Hallowali

There is no fun in celebrating festivals in the same old way is there?  Specially when you have young adults at home who shrug and mutter … been there, done that.

So I have decided – much inspired by Minakshi of The Compulsive Confessor, to make this festival (our first Diwali in our own home) a Hallowali.

I am getting a few pumpkins (whole) and cutting Jack-O-Lanterns out of them and placing them on the terraces to scare every one, self included.  They will be lit by diyas.

No one eats mithai … sigh!  So will get insanely huge amounts of chocolates with nuts and arrange them in silver bowls to gorge on.

Booze of course.

Rangolis by DIL ……. she is the artistic one.

Silver bowls filled with nuts.

Am trying to get the kids to do costumes …. sigh! They think I am insane.  

Any how – will upload pics once I get it going.

 

Sigh ………………. now back to work

A few of my favorite things

Inspired by The Sound of Music

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens 
Bright wrapping paper and gifts by the dozens 
Dried Fruit packages tied up with strings
These are a few of my favorite things

Cakes and mithai and crisp savory namkeens 
Friends and loved ones and lawns that are green 
Bright diwali lights and decor making my heart sing 
These are a few of my favorite things

Little ones in new clothes, bursting their crackers 
Love and familiar jokes, conversation and laughter 
Diwali games of cards, accompanied with drinks 
These are a few of my favorite things

When the dog bites
When the bee stings
When I’m feeling sad
I simply remember my Diwali binge 
And then I don’t feel so bad.

Bigamy … my thoughts

The Maharastra Government gave its green signal to amend Section 125 of Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) which seeks to protect the pecuniary interests of the ‘other woman’. However, it would need the Centre’s stamp of approval to become a law. Live in relations will finally become legal in India and wives out of wedlock will become “heirs” along with their children. The caste and dowry system will vanish for ever. Education system of filling up of forms will change as well. Questions wherein one had to fill in the father’s name now will have just the guardian’s name. The sacrament of marriage will become inconsequential as it is made null and void by the court of India.

A relative sent this rather hysterical exerpt to me, apparently its on a blog somewhere.  Yeah I know what bigamy means, and I know this legislation is making people, specially wives insecure.  At the very outset, before I start getting hate mail, let me tell you that my sons and I know exactly what the consequences of “other women” and “other wives” is.  We have seen it up close and personal, and suffered it.

But puhlees consider …. does it make any effin’ difference?  

Sociologists and anthropologists tell us that men are polygamous by nature.  They cant help it.

The reasons for such behaviour are creative to say the least.

Some of them “fall in love” with another woman and cant let go of their wives.  

Some men think that the more women they have slept with, the more “face’ they have.  Its a self esteem thing.  

Some “sexy sirens” are so manipulative that they ensnare the poor dear with their charms.  

Some other “main bechari” types need the dashing man’s protection.  It is chivalry, you see, they have to take care of this poor lonely female.  

Some men think that since they are successful and rich, they “can afford” two or more wives and families.  They also give examples of the kings of yester-years and say, we can afford it.

So people, specially wives, freak on, rave and rant – it isn’t going to make an effin’ difference.  This world will continue to spin on its slightly tilted axis, and never mind if a few families get derailed in the process.

I do not think bigamy per se is evil.  If both the wives know and accept this situation, it is absolutely okay.  The man is legally and morally bound to provide for both the ladies and all his children.  Of course, the man deserves it.

He deserves the freakingly high phone bills

He deserves the living and housing expenses, specially the utility bills

He deserves the college expenses

He deserves to be yelled at by both his wives (preferably simultaneously with stereophonic sound effects)

He deserves the politics that arise out of two women competing to outdo each other

He deserves to sleep on the couch twice as much since both of them have a headache

Most of all, he deserves to have two mother-in-laws.

Rites of Passage

I have got inspired.  I read two most hilarious blog posts on menstruation, one by a woman, and the other is a male view point on the subject.  Thanks Sue for pointing me in the right direction.  There is no doubt that men got lucky in this department.  The don’t have these rites of passage like menstruation, pregnancy, labour and menopause.  Well I also think that they don’t have our power, experience the joys of nursing an infant, and frankly we look good with or without clothes.  Also we have total black magic power on our men since our headaches, cramps, aneamia and hot flushes can make or break their lives.  I think the scales are tilted heavily in our favour.  Oh yeah, one more thing, we actually enjoy shopping.

My mother belonged to a generation that was taught to hide evidences of being a woman.  Even drying a bra was much cloak and dagger stuff, the darn thing had to be hidden under a saree or some other cloth on the clothesline.  I swear she must be dying a million deaths when she went to buy them.  When I reached puberty,  I was pretty clueless about what it all meant.  My social circle comprised of my male siblings.  I had no girlie person to share confidences with.  My mother dragged me into her room and locked the door.  Then she told me, in hushed whispers, while blushing deeply, that I was grown up now and would bleed for a week every month until I got pregnant.  I was not supposed to talk about this and from now on I would not play with the boys and would sleep with the babies.  I looked at her totally confused.  Far reaching changes were being made in my life, and it was scary.

Anyhow, after two years of this episode, I became friendly with another girl in my class.  We started sharing confidences and we got into an argument.  Both of us had Science in school and were aspiring to be doctors and engineers (was there any other profession?).  I insisted that we would have the period only until we got pregnant, after that – chutti.  My mother did not tell me that one got reprieve only for the duration of pregnancy you see.  She took unholy delight in correcting this misconception.  She had two elder sisters in medical college, and she hauled me by the collar and took me for an intense re-education programme conducted specially for me by her didis and their class mates.  Quite an enlightening experience.

Having lots of brothers to grow up with can either make you the shy feminine retiring sort, or it can make you an aggressive (fight back for survival) kind of a creature.  I became the latter and also developed a shocking sense of humour.  So when I read this blog about using human milk for ice-cream I simply loved it.  It has just the right amount of grossness for it to be side-splitting hilarious.  When Kid#1 was born, my elder cousins were scattered all around the globe in various colleges.  They all decided to come meet the “little man” at the same time.  Kid#1 was 6 months old when this happened.  They were fascinated by him, and also by me.  ”Oyyyyyeeee, you look like a little lady” they would remark.  They were most impressed by the way I carried him around and handled him and also the diaper duties, even though they made the most gross jokes about it.  Most of all, the fact that I was suckling the baby freaked them out.  I was discrete about it and would turn my back to them or go into an empty room and lock the door.  OMG,  the jokes they cracked!  Their entire stock of jokes was about milk booths and production factories.  Over the weekend, they decided to irritate me by asking me to make tea at every given hour – oh wow! the tomboy could make tea.  Uff, I finally had enough and stamped my foot down and threatened to make them tea with my milk, and insisted that they be brave enough to drink it.  What was good for my baby was good for them.  They backed off!  Phew!

Oh!  Now I am at the peri-menopausal stage …. or as my brothers quip MEANO – PAUSE.  They aught to know better, my sister in laws have been giving them hell I guess with hot flushes and mood swings.  Today one of them sent me a link to this delightful musical with the caption “I know you’re growing old, heh, Celebrate the Change”.  Thanks Kanav Bhaiyya, thanks a lot.  Do you remember the day you opened your drawer and found a dead frog stinking of formaldehyde?  It wasn’t Neeraj Bhaiyya who put the frog there, it was me…… just to let you know.  You were so nasty about not letting me play marbles with the rest of you that day – so I just evened the score.  So what if I waited 30 or 35 whole years before ‘fessing up ?

Happy memories my dear, and happy Diwali

Some school time memories

That tag I did yesterday stirred up some school time memories.  So here goes …..

I must have been about 12 or 13.  I had a whole lot of brothers, one real and about 9 cousins that I grew up with.  It was wonderful for me, when I was a kid, since I always had playmates, and the rough and tumble of boys’ games suited my tomboyish soul.  However, I grew up and started sprouting breasts.  I was unceremoniously dropped from the team and ordered to behave like a girl.  I hated it and also my stupid brothers.  I thought girls were sissy, and did not like them at all.  So to nurse my wounded pride and to get over their betrayal, I became an introvert and got into the world of books in a big way.  

There was this boy in my class who made my life a living hell.  He was tall for his age, and very very popular.  I was decidedly nowhere near his social status.  I was a geek and hurt many male egos with my over-achieving scholastic ways.  The girls thought I was a snob, and I could not stand their catty sissy ways.  I had too many brothers in the same damn school for any boy to even consider being friendly with me. All in all it made me pretty friendless.

Soumya was a likeable kid, the class clown. I think he had ADD decades before Tare Zameen Par made it fashionable.  He couldn’t sit still and drove all the teachers nuts with his constant wise-cracking and fidgeting.  So they did what any good teacher would do. They sat him beside me, the class swot, in hopes my goody two shoes behaviour would rub off on him.

It didn’t.

He took every opportunity to make fun of me, pull my proverbial pig-tails and make me the butt of his jokes. I was the angrezni, the chashmish (I did not have specs but since I was bookish …..) and the worse of them all, the girl who was flat as a board so he called me “Four-by-Four”.  The damn nickname stuck.

How I hated him. I would see him and cringe and pray every day he would fall ill to some mysterious disease and have to drop out of school thereby never having to sit beside me and needle me with his jabs through out the day.  I would be depressed, sorely tempted to get my elder brothers to bash him up – but I never did.  I was not speaking with them so I endured it.

I also endured it because sometimes,  when no one else was around, he was completely different. He was sweet to me and thoughtful and almost apologetic for his incessant public torture. It made him almost likeable. Almost.

For two years I was stuck with this boy, the boy who made me the laughing stock of our class on more times than I could ever keep count. Then thankfully, his father got transferred to another town.  On his last day in school he walked up to me and said “Hi”.  I just nodded, holding my breath wondering what verbal parting shot he would fire.  I cringed and reminded myself that this was the last class in which I would have to see him or hear his nasty voice.  Man, was I glad to be rid of Soumya, who would tell the class in a loud voice “Ritu does not wear a bra, she is so skinny” or “Ritu’s tiffin spilt on her skirt hahahha.  See there are haldi stains” and tell other girls in my class “No one wants Ritu as his girl friend”. I waited knowing that this was the end of the Soumya chapter.

“Ritu, I just want to apologize to you for all the teasing I did to you in school,” he said in his deepening man voice.

I just grunted.

“I want you to know, I really like you. I’ve enjoyed sitting next to you for the last two years. I wish we were better friends.” I looked at him like he had just grown horns out of his head and stood there tongue-tied. “I only teased you because I had a crush on you.”

Then he walked out of the door, turned around and smiled at me and said, “I teased you to get your attention.” Then he turned around, headed towards the school compound and out of my life.

At the time I was seriously annoyed. I could have thought of a dozen different ways he could have shown his affection for me, none of them which included drawing a plywood piece on the blackboard and naming it Ritu, snooping into my school satchel, peering at the back of my shirt to check whether I was wearing a bra or not.

But I’ve grown older and wiser and I look back on the memory of that smiley curly haired boy who loved his comic books and I see what I was blinded to in the midst of my youth.

Soumya  loved me. He was just a jackass about it.

As for me, life started improving after he left.  I had the desk to myself without having to be careful about it slamming down on my fingers.  Even tiffin would not spill so often which makes me suspect foul play.  I started filling out.  One thing remained the same – I never got along with the girls in my class.  Actually two things – I never got included in my family team of all boys.  These two changes happened in college where I met lovely chilled-out women who I am still friends with, and my cousins started behaving less like chowkidars and more like pals ……. possibly because they wanted to date my female friends.

Memories – a tag

Alankrita of Real Virtuality tagged me to do this one.  I am not too much into memories, since I have seen people live and relive past glories, or suffer the traumas of their past endlessly – quite forgetting that life is here and now.  Okay here goes …

This really is a trip in a Time Machine kind of thing …..

My oldest memory

I was quite a little thing … and it was a summer afternoon.  My brothers(cousins and real) and I were playing in the park at Humayun Tomb.  They decided we had to go inside the tomb – which was out of bound for us – beats me why.  Once we were inside, the elder four ran away, hid, and laughed a loud maniacal Ha Ha Ha, which scared the shit out of us (the three younger ones).  We screamed, wept and clung to each other like little baby monkeys and sat down – yeah on the gravestone.

Round one to my elder cousins!

Ten Years Ago

Oh most definitely a bad period, trying to get my divorce and trying to bring up a very out of control angry adolescent Kid#!.  The only thing good about that time was that I also enrolled along with Kid#1 for Tae Kwon Do classes for a few months and learnt how to kick some ass.

My first thought this morning

I hate mornings.  I hate getting up.  I hate office.  I hate exercise.  Ritu get up and exercise otherwise your butt wont fit into your office chair.  What do I kill, miam and cut for breakfast and lunch.  OMG I hate mornings.

If you built a time capsule, what would it contain

I dont know …. I live here and now.  I dont much care about either the past or the future.  Hmmm, my blog maybe?

This year

This year has been pretty big for me.  I built and moved into my own house.  I got promoted to General Manager.  My stories got published by the CBSE.  I started blogging in earnest.  Got my own domain.  Got Kid#2 into Engineering College with the strong feeling of “one down, one to go”  Pretty eventful.

14 years from now

Hmmmm, retired from corporate life, full fledged writer, living in a small cottage in the hills, two dogs, internet …. a very peaceful life.  Of course with the option of coming back to NCR when I get bored or if the winter is too cold.  I hope whatever I write sells – I need money for that kind of life.

I tag Itchy, IHM, Manpreet, Advitiya

Should be interesting reading other peoples trip down memory lane

Tolerance – do we know what it means?

This post was written about a year ago – but posted today, when this issue has come up again in my son’s circle of friends.

Whenever someone tells me that our culture is old and rich, I shrug.  Whenever someone tells me that we are a non-violent and satyagrahi country, it makes me want to puke.  Whenever someone says that we are understanding ……. I look at them with disbelief.  The fact is that we are racist, bigots and narrow minded.

I was surfing the net for some strength to face certain truths about myself…. and I came upon this, The Museum of Tolerance, and it brought tears into my eyes.  I was quite complacent and proud of myself because I do not practise intolerance.  Its a big step – since I was born and brought up a Jain.  Jains grow up feeling that they are blessed, because after doing good karmas for many many lives, they get to be born a Jain, which is the best of the human race.  We are almost divine – so our religion teaches us.  And if we follow all the precepts of the religion, we will definitely attain moksha.  Its pretty far out.  Any way I am a lapsed Jain, a sinner, so I am not superior and will definitely undergo many more cycles of life.  My live in help eats out of the same utensils we do, and I do not do things like get cheaper rice or stuff for him.  Non vegetarian food is cooked and consumed in our home, yes even on a Tuesday – all days are the same for us.  It does not matter to me what religion is being followed by my friends and loved ones.

So I thought I was tolerant – but am I?  Kid#1 has a friend who is gay.  He had never declared it – so we did not know.  Apparently his younger sibling opened his mail box and snooped into his emails and private stuff and found out…… and told their parents.  They live about two houses away.  The parents did not take it well at all.  The father actually slapped his son and told him “My son is dead for me”.  The boy came to talk to me, for some emotional support.  I said all the sympathetic things, but deep inside me was a feeling of relief that my son is not gay.  I was actually happy that I did not have to face this.  This is how tolerant I am.  I think I have gone quite a few steps down in my own self-estimation.

One of my best male friends was gay and it did not bother me.  He was the sweetest guy I knew.  This friend of Kid#1 is a loving affectionate and polite boy.  But when it came close to me and my family, it simply freaked me out.  All men are created equal irrespective of caste, creed, colour, religion and sexual orientation.  Yes I believe this and hate reading news about nuns being raped or Moslems being discriminated against.

The single most meaningful exhibit in this Museum building was the one dedicated to the civil rights movement – one of the most volatile and emotional periods in American history. A wall of large monitors at the exhibit reflects images and video from that period: African-American men and women being sprayed with fire hoses, hit with clubs, and hung from tree limbs by people who refused to believe all men are created equal.  We as a country are too hypocritical and cowardly.  We will bury this period somewhere deep and refuse to believe it ever happened …. and hope and pray that our children and loved ones do not force us to face our own narrow mindedness.

Today this issue came up again.  The boy has been given an ultimatum – to either become “normal” or leave home.  What is normal anyway?  Why is homosexuality such a bad word?  Why can’t we let these people co-exist peacefully – just because they are not like us?  Who says heterosexuals make great members of the society or parents?  Where is the outrage about the children who suffer as a result of divorce, infidelity, abuse, and other “crimes” perpetrated by heterosexual couples? Are we to believe that even those kids are better off than those who would be raised by two loving parents who happen to have the same plumbing?  And why don’t I freak out so much on facing lesbians?  Just because I have sons and not daughters?

I have no answers … I wonder if any one does?

Do read this on the same subject

My little one has grown up … sigh!

Yes I know I know I know dammit – he is over 18, is in Engineering College and shaves!  But somehow he has always been my baby – and it took one helluva long time for me to even believe that he was not an infant.  It took the combined efforts of Kid#1 and DIL to shovel it into my head – Mom let go and let him fall, dust himself up and carry on without hovering over him (Thank you kids, I mean it truly), but it only started dawning on me after Kid#1 left the country for his education.  

In the last few months its been hitting me on the nut with increasing frequency

1. Mom, puhleez, I would rather you sit and I drive, your driving scares me …. Humph, considering that I drove him all over the town all his life – this was startling.

2. Mom, I have to go to college.  I might whine, I might be sick – whatever, dont let me convince you to let me stay at home.  Awww, so sweet and responsible.  Now I can cheerfully be the only brat in the house

But conversation on Saturday was too much :

Kid#2 : Ewwww, D is so annoying, he’s grossing me out

Me : What’s he done

Kid#2 : He’s in love

All three of us : Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Kid#2 : I am bored, all he can talk about is this chick, I’ll puke if I have to listen to more of it

Kid#1 : (no doubt remembering his days) Yeah so? That’s normal

Kid#2 : Its pissing off, and when they are together some part of them is touching

DIL : So?  That is how it works.  Are you jealous?

Kid#2 : Nah.  I think this chick is making a girl out of him.

Me : May be you’re feeling left out.  Get yourself some more friends.  Let him be

Kid#2 : I know all he wants to do is get laid.  But does he have to make such an ass of himself?

Me : Speechless and shocked : Splutter splutter gasp

Kid#1 : Hahahahaha Mom cant believe her baby even knows such language

Kid#2 : Oh Mom, wake up, I am a big dude now!

 

Sigh! Yeah my baby boy is all grown up now …..

The power of positive thinking

How do you define a good pal – a good pal is the one who sends you a link to something so delightful as this.

Thanks Jaspal for seeing the inherent wisdom in the article even though you are male and would not know what she is talking about.

I was watching Baghban today.  I had wanted to see it when it was released but my kids would have none of that.  They did not want to be embarassed by me.  Yes, I am a softie and cry in movies.  I normally go for a weep-fest prepared with a box of tissues.  Heck I can even cry at a well presented Ram-Bharat milaap, though its such an overdone subject.  So I sat down with a towel and a huge cup of tea to watch the movie.  I wasn’t dissappointed.

What really impressed me was the quiet dignity displayed by the parents facing the changed circumstances and the realisation that their selfish and thoughtless children have no empathy or love for them.  So what did they do – they turned around the situation by fighting it and by being positive, like the girl on that public forum in front of an all male audience (in that article).

Life is not about being rich or poor, pretty or plain – life is all about attitude.  If we give up, we are finished.  We are not licked until we give up.

A Sunday well spent – a lesson revised.

Airline Industry – One Way Ticket, Destination Unknown

I have been watching the Jet Airways drama unfold with great interest.  My son is a pilot -so I can not claim to be a mere observer.  Aviation Industry is going through a bad time, dropping passenger demand, high cost of aviation fuel, high taxes, rate-cuts by the competition making airfares uneconomical, etc. are making this profession as high a risk as the Banking Industry.

• 1800 employees of Jet Airways get the sack, in a manner I would not dare to sack my daily help.
• The press goes overboard covering the entire fiasco – of course, there is human interest and there is good copy – so many youthful pretty faces, young faces with anxiety writ on them. I bet the TRP of news channels shot through the roof.
• Commentators going on and on about the “kaali diwali” for Jet employees, tugging at our heart-strings.  Hmmm, most of these PYTs would have been working on Diwali, if they had their jobs and not celebrating it – but never mind.
• Raj Thackeray and other political types jumping in and threatening Naresh Goyal with dire consequences
• Naresh Goyal reinstating the sacked employees – swearing on his mother that his motives were pure and he felt sorry for them and also that he did not buckle under any kind of pressure.  He also claims that he did not know about this mass scale sacking – WTF?????

Any industry is run for profits and the airline industry, if it is in the red will have to cut costs.  I think they were justified in cutting costs, only the manner in which they did it sucked big time.  It bothers me that these kids went rushing to MNS to get their jobs back.  Now will MNS force these kids to learn Marathi?  And will MNS put a clause in the re-instatement stating “Marathi people will get reinstated first”?  Sheesh, why give the damn thugs so much power and political mileage?  The company was within its rights to lay-off people on probation, and these kids have fed a snake that can only bite them some day.

It is a fact that there is a slump, global economy is facing an unprecedented downturn, the markets are down and big banks have fallen down like nine pins. India is also affected. Companies will have to take tough steps and shed excess weight to stay afloat. It is extremely worrying that the Jet employees have done what they did. Now we know that if some employees are laid off, all they have to do is organize dharna , call the media, cry on TV and tell sob stories of how their dreams were shattered and then approach opportunistic politicians to put pressure on management.

As for Jet, I strongly suspect that this whole episode is a drama to get sops from the Government.  After all, they do have an HR department which is highly paid and qualified.  They could have laid off employees in smaller chunks and in a more decent manner.  If these kids had been laid off due to some kind of a cash crunch, did the situation suddenly improve? 

Wonder what is happening behind the scenes.

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