a store that sold mobile phones. Bought a Sony Ericsson K750i (that too, after two hours of procastination on the 750, 790, 810, 20,000 blah blah...) and i absolutely love it. AND it has a camera!(Of course, my battered old Nokia 33 something is still my first love.)
Saturday i bunked gym. (Yes, i feel awful about it, but the back-to-back Salsa-Bellydancing-Jazzfunk classes today will be my redemption.) Went for Chak De India with chilla pilli in the evening, brought the theatre down with hoots and claps - esp. when our sobby SRK says, "Woh kya hai na, humaare hockey mein chakkey nahi hote." Lovely, one more cricket-hater. (As an aside, SRK's acting was commendable. The role suits his age more than the sloppy necking scenes with Rani in 'KANK'. Ugh. Oh, which reminds me, Kunal Kapoor is such a sloppy-wet on-screen pucker-upper - you have to see the trailer of 'Laga Chunari Mein Daag' to know what i'm talking about. Eeeeyuuuuuu, just thinking about it gives me the heebie-jeebies.)
Sunday had it's own list of things to share. Get a little presentable to receive Aunt at the doorstep (there was no way i was getting up early and going to the station to escort her family home), meet Mota-Langda (it's a joke R, do not take offense) and Langoor before they left for Hyderabad, go over to Ri's place for K's send-off session and sleep-over. The sleep-over was super fun. Not to mention some really creepy, crazy videos we caught on V and my (!!!) phone cameras.
Verdict: This is what great weekends are about. Although i don't recommend Sunday night glugging unless there's a holiday on Monday.
Coming up next weekend: A trip to Green Valley.
Let's start with Friday night. I finished early, hung around waiting for an auto, spotted two colleagues going into Casa's for refreshers and joined them. (Warning: Only if you have a really sweet tooth must you try the Chocolate Marble Cake.)
Got home, dragged dad to a store that sold mobile phones. Bought a Sony Ericsson K750i (that too, after two hours of procastination on the 750, 790, 810, 20,000 blah blah...) and i absolutely love it. AND it has a camera!(Of course, my battered old Nokia 33 something is still my first love.)
Saturday i bunked gym. (Yes, i feel awful about it, but the back-to-back Salsa-Bellydancing-Jazzfunk classes today will be my redemption.) Went for Chak De India with chilla pilli in the evening, brought the theatre down with hoots and claps - esp. when our sobby SRK says, "Woh kya hai na, humaare hockey mein chakkey nahi hote." Lovely, one more cricket-hater. (As an aside, SRK's acting was commendable. The role suits his age more than the sloppy necking scenes with Rani in 'KANK'. Ugh. Oh, which reminds me, Kunal Kapoor is such a sloppy-wet on-screen pucker-upper - you have to see the trailer of 'Laga Chunari Mein Daag' to know what i'm talking about. Eeeeyuuuuuu, just thinking about it gives me the heebie-jeebies.)
Sunday had it's own list of things to share. Get a little presentable to receive Aunt at the doorstep (there was no way i was getting up early and going to the station to escort her family home), meet Mota-Langda (it's a joke R, do not take offense) and Langoor before they left for Hyderabad, go over to Ri's place for K's send-off session and sleep-over. The sleep-over was super fun. Not to mention some really creepy, crazy videos we caught on V and my (!!!) phone cameras.
Verdict: This is what great weekends are about. Although i don't recommend Sunday night glugging unless there's a holiday on Monday.
Coming up next weekend: A trip to Green Valley.
Monday, August 06, 2007
Midnight among the mountains.
It was midnight and the rocks were taking a break. They were wind-worn, moist with fog and tired of supporting the flora and fauna around them. Like that wasn't enough, men had peed on them through the day, rubber-soled shoes had trampled on their rocky surfaces (they got their revenge though, turning slippery at places) and the behinds of many a human had mooned them. Just as they breathed their relief at having been left alone, what should they hear but the srcunching of wheels on gravel in the distance.
Two mini-buses full of over-enthusiastic midnight trekkers had just arrived!
They were filing out of the bus, forming a circle and...wait a minute, what are they saying? "Dangerous Deepu, Smart Sreeni, Jolly Jason, Gullible George, Perfect Pallavi..." this wasn't making sense. And why were they moving their hands towards and away from their chest like that, was it some sort of self-stabbing exercise? And, OMG! What was that funny hip thing they were doing??
I refused to move my butt in the Juguju (my dance instructor's term for it is 'Rhonde', and elegantly so) and stayed put, watching the others in the circle: K shivering slightly - her wind cheater was brand new, smart, but highly lacking in providing protection from the cold; GK smoking on the side, his bulky backpack resting beside him; A with his camera; S laughing silently... and on the other half of the circle, all the techies trying to be cool trekkies. They wouldn't have been half as bad, if it wasn't for the fact that i heard two of them cracking Tiger Defense 101 jokes in the mini-bus - "What would you do if a tiger jumped over you? Catch its balls! Ha ha ha ha ha!"
We walked a kilometre on a road made of red soil to get on to the hill christened Kalwarbetta - one of the highest and steepest climbs in the Nandi range. At one point, it felt like the beginning of the Blairwitch Project - flashlights encountering void because they weren't powerful enough to penetrate the air to hit the hills on either side, fences made of dried, thorned bushes and sudden cave-ins of the road. To add to it, just before i left home my mother got weirdly emotional and asked me not to go because she had had a bad dream about me a few days ago.
The moment of ascent crept up slowly on us. It began innocently enough and i was thrilled to bits about actually doing it. By the first break, i couldn't catch up with my own breath, leave alone the rest of the fellow trekkers. The view behind was worth it though - much like the view key-jangling man in ET gets when he stands at the edge of the cliff/mountain. Two minutes later we were climbing again. I think it was at this point that i really began to lose it - my body began protesting, quietly admonishing me for not having gymmed that day so i could be prepared for the pain and shortness of breath. (K was humming songs all the way up. Kickboxing thrice a week must be much tougher.)
My vision blurred, my lungs gave up and i could only see darkness around me. (Duh.) A ray of light pierced the darkness and i heard the oracle speak, "Hey, are you okay? Do you want water? Sip it, don't gulp, you'll only get more tired." She was a vision of strength, stamina and motivation. Ashamed as i am to say it, i didn't let her leave my side through the rest of the trek. Her left hand pressing into the hollow of my back kept me moving throughout. In between, i lost my balance real bad and would have tumbled God-knows-how-many feet, but she was there to propel me forward. In short, i was a complete sissy.
Three-quarters of the way up, somebody shone the light on the oracle's face, and who should i see but Anita, a classmate from college! The rest of the trek was easy-breezy (!) because i had somebody to talk to. (P claims to know my year book by heart, that's how much catching up Anita had to do from me.)
After all the huffing and puffing, it was sort of an anti-climax when we reached the top of the hill because it came so abruptly. The once-erect fort of Tipu Sultan lay scattered in ruins, grass and lichen growing over the stones. It looked haunting and gorgeous. At least what we could see of it, because the fog was descending rapidly. We had three hours to kill before sunrise, and no tents or bonfire to keep us warm. Temperatures dropped so much that any minute Dementors would come flying at us out of the castle, wearing armours and crying "Tipu Sultan! Zindabad!". K sat huddled in seven layers of clothing (alright, five), P and GK constantly smoked, S was just standing and A for the better part of it was one among the circle of people who were playing games. I was walking around, giving K and P a hug (none for GK and S - the latter i didn't know too well, and the former was the 'mard ko sard nahi hota' types because he gave his jacket away to K), avoiding getting whammied by the wind and constantly thinking that i was possessed because i was seeing people where there weren't any.
Five 'o' clock came, and with it a strange vision of white floating cloth. As it approached us, we could just about make out the boy-man under the shawl asking us if we wanted water or biscuits. Five in the morning, in the middle of nowhere, selling water and biscuits? He was either a ghost or demented. The fog was still so thick that we could have happily cut ourselves big pieces of it and eaten it up. Which also meant that our chances of seeing the sunrise were next to none. Ouch, i thought, considering i was the one who'd told these guys about the 'full moon trek' and the 'magnificent sunrise' on Kalwarbetta. The guilt weighed me down along with the fog.
Six fifteen, and the sun still refused to make its presence known. Reluctantly, we started our descent. This time, i was exhausted but didn't give up. GK had said that the uphill climb would be terrible, but it would seem worth it when we started down. He was right - the world looked like something else from up there - virgin greens and browns, giant white fluffs moving in the sky casting shadows on the ground, water bodies sprinkled randomly... a part of Bangalore that was more hill station and less IT city.
Surprisingly, the downward journey seemed much, much longer than the climb. When i reached the base, i turned around and asked GK who was walking behind me, "F***, we climbed that much?" He went, "No." Pause. "We climbed much higher." Oh freak. Not bad at all.
In the mini-bus, our heads nodded off as our brains tried to shrug away the numbness. K was sleeping on my shoulder and my head was buried so deep in my chest that if the bus had jerked, it would have snapped and rolled over. I must have been snoring, because I felt somebody tap my shoulder - A, sitting next to me, half-asleep himself, did an imitation of brail and asked me to use his shoulder to sleep on.
Ten in the morning, i reached home, well-spent. Would i do a trek again? Yeah. Maybe. In a thousand years.
Two mini-buses full of over-enthusiastic midnight trekkers had just arrived!
They were filing out of the bus, forming a circle and...wait a minute, what are they saying? "Dangerous Deepu, Smart Sreeni, Jolly Jason, Gullible George, Perfect Pallavi..." this wasn't making sense. And why were they moving their hands towards and away from their chest like that, was it some sort of self-stabbing exercise? And, OMG! What was that funny hip thing they were doing??
*-*-*-*-*
I refused to move my butt in the Juguju (my dance instructor's term for it is 'Rhonde', and elegantly so) and stayed put, watching the others in the circle: K shivering slightly - her wind cheater was brand new, smart, but highly lacking in providing protection from the cold; GK smoking on the side, his bulky backpack resting beside him; A with his camera; S laughing silently... and on the other half of the circle, all the techies trying to be cool trekkies. They wouldn't have been half as bad, if it wasn't for the fact that i heard two of them cracking Tiger Defense 101 jokes in the mini-bus - "What would you do if a tiger jumped over you? Catch its balls! Ha ha ha ha ha!"
We walked a kilometre on a road made of red soil to get on to the hill christened Kalwarbetta - one of the highest and steepest climbs in the Nandi range. At one point, it felt like the beginning of the Blairwitch Project - flashlights encountering void because they weren't powerful enough to penetrate the air to hit the hills on either side, fences made of dried, thorned bushes and sudden cave-ins of the road. To add to it, just before i left home my mother got weirdly emotional and asked me not to go because she had had a bad dream about me a few days ago.
The moment of ascent crept up slowly on us. It began innocently enough and i was thrilled to bits about actually doing it. By the first break, i couldn't catch up with my own breath, leave alone the rest of the fellow trekkers. The view behind was worth it though - much like the view key-jangling man in ET gets when he stands at the edge of the cliff/mountain. Two minutes later we were climbing again. I think it was at this point that i really began to lose it - my body began protesting, quietly admonishing me for not having gymmed that day so i could be prepared for the pain and shortness of breath. (K was humming songs all the way up. Kickboxing thrice a week must be much tougher.)
My vision blurred, my lungs gave up and i could only see darkness around me. (Duh.) A ray of light pierced the darkness and i heard the oracle speak, "Hey, are you okay? Do you want water? Sip it, don't gulp, you'll only get more tired." She was a vision of strength, stamina and motivation. Ashamed as i am to say it, i didn't let her leave my side through the rest of the trek. Her left hand pressing into the hollow of my back kept me moving throughout. In between, i lost my balance real bad and would have tumbled God-knows-how-many feet, but she was there to propel me forward. In short, i was a complete sissy.
Three-quarters of the way up, somebody shone the light on the oracle's face, and who should i see but Anita, a classmate from college! The rest of the trek was easy-breezy (!) because i had somebody to talk to. (P claims to know my year book by heart, that's how much catching up Anita had to do from me.)
After all the huffing and puffing, it was sort of an anti-climax when we reached the top of the hill because it came so abruptly. The once-erect fort of Tipu Sultan lay scattered in ruins, grass and lichen growing over the stones. It looked haunting and gorgeous. At least what we could see of it, because the fog was descending rapidly. We had three hours to kill before sunrise, and no tents or bonfire to keep us warm. Temperatures dropped so much that any minute Dementors would come flying at us out of the castle, wearing armours and crying "Tipu Sultan! Zindabad!". K sat huddled in seven layers of clothing (alright, five), P and GK constantly smoked, S was just standing and A for the better part of it was one among the circle of people who were playing games. I was walking around, giving K and P a hug (none for GK and S - the latter i didn't know too well, and the former was the 'mard ko sard nahi hota' types because he gave his jacket away to K), avoiding getting whammied by the wind and constantly thinking that i was possessed because i was seeing people where there weren't any.
Five 'o' clock came, and with it a strange vision of white floating cloth. As it approached us, we could just about make out the boy-man under the shawl asking us if we wanted water or biscuits. Five in the morning, in the middle of nowhere, selling water and biscuits? He was either a ghost or demented. The fog was still so thick that we could have happily cut ourselves big pieces of it and eaten it up. Which also meant that our chances of seeing the sunrise were next to none. Ouch, i thought, considering i was the one who'd told these guys about the 'full moon trek' and the 'magnificent sunrise' on Kalwarbetta. The guilt weighed me down along with the fog.
Six fifteen, and the sun still refused to make its presence known. Reluctantly, we started our descent. This time, i was exhausted but didn't give up. GK had said that the uphill climb would be terrible, but it would seem worth it when we started down. He was right - the world looked like something else from up there - virgin greens and browns, giant white fluffs moving in the sky casting shadows on the ground, water bodies sprinkled randomly... a part of Bangalore that was more hill station and less IT city.
Surprisingly, the downward journey seemed much, much longer than the climb. When i reached the base, i turned around and asked GK who was walking behind me, "F***, we climbed that much?" He went, "No." Pause. "We climbed much higher." Oh freak. Not bad at all.
In the mini-bus, our heads nodded off as our brains tried to shrug away the numbness. K was sleeping on my shoulder and my head was buried so deep in my chest that if the bus had jerked, it would have snapped and rolled over. I must have been snoring, because I felt somebody tap my shoulder - A, sitting next to me, half-asleep himself, did an imitation of brail and asked me to use his shoulder to sleep on.
Ten in the morning, i reached home, well-spent. Would i do a trek again? Yeah. Maybe. In a thousand years.
*-*-*-*-*
"*&!&#!@^$&^$&^)(!#%$%", cursed the rocks. Thank God the intruders were off, especially the fat-assed woman constantly panting and whimpering like a little child. Her name was just apt for her - Nitwit something. So thinking, the rocks and trees and earthworms relaxed a little, letting the early morning dew cool their temper. But the bliss was short-lived. Hordes of vehicles arrived, bringing with them some people, plenty of food and a bit of alcohol. Oh God! Would they do the hip-thing too??
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Life is beautiful.
A papercup full of hot water mixing with tea leaves mixing with sugar cubes mixed with plenty of crisply fresh rain mixed with some Desert Rose. Heady, heady combination.
I wouldn't trade places with anybody else right now.
I wouldn't trade places with anybody else right now.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Reality bytes. (Dedicated to Kaykay.)
It was pouring last evening - like nature was dealing whiplashes to all of us on Earth because we deserved it. Every single auto we (K and i) asked wanted 150 bucks and more to take us to our destination. After much hunting, though (thank God, PK had a car and we just had to roll down the window) we found an autowallah willing to take us. I decided to not act like the aggressive woman i am and quietly got into the auto.
Two things struck me - one, that the driver had made no demands for any extra money while everybody else was trying to capitalise on the rain; two, he made a conscious effort to avoid puddles and not splash all three of us (him, K and me. Duh!) with dirty water. So imagine our surprise when, close to Cunningham Road, an impatient boor zips past in his car (a Maruti van too, not even a Swift or a Merc) and leaves in his wake three victims soaked in yucky water. K and i escaped with little damage, but the autowallah didn't. The right side of his uniform (and his face) was dripping. He cussed all the way - just because the boor had a car, didn't mean that he could do what he wanted; there was no cause for him to be inconsiderate and do what he did. In a way, what the autowallah said made sense. I felt sorry for him, riding in the cold rain with his uniform offering him next to no protection.
About a 100 yards away from my dropping K off, the auto broke down. Some clutch problem. So our man got out - bare feet - in the pouring rain, and got to work trying to fix the problem. I felt like a heel, sitting there cocooned while he ventured into water. There isn't much i could do, but that didn't stop me from feeling the way i did. 20 minutes later, he came back, gave me a smile, said that the clutch was broken and started the auto. I didn't pay too much attention to what he was saying because i was aghast at his state - it looked like he had just got out of a washing machine without the tumble dry feature!
As i sat there, feeling worse by the minute (no it wasn't my fault, but i felt terrible for the chap), i counted my blessings. Each and every one of them. It would be uncomfortable to live like that, and i'm grateful to God for having made me who i am, for giving me all that he did. It's like Kaykay used to say always: we sit and crib about little things like work, and how little money we're getting, life sucks and blah blah. And then when we look at people like the autowallah, their living conditions, the fact that they manage to smile through it all, and then we can't help but feel like the scum at the bottom of the pond. Makes us wonder who's the better off of the two. Us or them.
P.S: Yes, i do seem to be bestowed with the power to communicate fairly decently with auto drivers - that's provided i get to sit in their auto first. Struck up a conversation with him, found out he used to do welding work. Fell off from a buildign where he was working and hurt himself badly enough to discontinue the labour. Chose to ride an auto instead because, ironically, he thought it was less work, and his body can't take much strain. 30 years old, married with three children, was planning to give up riding and start a business of his own (I think starting a business without money in your pocket is a bad, bad idea, but i didn't tell him that). He didn't ask for an extra pie (sceptics would say that after the sob sorry, he wouldn't need to), and for just that i gave him a 100 rupee note. Better spent on decent drivers who don't ask for it than the goddarn leching, pompous pricks who do.
Two things struck me - one, that the driver had made no demands for any extra money while everybody else was trying to capitalise on the rain; two, he made a conscious effort to avoid puddles and not splash all three of us (him, K and me. Duh!) with dirty water. So imagine our surprise when, close to Cunningham Road, an impatient boor zips past in his car (a Maruti van too, not even a Swift or a Merc) and leaves in his wake three victims soaked in yucky water. K and i escaped with little damage, but the autowallah didn't. The right side of his uniform (and his face) was dripping. He cussed all the way - just because the boor had a car, didn't mean that he could do what he wanted; there was no cause for him to be inconsiderate and do what he did. In a way, what the autowallah said made sense. I felt sorry for him, riding in the cold rain with his uniform offering him next to no protection.
About a 100 yards away from my dropping K off, the auto broke down. Some clutch problem. So our man got out - bare feet - in the pouring rain, and got to work trying to fix the problem. I felt like a heel, sitting there cocooned while he ventured into water. There isn't much i could do, but that didn't stop me from feeling the way i did. 20 minutes later, he came back, gave me a smile, said that the clutch was broken and started the auto. I didn't pay too much attention to what he was saying because i was aghast at his state - it looked like he had just got out of a washing machine without the tumble dry feature!
As i sat there, feeling worse by the minute (no it wasn't my fault, but i felt terrible for the chap), i counted my blessings. Each and every one of them. It would be uncomfortable to live like that, and i'm grateful to God for having made me who i am, for giving me all that he did. It's like Kaykay used to say always: we sit and crib about little things like work, and how little money we're getting, life sucks and blah blah. And then when we look at people like the autowallah, their living conditions, the fact that they manage to smile through it all, and then we can't help but feel like the scum at the bottom of the pond. Makes us wonder who's the better off of the two. Us or them.
P.S: Yes, i do seem to be bestowed with the power to communicate fairly decently with auto drivers - that's provided i get to sit in their auto first. Struck up a conversation with him, found out he used to do welding work. Fell off from a buildign where he was working and hurt himself badly enough to discontinue the labour. Chose to ride an auto instead because, ironically, he thought it was less work, and his body can't take much strain. 30 years old, married with three children, was planning to give up riding and start a business of his own (I think starting a business without money in your pocket is a bad, bad idea, but i didn't tell him that). He didn't ask for an extra pie (sceptics would say that after the sob sorry, he wouldn't need to), and for just that i gave him a 100 rupee note. Better spent on decent drivers who don't ask for it than the goddarn leching, pompous pricks who do.
Friday, July 27, 2007
Senses.
No bellydancing on Wednesday. My instructor's dance company - Tarantismo - was putting up a theatrical dance show at Alliance Francaise. Yesterday was the first of a series of five shows, and i was there. (So were some of the Page 3 people, but they're not my concern.)
I hurried through my gymming like the world was on fire, and reached just in time to be shuffled into the hall. Five minutes of shifting seats from one row to another, and we were ready for 'Senses' - the name and theme of their performance. PK -who's going to be part of the troupe soon - was in charge of sound, lights and music. Her name was mentioned in the brochures being passed around - with a spello, of course. So her surname was actually printed Katari (In a sort of rustic hindi, it means knife). We couldn't stop laughing.
The show started with a brief narrative by A, with the rest of the troupe on stage. It's amazing how different people look with make-up and shimmering gold bodysuits on. Like the name of the show suggests, the dancers took us through the five senses - sight, touch, taste, smell and sound (not in order).
I found the concept extremely interesting. For 'Sight', the dancers performed blindfold. Perfect co-ordination, flawless dancing and formations - despite the temporary impairment of their vision, they didn't once falter or lose their place on stage. It was quite remarkable. 'Touch' was the longest piece - exploring same-sex love, broken relationships, the bond between a woman and her just-born, sexual abuse and man-woman happiness. 'Taste' could have explored plenty such situations and emotions as well but they stuck to food. 'Sound' was good fun - a melange of belly dancers (waistbands with coins and mini-cymbals in the hand), bharatnatyam (ghungroos), dandiya and a junior shivamani (!)
Smell was probably the most dramatic, and perhaps, horrifying. Of this, there's only one thing i remember feeling - a chill creep up my spine as A ended her narrative with "The aroma of lust, and the stench of a dead animal."
Entertaining evening, on the whole. I'm looking forward to more shows of this sort.
I hurried through my gymming like the world was on fire, and reached just in time to be shuffled into the hall. Five minutes of shifting seats from one row to another, and we were ready for 'Senses' - the name and theme of their performance. PK -who's going to be part of the troupe soon - was in charge of sound, lights and music. Her name was mentioned in the brochures being passed around - with a spello, of course. So her surname was actually printed Katari (In a sort of rustic hindi, it means knife). We couldn't stop laughing.
The show started with a brief narrative by A, with the rest of the troupe on stage. It's amazing how different people look with make-up and shimmering gold bodysuits on. Like the name of the show suggests, the dancers took us through the five senses - sight, touch, taste, smell and sound (not in order).
I found the concept extremely interesting. For 'Sight', the dancers performed blindfold. Perfect co-ordination, flawless dancing and formations - despite the temporary impairment of their vision, they didn't once falter or lose their place on stage. It was quite remarkable. 'Touch' was the longest piece - exploring same-sex love, broken relationships, the bond between a woman and her just-born, sexual abuse and man-woman happiness. 'Taste' could have explored plenty such situations and emotions as well but they stuck to food. 'Sound' was good fun - a melange of belly dancers (waistbands with coins and mini-cymbals in the hand), bharatnatyam (ghungroos), dandiya and a junior shivamani (!)
Smell was probably the most dramatic, and perhaps, horrifying. Of this, there's only one thing i remember feeling - a chill creep up my spine as A ended her narrative with "The aroma of lust, and the stench of a dead animal."
Entertaining evening, on the whole. I'm looking forward to more shows of this sort.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
danah boyd.
I was sent this link today to browse through. I might sound unintelligent saying this, but being unintelligent is a choice i've made: she's brilliant. And not coldly so, if you know what i mean. Most people who are brilliant are estranged from the basest of feelings (Sex and hunger drives not included), but not her. I guess that what makes her breed of brilliance - the exceptionally high levels of emotional intelligence combined with what all of us refer to normally as IQ.
She has done so much, so much in her life so far - the list is quite endless. Makes me feel quite worthless. In one of her posts, she speaks of whether all of us have the opportunity to travel and learn but eliminate it because of our lack of interest, and perhaps she strove to avoid falling into the trap, hence she is what she is - well-travelled, an authority on virtual social networking, etc. I don't know about anybody else out there, but i felt like she was talking about me - i am one of those people she refers to. I could have travelled, i could have learnt. Rather than leverage my thinking capacity - which, i know without trying to sound pompous, is way above average - i decided to let it go. I could have been anything i wanted to be, i could have been as perfect as i wanted to be. But i decided not to.
Most people don't understand this about me, this desire for perfection. It has nothing to do with professional ambition, and everything to do with personal satisfaction, peace for my own soul. I don't intend to compete with anybody, i intend only to challenge myself. And keep challenging, till i know there's no more i can do. I want to be the person i can look up to and never find fault with. I don't know if that makes sense to anyone.
I've been a coward innumerable times and have given up just too easily on a number of things that i could have been great at, if i had just pushed myself. And reading danah boyd's blog just brought it all back with such incredible clarity and force that i'm feeling quite vulnerable right now. And there's nobody to blame for that but me.
Right now, i'm wishing that i could go back to doing all those things and carrying the same zest for life i had years ago. But i know that if i sit still for a while or find means of distracting myself, this feeling will pass. I'll be back to being the coward i am.
She has done so much, so much in her life so far - the list is quite endless. Makes me feel quite worthless. In one of her posts, she speaks of whether all of us have the opportunity to travel and learn but eliminate it because of our lack of interest, and perhaps she strove to avoid falling into the trap, hence she is what she is - well-travelled, an authority on virtual social networking, etc. I don't know about anybody else out there, but i felt like she was talking about me - i am one of those people she refers to. I could have travelled, i could have learnt. Rather than leverage my thinking capacity - which, i know without trying to sound pompous, is way above average - i decided to let it go. I could have been anything i wanted to be, i could have been as perfect as i wanted to be. But i decided not to.
Most people don't understand this about me, this desire for perfection. It has nothing to do with professional ambition, and everything to do with personal satisfaction, peace for my own soul. I don't intend to compete with anybody, i intend only to challenge myself. And keep challenging, till i know there's no more i can do. I want to be the person i can look up to and never find fault with. I don't know if that makes sense to anyone.
I've been a coward innumerable times and have given up just too easily on a number of things that i could have been great at, if i had just pushed myself. And reading danah boyd's blog just brought it all back with such incredible clarity and force that i'm feeling quite vulnerable right now. And there's nobody to blame for that but me.
Right now, i'm wishing that i could go back to doing all those things and carrying the same zest for life i had years ago. But i know that if i sit still for a while or find means of distracting myself, this feeling will pass. I'll be back to being the coward i am.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Losing my religion. Sort of.
I go for dance classes - jazz funk and bellydancing - that happen in the evenings on the terrace of a play school in Richmond Town. (Phew. Talk about endless sentences.) I met a little girl here whose Mommy was part of the Salsa class happening just before my bellydancing. I struck a conversation with little Tanishka to make her feel better about being left to fend for herself while her mother danced - school, friends, what she likes etc. A brief interlude of silence followed, where i didn't know what else to ask her. Out of the blue she goes, "You know, I'm a Hindu." Wha?! Assuming i'd heard wrong from her 4-year old mouth, i asked her to repeat it. And she did. "I'm a Hindu", she said.
I had asked her nothing at all about her faith. Naturally, no person would ask something of the sort from one so young. Yet, she thought it important enough to be part of a conversation she might have with anybody.
My first reaction was panic. I'm not sure she fully understood what she was saying, or the enormity of the statement she was making. It was scary that she was growing in an atmosphere where her religion was being drilled into her not just as words, but as behaviour and more importantly, as a foundation for her future beliefs and actions. Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying it's a bad thing. It's just that with the way things are going right now, i wouldn't be surprised if all this tutoring makes her something of an educated zealot.
This isn't just true of her, you know. I have my own cousins, all of them not more than 11 years of age. Already, when they meet their non-Muslim friends, they go chee when they see idols and all that. I'm stunned into silence, because it's such a wrong way to behave. Religion is something each of us has the independence to practice in our own way. Imposing one's beliefs on others is just so...uncouth, and such an exploitation.
And yet, is it any surprise that these things happen in our households, while the same occurs on a larger scale across the nation? Is it any surprise, when moral police from the religions fighting for domination in India hash and re-hash and ruin educational material, introducing conflict in content? Is it any surprise that each of us is religiously afraid of each other thanks to some bloody people somewhere who decided to start a fight and blow it out of proportion? I mean, think about this: for years, the Taj Mahal was admired for its beauty, and heralded by all and sundry as the one thing India and Indians should be culturally proud of. Suddenly, we have people who claim that the foundation was laid over an ancient temple. Innumerable texts and pamphlets were circulated, e-mails passed around. People had protests all over, and then they evolved into fights. The Raj Kumar protests are another example: the man died from natural causes, and Bangalore went berserk with grief. If it was possible, they would have stoned the Gods to death for taking away their beloved annavaru. Some places, buses were burnt and public property damaged. A boy was killed in some sort of stampede. His religious identity then started a semi-war between Hindus and Muslims.
It's like, people are waiting for an opportunity to bring out swords and fight in the name of God. And they're readying armies of the future by instilling thoughts in the heads of children as young as Tanishka.
It worries me no end. I hope i'm not around to see the last defining act of this degenerative process.
I had asked her nothing at all about her faith. Naturally, no person would ask something of the sort from one so young. Yet, she thought it important enough to be part of a conversation she might have with anybody.
My first reaction was panic. I'm not sure she fully understood what she was saying, or the enormity of the statement she was making. It was scary that she was growing in an atmosphere where her religion was being drilled into her not just as words, but as behaviour and more importantly, as a foundation for her future beliefs and actions. Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying it's a bad thing. It's just that with the way things are going right now, i wouldn't be surprised if all this tutoring makes her something of an educated zealot.
This isn't just true of her, you know. I have my own cousins, all of them not more than 11 years of age. Already, when they meet their non-Muslim friends, they go chee when they see idols and all that. I'm stunned into silence, because it's such a wrong way to behave. Religion is something each of us has the independence to practice in our own way. Imposing one's beliefs on others is just so...uncouth, and such an exploitation.
And yet, is it any surprise that these things happen in our households, while the same occurs on a larger scale across the nation? Is it any surprise, when moral police from the religions fighting for domination in India hash and re-hash and ruin educational material, introducing conflict in content? Is it any surprise that each of us is religiously afraid of each other thanks to some bloody people somewhere who decided to start a fight and blow it out of proportion? I mean, think about this: for years, the Taj Mahal was admired for its beauty, and heralded by all and sundry as the one thing India and Indians should be culturally proud of. Suddenly, we have people who claim that the foundation was laid over an ancient temple. Innumerable texts and pamphlets were circulated, e-mails passed around. People had protests all over, and then they evolved into fights. The Raj Kumar protests are another example: the man died from natural causes, and Bangalore went berserk with grief. If it was possible, they would have stoned the Gods to death for taking away their beloved annavaru. Some places, buses were burnt and public property damaged. A boy was killed in some sort of stampede. His religious identity then started a semi-war between Hindus and Muslims.
It's like, people are waiting for an opportunity to bring out swords and fight in the name of God. And they're readying armies of the future by instilling thoughts in the heads of children as young as Tanishka.
It worries me no end. I hope i'm not around to see the last defining act of this degenerative process.
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Garbage - Stupid Girl
One of my all-time favourites. (I vowed never to indulge in putting up videos and clips on my blog. Guess i have to chew on my own hard-boiled words now.)
Started out intensely disliking Garbage and their music, and then it just grew on me. I think it was the videos that freaked me out more than anything else.
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Random thoughts that are not so random.
I met Y for lunch today. We got talking about things, like hair colour, when my maid entered into the conversation. And i told Y about how she was bringing up three children all on her own. She left her husband years ago because he was an alcoholic, beat her and gave her a lot of grief. Before the words quite escaped from my lips, Y said, "It's so funny that we are educated people, yet when it comes to marriage and domestic issues, we prefer to stay in it and sort it out."
It's true. I know of a couple - R and F - who've had problems ever since they tied the knot, but have stuck on for donkey's years despite domestic violence and what-not. And these are the same people who persuaded my previous maid to leave her husband when she came home at 1 in the morning with a bandaged head. She left him, and to this day the other couple do nothing more than applaud my maid's courage. Likewise my present maid too. They were proud of her for having taken the brave step of leaving hubby behind. Makes me wonder, who's really empowered?
Does all of this mean that educated people are cowards when it comes to opting out of dissatisfactory marriages? Does it mean that they've got much more to lose than my maid or somebody else who isn't so well-to-do? What stops them anyway, the fact that they have social circles who wag tongues freely to deliver whiplashes of hurt and misery? Or are they duty-bound to their families, the people who attended their glorious weddings and the people they are married to? For that matter, what made my maids leave their husbands? It couldn't have been easy for them, not with their social backgrounds where morality is held in highest regard and leading a 'pure' life is so much more important. (This, by the way, is fodder for another post. I believe that when people have nothing else to hold on to, they clutch on to their morality. It's subjective... and not open to debate.) Yet these women did it. And they survived. And today, they're happy. Happy. Did they do it because, like Y says, they had nothing more to lose? They had seen the worst in life, and there was nothing else that could happen?
Frankly, i don't know. Which is why it scares me plenty to think that if i get married, i will be joining millions of the educated class on the bandwagon. And predictably, i know where that will land me too.
It's true. I know of a couple - R and F - who've had problems ever since they tied the knot, but have stuck on for donkey's years despite domestic violence and what-not. And these are the same people who persuaded my previous maid to leave her husband when she came home at 1 in the morning with a bandaged head. She left him, and to this day the other couple do nothing more than applaud my maid's courage. Likewise my present maid too. They were proud of her for having taken the brave step of leaving hubby behind. Makes me wonder, who's really empowered?
Does all of this mean that educated people are cowards when it comes to opting out of dissatisfactory marriages? Does it mean that they've got much more to lose than my maid or somebody else who isn't so well-to-do? What stops them anyway, the fact that they have social circles who wag tongues freely to deliver whiplashes of hurt and misery? Or are they duty-bound to their families, the people who attended their glorious weddings and the people they are married to? For that matter, what made my maids leave their husbands? It couldn't have been easy for them, not with their social backgrounds where morality is held in highest regard and leading a 'pure' life is so much more important. (This, by the way, is fodder for another post. I believe that when people have nothing else to hold on to, they clutch on to their morality. It's subjective... and not open to debate.) Yet these women did it. And they survived. And today, they're happy. Happy. Did they do it because, like Y says, they had nothing more to lose? They had seen the worst in life, and there was nothing else that could happen?
Frankly, i don't know. Which is why it scares me plenty to think that if i get married, i will be joining millions of the educated class on the bandwagon. And predictably, i know where that will land me too.
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