Spit for Thought........

The face resembled so much to the worn out faces I see everyday, of men in lungi,sweating hard,stinking bad,in share-rickshaws and railway stations.He was a short,lean,dark man and he came walking,swaying all along.He seemed to enjoy some unheard music that apparently was playing only for him.The huge government buses rattled beside him,the rickshaws,the share autos,the innumerable tvs50s that cover he largest percent of Chennai's suburban kacchapukka roads,daddies in cars driving carefully along,men on bicycles,walking children,shopkeepers drawing down their shutters to go home for an early dinner,,,,,ladies selling flowers on the roadside,,,,,dust all over,smoke all over...noise all over..there was nothing unusual today as I got down the cab and waited for the traffic to subside so that I could cross da road......As I advanced further, I could see him walking along the road towards me.I stepped back, allowing him to pass through....He was drunk..completely..da smell could actually kill an infant.Before I could realise that he wasn't walking anymore and had stopped and was staring me...It came flying onto my clothes...The cream coloured kurta that I wore to office today was smeared on the borders with sticky red spit..He spat on me!!!I was struck with silence,,a spell of all loud thunders.But there was more to come..He walked a little ahead, picked up some mud,shouted something and threw at me.I didn't want to run away.I stood like there like an innocent convict questioning his crime.He was totally drunk,upto the brim of this tiny slim throat which had layers of skin hanging out..He was wrinkled...he was old and he looked tired......That he was drunk proved lucky for me,he missed his target.The mud flew over my face,blurring my eyes....n even in the smoke of the dust,I could see him laughing.........laughing and singing...He realised his moment had come n just as any ecstatic hero falls on to the ground and kisses the battlefield,he stumbled and fell down....n there he lay ,the smile still showing on his lips and the song still coming out.The watchmen of the society came running,people stopped,sum to comprehend what actually happened and some just to use their muscles to kick an old drunkard lying on the road who was seen"eve teasing"...The victim "me" was given some sympathetic glances.The men offerred to kick the life out of the poor hero lying on the ground but the presence of a police station exactly opposite kinda obstructed their flow of chivalry..

The drama went on for five minutes.My 'assaulter' lay happily unconscious.The watchman told me he was a regular sight there,worked as a labourer in a construction nearby.I wasn't angry with me.I wasn't even scared .I didn't want people to hit him.But I was shaken!He made me think of the numerous selvis,pushpas and lakshmis(domestic workers in my building) who need to put up with such people as their husbands,not for running their houses, but just for social and security reasons.

The traffic resumed,the dust,noise and the smoke too came back...I walked back home thinking about.... everything.... Suddenly everything seemed to have a solution, an answer that in turn posed another question.I get choked wen I write this..I have always felt for the under-privileged women of the Indian society more than anything else..This time it's a lot more..As I wash my kurta today and try to brush off the stains of his saliva,I know many a stain on the society that we live in will take ages to get removed.Our life styles,migration and dislocation of ppl to cities and their empty bargains with their own destinies,disparities in the stratas of the same society,social evils,ground breaking truths

and unnerving realities......The cloud gets denser and denser..Today would be a long night for me............

The doctor says"It's a gal!!!"

It's the fire in my eyes,the flash in my teeth;

The swing in my waist and the joy in my feet....I am a woman...a phenomenal woman....!!!!

No, I am not talking about Michelle Obama....This may come across as a neatly phrased,imminently powerful and subtly strong lines describing the so called "woman of Substance".These may actually look the best on cards meant to be gifted to these "important women of our lives" on Women's Day ,to, may be, elude them,may be, convince them or may be to just give them that twitter of hope that they are treated on par with men....I see women languishing on my televison sets every now and then.Some are weeping in their "maykaas" perpetually while some are making elaborate preparations to head off to their "sasuraals" where they can languish more... some are already there in "sasuraals",all decked up with extensive jewellery but heading off to prisons and dungeons ..everywhere.Thats the whole issue.The area around some women is so glossy and glamorous that one feels they are the new queens and empressess of the new world.With some women,you really don know what's the story.Women have learnt to live in different spectra..some vye for power,some for money ,some for existence...same as men...but one lil thing separates them-the constant struggle to fight for dignity.This fight might be as simple as Rihanna's fight against Chris Brown's violence on her,or her subsequent subjugation to it, or my maid's determination to learn to read and write so that she saves her money in the money,away from the prowling eyes of her wayward,drunkard husband.Women trust other women more than they trust their husbands.All my maids have an agony in common.They get beaten up,ritually every other day.

Travel down to the suburban areas areas of Tamil Nadu someday.An interesting,infact hilarious sight awaits you...At nights you see huge,macho men,clad in dhotis tied high,exposing their long chaddis ,beating up their wives...wait untill the dawn the next morning.the situation now gets reversed.It's now victory time for the same women to bash up their useless husbands.The women in south are strong, better educated than their counterpart in other parts of the country,and they talk,they can go on talking and they talk sense 70% of the time...They want to be independent and they want a life of dignity.They have the urge to live a life of expressions and freedom and they try hard for that,even if they need to break ties with their husband.They speak about their rights with such intensity and passion that you get intimidated.Tamilndadu has the highest percentage of women employment. You see women labourers,domestic women workers,even fisherwomen,nurses,women making tea ,frying eggs on bus stand stalls,selling "mallipoos n kankambharams(gajras),roses,kadalai(peanuts),buttermilk" ....in trains,buses,on the roadside.The state has employed a huge number of traditional water harvesting methods that requires a lot of human labour.A bus ride in the suburban part of the city will treat you to the most glorious sight of the bucolic fete..Women with knee lenght sarees,bent down,rapidly picking up weeds and collecting them on straw baskets that they mke during the nights,while their husband hunt for the little fishes that might have strayed in the slushy streams..

I remember once when we lived in the city,we wanted to go to the beach one day and as we waited or a rickshaw,we prepared ourselves for the expected haggling and nonsensical bargainning with the very 'dangerous,foul-mouthed rickshawkara"..to our bewilderment,the one that stopped infront of us,had two ladies on the driver's seat,we got in immediately.We didnt mind paying them a little extra .We almost emoted the theory of relativity..How cool and bold of them..We were happy with the sight actually and there we journeyed,,along the roads of adyar and besant nagar upto the beach,two pretty ladies in the front earning their way out in this profession reseverved initally only for men,while five prettier ladies sqeezed ,sat and talked all the way behind..Women Empowerment,women Emanicipation....? Ya....as they say,the under all glimmer and shine,lies the truth,the forbidden reality...

We had gone to Spencer Plaza yesterday after a long time.I love outings,especially the short ones,the eveining ones which refresh you and that if you have Rishabh and Ridhima with you,you could go mad,with Ridhima actually being dumb and sweet most of the times and Rish with his N95 ,showing us random pics or we clicking our puzu pics with it ....As we were discussing the mystic,vocal sounds that one of my friend produces when she's asleep,on the Egmore station,we heard a quick thundering sound,n then it came again,,and again,with every time,da fierceness increased..it was not the the engine breaking down,it was a man,decently dressed beating up a gal sitting on the bench.He was on the phone a short while ago and god knows wat discovery or realisation had advanced upon him that he was violently thrashing up the gal,who looked much younger than him.....People on the station stared at the tenacity of the situation.some ridiculed,some shared pathetic glances at each other, some just walked away........and some just stood on thinking...........I was hurt,I was angry but I didnt know how to react.I was scared too....and I felt enslaved.......The term "weaker sex" wasn't coined by a chunk of high society women who wanted to overwhelm the males by playing the 'less privileged'.As the train left the station, I looked at the gal,she had her face buried in her hands.She was shaking and there was nobody to hold her,shame on me too!!!

A journalist is killed in the the capital and the chief minister feels she invited her fate cos she was "too adventurous"..Someday wen I go to office,with my face wrapped in a dupatta,people call me "taliban"...There was sum "talibanization" in Mangalore pubs happening sumtime back and Ms Renuka Chowdhury was displaying her theatre skills all over again,in an improvised,appealing manner on all leading news channels.And there's yet another "Moderate Taliban" according to president Obama,which isnt all that extremist with just 5 % of them being high handed muslims(This amazing statistic was the result of Joe Biden's exhaustive research on the same topic....).Too many talibans to talk about,yes only talk about.We all are veterans at talking..that's it...It all seems preposterous now,even to debate upon.

Violence against women has always been an unpleasant reality.It happens all over the globe.The victims,surpsingly range from the most common of households,to the lower strata,and also the high earning,champagne-drinking league...Many a reigning beauty queen's face has been scarred by the ugly punches of infamously famous yet popular men....I won't preach soultions to this vice,simply cos I know women would actually not come out with it in the open.As long as they remain landlocked in their plateau of so called moral subjugations,compromises and "protecteion of honour", no God would ever help them to throw away that Adam's rib in them and help them grow their own,individually and independently.This whole racket of "women liberation" fails for me when a women's dignity is questioned and silenced with the raise of one "powerful" hand.A woman is no parabola that can only either block a man's retreat into her or succumb to his advances.They aren't mere products who get flogged when religions and faith enter their testing zones.They are just age old victims of opression who,unfortunately live in close association, sometimes forcefully,sometimes out of their own consent,with their opressors fighting silent fraternizing battles with them for dignified living,apologizing for their strengths .Pain for most of them is not an undeserved punishment,it's just natural heritage...That's a soul wrenching tragedy of this whole impediment...For all you silent men out there supposed to be listening.........never let the hand that holds you,ever go down............Women might come across as feeble,weak creatures but remeber a teabag goes strong wen dipped in hot water....Given the right place,right situation ,right time,and right set of men,women might rule the world sumday with dignity and indentity and make it better,probably much better than what lies today!!!!

The Naming Zone

The walk to the station from my place is barely five minutes,but I prefer taking an auto.Chennai heat kills you.It makes you perspire and,sweat makes you stink.I hate that.As I waited for the auto, in front of bhaiya's shop,I remembered his wife had delivered a baby gal two weeks back and the lil baby would have got a name by now.Bhaiya owns a shop exactly opposite to where we stay.He is an ultra cool guy who talks hindi and tamil with equal fluency which make us respect him,and he is quite lenient with our "bhaiya,paise baad me denge, pakkese" attitude,dat makes our respect for him incease by numerous folds.I walked up to his shop,ordered an amul thanda and asked him,"bhaiya,kya rakha naam,preeti,prateeksha ya pragati".The baby's name was a big bone of contention in bhaiya's family of six,comprising of his parents,his siblings and his wife.Every member of the family wantd to name the baby wt a name of his choice.Thankfully,the baby's rashi sed she needed a name with 'p' ,so the options narrowed down a lil. And they had finally zeroed in on the three names.Ah,he gave me da meswak smile(have been using dat to avoid eating paste,the taste really sucks!!!) and spoke with that "shethji" wala attitude,"ab kya rickshaw prateeksha,it's elections everywhere,election is money,election is fame and election is fun...n more than that look at the contenders and campaigners...have named her priyanka,surname badal nahi sakta but I am very fond of priyanka gandhi,kya face hai uska,kya charm hai,seems to be indira's avtaar all over again..meri baat yaad rakhna,next pm wohi banegi,rahul bhi nahi..."

Well,I convince myself.It happens everywhere.I know my friend Lydia is named after sum Lydia who won the maximum medals at the olympics da year she was born.I have had the privilege to be acquainted with and in fact friends with rekhas,zeenats,
madhuris,kirans,indiras,sachins and the list is endless....Poor ppl,may be the baggage and brunt of making their mark in the world cling onto them da moment they breathe into the world.One of my friend's sister was born when her grandpa was paying a visit to a museum in London which had a big life-size poster of The Buckhingham Palace,n poor old grandpa was so thrilled to get a glimpse of its splendour that wen he got the news of her birth,he immediately ordered that she be named "Elizabeth" and nothing else.She was given an indianized "hindu" version of the name lest grandpa got offended..She is called Alzu today.

And ya, I know of instances when people bring their newborns and very dramatically leave them at the feet of Godmen,babas and soothsayers,sum genuine,sum deceitful.I know of a couple who got their boy named as "Valmiki" by their guruji.The guruji by his foresight predicted that the child would be 'notorious' in his childhood just like Rishi Valmiki was(for the ones who don know history,Valmiki
was a dacoit turned sage cum poet..He s da man behind our age old epic "Ramayaana")and then with lot of introspection and training, he would overcum his notoriety and conquer all levels of unparalled success.Well,faith can move mountains they say,I hope it does move walls and waters too.Little valmiki migrated to London with his parents wen he was a kid.He studies in a posh school there now and the kids there call him "mickey on the wall".

My mom says my name comes in a particular line of Lakshmi Strotam and since I was the first gal in the long extended family of uncles,aunts,grandpas an grandmas n cousins,I was very proudly given the name..it was actually "vasudharini",but my rickshaw driver in kg class couldnt get it propely,atleast poor sensible fellow couldn't associate such a never ending name with a tiny lil gal and he used to shout my mom's name(gita,it was relatively simple) every morning at our doorstep,wen he came to pick me up.Dad didn't kinda like it.May be he realised that I would be facing the same problem trying to remember my own name and he shortened it.Thank god Sense and sanity prevailed....But yes,not every where...I have a lil three year old cousin who's called Srinivasa Raghunandan and since he cannot get it right,no matter how hard he tries,he prefers introducing himself as kemal,thats cos he finds it easy to say that out,it resembles sumwhat to the name of a humped,interesting,dumb looking creature his mom shows on the cd and asks him to repeat after her,and more so because it happens to be his next door ,best "chaddi buddy",yaar's name too...

Names have always fascinated me.I loved the muslim names,even the anglo indian kinds,da old Testament,hebrew ones...I like the charater Anna Karenina so much that I try to infuse her name in very fiction dat i write.I even thought of a hindu name,Anandita,if i ever have a daughter so that I would call her Anna.I know a foreigner called Priscila,who became an ardent ISKCON devotee and changed her name to poornima...She says she loves Krishna,and its only during the poornima's that He cumes down to play raas lila with his gopis..Ah,mythology again?Well,a look into her eyes and u knoe she cant be entirely wrong.

They say the beginning of wisdom lies in calling things by their proper names.I feel another kind of parallel wisdom lies in giving people and products the names you think they deserve...Ya..Nicknames,petnames,they are the names the devil society throws at you and you never know wen u accept them.The worst part is the most ridiculous of them are the most adhesive!!!I have had batteries ,bhopus,tubelights,gotis,chasmis,infact kismis too in schools(many are kinda censored}..These names stick on.Initially they would seem to be stupid similies of association,later they become symbolic sounds of affection.

Then there are names given randomly by your household too,especially the worn out family members,who were either not expecting you,or werent actually prepared for you,or werent genuinely interested to pay any sort of interest to you,or may be just were so ecstatic to have you that the importance of naming you propely didnt actually occur to them.I have many pintus,bhailus,bittus,lalus,bablus and baboos in my neighbourhood.The names look very cute on three four year old running with their half knickers on.But the problem here is -these names are so very sticky dat they cling on-Bhailu kaka(uncle) today has three sons and six grnadchildren,n still he is called bhailu.Infact his passport says he is 'Bhailubhai'.It gets embarrassing for him sometimes but he really can't do anything about it.My maternal grandma once had two huge labradors at her place ,guarding her farm houses.She believes in proper naming of individuals and animals for her are anytime above humans.She called them Rajkumar and Subramanium.All went perfectly okay until a tenant landed up with us.He,sadly had the name Subrahmanium.It was interesting and exciting for we kids to deliberately go to his doorstep,every noon ,and shout "subbu faster,faster,jump,jump,u lazy bones,get up,run,run for ur life,get up else i wil thrash u,ur time starts now.." n subbu the dog would help us,adding on the background by barking continuously and puffing hard.Mr Tenant Subrahmanium left the house in a month and we didn't hear from him anytime after that.Well those are unpleasant incidents that your fateful name brings about....

Well,I remember the riddle I used to ask others wen I was a kid,"sumthin dat's ours,'exclusively ours', but which is given to us by sumone else and used by everybody else".The saga of names seems never ending.The etymologies of our names can be derived by googling,their symbolic presence can be figured out too by sum research but the power they possess,the numbing blows they impart and poetic transgience they supposedly represent, there's always more to look forward to!!!Tigers leave their their skins wen they dies,birds their feathers,trees their trunk and men their names..................

A tribute to sumone special...

Me and my grandma shared many things apart from our common love for toothpastes(weused to eat them and even discuss their tastes secretly,and after many prudent trials,examinations and investigations, we had derieved on this mutual consensus that Colgate toothpowder,dat tasted somewhat like amulya milk powder mixed with lots of grinded POLO mint in it),was the unoppossed and unarguably the best thing we could have in the mornings before she had her filter coffee and I, my bournvita.We both had the habit of sipping infact gulping in steaming,over-piping hot beverages, that can melt down the throat if poured into it at some particular speed from some particular angle.She has been the strongest lady I have come across in life,much stronger than my mom whom I love the most,not because she could dominate her, but because she made my mom accept her the way she was and to some extent, even love her ways.

I believe that in most arranged marriages, the 'love' between the the couple starts only after the children are born ,when their kindergarten dramas, repertoires of school life and college adventures grow in proportions, with the regular saga of uniform ironing and plait making and water bottle filling and home work monitoring tasks get mutually divided between both the parents.Most of the times,I do feel the love between our moms and dads comes merely out of habitual companionship and lots of gratitude which they think, is due for each other.This is because in the initial years of marriage,atleast in those times,most men were confused as to which female to resort to(either their moms,or their newly wed brides).Mom were always a safe option because obedient,dutiful and domesticated sons were considered culturally strong and virtuous, and they,by virtue of unshakeable dedication to their parents,even in the presence of 'wives who can break or make families' earn the prestigious privilege of being identified 'a good son' by the ever judgemental,over weening and interfereing society... And god-forbid not dishonoured with the other-'vice', scandalous title of a henpecked husband listening to the gal, barely two month old in the family... Some may learn to divide their approaches accordingly,like presenting the salary packet to their loving and doting moms every month end but making sure that they sneak out a few notes to give their wives a portion of her personal expenses, or like buying silk saree with a heavy golden border and gifting it to their moms along with their wives,but taking their wives out on park outings and icecream parlours on the pretext of cliched excuses of groceries and vegetable shopping and gifting her a lovely secretive dress she ought to wear only when the couple's alone.My mom might have also been a victim of deprieved,in fact secretive and divided attention.

My mom is strong when it comes to counselling our neighbours on the importance of sending their children to handwriting classes in the vacations or when it comes to teaching a random street kid, the basics of moral science and kindness, when she catches him idly aiming and throwing stones on poor grazing cows and loitering pigs.My mom would make sure to see that every dead creature our vicinity get properly buried and the body is not left rotting in heat,dust and rain.And our household was a museum of pets,lots of cats,a few puppies and doggies wagging their tails off the fences(they weren't allowed inside cos the cats wouldn't like it then),waiting to be thrown a biscuit or a roti dipped in ghee at regular intervals ,lots of kittens of the cats,squirrels,birds who came pecking down,making all sorts of noise to the parapet of the terrace where, beyond the reach of the monstous-michievous,ready to pounce-on--the-preycats , mom used to keep a pot of water with boiled rice in a saucer,some raw grains scatterred and a few bread crumbs too in a plate.Ma belives in peaceful co-existence and perfect harmony .I don know if she includes humans in her world of perfect symbiosis because I know she considers the inmates of the animal kingdom far more superior than humans.And that's one trait I and my bro have inherited from her completely and we are proud of it.This was something my dad and grandma could never comprehend.It was disgusting for them,the whole concept of sharing beds,sofas,razais with four legged, furred but properly named creatures trying to lick you all over. And Ma was a self appointed guardian of street animals,all the pets that we had cats and dogs were all stray,tamed to be with us with their liking ,consent and acceptance.Ma could never think of sumthing so repugnant as buying a pet dog or cat for money(my dad had suggested that many a time cos he feared we, as kids, would get infected which was immediately frowned upon and rejected and thrown into the dumps for all times to come).Dad listens to ma because I know he loves her and because he knows she loves his mom and cos we(me,pa n bro) are her world.My paati,(that's wat I used to call her,)on the other hand was very different.She loved to be with people who were sensible and intelligent.She made sure she wasn't in a company that could prove uesless to her in matters of anything,quality addition,relation building, transfer of information(aka gossip)..anything.She didn't like the pet-mania that we three(bro,me n ma) had.But she wasn't the grumbling kinds.She knew our fetish was strong,it was genetic,maternally inherited,cemented by a 'trio unity' and wouldnt perish in this lifetime.She got along with it,eventually falling in love with them more than us in her last days.There was one particular night when our pet cat,puff, of eight years,who was heavily pregnant,started whining and meaowing,indicating that she wanted to go in labor.Ma ,though wanted to take care of her ,felt helpless ,cos she and me had to leave the next day morning to naani's place in hyderabad and she couldnt let puff inside the house and have kittens cos the house would just have paati,who she thought wouldn't just care and my bro who would be busy with his boards...Ma was upset but she had her priorities set straight,she didnt want to beg her mother in law for something she knew she would be refused on face.Puff stayed there on the window slab crying heavily,begging to be let in and we stood inside not knowing wat to do.It must have been an hour's trauma,before which,paati barged into the store room,made a lil bed with a cardborad box,a lil soft bedsheet draped on it,lots of cotton stuffed inside and opened the window,in went puff,and in next an hour,we had three round balls ,living kittens delivered.Paati then gave ma a huge lecture on wat responsibilities are and how big a sin it is to leave a person so dependent on u,on the roads,when he needs you the most.She stood true to her word.By the time we came back,we had a house packed with frisky ,healthy kittens running everywhere, and jumping on paati,licking her, and 'not so grateful' puff darling,all happy and healthy, sleeping on the sofa like some queen.,all thanks to paati.

She was a lady, I have never seen crying,inspite of losing a husband,a young son,siblings,,all at a relatively young age.Not that she wasn't emotional,but cos she had gradually learned her lessons of life and was just trying hard to implement them.She remained composed,calculated and collected during every peril that struck her or the family.She was a literate,an eight standard drop out, who could read ,and write english and tamil and speak them,along with nice fluent, marathizized,bengalified hindi .She knew reasonably a lot about the world and the people,and if she didn't,she would make sure she asked anyone present to update her on that.Be it Nehru's socialism or the history of Madras-pattinam(chennai),or even the insane assaults of Bal thackeray against south indians of bombay in the seventies, to the ever growing population and changing faces of lake area and howrah in calcutta.She had lived in three big capital cities of India and she had made sure that she imbibed in her the best of everything.

One could talk to her for hours together,especially me.I just couldn't have enough of her slices of life.I remember we had a very antique,wooden,fish shaped vegetable cutter that had the pics of little fat fish,fish that resembled the ones we used to draw and colour on our drawing sketch book as kids.It was gifted to paati(that's wat i used to call her,grandma looks really 'proper and proper' and artificial)by her bengali neighbour.Ma would never use it citing everytime the same reason that it would have been the 'yamghat' for many a fish,prawn and wat not(I guess everyone in our family is a veggie cos we love animals and can't imagine killing them for ...blah blah and not cos our caste and tradtions demand it).Paati would simply laugh it over ,very sarcastically and tell mom"You have never lived in calcutta and bombay,you wouldnt know how these societies are and how memorable they become when you leave them, gita,you wouldnt simply get over your conventional thinking."Paati wasn't very fond of ma initially but she loved me unconditionally.That was cos we both could get along well co nicely.I won't mind accepting the fact that I used to spend most of my evenings with her instead of playing "thuppo" and "dog and the bone" with other kids.That was bad I know but that was different story altogether........Ma was very serious about our studies,both mine and bhai's and she would make endless question papers and take a number of photocopies to give us the practice,practice and more practice.This would just irritate paati to the core and she would just assemble all her contempt for slavery of chilren through bonded labour called meaningless,mugging education,in just one sentence everytime that would inturn anger ma,"You are just spoiling them gita,and their childhood too."

And paati in her nine yard saree with silver long thick hair nealty tied in a bun,was more modern than ma.I remember once when ma discovered the first ever valentine day card that I received from some sweet stupid classmate, in seventh standard, which I had hidden behind the book racks,she had chided me badly,making me feel worse than ever and guilty for no understandable mistake of mine.But all that paati had to say was "Who 's the guy,ammu,,do u want to marry him?tell me if u want to,I will talk to your dad,amma can't do a thing then..but don't get married so soon.you are my princess and this princess of mine,unlike other royal people,will have to work and earn her own money and build her big house,not depend on her husband like me and ur ma have done." Given an option between watching a mythological serial and an old tamil classic movie,she would chose neither and ask me to change it to news.That's actually wat even my mom would do but a lil difference comes here,she would change it to discovery or animal planet,never News...

Paati left us wen I was in my first year of college.But I won't be lying if I say there hasn't been a single day of my life when I haven't thought of her.I adore her,not cos she was and is the dearest person of my life,but because I admire her for the woman she was...sensitive yet strong, interesting, intriguing yet practical and calculating, not at all modest,a lil arrogant but adaptive and comforting,sarcastic but addictive,harsh but honest........I don't remember anyone,not even my parents, who could have loved and known me so well like my paati did....She has taught me the most important lessons of life,the most significant of them, is the importance of building up your interest and passion and nurturing it till you live and even when you start anticipating about your death...cos that's one thing that gives you a purpose to live and the confidence to endure,when time,age and health collectively betray you......love u paati.

Barbie Dahling!!!!i hate u..........

I have this pic of me holding a pretty doll in my hands.The figure looked very appropriate;big fat legs balancing a trunk and a body ,substantially with all its proper curves and dark blue eyes with pretty cluttering eyelashes that would drop and open.It wore a maroon "Ghaghra choli" but heeding to my uncontrollable pleas that she would feel very hot in that elaborate wear,mom had stiched another pretty summer frock for her,sleeveless and short, from an old and tattered bed cover.Every gal must have played with a doll in her childhood and who knows many a young/not so small boy too.Mom had got me 'julie' wen I was in the hospital admitted for jaundice in junior kg and I was made to believe that its julie who's not well, and being a nice lil mom,I had to lie next to her all two weeks 'nursing' her back to health ..and I remeber having celebrated julie 's bday every year on feb 8th till I came to secondary, cos that was my best friend shruti's bday and that was the only other date I remembered at that time...talking of dolls.Barbie???!! ya how can sumone not remember those slimy legs,those curves ,that tiny waist,and more importantly a well busted chest cum entire trunk placed on two long ,thin legs.impossible!!!!I am sure..sumone reading this would say"tujhe kya pata,delhi me aisi ji ladkiyan hoti hai!!!".OFcourse ,there are gals like that but not wen u r in ur fourth n fifth n sixth n seventh standards.That's prolly the time wen gals look the worst,with the sudden erupting acnes and pimples ravaging ur already plump face that's already stuffed wt a lot of puppy fat, with you just confused,plain confused with the incurring changes in ur body.Talking about barbies,ah!!!lemme tell u,it's a possession that every gal felt immensely proud of,and the bigger the collection of barbies,the closer she felt to being a gal,a lil mom,nursing her allready pretty babe,sorry baby,countlessly tying her gujju style orange sari with the zari border again and again n making sure u close the doors and windows before u do it,and copying her mom in whatever she did.There were different sets available and my parents would promise to gift me anything reasonaly inexpensive, depending on the stakes I kept,marks,a lil work at home like watering the plants for a week or an an incentive for not fighting weith bro and more importantly ,behaving myself .And there are other added accessories too that come free with the set.A pink plastic comb was one thing that came in for sure.I also got an extra pair of frock,white frock with yellow flowers all over,knee length,..she had a tiny waist and a smile that wasn't a smile actually.I felt that grin of hers carried a lotta attitude.I got my first barbie from sum fake santa claus who was sitting in sum humanly erected finlandish cave full of droopin lights and chocolates and baloons hanging and with an entry fee too high...This was a ritual with my dad,He knew my fetish for 'santa topis' and the wrapped gifts so cum christmas,he would take me to all the big ,all ready to cash in a lotta cash in the name of christmast splendor,departmental stores and ya I love him!!!.....I always felt inferior wen I looked at my first barbie .May be that's why i cropped off all her hair that very day much to the shock of my parents.After that barbie darling who wasn't even named till that time(owing to the immediacy of the events that followed), bald barbie was packed in a plastic cover and locked into the showcase for eternity.Barbie,she was in news recently.Glamorous naughty gal cumpleted 50 glorious yrs of teaching the basics of motherhood to lil fairies all over the globe .But today i pronounce,very strongly to all the future moms and dads reading this....Never gift ur lil gals barbies,n even if u do,tell them very clearly that they r just a show piece and cum wt may,no normal healthy gal would sport a figure like the barbie.....the barbie is not a reflection of wat the lil gal would expect to be,naturally herself,or her imaginary baby...She is just a few bones made of plastic,infact rubber n even her skin is pink.she doesnt even have big beautiful eyes,just paer and pen drwan eyebrows and thin 'unblinkable' eyes..,,no flesh at all,,,,build outright just to drive lil gals to bearing complexes.She is outargeously abnormal looking but ..........................pretty too.....I dunno y i wrote this..............It's just dat i love julie even now and I have preserved her.I remember having chatted wt her for hours together.She was my frend cos she looked a lil like me,infact prettier but she looked 'real ' for sure,unlike the three four gifted barbies who were happily mauled and dumped by me very soon .....

lobby talk

I just hated the sight of him and I feared even his shadow that came on to my cubicle wen he,poor fellow,walked up to the loo.I hated that vishu too for giving me a cubicle so close to the loo that made him inadvertently visit me atleast 6 times a day ( :)) and after completing his duties,he used to very religiously,infact quite unabashedly walk up to my cubicle, and (very much like the neighbourhood child,studious and oversmart ,pinku ya babloo,would climb up da wall common to ur houses and pop his head on the surface and ask,with that devilish grin,"abhi tak tera homework khatam nahi hua..kya hoga tera ab....tch tch"),would first straigthen his posture,bring his lips to a firmer line and say sumthing thats so very predicatble of him-"What are the updates".He knew for sure ,work when left to me would never have any updates,cos I simply didn't follow what he said.He said "just think and find a solution to this port time out thing" and I ran to Rishabh"Yaar yeh port kya hota hai"-He asked me once to create a server program that would accept sum input of xml and give out----blah blah!Thankfully,there was a communicator with milap "available" on it,and Rishabh to debug it.The demo was a success.He loved it.I loved it too cos it worked and I was happy cos he was happy and for one single day I was not the 'problem child' .I even came close to being the mistaken ,tortured divine developer..But sadly,it was just "chaar din ki chaandni ,Fir wahi andheri Raat".Devils and demons rule everywhere,esp in corporate offices.Next day,evrything was back to normal.The games,the hatred,the grumblings,the name calling(details cuming up!!!) etc... I hated him to the core cos of one simple reason-He made me work,he made me think,he made me code!!!That was the worst attrocity I could imagine sumbody commiting on me.The other team members were all ready to bully me.All that I could do was call them by names,weird ones,names of wild animals that one sees only on Discovery, that suited their personality and complimented my thinking.I knew i was creative and i loved playing hide- n -seek with him,everywhere.It was an eternal game that we played,atleast i did,in the food courts,near the water coolers,at the coffee machines,everywhere.I shirked work and he wanted me to work.I hated his attitude cos I believed he couldnt bully me like this.Afterall I was an employee,a fresher who is justified for being a lil naive and ignorant of technical stuff.I knew he wasn't askin for sumthing very spectacular.He just wanted sum quality work done.I love my frends.They sympathized wt me every day . Some also added on their painful stories of how their bosses extracted work from them,to mitigate my agonies.Now I knew,many of us were victimized!!!One of them,the sweetest of the lot sed of my ml "yaar abhi abhi shaadi hui hai uski,lagta hai biwi baat nahi maanti ,isiliye frustrate ho gaya hai,u don worry,he will b onsite next month,u wold be free then",another one poked in"yaar apni company ke labour n HR laws itne powerful hai,no one can fire you,it's a govt office babes,u dont need to work n all"I felt 'blessed' to hear such 'logical conclusions' and thanked them for their deep 'understandin' and warmth of words.

The masala chaai at Mansukhs at 4 pm sharp was sumthing i could never give up,not even cos of the ML (module Leader,He was my ML)fear.and as usual I would never go alone.The best companion ofcourse was undoubtedly Tushar,be it the numerous quizzes,or countless debates,I would not trust him but I knew I could depend on him anytime for anything.As we sat on the lobby ,I cribbed,I cried and i complained.I cursed my ML,called him every single little abuse that Tushar had taught me,with their variations too..pored my heart out...poor me....went on and on.He listened to everything very patiently and just spoke a sentence,very casually-"Y is it that u have a prob with all ur MLs,don't u think there's sumthin that u got to do bout it,cribbing and blaming and cursing won't help u,either change urself,or change ur work,but ya,think ,think once where the problem actually lies...May be he isn't wrong at all ..."

That did the trick...I thought..and I am happy that I thought about it that day....:)

The Happiness of Pursuit...

I tease a male friend of mine with every supposedly handsum and heavy babe that we come across together in the elevators,stairs,corridors,malls,trains,bus stops,shared autos,trains,even in random crossings and even museums and exam centres...This guy has an eye for the detail.He,I guess,never needed to be taught the chivalry of being a gentleman and the ettiquettes and mannerisms of sumone very dignified because his poise and attitude reflected every bit of decency.I guess he has everything in him that would brand him a perfect gentleman,but yes,he also has sumthin very commonly present in all my male friends;they call it the art of appreciating beauty.Beauty here very strictly means a figure that's not more ,not less,with appealing curves in their proper place,with a face that has no violent delicate scars,not even the slightest mark of irritating pimples and defects,and yes features that jus can maul with their sharpness.But they are the attractive,self sealed,non approachable auto-cuties for them.These naughty boys,look at them,enjoy the sight of their assets,feel the stimulations and more importantly becum happy-shappy and then.....ya ,,may be that's it.They are then captured in a world of imagination and fantasies and mind you,since there are so many , not every1 can suffice in their world of temporary dreams!!!!Most of them very soon,with the huge rush in of competition and need for change become forlorn memories,remembered only at times ,mostly in context to sum other gal.These "hoorparis" are given their due respect and since noone cares to find out their details (sum are privileged enuff to send a whole lot of boys hogging for their name and whereabouts,including actions as blantant as staring at their id cards with a restive hope to see sum letter formations )referred too as "Woh laal pyjama","us din waali yaar" or "alizi apni" or ironically very contradicting"pimple faced -tall gal with an ugly friend". More often,the regular attractions that one comes across in offices,food courts,trains and shuttles are given some sense of belonging and sum respect .They are referred to "teri waali" ya"Meri waali",sumtimes with mutual consent,"hamari" too.I asked this friend of mine ,very innocently once,"what if the gal u r ogling at now,standing in the right corner of the stairs,cum up to u and propose,,u would accept it na with open arms,open heart and open watnots"..haina?haina?,,,and he replied..."noways yaar,wts da fun in getting sumthing wthout any kinda pursuit.I love to pursue things before i get them.That gives me da joy of achievement."...Ab yeh toh hadd ho gayi...Ppl desire and die for free things in life,and sum ppl are really lucky to get the things they want with minimal efforts.But do we really enjoy and value the admissions that we get through our papa's influence,or the salaries that we get paid for sitting on bench in corporates ,or even the love that 's showered on us by parents,partners and peers that's effortless and indefinite and requires no extra combing on our part.Even Freedom costed us heavily.But I do value the the first rexic bag that I brought for myself,from my first salary.It's in tatters,but still preserved in my cupboard.As of relations,I know I value the ones that I got for free,for just being born into the world.But I get more sentimental about the ones that I had to strive and slog hard for keeping afloat,by dodging differences,understanding transits,accepting changes and reforming myself a little,just cos I wanted them in my life.There's an incredible energy in every lil pursuit u undertake for every lil dream u chase...and the joy of this run clings on to you making you feel greater,better and happier as a human ,as a fighter- a feeling that can suffice for all failures and falls that you had in the process!

Minutes that own moments....

There was this discussion on the stage going on on sum silly topic noone would care to remember,all that I get reminded of was a voice,a voice so meliflous that it doesn't jus touch your ears,it infact gently brushes them,very delicately on the outer drums,n then in a flash of a second,forges inside..leaving you just Happpy!!!I didn't knoe him then,That's a lie actually, because it's impossible not to know a person like him,I knew his name and which stream he belonged to.The kind of a person he was, reflected on his face,so there wasn't any investigation or thinking required on that part.I had just seen him here n there walking in the college corridors,with his head held high and a personality that could send many a gal go down their knees...He was different.He was a star,an effortless celebrity.Sometimes ppl needn't have to do exemplary tasks to prove their worth or merely their differing from the rest.He was one of a kind,sumone who seemed very approachable but one would actually shudder before doing that,cos he inspired awe,not cos he was immensely handsum,profusely pleasant looking ,extremely spontaneous ..n blah blah,,,only cos he was not one amongst the regular herd of cows and goats and buffaloes and mules and...who came to the college to graze their books and files off!Once there was a close encounter when we came near to having a converstaion kicked off.That was wen he sat just two tables away from mine in the college library and one of my frends challenged me to go and approach him and ask his name..I felt stupid and infact scared.He was an apparent sweetheart ,sumone I very well knew would respond with the utmost modesty but a creepy cranky sneaky lil feeling inside me dodged the urge to do it..I doubt if I was actually scared,I was actually feeling a lil guilty-What did i fear,that he would say"why u *****,u cum to college to hit on poor,innocent handsum kids like me..."...Forgot to tell you..I was his senior in college.That's even more embarrasing-Senior gals are supposed to talk to their junior boys in typical conventions,tell them wats good or bad for them,chide them when they drift away,scold them when their grades go low in exams,encourage them when they win laurels in footballs and quizzes ,keep an account of their professional and(personal if permitted)lives and yes...be jus the watchdog,Nannyma....That was a self prepared ethic that I weaved and weaved till I finally imbibed it in my veins,as though it was sum unopposable preposition....Cuming back,Yeah that was my last day in college then,n he sat on the stage effectively ruminating the collosive marvel of all points listed,in the group discussion and unarguably ,becuming the best speaker that day.I just remember his voice modulation and the magic that he created...You don't have to know sumone to go crazy over his voice,or even his attitude,in fact his everything...I wasn't crazy bout him ,I wasnt even sure if I would ever like him,But very often in life,you wanna talk to certain ppl u just glance at,u remotely look at ,u sheepishisly stare at.......These predicaments don't imply that u like him;it's just dat u wanna talk to him once,just once------That 'once ' for me had to be today or it would be never,cos I wasn't going to cum to college after that.He was there at the entrance,smiling,happily accepting the huge outpourings that flowed from the public,who raved and ranted about his performance.Everybody seemed to know him and everyone wanted to congratulate him...I wanted to go last,not cos i was shy,but jus cos i was scared dat he would jus walk away,actually no!i was sure he wouldn't do dat.You can predict sumthings very accurately about certain ppl cos their eyes,their expressions reveal every bit of wt they are...I waited cos i jus didn't know wt to say,but I knew I had to tell him sumthing,atleast a small lil hello...yaar that would be silly....Well,there he was cumin out,out of the door ,and technically straight upto me,cos that was the way out,sumhow I was there blockin the door..

"you have got a beautiful voice,u speak really well.....very impressive..............."That was n't the slightest of flirtation.These words just popped out,overpowering the several "hellos","hi's",and cte lil smiles that provoke better ones,that i had rehearsed....He looked at me,gave a smile,yeah he was perfectly normal and didn't even say a thank you....actually I amn't sure if he heard me cumpletely. cos it seemed he was in a hurry to blurt out sumthing .",,,I always wanted to talk to you................".....The world could have crashed for me at that moment,crashed very happily like thundering clouds give out the precious of waters and breaking shells reveal the best of oysters.I had the minute that owned such a beautiful moment of my life and i didn't want to let go of it...There are moments when you are not stoned or stunned,not even zapped to a single breadth of life,you are jus in the air,floating high with a whim that the fancy of these foregone moments continues and the feeling just stays,just that particular amount of magic....not more of it,definitely not lesser than that!

Thank you god!

I remember Him many a time,well much in advance of times when I perceive I may need Him,esp,His grace,so that he doesn't identify the 'kaamchor' streak in me.I make prior plannings as to how to woo Him and make myself sound very genuine and truthful!But destiny struck me bad,I cribbed,I grumbled,I pelted uncountable stones at Him ,held Him responsible for whatever bad that has happened to me as if He had been the architect of all the designs that the landscape of life depicted at this moment.I have thanked him merely once or twice,not more than that, for for the innumerable outstanding ,happy moments of my life.There were plenty of such events when my dreams met their desirable ends,when lovely ppl entered my life and showered huge amounts of love on me and gifted me with precious moments,when I myself made my family proud, with lil efforts from my side and He doing all the rest.I called it Luck then.It's like this huge carriage of sins that we carry on our brow beaten backs,already bent with innumerable agonies and not to forget,the cult of selfishness and faces bright with the poise and charm of morality very deceptively wrapped in a flowery,pleasant sheet ,with an under cover of an ugly,puny,stinking layer of hypocrisy.I prayed hard for it happen.I recited all the shlokas i knew,made huge promises to Him and even gave him a proof of my memory by chanting his hundred names that i was forced to learn as a kid.I touched thrice every lil piece of God i came across,very religiously and fearfully ,feathered them to my eyes making sure that my eyelashes touched them lest He sensed my disobedience.I even wrote on wish stones,making myself an educated illiterate ,trying to fool Him.I am sure He would have for sure enjoyed the whole drama,and in fact would have laughed his head off.Karna in The Mahabharata,though a Pandava,remained loyal to his word and instincts,and fought against truth with all his mighty valour.Karna or Karan today, is not just only one of the many Ekta Kapoor's unending list of male chocolate boys ,tottering in the dominance of their female counterpart .He and his qualities are a phenomenon,a castigating yet appealing feature,be it his act of kindness,his limeage or his tolerance.Apart from showing thighs to Draupadi and invoking the wrath of God,Karna happens to be the favourite of many ppl I come across.On the other hand,there's this brother of Ravana,Vibheeshana,who,technically should have been the hero of this age old epic because it was he who fumbled out the secret of Ravana, that his life lay in his stomach,while Rama,the shurvir prince kept hitting the faces of the demon king frantically,only waiting for them to re appear.But he isn't really worshipped,leave apart paying him the respect due.Reason simple-He was a traitor.Even the prophet himself vituperated the class of hypocrites,who ,sensing the danger ahead,refused to fight the holy war against the enemy and ran away.Some even collaborated with the enemy.He calls them Munafideen and orders the highest level of punishments to them,where their bodies would burn in hell,Religion ,God ,spirituality-I understand them but i dont belive in them-I like reaidng bout them but i don't actually think they can work wonders-But yes i took it for granted ,blinded with the aspirations of making it big with He lifting me a lil.The whole transformation infact,a ready transit from a poly bag of sense to a mountain of non nense,opportunistic flattering,blatant bribery, shameless meekness and deliberate,temporary subervience.Thoroughly irrational!!!!Thank You God for making me realise that you are no traffic policeman or a muncipality dead dog picker who would readily accept my calculated offerings and gift me with things I doubt I deserve.Thank You God for showing wisdom,Thank you for being what you are and teaching me devotion isn't a illustarted weekly or monthly article that comes with a price and looks attractive, or the flakes of ripe red looking watermelon that have this seemingly promising gaurantee of soothing ur over heated bowels.Thank you God for giving me tough exercises to practise and yes ,punishments too for trying the other ways to beget grace!

Sometimes....

Once I felt this nut go through my throat n get struck, I struggled for breadth,yelled for help and did all authentic mandatory drama till sumone very wise from the viscinity played the rescuing act of thumping me on my back and Yeh Lo-!!Down went the nut into my tummy.arousing a lotta excitement ,speculation and yes a lot of knowleddge-transfer with most ppl predicting and anticipating its grand exit out of my bowels the next day during the regular cleansing process-All's well that ends well!The question in the first place-y did i ever try to swallow it.Tons and loads of sands on the seashore get swept away by mighty ,bullying waves.We humans are no diffferent.It takes ages n aeons to build up a castle,,your little house of hypothetical yet concrete aspirations and standards you set for urself, sumtimes even with miscalculations about urself,more often an over estimation of ur credentials and credibility,nurture it with your dreams n fantasies,embellish it with every lil passion you have and then finally fling it across channels of despair and reject.There are times wen u feel like killing yourself,actually strangulating yourself with the tightest of ropes and yes,,,pulling it hard,till u yelp in pain,struggle in defeat n finally surrender to the horrendous capture of behemoth self killing thoughts ..You for sure then don't need an enemy at times,u can very comfortably be one to urself,e deadlier one infact.The journey ruptures you,your dreams stab you ,your passions maul you and your ambitions kill you......................Sometimes life can be cruel!!!!.