HE IS SO SHY...........ITS A BOY!!!!!
KITKAT....FINALLY MAKES AN APPEARANCE AGAIN
Monday, May 26, 2008
MISTRESS OF FALL
This sure is ‘dear diary’ stuff especially it literally happens to make me the ‘butt’ of many a joke which happens to be based on my rear end. And instead of relegating those to the back or my mind I have decided to take it head on …mostly like a bull by the horns. Wow! That sure sounds like a tough call and also a contradiction of sorts because I’m hardly a ‘tough call’ person unless I am pushed to make a choice between a deep abyss and an equally deep dark sea.
Without much ado here I go…people often recount in their diary the number times they kissed…the number of shoes they bought… the number of boy friends or girl friends they had…etc…eh!! Weighty emotional and psychologically motivating stuff…however, I am going to recount in this “dear diary” episode the times I fell down…oh! Not in love…but literally…
I am quite huge, i'm told, (at almost 5feet 8 inches and definitely not lean) and even though I should look ungainly…I don’t feel I am…besides the tricky part about being tall is …you can test if you are ungainly or not if you cannot dance…and I dance pretty well… (Good hand leg co-ordination, I use this to console myself not very successfully).However this factor of my height isn’t all that relevant to my come-a-cropper history, as much as I would like to pretend.
It all started with when I was a little baby. I suppose…when I used to fall a lot and mum thought it was cute to call me “tootsie”…THAT HOWEVER WASN’T ALL THAT CUTE WHEN I GREW UP…..thankfully it got amended to Toto…which is tolerable if not totally acceptable.
Early days yet…I remember I must have been a 3 or 4 year old baby…and my mum was sorting out the linen which intrigued me a lot and looked like a whole lot of nappies, primarily being white ( she has this fixation for white bed sheets leaving the bed covers colored as a sop to other people who liked variation….which unfortunately I must say has gotten transferred genetically to me too)…so I was poking my head into this giant chest of a thing that could have housed 4 of me at least besides the linen, chortling away merrily playing out the phrase ‘bottoms up’ to the ‘t’.Then suddenly I noticed a glossy Chinese umbrella stacked against the lid in an awkward position and thought … ‘why is the stupid thing not straight lying down instead of like that’. Being a neat freak from those early days…I pulled it straight …and to my consternation, Wham!!! The lid fell right on my head (which my mum calls a nut till date coz nothing happened).so half in and half out I got my first lesson in gymnastics trying to gyrate myself out from under the lid. Hearing the thud my mum came to investigate and to her horror saw what she saw as a beheaded tootsie…but when she lifted the lid I was as good as new …minus even a slight scratch from my skirmish. Unfortunately whenever this tale was told in social circles I came out more the ‘poke nose’ than the wonder baby. I found peace finally, when the name tootsie and the tale were permanently buried.
Then there was this incident when I had come to a cultural programme hosted in Merchant’s Chamber in Kanpur.Ours being an only girl’s school we were quite thrilled to get to see other students (pimple faced guys to be precise …the perfect romantic prince charming for 12 year olds) from other schools. You know what the say about girls from the convents…well we epitomized it all…gauche, shy, timid…and what not…Me and my three girl friends decided to dress up for the occasion and went to my friends place …off went the uniforms and on went the long midi skirts which were the height of fashion in those days (oh!! How I wish we had stuck to our uniforms... skirts which are a regulation 6 fingers above the knee) and not to miss the block high heels. I felt like a princess…only the end wasn’t as stately. My skirt belonged to my friend’s elder sister since I was a lot taller than her…and it was a lot longer for me. Hence I had to lift it up to let my twinkle toes show. Our seats were in the balcony squashed between a co-ed school and a pure boy’s school. In an attempt to walk straight I didn’t look at the carpeted floor and as you can probably imagine I fell…not on the floor as expected, but into the lap of one of the boys sitting there…and up I jumped up in the air like a shot…skirt and all….red faced ( I go really ruddy when I’m embarrassed).Only the guy stole my thunder as he went straight from pleasant pink to beetroot red in a space of five seconds flat. I stammered a shaky sorry and asked him of all the things whether I had broken his leg or something equally gauche to which he said with equal composure (or lack of it)…No! He was perfectly fine …
Like a tiny mouse I scuttled to my seat…but the evening was far from over for me or him and his friends kept on poking fun at him and making loud comments about how he got his first lap dance. Thank God I hadn’t started experimenting with make up then…or I would have had to deal with another embarrassment of being ‘over red’……my friends however thought that was the most ‘swell’ thing to happen…so romantic…it however did get me to be friends with the guy …my first from another school…I still am in touch with him and we have never really been able to live it down in our common friends circle…guess I was just glad of his sturdy size and that I didn’t have to bear the title of ‘bone breaker’ as well back then.
Then there was this funny incident when I had gone for a vacation to my maternal uncle’s place and he had taken us on a trip to the Hazaribagh Tiger Reserve. Three Kids and two couples.....My sister Deirdre (Pinky), brother Rohan and myself. I being the youngest used to tag along everywhere with them like a tail. Unfortunately I had a tail of my own trailing me…my falling or should I say failing luck!!!
Being in unchartered territory we decided to be brave and explore…the small narrow trail around the guest house in the reserve. We were walking single file…first Pinky then me and finally Rohan bringing up the rear. Suddenly we heard a commotion from behind …I could faintly make out my mum screaming something to me and as I turned my blood curdled and I froze stopping Rohan in his tracks. The hugest elephant( it looked huge from where I stood) I had ever seen…was pelting down the track at top speed…I don’t know what that can be for an elephant , but from my diminutive size it looked like mount Everest suddenly getting up and running to crush me almost at F1 speed. Just as suddenly as we froze all three started to run…unfortunately in single file…I was just following Pinky’s footsteps with terror in my heart and the thundering sound of death in my ears. Suddenly I didn’t see Pinky anymore and the next instant I knew I was lying face down in a ditch sprawled across her…and then a heavy weight was upon me squashing the breath out of me …and I thought…that was it…14 years of life squashed out of me like Heinz tomato ketchup…only then I saw the elephant supposedly crushing me, thunder past us with a happy mahout sitting atop. My elephant was Rohan!…we were a human sandwich.And I got to be the lettuce and mayonnaise while poor Pinky bore the brunt of it all with baldly scraped knees and elbows. It was ironical how afterwards we had to sit on the same elephant to go and take a ride to the waterhole to check out Tigers we never saw because they were supposed to be highly ‘Shy’ animals. I guess I don’t fall myself only but bring the falling luck to my companions too. So I guess Forewarned is forearmed…although I don’t know how that should really help.
Sometimes I’ve been the perpetrator of someone else falling…which is kind of sad for not everyone is blessed with a nice rear cushion to comfort the fall. This one is worth mentioning…
Once I went with my mother for vegetable shopping (haven’t told you all this but I have a fetish for neatly stacked fresh vegetables…which is why I used to accompany my mum on her shopping errands without the generally required bribes. I just love the smell of mint and glossy green chilies or capsicum…and the maroons of beetroot and onions…to me its like a palette of color and a bouquet of smells…each beautifully combined with each other to make the truly exotic).She was bending over and examining cabbages stacked up at in one vendors shop and told me to keep watch for any straying cyclist or cow coming too close. I as usual was high on the veggie smells that to me can beat the axe effect anyday.
A little commotion and I looked behind to see this big brambly bull charging at us. I screamed to my mother who turned in haste and fell into the pile of cabbages and couldn’t get up for they kept rolling under her. The bull passed by without even sniffing disdainfully at us. What an anticlimax!!!…the poor vendor came to my mum’s rescue because I couldn’t manage to pull her up by myself. She offered to pay for the damage done…which were several broken and split cabbages…but manfully he was more concerned about her wellbeing…I ofcourse got a earful for snickering in the beginning.
Fortunately or unfortunately I went through the same situation some years later… the cabbages replaced with some really hard potatoes and a bull replaced with a very pregnant cow that could barely sidle past me…let alone butt me. One thing however remained constant…the snickering!!!! Ofcourse this time it wasn’t me but the vegetable vendors who found the sight of my ungainly sprawled figure pretty amusing…but no harm…by then with my history of falls I had learnt to laugh at myself.
I guess that was preparation for the mother of them all. I wasn’t even young or small then…and the embarrassment was manifold which is why I’ve never revisited the scene of crime till today. It was in Post graduation second year when I was in Bhopal…had purchased my new Action Lisa shoes which were the craze then…had gone out for lunch with mum and dad to the restaurant Kwality on New Market. Only I didn’t get to lunch there….because as soon as I entered the restaurant head held high regally…I missed the small step inside the door and was measuring the floor to the reception desk…sprawled literally like one of those pilgrims who goes for darshan at the siddhi vinayak (only they do it voluntarily and here I was paying homage to a receptionist who was trying her very best to keep a straight concerned face).All the waiters came running to my rescue and a restaurant full of eyes were focused on me…refusing help like a passionate suffragette supporter, I got up with as much composure and poise I could muster. I turned to my mum and dad who were shell shocked …and said with a frigid civility that would have rivaled that of the Queen Mother’s had she been confronted by Hitler himself… ‘Let’s go…we can have lunch elsewhere’…thankfully mum decided to and we went out never to turn back again. I however was a nine years wonder for my parents after that and this anecdote was pulled out of the hat at many a dull party much to my chagrin. Never wore those Lisa shoes again…eventhough it wasn’t their fault, just my inability to see what’s right under my nose.
My personal favorite however is when I surfed and skated on potatoes and chicken to go and watch Bold and the Beautiful. It was a hot afternoon in Jalandhar…the year 2000, I think. I had my regulation 2nd bath of the day( 4 baths in summers and two in winters…I know I will cursed by all those water conservation activists…but dad did the good deed and installed showers in all my bathrooms in a move to sop his and of course my conscience about that matter) just before lunch…and being over enthusiastic in doing so splashed around a good deal. some of the water had escaped from the bathroom into the passageway between the bedrooms…
it was almost time for my favorite serial Bold and the Beautiful (which I thought pretty mature and mature in those days…was graduating from pimple faced guys straight to the peppered grey heads with hot bedroom eyes…who seemed to epitomize charm and suavity among men…you know what I mean…the veritable Richard Gere’s and Clooney’s of the world).I loaded my plate with the fare my mum had cooked ( not wanting to come back for second helpings) …chicken curry with my favorite roasted potatoes fried rice and fried veggies. In the haste not to miss even a second of it I rushed towards mum’s bedroom where the TV was, forgetting all the water in the passageway.
I would have put a ace skate board champion and a surfer to shame with that skid…plate glass of water and all I skidded into the bedroom…like a grand finale to a fantastic play. Only it wasn’t quite right…I was riding the potatoes and had the chicken curry and rice all over my front…and to add insult to injury my dog, Pepper sniffed me nonchalantly, and picked off a chicken breast literally off my breast…
Mum came running to see what had happened…and literally roared with laughter at the incongruity of the scene…me sitting on some fantastically squashed potatoes…plate and glass tossed aside and Pepper at my feet eating the chicken happily…while the title music for Bold and Beautiful belted form the TV…not so beautiful eh!!!!
Apart form that I kept up the tradition in many a place in Pune too….pulled down a whole shelf in Crossword with my flowing dupatta…….after which I decided not to “flow” so much…..confined myself to wearing jeans and T shirts while shopping in potentially dangerous places like Tussorie or any other china shop. I’ve also created new record highs of falling maximum number of times down the hostel stairway…a huge score of 6 times during two years… (Fortunately for me I’m well padded all over)…and the record of dropping my Nokia 6030(am ardent supporter of that model…due to its indestructible nature) from the fourth floor window while hanging out of it talking to my friends is virtually unbeatable. It was a nine days wonder to me too how that phone survived such a fall…only to be lost in a clumsy mix up while traveling in an Auto rickshaw. Neighbours envy owners pride…lucky guy who got it!
Nothing with me or which belongs to me can be ‘Breakable’…And yet I’ve always marveled how I am so good with washing china and not breaking even a single piece while mum just has to stand near for it to be jeopardized. I guess we share the fall misfortune………I with my person…and her rotten luck with china and glass.
Nevertheless I am the unparalleled queen of fall…with many a more embarrassing tale to relate…as the journey continues…falling from mules, falling from trees, falling into swimming pools…falling into shops, falling into laps… falling out of taxis…falling into gutters…falling off the be..................
TO BE CONTINUED....................
Without much ado here I go…people often recount in their diary the number times they kissed…the number of shoes they bought… the number of boy friends or girl friends they had…etc…eh!! Weighty emotional and psychologically motivating stuff…however, I am going to recount in this “dear diary” episode the times I fell down…oh! Not in love…but literally…
I am quite huge, i'm told, (at almost 5feet 8 inches and definitely not lean) and even though I should look ungainly…I don’t feel I am…besides the tricky part about being tall is …you can test if you are ungainly or not if you cannot dance…and I dance pretty well… (Good hand leg co-ordination, I use this to console myself not very successfully).However this factor of my height isn’t all that relevant to my come-a-cropper history, as much as I would like to pretend.
It all started with when I was a little baby. I suppose…when I used to fall a lot and mum thought it was cute to call me “tootsie”…THAT HOWEVER WASN’T ALL THAT CUTE WHEN I GREW UP…..thankfully it got amended to Toto…which is tolerable if not totally acceptable.
Early days yet…I remember I must have been a 3 or 4 year old baby…and my mum was sorting out the linen which intrigued me a lot and looked like a whole lot of nappies, primarily being white ( she has this fixation for white bed sheets leaving the bed covers colored as a sop to other people who liked variation….which unfortunately I must say has gotten transferred genetically to me too)…so I was poking my head into this giant chest of a thing that could have housed 4 of me at least besides the linen, chortling away merrily playing out the phrase ‘bottoms up’ to the ‘t’.Then suddenly I noticed a glossy Chinese umbrella stacked against the lid in an awkward position and thought … ‘why is the stupid thing not straight lying down instead of like that’. Being a neat freak from those early days…I pulled it straight …and to my consternation, Wham!!! The lid fell right on my head (which my mum calls a nut till date coz nothing happened).so half in and half out I got my first lesson in gymnastics trying to gyrate myself out from under the lid. Hearing the thud my mum came to investigate and to her horror saw what she saw as a beheaded tootsie…but when she lifted the lid I was as good as new …minus even a slight scratch from my skirmish. Unfortunately whenever this tale was told in social circles I came out more the ‘poke nose’ than the wonder baby. I found peace finally, when the name tootsie and the tale were permanently buried.
Then there was this incident when I had come to a cultural programme hosted in Merchant’s Chamber in Kanpur.Ours being an only girl’s school we were quite thrilled to get to see other students (pimple faced guys to be precise …the perfect romantic prince charming for 12 year olds) from other schools. You know what the say about girls from the convents…well we epitomized it all…gauche, shy, timid…and what not…Me and my three girl friends decided to dress up for the occasion and went to my friends place …off went the uniforms and on went the long midi skirts which were the height of fashion in those days (oh!! How I wish we had stuck to our uniforms... skirts which are a regulation 6 fingers above the knee) and not to miss the block high heels. I felt like a princess…only the end wasn’t as stately. My skirt belonged to my friend’s elder sister since I was a lot taller than her…and it was a lot longer for me. Hence I had to lift it up to let my twinkle toes show. Our seats were in the balcony squashed between a co-ed school and a pure boy’s school. In an attempt to walk straight I didn’t look at the carpeted floor and as you can probably imagine I fell…not on the floor as expected, but into the lap of one of the boys sitting there…and up I jumped up in the air like a shot…skirt and all….red faced ( I go really ruddy when I’m embarrassed).Only the guy stole my thunder as he went straight from pleasant pink to beetroot red in a space of five seconds flat. I stammered a shaky sorry and asked him of all the things whether I had broken his leg or something equally gauche to which he said with equal composure (or lack of it)…No! He was perfectly fine …
Like a tiny mouse I scuttled to my seat…but the evening was far from over for me or him and his friends kept on poking fun at him and making loud comments about how he got his first lap dance. Thank God I hadn’t started experimenting with make up then…or I would have had to deal with another embarrassment of being ‘over red’……my friends however thought that was the most ‘swell’ thing to happen…so romantic…it however did get me to be friends with the guy …my first from another school…I still am in touch with him and we have never really been able to live it down in our common friends circle…guess I was just glad of his sturdy size and that I didn’t have to bear the title of ‘bone breaker’ as well back then.
Then there was this funny incident when I had gone for a vacation to my maternal uncle’s place and he had taken us on a trip to the Hazaribagh Tiger Reserve. Three Kids and two couples.....My sister Deirdre (Pinky), brother Rohan and myself. I being the youngest used to tag along everywhere with them like a tail. Unfortunately I had a tail of my own trailing me…my falling or should I say failing luck!!!
Being in unchartered territory we decided to be brave and explore…the small narrow trail around the guest house in the reserve. We were walking single file…first Pinky then me and finally Rohan bringing up the rear. Suddenly we heard a commotion from behind …I could faintly make out my mum screaming something to me and as I turned my blood curdled and I froze stopping Rohan in his tracks. The hugest elephant( it looked huge from where I stood) I had ever seen…was pelting down the track at top speed…I don’t know what that can be for an elephant , but from my diminutive size it looked like mount Everest suddenly getting up and running to crush me almost at F1 speed. Just as suddenly as we froze all three started to run…unfortunately in single file…I was just following Pinky’s footsteps with terror in my heart and the thundering sound of death in my ears. Suddenly I didn’t see Pinky anymore and the next instant I knew I was lying face down in a ditch sprawled across her…and then a heavy weight was upon me squashing the breath out of me …and I thought…that was it…14 years of life squashed out of me like Heinz tomato ketchup…only then I saw the elephant supposedly crushing me, thunder past us with a happy mahout sitting atop. My elephant was Rohan!…we were a human sandwich.And I got to be the lettuce and mayonnaise while poor Pinky bore the brunt of it all with baldly scraped knees and elbows. It was ironical how afterwards we had to sit on the same elephant to go and take a ride to the waterhole to check out Tigers we never saw because they were supposed to be highly ‘Shy’ animals. I guess I don’t fall myself only but bring the falling luck to my companions too. So I guess Forewarned is forearmed…although I don’t know how that should really help.
Sometimes I’ve been the perpetrator of someone else falling…which is kind of sad for not everyone is blessed with a nice rear cushion to comfort the fall. This one is worth mentioning…
Once I went with my mother for vegetable shopping (haven’t told you all this but I have a fetish for neatly stacked fresh vegetables…which is why I used to accompany my mum on her shopping errands without the generally required bribes. I just love the smell of mint and glossy green chilies or capsicum…and the maroons of beetroot and onions…to me its like a palette of color and a bouquet of smells…each beautifully combined with each other to make the truly exotic).She was bending over and examining cabbages stacked up at in one vendors shop and told me to keep watch for any straying cyclist or cow coming too close. I as usual was high on the veggie smells that to me can beat the axe effect anyday.
A little commotion and I looked behind to see this big brambly bull charging at us. I screamed to my mother who turned in haste and fell into the pile of cabbages and couldn’t get up for they kept rolling under her. The bull passed by without even sniffing disdainfully at us. What an anticlimax!!!…the poor vendor came to my mum’s rescue because I couldn’t manage to pull her up by myself. She offered to pay for the damage done…which were several broken and split cabbages…but manfully he was more concerned about her wellbeing…I ofcourse got a earful for snickering in the beginning.
Fortunately or unfortunately I went through the same situation some years later… the cabbages replaced with some really hard potatoes and a bull replaced with a very pregnant cow that could barely sidle past me…let alone butt me. One thing however remained constant…the snickering!!!! Ofcourse this time it wasn’t me but the vegetable vendors who found the sight of my ungainly sprawled figure pretty amusing…but no harm…by then with my history of falls I had learnt to laugh at myself.
I guess that was preparation for the mother of them all. I wasn’t even young or small then…and the embarrassment was manifold which is why I’ve never revisited the scene of crime till today. It was in Post graduation second year when I was in Bhopal…had purchased my new Action Lisa shoes which were the craze then…had gone out for lunch with mum and dad to the restaurant Kwality on New Market. Only I didn’t get to lunch there….because as soon as I entered the restaurant head held high regally…I missed the small step inside the door and was measuring the floor to the reception desk…sprawled literally like one of those pilgrims who goes for darshan at the siddhi vinayak (only they do it voluntarily and here I was paying homage to a receptionist who was trying her very best to keep a straight concerned face).All the waiters came running to my rescue and a restaurant full of eyes were focused on me…refusing help like a passionate suffragette supporter, I got up with as much composure and poise I could muster. I turned to my mum and dad who were shell shocked …and said with a frigid civility that would have rivaled that of the Queen Mother’s had she been confronted by Hitler himself… ‘Let’s go…we can have lunch elsewhere’…thankfully mum decided to and we went out never to turn back again. I however was a nine years wonder for my parents after that and this anecdote was pulled out of the hat at many a dull party much to my chagrin. Never wore those Lisa shoes again…eventhough it wasn’t their fault, just my inability to see what’s right under my nose.
My personal favorite however is when I surfed and skated on potatoes and chicken to go and watch Bold and the Beautiful. It was a hot afternoon in Jalandhar…the year 2000, I think. I had my regulation 2nd bath of the day( 4 baths in summers and two in winters…I know I will cursed by all those water conservation activists…but dad did the good deed and installed showers in all my bathrooms in a move to sop his and of course my conscience about that matter) just before lunch…and being over enthusiastic in doing so splashed around a good deal. some of the water had escaped from the bathroom into the passageway between the bedrooms…
it was almost time for my favorite serial Bold and the Beautiful (which I thought pretty mature and mature in those days…was graduating from pimple faced guys straight to the peppered grey heads with hot bedroom eyes…who seemed to epitomize charm and suavity among men…you know what I mean…the veritable Richard Gere’s and Clooney’s of the world).I loaded my plate with the fare my mum had cooked ( not wanting to come back for second helpings) …chicken curry with my favorite roasted potatoes fried rice and fried veggies. In the haste not to miss even a second of it I rushed towards mum’s bedroom where the TV was, forgetting all the water in the passageway.
I would have put a ace skate board champion and a surfer to shame with that skid…plate glass of water and all I skidded into the bedroom…like a grand finale to a fantastic play. Only it wasn’t quite right…I was riding the potatoes and had the chicken curry and rice all over my front…and to add insult to injury my dog, Pepper sniffed me nonchalantly, and picked off a chicken breast literally off my breast…
Mum came running to see what had happened…and literally roared with laughter at the incongruity of the scene…me sitting on some fantastically squashed potatoes…plate and glass tossed aside and Pepper at my feet eating the chicken happily…while the title music for Bold and Beautiful belted form the TV…not so beautiful eh!!!!
Apart form that I kept up the tradition in many a place in Pune too….pulled down a whole shelf in Crossword with my flowing dupatta…….after which I decided not to “flow” so much…..confined myself to wearing jeans and T shirts while shopping in potentially dangerous places like Tussorie or any other china shop. I’ve also created new record highs of falling maximum number of times down the hostel stairway…a huge score of 6 times during two years… (Fortunately for me I’m well padded all over)…and the record of dropping my Nokia 6030(am ardent supporter of that model…due to its indestructible nature) from the fourth floor window while hanging out of it talking to my friends is virtually unbeatable. It was a nine days wonder to me too how that phone survived such a fall…only to be lost in a clumsy mix up while traveling in an Auto rickshaw. Neighbours envy owners pride…lucky guy who got it!
Nothing with me or which belongs to me can be ‘Breakable’…And yet I’ve always marveled how I am so good with washing china and not breaking even a single piece while mum just has to stand near for it to be jeopardized. I guess we share the fall misfortune………I with my person…and her rotten luck with china and glass.
Nevertheless I am the unparalleled queen of fall…with many a more embarrassing tale to relate…as the journey continues…falling from mules, falling from trees, falling into swimming pools…falling into shops, falling into laps… falling out of taxis…falling into gutters…falling off the be..................
TO BE CONTINUED....................
Monday, May 19, 2008
CONSUMED WITH COLLECTION ADDICTION
My biggest sin is that I am a compulsive collector. Let me give you a sneak peek into my room and its contents which will tell you why such a simple trait is a sin. I’ve been long trying to establish a reason for such a behavioral aberration as many would call it and came to the conclusion the answer to such questions lie in the past.
Oh No! Not my immediate past but the past lives past. Maybe I was a part of a civilization long gone which was routed out of existence due to severe deprivation, the dregs of which trickled down into my soul via generations. But then logically that wouldn’t be possible because if they went out with the light like some obscure race, then neither would I be in existence. So scrapping that line of thought I fantasize about being born during the dark ages which kind of fits because I am
A) A compulsive collector ( as if the world’s supplies are going to end the next minute….a veritable hoarder)
B) A supporter or emancipation…a hater of any form of repression…a rebel against authority ( I feel women can never be treated too well and yet believe they have a place of their own in society which they shouldn’t relinquish in the pursuit of the ultimate goal of a perceived equality)
C) I hate cumbersome clothes. ( I think that would be common to anyone )
D) Also I have this peculiar OCD for cleanliness. I just love cleaning things up …its like therapy to me. Maybe I was a maid in those times, or had some insufferable guilt that goes with being born in the Dark Ages, something sinister and (gleefully) horrid…something I just had to try and wash away and have been trying to erase since then.( Boy! That sure would take an awful lot of washing up during the years)
E) I like the colder climes better than any other climate. It seems to be something I’ve inherited…the heat just doesn’t suit me…(feels like some really slow genetic adaptation… my mind and body still seem to feel they are meant to be in Europe and not here in the tropical climes of India.)
My collection habits range from the good to the strange to the really bizarre. Its definitely more than just what the average female collects...old birthday cards, shoes, dresses, accessories….(P.S. I think Jayalalitha was a pretty average female even with her collection of saris and shoes).
For instance I have this stash of really unmatched buttons I’ve collected over the years. Just simple plastic, bone and metal buttons with which if I tried to make a multicolored plaque would resemble something like an MF Hussain painting gone wrong. (That says a lot for the color combinations I would be forced to use).I really don’t know why I collect those buttons. It’s probably because I can’t see anything being wasted or maybe just in the hope of getting the perfect garment to match them. Truth be known I just get a joy in putting my hand in the bag and sifting through them …it pretty much feels like when u go into a supermarket and sift your hand through a tin of grain. Oh! That feel of plenty is priceless.
Then once I went on this Jag of collecting foreign currency which is quite normal. However my reasons weren’t so normal. I didn’t collect for any cultural or educative reasons as most people would say but because it tickled me pink at the thought of the distance that piece of paper or coin traveled to get to me. I mean I could write a whole book on the life of a note…all the various exciting places and events it went through to reach its final destination –ME. However I grew out of that habit thankfully…courtesy a soured love relationship which made me clear a lot of mess and junk a lot of clutter…both physically and metaphorically.
Then I have this fascinating habit of collecting Plastic bags. It’s a habit that’s totally unique except to the rag picker race. However I do consider myself one notch above that scavenging race. I DON’T collect used poly bags…just newly minted poly bags. I have a super collection of bags both Natural fiber and polythene which I keep close to me literally. I line the underside of my mattress with all those glorious bags. Plus it has an advantage of leveraging my position from ‘single’ cushion to ‘double’ cushion. When I was in Pune studying I created the largest collection of bags anyone would have had in my hostel and people knew whom to approach had they needed one.Oh I could afford to be generous. I had surplus over my buffer supplies. My collection ranged from Subway take away wraps to Pune Central glorious translucent watermelon bags…to those crackly Piramyd bags to those glossy Amsterdam Airport Merry Christmas holiday bags. I have also collected Laundry bags and airsickness bags from airports and Hotels…well all justifiably needed …how awful to be caught getting sick without an airsickness bag ( Perfectly legitimate for me to take one).another reason why I like going shopping is the Bags I get. Sometimes when the need and hunger gets too much…….I just go shopping with someone and take the bags in fair exchange for my esteemed company.
My recent interaction with the beach for the first time left me with two bags of an assortment of shells and stones.Oh! Those two beautiful days of beach combing that left me looking like something like the hunchback of Notre dame. All I could do at the water’s edge was chase after the shiny shells and pebbles which kept appearing and receding magically with the tide. I went totally berserk…what a collector’s paradise! Smooth stones, serrated surfaces, colored, jewel bright stones… (Who knows that might have been a rare diamond)…green, blue, yellow ochre I collected them all.Ah! But this is one of the more tame addictions of mine so I shall not go in further details besides its seasonal and short-lived for I’m a beach collector so I only collect stones if and when I go to the beach.
As a kid I had this fascination for collecting pretty perfume bottles (the secret being in those early days I wasn’t allowed to put perfume so I would fantasize about it by sniffing at the innumerable bottles I collected…).which later on extended to wine bottles which I sniffed at too but for very different reasons… (Had been reading those M&Bs which ...er.. taught so much about wines and their bouquets….I was just beginning to learn about that concept….being not only restricted to flowers).However that was soon put to an end…when my developed sense of smell got away with me and I brought home a bottle of formaldehyde preserved ancient but still not disintegrated earthworms. They were my pride….only my mother didn’t share in it and out went my collection of bottles and all. I cried, I felt deprived, I screamed in rage, but to no avail. Anyway I grew up and found compensation in the real stuff……..real perfumes and wine. For those of you who don’t know…I love perfume….and anytime you are stuck for what to give me …..Give me a bottle of wildly expensive French perfume….Oh! And please no Rose….I hate rose…..except in flowers.
My recent craze is DVD videos. Being in a hostel gives you ample opportunity to make your own library of videos. I have approximately 400 movies (a modest collection) right now. Some as original DVDs or VCDs…those evergreen collector movies one would like to see over and over again ( and that brings to the forefront another peculiarity of mine…..when Shakespeare said “if music be the food of love, play on…” he meant me………it takes me an average of 50-60 times listening to a track to make me sick of it after which I will not touch it till eternity…..this habit of mine has percolated into the other parts of my life too…food…drink…movies…and sometimes sad to admit people too….so if I’m onto you big time, beware!….your days in my life are numbered…sometimes fortunately for you, and sometimes for me). My rationale in collecting movies---a visualization of what I’ll be when I’m 80 years old ….sitting on an overstuffed couch with nothing to do besides matchmaking (something I want to desperately do to torture the next generation as I was tortured…).Ah! hopefully by then my elephantine memory will have dimmed and I can enjoy the mammoth collection I’ve made over years of careful education in good taste ( my collection of movies has no riff raff….its all the choicest ones …each a story to tell both in the making and how it landed in my collection…).
Then there is the morbid streak in me too…I collect remains of old relationships…movie ticket stubs, bills from lunches and dinners, old envelopes from letters that are preserved for posterity, feathers, dried flowers and even in my case …er…pop corn packets….. (Don’t ask me why pop corn).Then there are other things like……..a lock of my dead dog’s hair… Oh I think that’s so romantic….the whole ‘locket and lock’ thing. That was my dog’s…Beware! if you are the love of my life you’ll probably go missing some hair…or an old t shirt …I LOVE RELICS…Sometimes I feel I might have been an Egyptian the way I mummify my things ‘achaar dalo’ as my friends and family say…
And there is this lifelong fetish I have with anklets and earrings especially filigree and stone jewellery.No, if you’re wondering I’m definitely not high maintenance. I could ooh! And ah! over some junk you picked up for me from some street vendor in Bandra or rhapsodize over a delicate spider web of silver from Oysterbay.But for the major part I feel Jewellery and shoes are highly personal and should be bought by oneself only…they are a reflection of what you are. There is this old adage that still holds true today… “You can make out the kind of man by his shoes and friends”. I’d like to take the liberty to extend that to women too.
Then there are the more mundane items like scented candles, pot pourri, stationary, multicolored post-its, recipes books scavenged out of “kabaari waala tapris” ,flower seeds and fresh flowers and plants, books, etc.
Oh the never-ending joy of collection. You can just imagine the pleasure. It’s another thing that I will always need a store room wherever I live to keep my stash safe from prying eyes.
Oh No! Not my immediate past but the past lives past. Maybe I was a part of a civilization long gone which was routed out of existence due to severe deprivation, the dregs of which trickled down into my soul via generations. But then logically that wouldn’t be possible because if they went out with the light like some obscure race, then neither would I be in existence. So scrapping that line of thought I fantasize about being born during the dark ages which kind of fits because I am
A) A compulsive collector ( as if the world’s supplies are going to end the next minute….a veritable hoarder)
B) A supporter or emancipation…a hater of any form of repression…a rebel against authority ( I feel women can never be treated too well and yet believe they have a place of their own in society which they shouldn’t relinquish in the pursuit of the ultimate goal of a perceived equality)
C) I hate cumbersome clothes. ( I think that would be common to anyone )
D) Also I have this peculiar OCD for cleanliness. I just love cleaning things up …its like therapy to me. Maybe I was a maid in those times, or had some insufferable guilt that goes with being born in the Dark Ages, something sinister and (gleefully) horrid…something I just had to try and wash away and have been trying to erase since then.( Boy! That sure would take an awful lot of washing up during the years)
E) I like the colder climes better than any other climate. It seems to be something I’ve inherited…the heat just doesn’t suit me…(feels like some really slow genetic adaptation… my mind and body still seem to feel they are meant to be in Europe and not here in the tropical climes of India.)
My collection habits range from the good to the strange to the really bizarre. Its definitely more than just what the average female collects...old birthday cards, shoes, dresses, accessories….(P.S. I think Jayalalitha was a pretty average female even with her collection of saris and shoes).
For instance I have this stash of really unmatched buttons I’ve collected over the years. Just simple plastic, bone and metal buttons with which if I tried to make a multicolored plaque would resemble something like an MF Hussain painting gone wrong. (That says a lot for the color combinations I would be forced to use).I really don’t know why I collect those buttons. It’s probably because I can’t see anything being wasted or maybe just in the hope of getting the perfect garment to match them. Truth be known I just get a joy in putting my hand in the bag and sifting through them …it pretty much feels like when u go into a supermarket and sift your hand through a tin of grain. Oh! That feel of plenty is priceless.
Then once I went on this Jag of collecting foreign currency which is quite normal. However my reasons weren’t so normal. I didn’t collect for any cultural or educative reasons as most people would say but because it tickled me pink at the thought of the distance that piece of paper or coin traveled to get to me. I mean I could write a whole book on the life of a note…all the various exciting places and events it went through to reach its final destination –ME. However I grew out of that habit thankfully…courtesy a soured love relationship which made me clear a lot of mess and junk a lot of clutter…both physically and metaphorically.
Then I have this fascinating habit of collecting Plastic bags. It’s a habit that’s totally unique except to the rag picker race. However I do consider myself one notch above that scavenging race. I DON’T collect used poly bags…just newly minted poly bags. I have a super collection of bags both Natural fiber and polythene which I keep close to me literally. I line the underside of my mattress with all those glorious bags. Plus it has an advantage of leveraging my position from ‘single’ cushion to ‘double’ cushion. When I was in Pune studying I created the largest collection of bags anyone would have had in my hostel and people knew whom to approach had they needed one.Oh I could afford to be generous. I had surplus over my buffer supplies. My collection ranged from Subway take away wraps to Pune Central glorious translucent watermelon bags…to those crackly Piramyd bags to those glossy Amsterdam Airport Merry Christmas holiday bags. I have also collected Laundry bags and airsickness bags from airports and Hotels…well all justifiably needed …how awful to be caught getting sick without an airsickness bag ( Perfectly legitimate for me to take one).another reason why I like going shopping is the Bags I get. Sometimes when the need and hunger gets too much…….I just go shopping with someone and take the bags in fair exchange for my esteemed company.
My recent interaction with the beach for the first time left me with two bags of an assortment of shells and stones.Oh! Those two beautiful days of beach combing that left me looking like something like the hunchback of Notre dame. All I could do at the water’s edge was chase after the shiny shells and pebbles which kept appearing and receding magically with the tide. I went totally berserk…what a collector’s paradise! Smooth stones, serrated surfaces, colored, jewel bright stones… (Who knows that might have been a rare diamond)…green, blue, yellow ochre I collected them all.Ah! But this is one of the more tame addictions of mine so I shall not go in further details besides its seasonal and short-lived for I’m a beach collector so I only collect stones if and when I go to the beach.
As a kid I had this fascination for collecting pretty perfume bottles (the secret being in those early days I wasn’t allowed to put perfume so I would fantasize about it by sniffing at the innumerable bottles I collected…).which later on extended to wine bottles which I sniffed at too but for very different reasons… (Had been reading those M&Bs which ...er.. taught so much about wines and their bouquets….I was just beginning to learn about that concept….being not only restricted to flowers).However that was soon put to an end…when my developed sense of smell got away with me and I brought home a bottle of formaldehyde preserved ancient but still not disintegrated earthworms. They were my pride….only my mother didn’t share in it and out went my collection of bottles and all. I cried, I felt deprived, I screamed in rage, but to no avail. Anyway I grew up and found compensation in the real stuff……..real perfumes and wine. For those of you who don’t know…I love perfume….and anytime you are stuck for what to give me …..Give me a bottle of wildly expensive French perfume….Oh! And please no Rose….I hate rose…..except in flowers.
My recent craze is DVD videos. Being in a hostel gives you ample opportunity to make your own library of videos. I have approximately 400 movies (a modest collection) right now. Some as original DVDs or VCDs…those evergreen collector movies one would like to see over and over again ( and that brings to the forefront another peculiarity of mine…..when Shakespeare said “if music be the food of love, play on…” he meant me………it takes me an average of 50-60 times listening to a track to make me sick of it after which I will not touch it till eternity…..this habit of mine has percolated into the other parts of my life too…food…drink…movies…and sometimes sad to admit people too….so if I’m onto you big time, beware!….your days in my life are numbered…sometimes fortunately for you, and sometimes for me). My rationale in collecting movies---a visualization of what I’ll be when I’m 80 years old ….sitting on an overstuffed couch with nothing to do besides matchmaking (something I want to desperately do to torture the next generation as I was tortured…).Ah! hopefully by then my elephantine memory will have dimmed and I can enjoy the mammoth collection I’ve made over years of careful education in good taste ( my collection of movies has no riff raff….its all the choicest ones …each a story to tell both in the making and how it landed in my collection…).
Then there is the morbid streak in me too…I collect remains of old relationships…movie ticket stubs, bills from lunches and dinners, old envelopes from letters that are preserved for posterity, feathers, dried flowers and even in my case …er…pop corn packets….. (Don’t ask me why pop corn).Then there are other things like……..a lock of my dead dog’s hair… Oh I think that’s so romantic….the whole ‘locket and lock’ thing. That was my dog’s…Beware! if you are the love of my life you’ll probably go missing some hair…or an old t shirt …I LOVE RELICS…Sometimes I feel I might have been an Egyptian the way I mummify my things ‘achaar dalo’ as my friends and family say…
And there is this lifelong fetish I have with anklets and earrings especially filigree and stone jewellery.No, if you’re wondering I’m definitely not high maintenance. I could ooh! And ah! over some junk you picked up for me from some street vendor in Bandra or rhapsodize over a delicate spider web of silver from Oysterbay.But for the major part I feel Jewellery and shoes are highly personal and should be bought by oneself only…they are a reflection of what you are. There is this old adage that still holds true today… “You can make out the kind of man by his shoes and friends”. I’d like to take the liberty to extend that to women too.
Then there are the more mundane items like scented candles, pot pourri, stationary, multicolored post-its, recipes books scavenged out of “kabaari waala tapris” ,flower seeds and fresh flowers and plants, books, etc.
Oh the never-ending joy of collection. You can just imagine the pleasure. It’s another thing that I will always need a store room wherever I live to keep my stash safe from prying eyes.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
DEVELOPMENT IN INDIAN Inc.
I wonder sometimes at the definition of development which is paraded so vigorously by everyone including our esteemed politicians. Is Indian .Inc a reality? Those incredible India adverts floating on channels in between prime time programs seem to say yes!
And yet there are instances which remind us of the primitive state of the society we live in. You have people steeped in superstitions tossing their babies in the air from the second floor to help make them stronger, and serials of the “saas-bahu “ genre that are surely nothing but a intellectual paralysis and sari and jewellery parade getting prime spots on a country with one of the biggest population of youth.
Well that’s some thought for the media barons….have we actually done our segmentation properly or is it that the Indian population is intellectually incapable of handling more than a series of plastic surgeries and illegitimate affairs still going strong even when the protagonist has got great grandchildren. Says a lot for their sexual prowess if nothing else…..and all this of course happening in typical “sanskaari” parivaars.if it wasn’t so pathetic it would be almost laughable.
Another shocking incident the other day getting covered in the news made me think again about the development of our society. There was this stray case of an identification goof up in Noida.An old woman had died under mysterious circumstances and because of the disintegrated state of the body the police couldn’t identify her. a person claiming to be her son comes and claims her body as his mothers. Two days later…the person believed to be dead is seen trying to prove that she is alive via ration cards and photographic identification etc.another person believed to be the corpse’s real son comes and questions the police on its negligence. Apparently there was some jewellery and money on the dead body which understandably went missing.
Another ecerpt taken from India Today kind of hinted at the hopelessness of the state of law and order support services in India. In 2006,alone the GRP personnel found 1568 bodies,in 2007 a whopping 1696 deaths on the tracks…which hints at a grotesque rise of approximately 5 deaths per day on the tracks and all this only in Haryana.Even more startling is the number of unidentified bodies (10698 bodies recovered since 2001 and of these 3,298 were cremated without identification).while accidents and suicides are a common cause ,police officials have unearthed another dangerous trend of Murders being passed off as accidents.The rationale being that such bodies are generally not identified and the killer gets to go scot free.
However I’m still wondering about the method of identification or a person if she isn’t alive to tell the tale. Abroad we have dental records social security numbers. Over here if your body that is either burnt or mangled beyond recognition with finger prints missing, then there is no way to tell who it is.
Basic requirements like dental records are not there. Quite a few people have never even seen what a hospital looks like let alone availed of any medical service. Even worse many births go unregistered……assisted by phony untrained midwives. In such a situation how difficult would it be for a criminal…worse for a terrorist to die and then suddenly come alive again?
The more shocking recent unearthing of mass graves in Gujrat, a screaming testimony to callous treatment of the dead just goes to show that we cannot even afford to give basic dignity to our dead let alone the living.I hope that the outside world doesn't watch these bizzarre happenings in India as a picture of a "truly incredible India" with all the negative connotations...
And yet there are instances which remind us of the primitive state of the society we live in. You have people steeped in superstitions tossing their babies in the air from the second floor to help make them stronger, and serials of the “saas-bahu “ genre that are surely nothing but a intellectual paralysis and sari and jewellery parade getting prime spots on a country with one of the biggest population of youth.
Well that’s some thought for the media barons….have we actually done our segmentation properly or is it that the Indian population is intellectually incapable of handling more than a series of plastic surgeries and illegitimate affairs still going strong even when the protagonist has got great grandchildren. Says a lot for their sexual prowess if nothing else…..and all this of course happening in typical “sanskaari” parivaars.if it wasn’t so pathetic it would be almost laughable.
Another shocking incident the other day getting covered in the news made me think again about the development of our society. There was this stray case of an identification goof up in Noida.An old woman had died under mysterious circumstances and because of the disintegrated state of the body the police couldn’t identify her. a person claiming to be her son comes and claims her body as his mothers. Two days later…the person believed to be dead is seen trying to prove that she is alive via ration cards and photographic identification etc.another person believed to be the corpse’s real son comes and questions the police on its negligence. Apparently there was some jewellery and money on the dead body which understandably went missing.
Another ecerpt taken from India Today kind of hinted at the hopelessness of the state of law and order support services in India. In 2006,alone the GRP personnel found 1568 bodies,in 2007 a whopping 1696 deaths on the tracks…which hints at a grotesque rise of approximately 5 deaths per day on the tracks and all this only in Haryana.Even more startling is the number of unidentified bodies (10698 bodies recovered since 2001 and of these 3,298 were cremated without identification).while accidents and suicides are a common cause ,police officials have unearthed another dangerous trend of Murders being passed off as accidents.The rationale being that such bodies are generally not identified and the killer gets to go scot free.
However I’m still wondering about the method of identification or a person if she isn’t alive to tell the tale. Abroad we have dental records social security numbers. Over here if your body that is either burnt or mangled beyond recognition with finger prints missing, then there is no way to tell who it is.
Basic requirements like dental records are not there. Quite a few people have never even seen what a hospital looks like let alone availed of any medical service. Even worse many births go unregistered……assisted by phony untrained midwives. In such a situation how difficult would it be for a criminal…worse for a terrorist to die and then suddenly come alive again?
The more shocking recent unearthing of mass graves in Gujrat, a screaming testimony to callous treatment of the dead just goes to show that we cannot even afford to give basic dignity to our dead let alone the living.I hope that the outside world doesn't watch these bizzarre happenings in India as a picture of a "truly incredible India" with all the negative connotations...
Friday, May 16, 2008
ABSTRACTED THOUGHTS
There is an inordinate pleasure humans derive in drawing parallels between themselves and anything this world contains. We draw comparisons between our lives and those of great people gone before us (sometimes saying this is exactly what I am like , or this is what I would never want to be like)…some mere mortals immortalized by their acts of deceit and vengeance or something so horrifying that relating it with glee is in itself a sinful act. The Mata Haris and Hitlers of the world are just as alluring to read about or enjoy as a finely crafted Belgium Godiva chocolate…or a Rembrandt immortalized by their perfection.
We relish the act in a horrific way even if it is of the highest negativity. Its very strange that although most of us are ever ready to walk down a moral high path in the name of what is correct and what is not we are so lacking in perspective where it comes to defining what can be enjoyed by us or not. I mean one can never or should never take “interest” or “pleasure” in the torture of another individual person or animal. Yet the views or hits the -------- Fritzl case or Nathari case got bears testimony to exactly what I denounced earlier. Kind of brings to my mind another thought that ….the purest of emotions can never be negative or positive but both….Pleasure for instance can be both positive as well as negative depending on who looks at it and from what angle. Love too can be negative and positive……..sometimes its called passion, sometimes obsession, and sometimes when both partners are in love its called sublime….of course this is the most desirable state as no one gets hurt and the world is a happy place.
Getting back to the original line of thought… the news channels today capitalize on the misery of individuals and report heinous acts of crime against humanity……No! Not for the sake of justice only…but also to make sure their TRPs don’t flag. And we the viewers applaud them for broadcasting and making aware the general public…awareness is a lethal weapon which empowers us right? Yet we as dumb bystanders on many occasions just stand by and enjoy the scene, the revulsion drawn out a brutality which is enjoyment itself.
Some people might say why I am so dark in my thoughts…that the good in the world is reported too……..but human nature being what it is……how many of us are ecstatic at the news of a man saving ten orphans from a fire …we would rather enjoy the news of how three sons bludgeoned their mother in the name of witchcraft to save her soul.
This world is made of mixed shades of grey…while the most beautiful primary shades of black and white (an amalgam of all colors we have ever seen and if I may say so) are what are immortalized as fluctuating benchmarks never to be reached…one can never be perfection never attain it because it’s a chimera…a foggy target which is just a dream with no roots in reality.
As X-Files put it the truth is out there……the bigger truth (yes there are degrees of truth varying just as there are shades of grey) is….the truth lies within. Imperfection (perhaps I am a little harsh to my kind…lets say human perfection….imperfection holds too negative a connotation) is the only truth and it lies within. We are not a very pretty picture (if I look from the white end of the spectrum…if from the black end there is still hope for humanity) to look at…because objectivity and POVs govern all our acts. The faster we accept this the faster we will be able to accept differences.
By difference I mean-differences between races, differences between sexes and communities, differences between priorities…and the slower we will be to denounce our fellowmen. It will take a strong individual to actually give objectivity total control. I like that movie a lot ‘Thank you for smoking’. If you argue correctly, you can never be wrong.
We relish the act in a horrific way even if it is of the highest negativity. Its very strange that although most of us are ever ready to walk down a moral high path in the name of what is correct and what is not we are so lacking in perspective where it comes to defining what can be enjoyed by us or not. I mean one can never or should never take “interest” or “pleasure” in the torture of another individual person or animal. Yet the views or hits the -------- Fritzl case or Nathari case got bears testimony to exactly what I denounced earlier. Kind of brings to my mind another thought that ….the purest of emotions can never be negative or positive but both….Pleasure for instance can be both positive as well as negative depending on who looks at it and from what angle. Love too can be negative and positive……..sometimes its called passion, sometimes obsession, and sometimes when both partners are in love its called sublime….of course this is the most desirable state as no one gets hurt and the world is a happy place.
Getting back to the original line of thought… the news channels today capitalize on the misery of individuals and report heinous acts of crime against humanity……No! Not for the sake of justice only…but also to make sure their TRPs don’t flag. And we the viewers applaud them for broadcasting and making aware the general public…awareness is a lethal weapon which empowers us right? Yet we as dumb bystanders on many occasions just stand by and enjoy the scene, the revulsion drawn out a brutality which is enjoyment itself.
Some people might say why I am so dark in my thoughts…that the good in the world is reported too……..but human nature being what it is……how many of us are ecstatic at the news of a man saving ten orphans from a fire …we would rather enjoy the news of how three sons bludgeoned their mother in the name of witchcraft to save her soul.
This world is made of mixed shades of grey…while the most beautiful primary shades of black and white (an amalgam of all colors we have ever seen and if I may say so) are what are immortalized as fluctuating benchmarks never to be reached…one can never be perfection never attain it because it’s a chimera…a foggy target which is just a dream with no roots in reality.
As X-Files put it the truth is out there……the bigger truth (yes there are degrees of truth varying just as there are shades of grey) is….the truth lies within. Imperfection (perhaps I am a little harsh to my kind…lets say human perfection….imperfection holds too negative a connotation) is the only truth and it lies within. We are not a very pretty picture (if I look from the white end of the spectrum…if from the black end there is still hope for humanity) to look at…because objectivity and POVs govern all our acts. The faster we accept this the faster we will be able to accept differences.
By difference I mean-differences between races, differences between sexes and communities, differences between priorities…and the slower we will be to denounce our fellowmen. It will take a strong individual to actually give objectivity total control. I like that movie a lot ‘Thank you for smoking’. If you argue correctly, you can never be wrong.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
KITKAT
I am suddenly a proud mother and grandmother of a medley of stray cats. One day a shabby little grey cat came at my doorstep when I was sitting in the Garden which is really a patch of grass and a few flowerpots…drinking my cuppa of tea. He sat in front of me blinking his grey green eyes as though I was a surprise to him rather than the reverse. Anyway I and my weakness for tiny helpless mites like that…..
You can imagine what I did went and located a plastic bowl which could be his for life and then made some concoction of malai and rotis ….the bowl signifying that this guy was there to stay…
Called him Kittu………..gosh how obvious I can get but he looked so cute and ‘kittuish’……..and then I didn’t have time to decide his name did I? He just foisted himself on me from nowhere.
Then one fine day I see my cat had suddenly become two from one. Suddenly Kitty came into the picture. A smaller version of Kittu and that too in a different colour altogether. Kitty was smarter and bullied the life out of Kittu.She ate up all his food and I wondered why. I was in for another surprise. One day I am sitting on the same steps and I heard this pathetic mewling all of a sudden. Following it I went behind one of the flower tubs and saw this tiny rat like animal which was supposed to be a cat………..this is KitKat….the offspring of Kittu and Kitty….and finally I am a proud mother….and now grandmother of three cats.
You can imagine what I did went and located a plastic bowl which could be his for life and then made some concoction of malai and rotis ….the bowl signifying that this guy was there to stay…
Called him Kittu………..gosh how obvious I can get but he looked so cute and ‘kittuish’……..and then I didn’t have time to decide his name did I? He just foisted himself on me from nowhere.
Then one fine day I see my cat had suddenly become two from one. Suddenly Kitty came into the picture. A smaller version of Kittu and that too in a different colour altogether. Kitty was smarter and bullied the life out of Kittu.She ate up all his food and I wondered why. I was in for another surprise. One day I am sitting on the same steps and I heard this pathetic mewling all of a sudden. Following it I went behind one of the flower tubs and saw this tiny rat like animal which was supposed to be a cat………..this is KitKat….the offspring of Kittu and Kitty….and finally I am a proud mother….and now grandmother of three cats.
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