+: etcetera :+

Over the last few months, we’ve come to the startling realization that there are people out there that actually read this blog. I have a feeling this alarming trend started when I stopped writing and DoZ took over… which makes it a little less alarming, if you ask me.

To better cater to these mythical people, we’ve redesigned ourselves. Please check us out, and pay close attention to the Asides section, for that’s the culprit that has been flooding your feedreaders. Also, after checking it out, please let us know who you are. I’d like to make friendships with the morons that read such drivel.

PS: By the way, efforts are underway to split our feeds. Until then, bear with us.

PPS: Efforts have been underwent, and split feeds are now available. The default feed offers the Asides, but you are welcome to subscribe to the no asides feed  here . And yes, we do offer an asides only feed , but why mention that here, right?

I don’t remember who told me this, but for the longest time, I believed that whatever action you performed when the clock struck midnight on Dec 31^st is the action you’d perform for the rest of the year. It didn’t matter that I’d spent a whole year wasting my time or that I’d watched what Doordarshan called entertainment till 11:59. I’d take special care to not cry in that one minute, or to laugh too hard. The laughing bit didn’t have everything to do with the New Year’s Eve action concept. That was thanks to another superstition – whenever you laugh very hard, the only possible thing that could happen next was that you’d cry very hard. And I didn’t want to start crying at 12:01 or 12:07 for that matter, for who knew how long the New Year-action period lasted.

By midnight, I’d make sure I turned the TV off, and picked up a suitable text book, preferably of my current favorite subject. I’d ‘concentrate intensely and study’ for the next couple of minutes. I never thought back about this during the rest of the year – but now that I do, perhaps the superstition was right after all. I did spend a number of years pretending to study.

The last few years, I haven’t had assorted Gods of learning to appease. New Year’s Eve usually finds me at someone else’s house, where one does the obligatory count down and the wishing everyone a happy new year. But old beliefs, especially old superstitions die hard. And at the exact moment when the clock struck midnight, I took care to set down the glass or plate of food or whatever I was holding. No one wants to spend a whole year drinking or eating cake. And yes, as planned, I have indeed spent the last few years pretending to be on a diet.

Last night, there was no party. And contrary to my friends’ expectations, I did not get all bundled up and trudge down to Times Square to watch the wondrous effect of gravity on a silly ball. I spent the night in bed, reading Margaret Atwood’s Moral Disorder. Hopefully this year, there will be fewer pretenses, and more joy.

As for resolutions, my most important one for this year is simple but tough – to avoid the one hour crime drama in every one of its devious avatars. Given that it’s a brand new year, let us be optimistic and imagine that I actually succeed in my lofty goal – I figure this will automatically free up so much of my time that am sure that other goals such as learning a new language, trying a new author every month, listening to more music or going to the gym more often will have no choice but get accomplished.

Happy new year, everyone. And wish you the very best of luck with your own resolutions.

Last night, I watched Govind Nihalani’s Party, a star studded example from the 80s parallel cinema period. Rather than list who is in it, it’s quicker to say who isn’t - Shabana Azmi, Smita Patil and oh, Kulbhusan Kharbanda are some actors you might miss. Almost everyone else you might remember from those days is in the movie.

I was eight years old when this movie came out, if it had a theatrical release, that is. My parents were not, are not, interested in movies like Party. And even if they were, they certainly wouldn’t have taken an eight year old to watch Rohini Hattangadi topless (yes, this is that movie, as I found out yesterday). But thanks to growing up with Doordarshan, I do remember watching other movies from the 80s. Back then, I hadn’t discovered the joys of existential angst (which sounds like an oxymoronic idea, but really isn’t), and didn’t understand these movies, but because there was nothing else to watch, watch them, I did. And drew all sorts of messages from them, which would no doubt surprise the jolna-pai clad crowd that made these movies.

I simply assumed that that is what one did when one grew up - an adult in Delhi went to “parties” (in a Padmini if one had a smarts to make enough money to afford one), had endlessly boring conversations with people there, while drinking what looked like watered down Thums Up (but which Amma disapproved of even more than Thums Up - I decided I’d summon the courage to ask for watered down GoldSpot when my time came, even if it was terribly rude to make such demands as a guest), coming home and carrying on the same boring conversation / argument (like the difference matters to a 10 year old) with my husband. Occasionally, I’d have to scream and rant and tear out this husband person’s shirts (my mom never did this with my dad, but she was a Madrasi who clearly did not know the ways of Delhi). I was game for this because it looked like a lot of fun.

In these movies, all the dressed up people at parties rarely looked like they were having fun. But I didn’t see anything abnormal about it. If I had to eat standing up and was given nothing to drink but watered down Campa Cola, I’d be pissed, too. But I did feel that they should express some sort of gratitude, given that they were being allowed to drink these beverages from a “glass tumbler” as opposed to the “ever-silver” tumblers we had to make do with at home. Teen-aged kids in these movies had fancy “two-in-ones”, on which they listened to “pop music”, and they even danced to this music, occasionally. I somehow knew that there was only heart-break in wanting this - even if by some miracle, I got hold of a two-in-one, Amma would never allow me to listen to loud music, and Appa would think me foolish for even thinking of what these kids were doing as dancing - chumma, kai-um kaalum attana, dance aayiduma?

I wonder how much of a struggle it was for my parents to move to Delhi. In those days, it was a culture completely alien to our lives in Madras. I remember insisting on having a birthday party, since everyone in my class had one. My parents proposed a compromise - I could have the cake, but not the party. Our friends (who were all Tamil) weren’t the sort who had birthday parties, and it would have seemed too odd for us to have one, I suppose. I still remember my dad objecting to my blowing out the candles on the cake - nalla naal athuvuma, velakku ethu vangala, anaippaangala? Since my school started at 7:30, birthdays meant having to wake up sooner than usual to do the whole cake thing before I left for school. We couldn’t do it in the evening, as it would be too late by the time Appa got back. By the third year, I was ready to give up the whole Cake thing if it could get me a ½ hour of extra sleep.

We never went to any parties (birthday parties weren’t an exception), like the folks in the movies always seemed to. Colleagues of my father, all of them Tamil, save one Bengali, lived in nearby MIG flats, and we’d go over or have them come over (although I don’t remember the Bengali family ever in our Tamil gatherings - they probably did mysterious Bengali things of their own, then). Sometimes, we’d have picnics with these friends - a very Tamil picnic with lemon rice and puli saadam and thair saadam and oorga and potato chips - in the parak (In the first year or so of our moving to Delhi, all three of us laughed at our neighbors who called a park “parak”, till we started calling it “parak” too).

Watching the movie yesterday reminded me of my old “partying” ambitions. This time around, I understood the conversation, and knew that the stuff in the glass tumbler isn’t what I used to think it was. I found the shirt tearing scene sad, not amusing. And with even greater sadness, I have to dismiss this movie as being not as great as many other ensemble pieces. The fact that the women in this movie smoke and drink and seduce men and swear doesn’t feel very odd now, although it must have seemed scandalous then. I vaguely remember talk of Rohini Hattangadi’s shocking behavior - but the most persistent image of her in my mind today is her playing Kasturba Gandhi and more recently as Munna Bhai’s mom. It was nice to see those 80s hotties - Jayanth Kriplani and Benjamin Gilani and Soni Razdan and Deepa Sahi? Wonder what they’re doing now?

Is it complete folly to have ambitions as a child? By the time you grow up, so much of what you want isn’t even available any more. I’m not saying that I spent the last 20 years acquiring the skills I thought I’ll need to be a socialite (see, even the term has become negative now), but I can drive a car, even handle a stick shift, if not a Padmini with its steering wheel gears, and today, I probably could make actual conversation with the people from the Party in this movie. But the people from this movie are all gone. I’d scandalize no one (other than my mom) by drinking or smoking. And you’d impress no one by calling someone else a bitch (indeed, you’re expected to be proud of being one).

So if you see your kid or niece or nephew wishing they were Paris Hilton, wish them luck. Nothing will come of it.

I did something very unlike a New Yorker today - kept a goofy smile all the way from the 5th Avenue subway station to home. How could I not? I’d just read these:

The Rival Poet
- Billy Collins

The column of your book titles,
always introducing your latest one,
looms over me like Roman architecture.

It is longer than the name
of an Italian countess, longer
than this poem will probably be.

Etched on the head of a pin,
my own production would leave room for
The Lord’s Prayer and many dancing angels.
No matter.

In my revenge daydream I am the one
poised on the marble staircase
high above the crowded ballroom.
A retainer in livery announces me
and the Contessa Maria Teresa Isabella
Veronica Multalire Eleganza de Bella Ferrari.

You are the one below
fidgeting in your rented tux
with some local Cindy hanging all over you.

—————-

Earthling
- Billy Collins

You have probably come across
those scales in planetariums
that tell you how much you
would weigh on other planets.

You have noticed the fat ones
lingering on the Mars scale
and the emaciated slowing up
the line for Neptune.

As a creature of average weight,
I fail to see the attraction.

Imagine squatting in the wasteland
of Pluto, all five tons of you,
or wandering around Mercury
wondering what to do next with your ounce.

How much better to step onto
the simple bathroom scale,
a happy earthling feeling
the familiar ropes of gravity.

157 pounds standing soaking wet
a respectful distance from the sun.

————-

Perhaps it’s just me, but there seems to be a lot of Billy Collins around lately. Falstaff’s been posting some wonderful stuff by Collins over at Poi-tre. And this morning, Ganja Turtle emailed this* delightful poem. So, I finally picked up a volume of Collins at the library this evening.

*  I refer to ‘The Country’

Yesterday, when I called home, I was reminded for the n^th time that today was Saraswathi Pooja. My mom’s afraid that after moving to New York (read away from my Aunt and one particular friend in Dallas, both of whom my mom believes kept me “a good Tamil girl”, or well, close enough at any rate), I don’t have family or friends who will tell me about all things Tamil. She’s right. I’d have thought about it in December, and wondered whatever happened to Saraswathi Pooja, if I ever remembered at all.

At any rate, I felt guilty enough to do something about it. I eschewed whipping myself a nice omelet for breakfast, and ate some completely vegetarian oatmeal. Instead of lazing about with the Sunday papers, I moved my ass and made some kheer (OK, MTR kheer, but I did all of the stirring, I’ll have you know!), and soaked some sun-dried peas to make Sundal in the evening. For a few minutes, I merged Saraswathi Pooja with Vijaya Dasami in my head – I had planned to have a second pooja in the evening and do a bit of studying (a book on women’s health that I’d picked up for a buck at a second hand sale was the only “studious” book I could lay my hands on).

I didn’t want to have two poojas – I had plans to go to the gym and do my laundry in the evening (“planned to go to the gym”, mind you). Whenever I feel this lazy, I usually come up with some brilliant scheme to remain that way. I had a sneaking suspicion that the two festivals didn’t necessarily have to fall on the same day. I vaguely recalled something about the books remaining in the Pooja room overnight. I was too, what’s the word am looking for here – scared, yes, scared to call my mom or the ladies in Dallas to confirm my suspicions. I googled instead and figured out the truth – that Vijaya Dasami falls on the day after Saraswathi Pooja - which am sure any “good Tamil girl” would know from birth.

Relieved that religion wasn’t going to compromise my wild lifestyle (hello – remember I had a fascinating soiree to attend at the Chinese Laundromat down the road) I went about the house marking anything that resembled an appliance or tool with some turmeric paste, topped off with a little bit of kum kum. This was easy, as this had been one of few tasks I’d deigned to help my mom with. The contents of my studio include a television, a laptop, a DVD player, a router, a set top box, a refrigerator, a microwave, a hair-dryer, a fan, one screw driver, an alarm clock and a hammer, which fall under the appliances / tools category. All of them were duly marked yellow and red.

Midway through the pottu-vaithal, I realized that I wasn’t myself bedecked thus, and after hearing my mother’s voice speak the word “amangalam”, I shrugged and made myself a bindi, too. As I was lining things up for the pooja, I rapidly rejected this plate (my mind recalled I’d eaten scrambled eggs off that plate. That this is the same mind that still can’t tell me where the rest of the garlic I bought last week is gives me great comfort), or that scrub (used to clean said “soiled” plate). Eventually the pooja got done.

In the evening, I had to make the Sundal, because I’d already soaked the peas. But I couldn’t do the pooja cuz I popped one pattani into my mouth to check if they were done… Before you go there, I’ll tell you that my mother’s voice drowns out the story about the chap who tasted the meat before offering it to Shiva. So, no I didn’t have the heart to do it.

I joke all the time about turning into my mother, but today I think I actually did. Or maybe not. I ate the sundal straight out of my 12-inch wok You should try that sometime, Mom. It’s one less dish to wash.

At 2:40 PM on Thursday, I find out that Fedex overnighted my packages from Dallas. Instead of arriving in New York on Friday or Saturday (I’d asked for the 3^rd day delivery option), they are going to be delivered at the latest in another 20 minutes. I rush home in a cab, or try to get there as fast as the traffic will allow me. On the cab, I call my ex-roomie in Dallas and between my sputtering and his, we figure out that the ‘standard overnight’ option may have been checked by the woman who picked up my stuff in Dallas.

As we turn from Park towards 1^st Avenue, I mentally prepare myself to confront the sight of eight U-Haul boxes unloaded on the pavement outside my apartment, or the sight of no boxes at all (because delivery van had come and left as I wasn’t at home) At this point I can’t decide which will be worse, so I focus my energies on willing the cabbie to find a faster route home.

I get home to see my boxes stacked neatly below the stairs, next to the mail boxes. The saving grace is that they are inside the apartment, instead of on the pavement. One or two look slightly the worse for wear, but none of them appears seriously damaged. It is I who look devastated. By this time, I have considered what Fedex might charge me for overnighting packages I was in no dying hurry to receive. But that figures as item #29 on my list of items to worry about. Items 1 through 8 are how I’m going to haul these heavy boxes up two flights of stairs all by myself. Items 9 through 28 are the medical complaints I will have if I did manage items 1-8 by myself.

I go up. Call the ex-roomie again. He’s at work and promises to ‘look into it all’ in the evening when he gets home. I go back downstairs and pick the lightest box (and btw, they all feel that way downstairs) and lug it up somehow. The second lightest box is too heavy. I unpack it and bring the stuff up in two batches. By this time, am all out of breath and too afraid to notice the aches in weird places.

I call my office mate and tell her that am taking the rest of the day off. I’m on the verge of tears by now and she offers to come over after work and help me. I tell her that there’s no way the two of us could possibly move all that stuff. She ups her offer to include her husband and brother, so we can all move the stuff, even if piecemeal. I promise to call her back at 5 PM if am still unable to figure something out myself.

I get off the phone and burst into tears. I thought I’d panicked on the way over. I was wrong. This is what a real panic attack feels like. My whole life flashes before my eyes and it feels like every choice I’ve ever made in life has come back to bite me in the ass. All my talk of “independence” was just so much talk, wasn’t it? How would I ever make it on my own if I can’t manage something as routine as moving to a new city?

At that time, it somehow felt imperative that those six remaining boxes reach my apartment as soon as possible. I am convinced that if it came to pass that they had to remain downstairs overnight, it would be the worst possible thing that could ever happen to me. My primary concern was not about their safety (safety was the second concern). The thing I am worried about is that I would be an unmitigated failure at the life I had so desperately wanted to live.

I am sure that taking up my office mate’s offer of help would be an admission of defeat. Come what may, I had to figure this one out on my own. So I think about what my parents would have done if they’d been in my situation. Dad would’ve never been in a situation like mine. Or even if he were, he’d have managed to charm some kid on the road or the iron-pannravan or someone to come and help. But if nothing had worked out, Mom and Dad would’ve lugged the stuff, even if all they had to do it using 2 small yellow pai’s each.

I try to be objective about it. All I have is one Ikea ugly-big-plastic-bag-that-cuts-your-fingers-with-a-vengeance. It would take me countless rounds to get the contents from six boxes. And where would I put the stuff once I unpacked it? If I dump the stuff all over the apartment, where would I put the furniture once it arrived later in the month (or so I hope)? I need the stuff to remain in the boxes and the boxes to get upstairs. So the answer is simple. I couldn’t do this on my own. I simply accept it, without feeling guilty or ashamed about it. I need help and have no idea where to get some. My last ditch resort is to call Louie, the doorman from my friend’s apartment. Louie’d helped carry my suitcases when I got to my apartment last week. He might know some kids who might be willing to help.

But I remember seeing a flyer for $15-an-hour-movers on the road the previous day. So I lock up and go downstairs again. I wander around looking up every tree and upright object on the pavement. There is nothing today. On the walk back home, I notice a moving truck parked across the street from my building. At first it looks like there was no one in it. But I walk around, just to make sure

Lo and behold – movers. Men with the strength and expertise to do precisely the things that stumped me. The third guy I speak with (and by this time my story’s gotten crisper with each re-telling. I mention ‘across the street’, ‘six boxes’, ‘two flights of stairs’ and make no mention whatsoever of Fedex or of my hopes and dreams of single life in New York) acts. My knight in shining gets the first man I spoke with and the two of them slip out and carry my stuff upstairs in under 10 minutes. I have to chase after them to give them a tip. I’d have hugged my knight and offered him my first born if I didn’t have to hold the door open (the keys are upstairs).

When I see the boxes neatly lined up in my apartment, for the first time I start to feel that this city and I might yet hit it off. But after the relief-driven euphoria wears off, I realize how very close I was to the world falling about my ears. I have been planning (or at least thinking about this move) for weeks. I even did my research, however rudimentary it may have been. Got quotes from 2 movers and from Fedex and UPS. My choice of Fedex was based on factors that included cost, expected pick up and delivery dates, ease of pick up and door to door delivery. When the move finally happened, I had zero control over it, and all of my “factors” were shot to hell.

It was bad luck that the delivery ended up being expedited…bad luck that I didn’t find out about it at 2 (the delivery happened at 2:46)…good luck I didn’t get home at 4 (movers across the road would have left by then)…good luck that nice Brit mover was willing to help. So, planning’s a load of crap. Or did I get lucky because that couple down the road had planned their move today?

Trying to draw lessons from a stressful experience immediately after the experience is rarely a good idea. I decide to make myself a nice cuppa chai. Remember I’d run out of milk. As I cross 87^th street to get to the local Food Emporium, I hear a hissing sound behind me. I turn back and see an Asian man whose bicycle tire has started to spontaneously deflate. The man gets off his cycle, and fiddles with the tire. The hissing continues. I wonder what he’d planned for the day…

I’ve been here for almost a month now. Single girl in New York City. I can’t tell you how exciting it’s all been. Why, I was in transports the other day, practically jumping up and down in glee. There’s nothing like spotting the right brand of cereal bars to make you feel like you can survive a strange new place. The Subzi Mandi at Queens had me tears - people around me stared while I held a pack of frozen rotis, choking out, “I know you!!”

No, getting used to the city hasn’t been as easy as I thought it would be.

Much like a prisoner, when you’re stuck in a place like Dallas, you only think about getting out. You make elaborate plans to dig tunnels, pretend to be a dead-body, bribe the right guards and so on. You never really get around to thinking about what happens when you find yourself on the other side of the tunnel or in the ocean, or trapped inside a sealed coffin or all of the above. As deluded as it sounds, you figure that all you have to do is to somehow trap yourself into a coffin, and life will take care of itself from there on.

Life, of course, does not take care of itself. If Edmond Dantes had to find an apartment in New York City after escaping from prison, he’d have realized his grave mistake. How could his great enemy have been anything but a guardian angel? Who the hell else is going to banish you to a chateau? And we’re not talking about some random château located on some soggy plain - we’re talking about an “Island Chateau”! And one that comes with a doorman, free delivery service and a view! Ah, how he would have cried when he remembers the free laundry and the no guarantor-required part. If he were the smart man we all think he was, he’d have burst into tears after reading through his first real estate section, and promptly turned himself in. At any rate, he’d have realized that his true enemy was Dan Glassmann, the real estate agent from Queens, and not that nice French guy. True, the Frenchman does like to burn the occasional letter, but hey, everyone knows that eccentrics make the best pals.

The experience of finding an apartment in this city doesn’t just make you re-evaluate your French classics. For the first time in my life, I’ve started to have second thoughts about Woody Allen. Watching an Allen movie from this point onwards is going to be difficult - 20 something’s with humongous apartments on the upper west - replete with killer views, elevators and doormen, week end homes in the Hamptons - arrrggghhh. Many of my friends object to Allen on moral grounds. I object to him on real estate grounds.

But I am relieved that Allen seems to have shifted his focus to London. This way, I can continue to imagine that young-person-on-first-decent-job lives in spacious, furnished one-bedroom a stone’s throw from Hyde Park, belongs to private health club, and retires to nice stone cottage in the country over the week end. Unlike sucky American jobs, the Brits must know how to pay, and am sure that those things are part of the standard London job - just like holidays for Rakhee are with the standard Delhi job. I’m finding me a Brit job. As soon as I get out of the lease I signed on what is soon to be “my” apartment.

The day after tomorrow, I’m moving to New York. From Monday, I start at my new job, where I’ll be playing a mighty insignificant part in a rather large company. For the last two years, I was playing an equally insignificant part in a rather small company. So the only change that matters is that I get to live in New York instead of in Dallas, as I work hard not buying or selling (or anything else of importance, really) companies or countries.

I am a sucker for reform. No - not for reform itself, but the possibility of it. My favorite activity as a kid used to be dreaming of ways in which I will turn good (good student, good citizen, good human being, whatever) starting next week. A new job in a new city (OK, not new - but this is the first time I’ll be officially “moving” to the city, instead of merely “visiting” it) is irresistible plan-candy.

For starters, I plan to be happier than I have been lately. Living in a real city is going to help. I suppose some would call Dallas a city, too. It’s just that to me the whole idea of living in a city is to be surrounded by people who are even more miserable than you are. There are unhappy folks in Dallas (don’t let the “how y’all doin’?” fool you, as it did me at first. During my first few months at Dallas I came this close to checking out those emails that try to sell me cheap Prozac) It’s just that, in a place like Dallas, every one is miserable in their own space. There’s no public gathering or exhibition. There’s no one the streets, let alone the charming oddball who will swear at you. Texans gather in a crowd formation once a year - to watch the fireworks on the 4th of July. During the rest of the year, they drive about in their trucks, when they’re not too busy opening doors for you and howdyin’ you to death.

I will need a new wardrobe. Oh joy, to need a new wardrobe. I don’t have winter clothes. OK. I may have some, but none for New York sort of winters.

A new wardrobe is plan-candy for weight-loss plans. The fact that I have a few months to go before the snow storms hit the city is great. I have all the time in the world to do all sorts of planning - like plan to give up all things cheesy (this only includes edible stuff. Plans to give up watching Grey’s Anatomy is a different plan entirely), plan to eat more fruit (always a good one this. There are many fruits I love, such as potatoes. The potato plant reproduces through the potato, does it not? Ergo, potatoes are fruits.), plan to run in Central Park (ahhh>! The run in Central Park plan. This is amongst my oldest and hardiest plans - the sly thing changes with every city I’ve ever lived in. Earlier avatars of this plan include - run on Taylor’s road, run in Kailasapuram, run around DLF A block, run in Willowbend Park. As I said, an extremely adaptable plan).

I will need a membership at the NY Public Library. This is an important item, because in sharp contrast to my weight loss plans, this one I will carry out. Plano’s dear old Parr Library has been great, but am sure NYPL is going to be awesome!

I plan to meet more people! At Dallas, I’ve lead a somewhat sheltered life. A very informative one, but one sadly deficient in cheap thrills. What’s the point of attending baby showers, if the only people you meet are the ones giving the showers? The only folks you can impress / scare-the-living-daylights-out-of with the vital knowledge you accumulate from a baby shower are not other married folks. You need single people for that. So, let me amend that to ‘I plan to meet more single people!’

And New York being New York, there are of course the obligatory plans, such as watching Philip Seymour Hoffman live, claiming to hate every place else on earth but New York (I may already do that - but it’s nice to tell those people who remind me that I don’t know that ‘cuz I don’t live in New York that now, I do.), NOT having to defend Texans’ voting preferences (I won’t have a vote in New York, but little did that help me in Dallas!), etc.

That’s all from Dallas, folks. Meet y’all soon from New York. (note to self - drop the y’all as soon as possible) .

I don’t sleep too well. Never have, and don’t expect to in the future. Since I read this [link], my insomnia’s gotten worse. I spent most of last night thinking of ways to get idiots men like Mika to see. A little after 2:15 AM, I’d gotten past the men-like-Mika-should-be-boiled-in-oil stage. I still had the rest of the night to kill, so I tried thinking of practical[1] responses to bad celebrity behavior:

• Boycott his music. That’s got to hurt, right? I am not sure how many albums this guy sells in India, but if even, say, 10-15% of his audience refused to contribute to his coffers, wouldn’t the record company get him to keep his mouth shut?
• Boycott his more successful brother’s music: As I said, am not sure if this Mika’s worth much. His brother, on the other hand, is successful. Why not refuse to buy Daler’s music? Or give it less airplay? Will that move him to do something more than say “party kissing is not Indian culture”? [Link]
• Do a Morgan Spurlock on Mika: No - am not talking about giving him 30 days of nothing but McDonald’s food (the guy’d probably have a grand time gorging down Aloo Tikki burgers!) - but make him live for 30 days in Rakhee Sawant’s shoes and her clothes and her life. That might make him find out what it’s like to be treated like a slab of meat.
• Make him wear a turban. If Rakhee, being a Bharathiya nari, is supposed to wear a saree - why can’t the man wear a turban[2]? Yes, even I realize this is a ridiculous form of punishment. In my defense, I was in grave danger of slipping back to the men-like-Mika-should-be-boiled-in-oil stage, so I forced myself back to the path of non-violence, which somehow lead me to the “turban as a punishment” scheme.
• Boycott him. Who’s inviting this guy to anything? Why? Let the other “celebs” give the man a chance to stay home and mull over the consequences of his actions for, say, the next year or so. If making a child sit facing the corner for an hour or so works wonders, why not apply it to adults too? An hour or a week might not help, but a year of no partying is sure to hurt a celebrity. That’ll teach him to feel sorry instead of bragging about his lousy behavior.
• Ignore him. This guy’s a chronic Page-3 ward patient. Let him go to all the parties he wants. Just don’t cover his existence in the media. If he does something actually news-worthy, like say, release a new album - cover that, but only write about his music. Don’t say a word about Mika the person. Or is this too harsh a punishment? If he ceases to exist on the gossip columns, will he in effect, cease to exist?

As much as I wish to silence men like Mika, it bugs the heck out of me to admit that he has every right to demonstrate to the world that he’s an ass. Just as much right as Ms. Sawant has to wear whatever she wants to. And as much as I hate papers like HT and TOI for giving any importance to this sort of thing, they too have a right to print whatever crap they want. So what is the solution? Arrrrghhhh! There goes tonight’s sleep. If you’re up late - call me. Perhaps we can jointly brainstorm about how to have a totally free society where everyone also “behaves”…

[1] So, some solutions that appear to be all wrapped up in practicality at 3:40 in the AM lose this quality 6-12 hours later. Big deal.

[2] Why turban? It was the first item of clothing that popped to my head after I spent 5 or so minutes simultaneously sputtering and racking my brains for a suitable male equivalent to the saree [3].

[3] Why are the most common mythological characters associated with the saree of the Sati-Savithri type? Did the Menaka-Surpanakha types wear Fashion by Paris Hilton?

Sonia Faleiro’s The Girl, a book I’d briefly mentioned in this post at Sepia Mutiny, is a melancholy novel set in Goa about two men and The Girl they both loved. The book begins with the young woman’s suicide - yet another tragedy in cursed Azul - and the two men are “achingly curious” to find out why. And when one of them stumbles upon her journal, they use it to reconstruct her life leading up to the suicide - the death of an unhappy woman whose last big hope had vanished.

Just a few pages into the novel, and it is obvious that it is as much about showcasing the writing as it is about the actual plot. The Girl is a carefully crafted book: every sentence is meticulously assembled from deliberately chosen words, each page is filled with precise paragraphs construced from meticulously assembled sentences.

There is plenty of wordplay, and large doses of descriptive detail. Nothing is too insignificant to be let off without a metaphor or two, ranging from the inventive to the cliched.

Thus we have the earth “encrusting the casket like pastry bubbling into hardness,” a bar and its location as mismatched as “vegetarianism and a Goan” and as “profoundly antipodean” as the “Rua’s many little old ladies and the one young lady who lived opposite Breto’s in a stone mansion, and many years later flung herself into the well in the corner of her garden.”

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Someone talking to me for the first time is usually struck by two things: How incredibly handsome I am, and how incredibly smart I am. If they can get over this, they’ll be struck by two more things: How much I love movies, and how much I love books.

Someone meeting Manoj for the first time is usually struck by two things: How much he loves movies, and how much he loves music. Ok, maybe they’ll also be struck by how smart he is. Whatever. That’s not the point.

So anyways, Manoj and I spend the better part of our days IMing each other. In normal English, capitalized first words and all. (The only allowance for IMspeak is the ubiquitous brb, which I thought was a misspelt female undergarment when someone first used it on me. Now I know, and love to use it coz it sounds so, um, kinky.)

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In Tamil, there’s a term called “Janma saabalyam adayarathu”. Roughly translated, it means the achieving the purpose of one’s Janma. My mother tends to use it to tease me whenever I do something that I’ve waited for ages to do… There’s something about the way she says the words that conveys a perfect blend of expectations fulfilled and disappointments realized.

Watching Brokeback Mountain qualifies for the term, at least in the way my mom uses it. Since the movie was released, my life has been filled with friends who watched the movie without me, a roomie who invented every excuse known to man to avoid watching it, my very first Netflix “long wait” queue and just plain old bad-luck. Usually, when I’m really really interested in a movie, I keep away from friends who might reveal the plot, or even express so much as an opinion. Staying aloof in this case was impossible, as everyone from Larry David to my aunt has an opinion about the movie and is eager to express it.

I will stop rambling and get to the point - last night, I finally watched the movie. I expected it to fall just short of disappointment (which is so much worse than actual disappointment because “less than disappointing” carries a sense of indifference about it, and I’d rather feel disappointment than feel nothing at all). The story held no surprise, as I’d read the Proulx version before watching the movie. I appreciated the acting to the extent that none of the actors imposed themselves on the story in a way that detracted from its poignancy in any way. The minor additions to the Proulx framework didn’t succumb to the usual Hollywood temptation of wanting to squeeze those additional tears from the audience. I had expected to sign my soul over to Heath Ledger by the end of the movie. But I didn’t. And nor am I tempted to sigh like a school girl whenever Jake Gyllenhaal appears on the screen. Not that they didn’t do a great job. The utterly casual manner in which scene after scene of beautiful country-side unfolds took my breath away (and made me fume how much better it all would have been on a big screen).

I shan’t carry on any more about this movie. And get to the actual point of this post. We live in such over-hyped times. Unless you happen to live on a deserted island with no cell phone, no internet and no friends or enemies, very little surprises you in life. Whether a performance is great, or otherwise, your every reaction has been tainted by some critic or friend. Little reaches you past your world-weary filters.[1]

What I really need is a hype-no-tizer. A box shaped device[2] that I can climb into, think about the one thing that I want de-hyped, hit a button and have all of the crap my mind’s accumulated on said thing instantly purged. I can emerge with my innocence intact, and go on to enjoy a work of art, or make a more personal decision about oh, what I really feel about marriage or falling in love[3]. Can you imagine how mind blowing it would be to watch a performance of Shakespeare without waiting for your favorite lines? Or to listen to Haydn or Mozart for the very first time, free of all associations of “call center hold music”? Or to read Pride and Prejudice without simultaneously shuddering at the thought of Keira Knightly playing Elizabeth? Wouldn’t life be wonderful? Which reminds me - what must it feel like to listen to Louis Armstrong singing “What A Wonderful World” without feeling like you’re trapped in a supermarket or an elevator?

Considering there’s no hype-no-tizer, and that there’s probably not going to be one very soon, I’d like to watch Brokeback Mountain again. In 20 or 30 years from now. Of course, by then, I’d have the movie all wrapped up in nostalgia for the good old days (life feels far from good now, but I am confident it’ll get worse enough soon enough to make me long for today). But those are pre-conceptions that’ll only add to the movie’s charm.

[1] The Bard, as always, continues to be a consistent exception. Last week, I ended up watching parts of the movie version of Hamlet (with Kenneth Branagh), and found myself chuckling at the grave-yard scene and felt moved over Laertes’s grief.
[2] Obviously, mine was not the brain behind the i-Pod. Am sure those guys could come up with something far more elegant and infinitely more accessory-friendly.
[3] That I use the conditional is itself indicative of just how prejudiced I am about both.

In this week’s New Yorker, a professor of geography rues how people have lost appreciation for geography and just want to be told where to turn. Sure, the internet is making people dumber all the time. But just how dumb we have become if we need plug-in excuses to stay away from work or indeed to be a lazy college student! Is nothing sacred anymore? Perhaps I should hypnotize myself and convince myself that I can think for myself.

People often inherit their politics from their parents. In some cases, what politics inherit from people is more interesting. Take Sarath Kumar’s jumping ship to the AIADMK. AIADMK not only gets itself some marketable (leaving aside for a moment the question of why any one would find Sarath Kumar a marketable anything) star power, but also a prime television asset. Will this mean the end of Sun TV’s hegemony over the 9:00 PM slot, and the ascendance of Jaya TV into the hearts and minds of weepy wives and hungry husbands? As election unfolds in TN, it sure looks like life’s going to be interesting.

A very happy and prosperous new year to our readers. Lots of new movies to crib about I hear As a starter, here’s a gem: Tirupati Erangi Poravanalla.. Eri Poravan da.
Watch this space as we catch up with the lemons released this week.

Of late, there’s been a new topic to rant about in week-end calls with friends. Polygamy. At least 2 of my friends have watched the new HBO show, and well, so do I. There’ve only been about 2-3 episodes so far, and already I see a disturbing pattern emerging. My blood comes close to boiling when watching the show, and I relish making caustic remarks about it with friends, who in turn agree and come back with equally caustic responses. We swear we won’t watch it again. And the next week end, we’re having the same conversation all over again.

In this week’s episode, the question that my friends and I had anticipated, and which has fuming with indignation but also stuttering with nothing better than “But…but that’s not the same thing! At all!” finally came. If same-sex marriages are unions between consenting adults, doesn’t the same principle apply to polygamy? Let’s face it – it is the same thing. I just don’t happen to like it.

I almost miss the days in which the only thing on TV that made me feel this indignant was Chitthiiiiiiii (God, I used to hate that show!). It felt so easy to rant against media empires that gave away prime time slots to shows where wives were beaten up (remember Deepa Venkat!), ambitious women were portrayed as evil, to rave against women content creators who were so lost to greed that they only cared about making money (did I find male content creators who were as greedy to be equally offensive? No – But I was more sexist then.)…

I digress. To return to polygamy. Would I like it any better if the question were about polyandry, as opposed to polygamy? I doubt it. Because in both cases, the victims continue to be women[1]. And that’s the crux, really – my apparently unshakable conviction that in polygamy/andry, there are victims. Whereas that’s not how I feel about same-sex marriages. Big Love doesn’t make it easy for me to revise my opinions. Can’t help feeling that the men are smug. The women come across as needy (wife # 3), don’t-know-any-better (wife #2), or inscrutable (wife #1). It’s impossible for me to feel sorry for the husbands who’re under tremendous financial pressure to support multiple families, and get more than their fair share of wifely nagging. The minute I feel they must be regretting their lifestyle, along comes a bout of love-making that seems to make these men feel that the financial hassle’s worth the trouble. One fatso character actually believes that taking on wife #4 is his way of answering God’s calling. [2] Clearly, I have issues with the show.

Morality is a way to speed up decision-making. You don’t have to agonize over the pros and cons of a situation. You agree with some side because it is the “right” thing to do. It’s more efficient. In situations where morals fail or don’t apply, one can at least fall back on personal preferences:
- stealing: bad (moral reasons),
- killing: bad (ditto),
- cosmetic surgery (to get sexier looking lips / boobs / whatever): bad (surprisingly enough, moral reasons – I feel that you’re not dealing with the hand nature gave you - corrective surgery, OK - elective surgery NOT OK),
- smoking – bad (Here I leave morality and move into the realm of personal taste. I don’t like it myself, so I won’t do it. I vaguely think you’re foolish to do it, but I won’t hate you for it, or stop you from doing it, so long as you don’t blow smoke in my face),
- eating meat – distasteful (to me. You can eat whatever pleases you, so long as you don’t mess about with dead flesh in my kitchen), and so on and so forth.

I suspect I have strong “moral” beliefs about questions like stealing, killing etc. because these were instilled into me as a child (growing up with desi movies, for the longest time, I actually used to believe that the minute you commit a crime, you’d hear sirens blowing as the cops would be on their way. I must have been 12 or older before I figured out that in most cases the police really have no way of knowing the instant a crime is committed).

I’m sure my parents must have emanated a sense of “polygamy: not good” because I feel so very comfortable making that call. On the other hand, I am 100% certain there was no talk what so ever about same-sex marriages. (In all fairness we never even had the birds & the bees talk, so this topic had no chance at all. I was quite into science in those days, and they must’ve figured I’d get around to it sooner or later). And yet, I appear to have acquired strong “moral” beliefs, and unfortunately conflicting beliefs about both.

Here’s the thing about morals … They have this nasty habit of turning into umbrellas. Over-arching principles, which if they apply to situation A1 demand they be applied to situation A2 as well. With polygamy, I’m not sure what I’ll decide. I see three options before me:
- go down fighting,
- after a while bump the question from an ethical one to one of personal taste.
- stop taking stuff on TV personally. HBO wants to make money. I want to spend money. We’ve already struck a deal. Why sour the relationship with silly questions?

In the meanwhile, I’ll day-dream of situation A3 - nogamy - where people who wish to be left alone are left alone - by people of all sexes.

[1] I’m afraid I don’t recall specific evidence that I can use to back my claim. Regular readers of Kalpana Sharma will know what I mean. Or you could try watching Matrubhoomi. Yes, the latter’s fiction, but so is Big Love. All very apples to apples.
[2] My cattiness apart, the acting is really good. So far the show’s been interesting, and one hopes it will not soon run out of steam, even if carton-loads of Viagra continue to keep it steamy.

Update: When I say “polyandry as opposed to polygamy”, I mean “polyandry as opposed to polygyny”. Thanks to Sudha & Pete for catching that oversight.

A friend sent me this. This is one instance when muttering Bipasha Bipasha Bipasha (replace with your choice of item girl / guy) might have been so much better. Or perhaps that is what this chap did mumble, and got his words twisted around by an angry wife… This got me thinking about what would happen if the courts started taking action on the things we mumble when we’re asleep…

A new clause will have to be added to the Miranda rights - whatever you mumble when you’re asleep in your cell can and will be used against you in a court of law. You can get your lawyer to sleep with you, or one will be provided for you.

Interrogations will no longer feature those old bores (the good cop & the bad cop) - the most respected interrogators will now be the cops who can get you to fall sleep… Their expertise will lie in choosing the right material for the right person: Engineering text books for some, old issues of The Economist (or new ones) for others, and for the especially hardened cases perhaps even a lullaby (police brutality taken to unimagined extremes: picture David Caruso wearing sun-glasses and posing with his hands on his hips, giving you that sideways glance and singing a lullaby - I’d confess to anything under such duress!) The good cop’ll now ask you if he can get you a nice warm glass of milk. Overnight, insomniacs will become the most difficult criminals to crack.

Popular fiction is becoming like the restaurant business. If it’s new, it’s a good idea to try it now. In three months, you’ll get the same gravy / sauce (if the cuisine’s Italian) that is mass manufactured in Guangdong or Gurgaon and air-lifted to every restaurant in the world.

Take Austen. The lady writes a delightful comedy of manners and society. And since they didn’t have the internet back then, it took several hundred years for the mass production to start. First came Georgette Heyer, then Helen Fielding. Now, you have whole sections devoted to Chick-lit, all of which read exactly alike.

The Name of the Rose was great. Foucault’s Pendulum. Even better. We then move to 25 million copies of a somewhat re-hashed Foucault’s and before you know it, you have a whole genre of wannabe historical mysteries. The latest addition to this genre is Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian. The premise looked interesting enough. Problem: a good two generations worth of mystery surrounding Vlad, the Impaler (aka Dracula), plus at least one kidnapped Professor of History. The heroine: another Professor of History who looks into old documents collected by her father, and his mentor and travels all over Europe to unravel the mystery and to rescue the missing person(s).

It’s such a pity that what made Eco’s old sauce work has now been reverse-engineered into its individual components. The ingredients for Writing a Historical Mystery:

1. One pinch of history (vital that this pinch be from some area that even science majors will know about)

2. 5 heaped scoops of nerdiness (why would anyone who is truly cool be remotely interested in Sir Francis Bacon or a 400 year old Romanian landlord?)

3. 2 tea-spoon full of Great-Looks (for your oeuvre to really have legs, the casting director must be able to use leggy actresses) [1]

4. One attractive reward that awaits the intrepid scholar / librarian / diligent student at the end of his or her adventure (helpful hint: world domination, buried treasure, heirs to sons / daughters of God, even cataloging a rare and extensive collection of books and manuscripts - all taken - please think of something else)

5. The following are essential ingredients that you cannot replace, no matter how adventurous you’re feeling: Istanbul / Constantinople, Rome, obscure village in some-country-formerly-behind-iron-curtain, at least 2 piazzas, 3 water fountains (at least one of which should be functioning - remember leggy heroine must get wet), 4 chapels, 17 libraries and 1 railway station (to remind your US audience that Europeans are so archaic they still use trains!)

6. Very important: Pique the readers’ curiosity at the end of every word / sentence / para / chapter. If you are confused about how you can do this, begin by replacing full stops with exclamation points!

Kostova sticks to all of these rules. I might have found the book merely tedious, but the “prize” (refer rule 4 above) offered by Kostova transports the book into the realm of the ridiculous. It’s not “propah” to disclose more. I will merely say that the secret had two of my friends in splits. I was in too much pain to laugh.[2]

When I consider this genre-fication phenomenon, I realize that the fault lies with me (as it almost always does). When I see a good thing, why can’t I just let it go? So, I loved Eco. I shouldn’t try to seek that same thrill over and over again. I should move on. The hang-ups that served me well in childhood (if you enjoyed one book in the Tin Tin series, reading allof them is a good thing) no longer apply. A good friend’s always asking me to expand my horizons. I’ll try to heed his advice in at least one area of life. No more wannabe Tolkiens, Ecos, or Austens[3].

[1] In my more paranoid moments, I wonder if this whole history + mystery movement hasn’t been started by academics who would appear to have finally hired Rick Renard or someone of his caliber. In my less paranoid moments, I wonder which celebrity is a Rosie Crucian / Free Mason / what-have-you (as you can see, Foucault’s Pendulum has left a lasting impression.)

[2] For a fee of twenty-five cents, full plot will be disclosed via personal email.

[3] You should be so lucky to get wanna be Tolkiens, Ecos or Austens. You’re more likely to end up with wannabe-wannabe-Tolkiens (a wannabe-Rowling or wannabe-Paolini for instance), wannabe-wannabe-Austens (the wannabe-Fieldings and the wannabe-Bushnells figure here)

I am an un-married, un-pregnant, not-in-love-and-not-confused-or-sad-about-that, and getting-long-in-the-teeth person. Why has that become such a crime of late? With each passing day, the egregiousness of the crime only seems to increase. I’m not sure what irritates me more - being thought of as a hedonist, an “abnormal” person, or being treated with hope and sympathy - “you’ll change soon”, “everything’ll be alright”, “just wait till May”… People fail to see that I am just as miserable as married people, pregnant people, people in love, and people who’re just confused. Why this marked preference for one form of misery over another?

So, here are the top 10 ways to respond the next time someone tries to give you the “talk”:

- I actually want to be in a relationship, but since I’m fat, ugly and stuck in a dead-end job no one will have me. Can you set me up with your best friend / close relative?

- If the goal is to not fit into that pair of skinny jeans, which method would you say is more efficient? 1 1/2 hours at Olive Garden or 1 1/2 weeks at Presbyterian Maternity?

- And how are you enjoying Nickelodeon?

- Thank you for asking. My relationship with Netflix is everything I ever dreamed of.

- Last Tuesday, I finally did it. Fell madly in love - with myself. I give it two months.

- Children? I’m waiting till more book-friendly models become available.

- Ah yes – the pitter-patter of little feet. I convinced my parents to adopt. It’s been wonderful for them, really.

- Since you asked, research shows that single life after 35 is completely cancer-free. We singles don’t like to let that out.

- (This one’s for enquiries from anyone who’s 10 or more years elder to you) So, what you’re saying is, “If your best friend jumps into a well, so should you?” Oh well, I only wish you’d taken the trouble to tell me that when I wanted to (a) get my tongue pierced (b) drop out of school to get a head start in the pizza delivery business (c) save that money to move to a commune

- You’re just jealous that I might pull a Demi over y’all.

PS: In the last month, I’ve outed myself to some of my friends, and I expect threats, tears et al. from a number of you for this post. Remember your own advice - let’s wait till the end of the year, I’m bound to change sooner than later.

This has been an interesting week for me. Why beat around the bush? It’s been a miserable week. Four, what should I call them - disappointments, i-knew-this-would-happen’s, i-should-have-seen-this-coming’s, still-it’s-not-the-end-of-the-world’s, c’mon-you’ve-been-through-worse’s or my favorite at-least-i-have-my-blog-and-my-health’s in seven days. Two out of the four were pretty solid whacks to the heart and ego. The other two would have gone by almost unnoticed were it not for their timing - their contribution is invaluable in giving life that perfect degree of bleakness.

As my back-end processors work on a pep-talk for myself, I am going to bore y’all for a while by examining the common theories of happiness / sadness to see if I can pick the right model for myself:

Alternating peak-trough theory. Sometimes, I think I put too much faith in the peak-trough philosophy - the one about life being filled with alternating troughs and peaks. This makes me feel entitled to a peak every time I hit a trough and fear a trough the minute I hit a peak. So I spend my whole life dreading peaks, because only a trough can follow & the bigger the peak, the deeper the trough, and so on. And what if some lives are all troughs or all peaks? It is, after all, as valid a theory as the alternating peak-trough one.

Widow-door theory or the “when a door is closed, a window opens” hypothesis. People really should have never bought this theory in the first place. From the very name window/door, you know they’re pulling a fast one over you. The scale’s all wrong. A DOOR closed. And a window is clearly a completely inadequate consolation prize. The door’s usually of the magnitude of losing the love of your life, and the window’s like your boss telling you that you’re wearing nice shoes. Nice try, boss-man – can I be offered a day off?

Post-mortem settlement. This is very similar to the alternating peak-trough theory, but the crucial difference is that the time frame is considerably longer, and possibly never-ending. This one proposes that by facing tough times, you’re either repaying debt from a couple of generations ago, or shoring up for future generations. I have many problems with this theory. One of which is that according to this theory, the act of dying is less powerful than declaring bankruptcy is and say what you will, that just saddens me.

Plenty of other fish in the sea theory: I suspect that this is the old window-door theory rebranded for fishermen.

Shit happens: Why are we so enamoured of patterns anyway? Why seek logic? Life is random. So long as one doesn’t have to hear the story of a butterfly in Shanghai causing a storm in California, I think I’m actually ok with this one.

I don’t know why I started this post, but when have we ever let minor things like that stop us? I must work on my pep talk now.