Emotional Atyachaar

(Glossary: Atyachar is hindi for “harassment”)

I have been following Emotional Atyachar (on UTV Bindass) off and on, for quite some time now…

For the uninitiated this is yet another reality show where real-life couples take the help of the crew members of the serial to do a loyalty test on their partners.

Frankly speaking, almost all couples featured are insecure, desperate to get on TV and ultra dramatic. Nevertheless, the loyal viewership that the program boasts of is quite understandable. One, the whole detective angle leading to the climax is outrageously hilarious and two, you are like – thank god I am not stuck with this crazy guy/girl.

A relationship, in which either of the partners feels the need for a fidelity test, is already doomed irrespective of the outcome of the test.

You trust your partner or you don’t – how will your partner’s reaction to a planted bait salvage your already faithless bond?

On TV or offline, I would never do a loyalty check on my partner – Would you?

Slogan T’s!!!

Now, let me start with a disclaimer - am not much of a fashion whiz and so am hardly ever consciously aware of the latest trends or the outdated fads.

However, I have always had a huge soft corner for smart short T shirts with witty one liners!

While I mostly shy away from wearing something that screams too outrageously wild, here are a few of my all time favorites (I have not necessarily owned all of these) from school and college days:

• Coffee, Chocolate, Men - Some things are best rich!!!

• If I don’t find true love, I will settle for a lot of money!

• I was born this way, what’s your excuse?

When I started working, the T’s in my wardrobe reduced – so forget slogans on T’s! For some strange reason, very recently, I have begun to revive my fetish for these.

Tantra and People Tree are some places in India that I have checked out and find to be quite good!

Here are the few that I now own:

(Before you ask, yes, I wore this one to work already :D)

I hate to say this but there is a much more varied range when it comes to the men’s sizes!

My hubby wears awesome screen printed Ts picked up mostly at rock concerts or Hard Rock Cafés he frequents – Not really slogan T's – but nice!

My bro is also very particular about the kind of Ts he wears – and sometimes I have to really convince him to wear slogan Ts – And come to think of it, half the world proclaims women are finicky about their clothes!!!

Here are a few classics from my bro’s wardrobe:

• This T shirt turns green in the company of morons (It’s obviously a green T :))

• Beer is cheaper than fuel. Drink, Don't Drive.

• You don’t have to be crazy to work here, They'll train you. (He begins his first job soon and I wonder if he will get to wear it to work!)

What are u fav slogans for T’s?

And let me know where you shop for them!

Memories on a Filmstrip

I was recently going through a friend’s photo stream with no particular reason or intent. Blame it on my aimless days.

But this “just like that” skimming soon became something more emotional. I found pics that told stories – I felt an uncanny relation to them - not the kind you get when you see a pic of a place you have visited but the kind of emotion you feel when the pics focus on the imagery you associate with the place – the unmistakable similarity in the pathetic fallacy of the images captured.

Well, these pics are of places I had also visited – mostly without that friend. Yet, the photographs spoke volumes of the sentiment akin to what I had felt at that same place, at a different moment in time – So many of those thoughts that had relegated to my memory archives came pounding forth, on hardly any provocation – Memories of what happened, what did not happen, what could have happened, and how life progressed from that point onwards – how life’s branches entwined and separated and moved forward – despairing cobwebs grew and they sometimes were comforting too – years fast forwarded, time stood still.

It is strange how so many a times I read so much into a moment, a picture, a memory – not even captured by me but a high-end camera and a sensitive photographer – a gamut of feelings, warmth, nostalgia – a range of reactions, a faint smile, a tug at the heart, a feeble attempt at dismissal by the brain….

Does this happen to you also? Or do I just come across as a hysterical maniac?

Leaving you with an emotion, an experience, a moment that I felt when I captured the following photo at Tuolumne Meadows in California in the fall of 2008. Describing it would ruin it.

A moment in your eyes, forever in your mind.

Leftovers from Spring

Who doesn't love the fresh aroma, the soft touch, the warm feeling that flowers bring!

Nothing like flowers to cheer one up, right? Wrong!

For the past few weeks, I have been battling with my pencils to sketch a few of my favorite flowers and the results have been very very disappointing. While landscapes remain my favorite subject, I do not think I have the courage to ever draw flowers again.

I just cannot capture the seemingly simple and elegant beauty of these creations on paper. So here's a sample of my dismal work.

Pansy: I swear to god, I hate all pansies now (pun unintended)...Everything went wrong with my first attempt - the drawing, the strokes, everything.

Carnation: The flower is menacing in its simplicity; it camouflages an artist's worst nightmare...

Tulips: How can anyone go wrong with Tulips...Well, I can...

Dogwood: Am sure, this is everyone's favorite doodle flower. A lot of my notebooks in school, college and even some notepads at work have been subjected to many dogwoods :).

P.S. After viewing the above sketches, please do not "unfollow" me or remove me from your feeds, I plan to move to some other subjects, I promise :).

Award time :)

Masalla Lemonade completes one year of blogging and celebrated the occasion with the Lemonade Carnival!

Mr. "Niraj" Lemon was kind enough to present me with the following award:

Thank you! Feels awesome to be awarded by a fellow blogger! The beautiful lemonade award now proudly adorns my right panel!

Let the ink continue to flow :).

Deeply unsettling…

I have tried convincing myself, unsuccessfully, that I have no business commenting on people’s beliefs and rituals. But there are certain experiences that are so agitating that you choke!

Chennai is a city that is an unfathomable concoction of disparate ways of living. You have the usual Page 3 glitterati, the revered Kollywood stars, the megalomaniac politicians, the intellectual few, the balanced educated middle class, the poverty stricken slum dwellers, the miserly rich – sounds like any Indian city?

Hang on – You have to live here to understand how stark the differences between people are and how these manifest themselves in every day living, unlike a metropolitan like Delhi, Mumbai or Bangalore.

On the same stretch of road, you can see women wearing short dresses, salwar kameezes, saries from 6 yards to 9 yards; men wearing shorts, jeans, dhotis and suits, children with dainty sandals, sneakers and bare feet!

But this kind of economic variance is not as perturbing as the religiously charged atmosphere of the city.

In a strange way the whole city is united in its religious fervor and yet divided by the differences because of religion again. Temples adorn every street and corner available – queues of people throng these every single day – different gods for different sects – different traditions for different sects.

I am no religious person. I know only one entity - one god – a super power that I believe in. My god has no religion. The only good part about religion is the festivals – opportunities for community celebration and I believe in the spirit of all festivals irrespective of the religion they come from. So what irritates me is when religion interrupts normal life – be it the kavars in UP, the chhatt processions in Bihar, the use of loud speakers in jagratas, bhajans – however all these can be ignored as just inconveniences – take a different route, stuff cotton wool in your ears...

What is deeply unsettling is rituals out of my understanding – the death dance – the joyous dancing by men around the dead body celebrating life after death or the end of a torturous life and peace in death – I do not know.

I was just growing accustomed to this very common sight on main roads and streets here, that I had another disturbing experience yesterday. I witnessed, at multiple places, men and women with lemons and arrows pierced on their painted bodies, faces and even eyes – swaying swords, dancing as if in a trance – with hundreds around them in some sort of unexplained frenzy.

My heart had that sinking feeling you get when you sense the world around you collapsing.

At North Usman Road, I was in an auto waiting at the traffic signal – when one such procession stood right next to me. The dressed up man and woman looked towards my side and our eyes met. I did not see any religious faith, strength, joy or even anger. There was an unmistakable desperate fear, their gaze seemed to go beyond, as if in a given-up-search of another horizon.

In a split second, the noisily dancing crowd around broke my line of sight.

Why in the name of god torture do we torture our bodies, kill our souls, inconvenience and hurt others – why can’t we use the name of god to bring peace, serenity and love – the symbols god stands for?

Another veiled story…

As I tried understanding the debates around the burqa especially in the French context here, I received many valid, well thought out, and legitimate replies – all in one way or the other against the “forced veiling”.

In a country like India, it is heartening to see educated people expressing their opinion, which is for humanity and moderation and balance. However, it is greatly disappointing to wake up to news that reads: Forced to wear burqa, teacher quits.

What is most shocking about this news is that the Students’ Union pressurized the university teacher!

What is happening to the supposedly educated youth in our country?

Why are young minds embracing religious fanaticism with such ardor?

Are they in search of a unique identity because they feel their individuality is threatened?

Has Indian politics created a whole generation of confused and misguided youngsters – rebels without any real causes?

I still remember my childhood days when religion and caste were only chapters we read in our Civics books. In school, I did not know which caste my classmates belonged to.

Through my growing up years, I had Sikh neighbors with whom I used to happily pile on for the Sunday langars at the Gurudwara; I had Muslim neighbors who were differentiated only because of the wonderful language they spoke – aap, bhai-jaan, abba-jaan – music to the ears; I had Christian neighbors who shared rich plum cakes on Christmas; and all of us together celebrated the “Hindu” festivals of Diwali and Holi!

Come the late 90s and early 2000s, as college beckoned, caste based reservations became the talk of the day. Quota seats – General seats – SC/ST – OBC – all alien terms began to invade my vocabulary.

I still remember the day I started filling out my entrance test forms - all of them asked the following disturbing questions:

Religion?

For the first time I was going to define my identity within a religious institution that had not meant much in my life so far.

Hindu, I wrote. In a fraction of a second, differences based on religion were established between neighbors.

And then the final blow that firmly established boundaries and partitions in once-innocent classrooms.

Select one of the following:

SC, ST, OBC, Others

I was baffled. I asked my dad, what I should fill in.

He said in a matter of fact tone, “Others”.

A Sailor’s Cottage

A couple of months back, I happened to visit Odyssey (a leading book store in Chennai) and was delighted to spot the Anchor Stitch Kits.

Those not familiar with these kits must know that Anchor provides great designs that you can embroider using long stitch. They give you the design as well as the matching threads.

Though not a pro at these myself, take my word that they are extremely easy to work with – I first did a design (a cute penguin with an easel) eons back in school and it took me 3 years to complete it – not because it was complicated but because of the lazy procrastinator I am :). The framed work still adorns my bedroom back at my parents’ place.

This time around I thought these kits would work well with my resolve to do something more constructive with my free time, especially over the weekends, instead of wiling it away on the idiot box. So the highly ambitious person that I am, I picked two large ones.

After a good amount of dilly-dallying with little progress made in months together, I pulled myself up. And, yes, the self reproach did work.

Here’s the fruit of my labor, and you bet, I am damn thrilled and proud of myself. Forget the fact that long stitch is child’s play, atleast I did it reasonably well. This design (25 cm x 30 cm) is named ‘A Sailor’s Cottage’ and I love the bright, vibrant colors that make the setting! This colorful work goes for framing this week and then its up on the wall :).

I have the next one (and the larger of the two :() to finish now, but want to take a break from all the needlework. Hoping I can get back to my pencils in the interim!

What lies beneath?

I have been following the various feminist, political, and racial debates that the French proposal for ban on the Islamic full veil or hijab has fanned. Read the latest on it here.

My feelings, stance and opinion remain unsorted and confused. A lot of questions diffuse my attempts at any kind of understanding, and I share them here.

• Does Islam really mandate the wearing of a veil that covers the face in its entirety? Doesn’t the holy Quran refer to the hijab in its broader sense of modesty and not necessarily a physical piece of clothing to be worn? If it is modesty and social propriety, is a piece of cloth enough to ensure the same?

• Is the enforcement of the mandate of the full veil a fanatic religious measure to keep women entrapped in the dark shadows of illiteracy and ignorance - do the extremists actually believe that women need to be protected, or hidden, or maybe just put away?

• Is the proposal to ban the wearing of the full veil in France pro open-faced democracy, and in the interest of the security of the nation, and the feminist endeavor for greater rights and freedom for women?

• Is the problem with the veil that it covers the full faces and hence poses security threats? Have there been incidents of misuse of the veil by criminals?

• Is the proposed ban against the institution of secularism? Does it indicate religious intolerance and racial bias of the xenophobic “west”?

• Do Islamic women see the burqa or the hijab as a cultural identity that empowers them as unique individuals or thwarts their efforts at any kind of progress?

• Do Islamic women wear the veil out of coercion or of their own free will? Is their will free or conditioned?

• Is the hijab the only form of expressing religious belief? Why should only women carry the burden of religious identity?

A shot at optimism…

The heat and humidity in Chennai (and Delhi) is enough to put any enthusiastic and cheery person off. Alas, the Indian “garmi” is in stark contrast to the romantic and poetic “Summer” of the west!

Which Indian will talk of summer as:

“Great is the sun, and wide he goes

Through empty heaven with repose;”

(Robert Louis Stevenson)

I wonder if the yogic power of auto suggestion – or in more filmy terms – the “aall izzz well” mantra really works…The plan is to list down things that I love about the summers (I better have a long list because that’s the only season in the city where I live – Chennai).

As always, it would be great to hear your summer hit list too!

• No. 1 - Raw mangoes - With a dash of red chilli powder and a touch of salt

• Naariyal paani (tender coconut) – I insist on eating the fattening “malaai” too!

• Lemon Soda with lots of yummy masala

• Gola or chuski – the kaala khatta one at the Rajasthan stall at Dilli Haat (Delhi) being the best I have ever had!

• I am wondering if I should mention ice creams because I can eat them and enjoy them irrespective of the season :)

• (Gosh I am such a foodie all that comes to my mind is what I can “feed” on! - Summers is a time when weather permits walks - but motivation is another matter)

• Light, breezy clothes – come to think of it – most desirable and fashionable wardrobes are designed for summers!

• If I was in school, I would have surely said summer vacation, but, well…

• Ummm, what else?