Letter to…

Hi!

I was just passing by. They said that you should walk around the area to feel the New York vibe. Honestly, I have been going with the flow. People seem to walk in here a lot, so that’s why I chose to come in.

It’s crowded in here, and yet it’s calm. This is the calm I need, this is it. As I look around, I see a beautiful building. How could someone imagine such a beautiful building? How did they build it? How did they translate their vision into reality? Who gave them the strength to believe and the power to execute? Who else could possibly be behind such a beautiful creation? Yes, I believe in you. I know you exist. I have felt your existence and I have faith in you. I come from India, where we have branded and rebranded you in so many different forms across different religions, sects and beliefs. You are such a comfort to people when they cant relate to something, you are such an encouragement to people when they set out to do something. You are an enigma.

People convince themselves you’re just a human concept. Some people convince themselves to lead their life in a certain way because it means they are serving you. Some people believe that you, in any other form but the one familiar to them, are not you. How did you let such confusion over your identity happen?

I don’t believe you belong to any religion. You are too big to fit into the definitions that each religion spells out for you. Probably, your power was so unfathomable that people perceived you as they experienced you and decided, ‘That’s it,’. Nobody dared to question them.

Here I am- A Hindu girl, staunch believer of Ganpati, talking to you. As tourists take a guided tour, while some people kneel down and pray for peace, assurance and seek your blessing, I have decided to write to you. This is what I do best, so this is how I will communicate with you.

They say you like everyone, you love everyone. If you do, why do you give us pain? Why do you let innocent young children suffer with terminal diseases? Why do you allow us to get our hearts broken? Why do you give us the power to break someone else’s heart?

Many a times I wonder, in spite of my sense and sensibilities, why do I do things that are utterly stupid? You tell me to do these things. You make me fall but then you give me the power to get up again. You give me the opportunity to smile. You leave it up to me to do what I must with that power and opportunity. You, Mr. Whoever you are, are pretty awesome. You make us and you keep making and remaking us. You are the artiste and we are your live works of art…
For now, I choose to get inspired by this lovely church and get up. The Brooklyn Bridge is waiting to inspire me.

Btw it was nice talking to you

(written in Trinity Church, New York City)

Parchai

Ek zindagi Kai kahaniyan,
ek kahani kai parchaiyyan
Ek parchai hai Jo saath chalti hai
Mujhse Kai sawal poochti hai…
Jawab kaise dun, Mai nahi janti,
Har jawab mein ek nayi kahani,
Ek nayi zindagi…

Who? Me!

Don’t you just love it when you wake up from a lovely dream? When you wake up and snuggle, delving your head deeper into pillows. When you savour the aftertaste of the lovely dream and a faint smile caresses your lips? Don’t you just love such mornings? Today’s was a morning like that. I stepped out of bed, full on, like a typical ‘Yashraj’ heroine! It was raining and the sky was cloudy… Perfect.

It’s a different story that my life came crashing back to reality. No sir, there was no ‘Lazy Lamhe’ nor did life break into a song n dance in Switzerland. It took me 20 minutes to transform from the dreamy wannabe Yashraj babe into a 25 year old girl, who works bloody hard to prove to the world she’s awesome and independent. Sigh! But yeah, I did savour the memories of the morning during my coffee breaks. My little guilty pleasure. My life!

Jury Fury!

All those who wonder what’s the new page on my blog all about. Get ready to cheer. Your’s truly is now on the jury of Yaymen on twitter. But it’s not just about twitter, in general, I feel that men don’t get the loving they deserve. 

Come on, we love acting all feministic and shunning the fact that we need men, but the truth is, men make life interesting. However powerful we are, men will always stand by our side to just support us. Be it as a friend, brother, father, boyfriend, husband or a plain acquaintance. 

Of course, they sometimes make us fret, worry, angry and all that, but be honest, don’t you love fawning over your boyfriend’s laziness or your dad’s eating habits? Don’t you love that they can’t make a decision without you.

I love it. I love it that my brother calls me to ask me what coffee he regularly drinks at Barista or that my best friend depends on me for directions. I love it that the father and the brother would suspiciously eye any guy who so much as looks in my direction. I love it. 

And if men make me feel so awesome, why sould I be all coy about appreciating them. The male beauty pageants need to go beyond looks. And that’s exactly what Yaymen is all about. Its about appreciating men, thanking them for their love and attention.

Don’t be shy girls, let the men know we cherish them. Because boys might be stupid but men are awesome. 

PS: I dedicate this post to John Abraham in the yellow boxers in ‘Shut up & Bounce’. He takes eye candy to whole new level and he sparked off the Yaymen discussion!

Women’s Day Followed by Barbie Day!

Yesterday was International Women’s Day (8th march) and quite a few people wondered what the relevance was. But that’s not what this post is about. You can read about the origins of International Women’s Day right here.

In short, on this day we remember the women who stood up against oppression, fought for their rights. It’s a day you acknowledge the contribution of these women to the freedom we enjoy today. And yes, one mustn’t dwell in the past too long and therefore, we must also celebrate and encourage the dreams of the modern woman.

I received a long list of SMSs wishing me ‘Happy Women’s Day’ because the message told them, ‘pass this along to every beautiful woman you know.’ To me this is pointless. I haven’t done enough to be celebrated on this day, in fact, I want to do something and say thank you to women like Savitree Phule and Iravati Karve who made sure women in India got a right to education. It is thanks to these women that I can dare to go out there, support myself and look the world in the eye.

So anyway, this whole Hallmarkisation of women’s day was kinda getting on my nerves. Newspapers carried guest columns by women, and yes some of these women were actually women of substance but many of these were socialites, industrialists’ wives. The modern day Indian woman who struggles with a career, home and social pressures got a rare mention.  Her struggle continues, whether or not its 8th of March.
She is given the education and the liberty to work, but time and again she’s also reminded that her responsibilities towards the family are greater. Where does this start?

A small girl proudly displays her ‘bhatukli’, Marathi for toy kitchen sets. She makes her first cup of imaginary tea, and she’s praised. She starts to make believe she’s cooking and serving, and she starts enjoying the process.
Speaking of play, another thing that subconsciously reinstates a woman’s role in her life to come is a doll. The doll, very often brings out a maternal side of the child. They care for it, they dress them up, they cook imaginary food to feed the doll.

I couldn’t help but wonder. In play do we start defining her role for her? That said, seeing one of my toddler friends take keen interest in ‘bhatukli’ despite being boy, made me feel awesome. I relished the tea he served me. So what if it was imaginary, we have a dream!
Being a total tomboy, I rarely played with my tea-set and almost always beheaded my Barbies. But I still enjoy cooking (occasionally ) and can tackle kids much better than many people my age. So I’m not saying playing with dolls or playing bhatukli make you a better home maker or anything. I’m just wondering if the fact that Barbie’s birthday falls the day after women’s day symbolizes something. What do you think?

25 Random Things About Me

I know its not that interesting, but yeah, I wrote it for FB so might as well put it up right here!

1. I’m addicted to my phone. I can spend hours doing stuff on it. Lock me in a room; leave me my charger and the phone. I will be happy!
2. I love tweeting. According to some people it may even be an addiction. Discussions about twitter happen over the phone even!
3. I’m a foodie who is paranoid about gaining weight. More a reason for you to believe what an eccentric idiot I am!
4. I have written a novel. Yes a full length novel. It is a love story
5. I’ve been working since I’m 17! My first job was for Akashvani. I have been a radio presenter, gossip writer, journalist, food critic and lots more.
6. London and Paris are my favourite cities in the world and I long to see New York. I have seen the most good looking people in Barcelona, Spain!
7. I’m very close to my friends. I would collapse without them. I absolutely adore my sister. Back during my school days, I had barely any friends and never got along with the sister. Strange but true!
8. I used to go up to Mannat every year, on 1st Nov and wait for midnight to sing happy birthday to Shahrukh Khan. One time I saw him even and I nearly fainted. Another time I tripped and fell into his lap at a popular award function. I am not telling you anymore stories!
9. I sometimes feel I am a guy. I can understand guys much better than girls and boast of a ton of guy friends. I still love pink!
10. I just can’t be myself around a guy I’m crushing on. I get tongue tied, say something stupid and go completely red in the face!
11. I’m always struggling for time, even though I’m paranoid and leave well in advance. I will always be just in the nick of the time for the movie.
12. I wear makeup and dress like a chic every time I m depressed… So if I’m all dolled up, you know you need to hug me.
13. Alcohol tolerance level is super low and post alcohol energy levels are super high
14. I love listening to music on long commutes and imagining my own original version of the music video. Keeps me entertained!
15. I clearly love talking/writing about myself! I used to love talking to myself too…
16. I can never take a compliment. I always make an excuse for how the compliment might be untrue.
17. I love all kinds of films, most genres of music, and fiction reads. I like the good things in life and want to be paid for writing about them things! Too ambitious?
18. I’m very lazy and procrastinate until I’m shaken up by an anxiety attack.
19. I love dancing. I even dance in the car when I think no one’s watching!
20. I cry very easily. Movies, music, TV shows, people, anything can make me cry. I never cried at work until CampusJunkie though!
21. I am very cynical about things and will think up the worst case scenario’s worst case scenario.
22. A hopeless romantic at heart, I refuse to give up on the idea of a mushy love story for myself. Having said that, pt. 21 still comes in the way. That’s when I watch mushy movies.
23. I really believe 25 is a large number and even I can’t find anything to write.
24. I m very restless, and hence now I need to walk!
25. You can’t force me to write! Berges asked me to write this about 2 weeks back… So yeah!
Anything anyone else wants to add?

…Hmmn

I never knew what love was (not that I know now!) until I saw Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge! The day I watched the movie I fell in love. The guy was Raj, Raj Malhotra. It was the magic of the film and the magic of SRK.

Of course, the love of SRK has made do some crazy things including buying a car he endorses (Santro is zipping still and nobody’s complaining, so get that judgmental look off your face, NOW!).

Since the last two years, my singledom has been a cause of worry to all and when they ask me, my answer is, ‘No guy’s swept me off my feet!’ and I go into a dreamy smile and silently tell myself, ‘except SRK!’

People noticed this and started telling me I needed to get over SRK if I was to ever notice any other guy around. After all who can hold a candle to a superstar, right? So in my set of resolutions for the year 2009 I made a list of things for my ‘get-over-SRK’ mission. Here’s what I needed to do to stick to it.

1. Not grin dreamily everytime a song related to Shah Rukh appears on TV/Radio or wherever.
2. Avoid longingly looking at his pictures in the newspaper
3. Stop buying the products he endorses (If they r awesome, as they mostly are, I will still buy them)
4. Give up on dreaming about him randomly.
5. Stop talking about how he’s the right one, he’s taken, so me being single is all fine!
6. Stop looking for him on all airports, trains stations etc.

So yeah I have pretty much stuck to it, until my Goa trip happened. On the trip, nothing made me smile like a line or two from ‘Ruk Jaa’. I couldn’t stop analysing how he’s a ‘smart’ brand manager and not a repetitive actor and I realised that the man is a source of great joy in my life!

So yeah, I am not giving up on him. I will love him. And btw, I am now following him on twitter. So, any hopes of me getting over the S man are officially down the drain!

PS: Driving 650 kms in a day can bring out a lot of inane thoughts and somehow the fatigue gives you the freedom to say it out loud!

Gender Bender

‘What did I ever do that you found such a weird name to give me?’ I remember asking my Mom every single day when I was a kid. Yes, I was the girl who was always asked ‘Why do you have a guy’s name?’

Then I became the girl who was called ‘shakti kapoor’ ‘shakti man’ and what not! The worst day of my school life was my 11th birthday. The school would put up your name on the notice board with flowers to wish you a happy birthday and I was pretty kicked about it. So imagine my horror when they wrote my name as Mast. Shakti Salgaokar on the blackboard! As I stood there in front of the highly decorated notice board, watching my dream wilt through the haze of my tears, every single person passing pointed to me and laughed, ‘They thought you were a guy!’

I went on to be a tomboy who took great pleasure in thrashing ‘stupid’ boys. Of course, terrorizing the ‘stupid’ boys helped. The jokes on my name obviously stopped, but somewhere, the guys all forgot I was a girl.

Of course, through college I continued to be a tomboy and only discovered the joy of being ‘girl’ like recently. That’s a different story (you can read it here). I love my name, it’s different and I have found peace with being myself!

So why am I writing this? Because something happened and I am revisiting my childhood traumas. You all know how super thrilled I am about twitter (In case, you don’t, here’s a post about it). My twitter updates have been regular and random. And I’ve even made a few friends on twitter! So anyway, I suddenly changed my twitter avatar to a nice picture of myself. And immediately, I was flooded with @ replies asking me if that was indeed me. And two tweeple actually were surprised I was a woman!

Of course, I don’t know if they were disappointed I was a woman, but I was in a bit of a shock. Did these tweeple not a get sense of my gender from my tweets? Or am I still that tomboy I used to be? I am a bit baffled. Anyway, is this a side effect of the cyberworld? You can’t see the person you’re interacting with, all you have is the assumption you’ve made about them!

PS: Check out twitter if you haven’t already done so!

Goodbye, 2008!

Whooosh… That’s what 2008 sounded like. It came and it went. Whoosh. It was busy, it was engaging, it was hurtful, it was hopeful, it was new, it was old and it was a lot more than words could describe. 2008 brought alive a lot of my dreams. It taught me to be honest to myself and it made me smile through most of it. Of course, post 26/11, it evoked a passion for Mumbai that I’d never known. But yes, the year has been a mixed bag.

So here’s a short capsule about the year that was, just in case I wake up with the year 2008 erased from my memory:

1. The brother came back from New York: To be honest, Om and I aren’t related by blood at all. His parents and my parents are best friends. We grew up together. I worshipped him, I adored him and then, suddenly I couldn’t stand the sight of him. At one point it was so bad that we couldn’t stand each other’s presence in the same room. And then something changed. We just went on to become thick buddies and before we knew it, the dude jet set off to New York for his MFA. Now that he’s back, we spend hours talking about random rubbish. We swing between crazy, sane and absolutely insane. At the moment, he’s busy giving me advice about the kinda guy I should be ending up with. Hmmn… You too, Brutus?
2. I lost weight: Yes I know its lame, but, I have been chubby for a long time. Of course I got a little too chubby for my liking (or for anyone’s liking for that matter, I looked like a planet!) I struggled for about a year and a half and around the beginning of 2008, I got to a comfortable weight. Look, I still hate my ass and I wish my stomach was flatter and I think my arms need liposuction, but show me one woman who’s happy with her body just the way it is! My triumphing moment was my slim doctor telling me to go home cause I didn’t need to lose more weight (I disagree but I think I’m never going to be happy with my weight!)
3. Confidence! Okay, I do not have faith in myself ever! I am almost certain I do things the wrong way and when I got my job, I realised that I can kick ass. Well not quite kicking ass, but yeah, I’m happy with the way I have been doing my job. I’m not happy with my job, but then show me one person who is! (Okay, I guess JLo’s personal boob-setter is thrilled with his job, but other than that one)
4. Novel! I finished my novel. Yes I did. It is presentable, it needs a lot of work but it is indeed presentable! Now, this year will see it published.
5. Dostanas: I was a dorky kid in school. In the last couple of years at school, I had barely any friends and spent quite a lot of time wondering how it’d feel to have so many friends that time wouldn’t be enough! That dream has come true. I treasure my friends. I love talking to them, I love thinking about them and I love being there for them. It has taken years to find them, but, this year, I realised how much each one of them means to me 
   

Now there are two things that I look forward to in 2009.

1. Moving on: Well, I shut myself away from the idea of love for a long time. The parents made me see sense in the idea of arranged marriage, and though it’s not my plan, I gave it a shot in 2008. There were funny instances, clumsy ones and there were nice ones. The sort that make you smile. I don’t know what I want, but I think I’m slightly closer to knowing it than I was a year ago. Although everyone around me is insisting that my resolution this year should be finding a boyfriend/husband, I will let that take its time. For now, I shall focus on living and loving every moment.
2. Reality check: This is the year I will get over Shah Rukh Khan. Yes, every year I tell myself I won’t go all dreamy eyed when this man shows up anywhere, and every year I fail. I promise not to buy the products he endorses, I promise not to smile every time an SRK song comes on the radio and I promise I will not kiss the TV/newspaper/magazine in which he shows up. However, he will still come in my dreams. One step at a time people!

Okay then, this post is a diary entry! May not make any sense to someone, but hey, this is my blog! I’ll write what I want to. In 2009, I shall write, just write. Because, 2008 made me realise that there’s nothing in this world that gives me as much joy as writing does. (Well, food n music give me joy, but there’s no sense of creation there!)

Happy new year and thank you f0r reading this

Salon Musings!

After much negligence, my hair demanded it be taken care of. So I found myself seated at my aunt’s lovely salon, a book in tow, getting the much needed hair treatment done.

Amongst the pedicured feet and immaculately soft hands, I felt rather country cousinish. I took a minute to see myself in the mirror. The trendy boy cut had transformed into a shoulder length fritzed out mess within a year. The face was alright but could have glowed. Little hints of dark circles could be visible (all thanks to a sleepless night spent in desperation to create a new character for a new novel).

I always thought I looked alright. I had lost a considerable amount of weight (I can never stop showing off!) I actually tried to wear pretty clothes (most of the time) and yet, these women around me with their flawless skins (before the treatments! How God how?) made me feel miserable. I suddenly felt ugly. I wanted to hide behind that magazine, tuck my uncoloured toes under the chair and disappear.

I survived. Yes, I survived a hair treatment and begged my Auntie (did I mention this cool Auntie runs her own show, a fantastic salon at an affordable price?) to cut my hair. ‘You mean trim?’ she asked as she fidgeted with another girl’s hair (which was shining like a clinic all clear ad!), looking for the perfect length.

‘Nah, real cut. Something funky, something drastic!’

So here’s the thing. I was happy being the plain jane I am until I started losing weight. Every once in a while, I feel like transforming myself, doing something drastically new with myself, so that I don’t get bored when I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I like to shock myself and those around me. (Ask the brother, the sister and the best friend. They suffer a shock ever so often!)

So, I told auntie to go ahead and give my hair a nice chop. ‘You want to ask your Mom?’ she asked me.

‘Ask what?’ I was feeling small enough, this made me feel like a kid!

‘Whether its okay to cut it that short?’

‘Why??’

‘She mentioned that they are hunting for a boy. Usually, girls start growing their hair…’

I didn’t wait for her to complete. Okay, so I am looking to meet someone. What’s the length of my hair got to do with it?

‘Whoa! I don’t want permission. I am okay. Can we cut it now, please?’

She lovingly handled my tresses. I love my boyish, zero maintenance bob cut by the way. As I adored my new hair, an ‘accomplished’ woman sat down next to me.

My aunt trimmed her hair and suggested that she chop off her hair.

‘Your ends are splitting and the hair quality is pretty bad. A good hair cut will change that,’ my aunt explained.

‘Let me ask my husband you know. I can’t cut it unless he’s okay.’

I suddenly felt awesome. I felt independent and I didn’t give a tiny rat’s a*se about my non pedicured feet or the unlovely poise. I had a brain of my own, and I was living my life how I wanted it.

PS: For my argumentative Aunt. Letting your husband know you’re getting a hair cut and inviting suggestions is very very cute. Agreed. But waiting for his ‘permission’? Non-cute!