A bad hair (wedding) day.

I have not been to a lot of weddings outside Kerala, but I envy them. 

Whenever I tune into some Hindi wedding song I see all those impeccably ornamented, good looking , happy families, full of youngsters. An average looking baby born into such a family could suffer from some serious inferiority complex. And there are like fifty people in the 20 to 25 age bracket which is not logical, this being one among a lot of other things. For example the wedding in the movie 'Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani' (where there were no adults anywhere in the scene) is so awe inspiring. All along it is like- who wants adults at a wedding they are old, they can’t eat cake. Somewhere some super rich Dad was paying astronomical bills and was not invited to what he was paying for. The bride gets to choose her designer and her hair done in the most exquisite style and eventually ends up looking like a …a….err… Bollywood actress:-/ (Well, what else)

Talking about hair, I am sure there must be some great tradition behind the updo hairstyles for Christian brides. Christian weddings in Kerala- I’ve been dragged to a lot of them – and willingly went to a few. And this hair updo undoubtedly is one of the greatest traditions that no one ever dared to defy. Other smaller, insignificant traditions like marrying someone from the same religion or caste or age group were reformed ages ago.

The bride, who is usually a woman who has never appeared in an updo in public view before, does so on the biggest day of her life. Other days she did updos were at home, when there was load shedding. You cannot really call that an updo…it is something like a temporary (and futile) way of tying up the hair to keep it away from the face and neck because of increased perspiration.

I have always wondered why a comfortable and tried-and-tested hairdo cannot suffice on a wedding day. A bridal updo is considered to be very sophisticated and its origin dates back to the days of Adam and Eve. The bride has no choice but to submit herself to the hands of the experienced hairdresser (who does the obvious which she has been doing since decades now she can do it even in her sleep). Even though the day hugely belongs to the bride, her choices are comparable to the likes of white mice at the laboratory. Only the angle of elevation of the updo differs, and organza flowers on the updo replaced the traditional pearls, but the stylists are completely oblivious of the fact that no one really cares.

However I have noticed that a lot of pretty women end up looking like someone they are not. The hair, the comfortable partition that defined the shape of the face and everything that looked good on a woman is changed for worse. Yes some brides did look much more beautiful than usual, but most commonly it so happens otherwise. The updo for one is tried for the first time, the off white saree spells simplicity and hence the makeup needs to be tastefully done- but I have been witness to beautiful women who became quite unrecognizable.

Wedding rehearsals are still not very common yet. Why not someone just go ahead and let the hair loose if she is most comfortable and pretty in it? You can always trust hairpins to keep hair away from the face. A simple and uncomplicated tiara to complement that can look like a fine hairdo! Look at her- I am not saying that this is an uncomplicated tiara, but the hairdo is pretty simple.

Ban updos. They are not for us. Let’s admit it, updos can look sophisticated with gowns on some women but with sarees …I don’t know, they just rarely look good. Sarees and updos are so familiar to us; we see it every other day that we have ceased to see beyond it. With time we are just improving it but we did not replace it with what suits us best.

I had an updo put up at the back of my head on my wedding, and disliked it to my very core. I wished I could pluck it and throw it away. I had never done an updo before that, ever. And I got a terrible headache with hair pulled up so much that its strength was tested (so was my patience). There were as many hair pins as there were people at my wedding and I ended up looking like someone I was not. And you know what? I cannot go back to that day and do it better!

It is so ridiculous I had the guts to choose my life partner but not my hairstyle.

Image Courtesy:Google Images.

About Cleanliness and Cluelessness.

My convent school memories are like a sepia tinted beautiful musical. All that I look back and laugh has something to do with the disciplinary methods of the school and how we managed to break the rules and regularly ended up in the Principal’s office. The phrases ‘Pin drop silence’, ‘Do not eat with your hands’ and ‘Shoes should be so clean you should see your face on it’ ring in my ears whenever my mind takes me back to my school days.

 I am sure they went a tad too much with that shoe thing. I have never seen my face on my shoes. However some teachers tried to see their reflection on my shoes and failed miserably, in turn subjecting me to their wrath. Logically speaking, this cannot be a judging factor for adherence of school rule number 2, Cleanliness. They also said that Cleanliness was Godliness, and my school shoes just kept proving that I was not God.

In my terms, a clean black school shoe is one that is NOT brown.  I've had my share of brown shoe days (it was a magical time when bad hair days were unheard of) along with many others and on such days our Principal decided that we were unfit to be in class for the first hour. Which means the first hour is basically for shoes and not people? What does that make of those kids who were allowed to attend the first hour class? Theoretically they should feel offended. However they were seen hopping away to the class with much glee and pride. Seriously I still don’t understand certain things which everyone else seems to get.

And then came the eating with hands part. Even when a fork or spoon is used we are still using our hands right? So what is the point in saying ‘Do not eat using your hands’? This can only be possible if Mummy came and fed me during lunch hour, so that I will not be using my hands, but hers. Being pure non vegetarians, our lunch consisted of fish on a daily basis. How are we supposed to eat fried dish from a deep round steel lunch box using a fork and a spoon? The chance of the fish taking off and landing somewhere else was very high. We also had vegetarians in our class and someone complaining ‘Ma’am she threw a fish into my lunch box ewwww’ was the last and only complaint left to be registered in my file. Also I am not ready to part with my fish. Same was the case with all my pure non vegetarian friends and not once in our school days did we use forks and spoons.  

And then one afternoon, I was happily sharing pending stories from the weekend to my friends. The clocked ticked its way towards the end of recess and the bell rang. I hadn't eaten much, my fingers still dipped in a tub of rice, sambar and fish. There was no way I could reach the wash room and be back before the teacher came. And I dint believe in carrying napkins my Mom gave me along with the lunch box every day, I just kept wondering why they even existed. I was caught in a pickle. Suddenly a brilliant idea struck me. I took my water bottle, put my hand out of the window and washed it. The water fell on the sun shade.

The teacher walked in watching me do the dirtiest thing that could ever happen in a convent school. And then she made me write ‘Henceforth I will not wash my hands through the window' in my school diary and asked me to get it signed from my father.

Papa was NOT a terror in our school days, but any failure in following discipline can irk him real bad. Even if I failed an academic year he would not be too bothered. However he does not tolerate bad behavior. That whole day I’d been thinking how to face him and then bring up that diary which could change my life forever. I had no excuse. I had no one to support me. Mummy was like ‘WHAT? Unbelievable! How could you…’. Our house was a complete setting for an intense drama. I ended up looking like a kid who did drugs in school. And that sun shade would have dried up already. It’s not like I drank whiskey and threw the bottle there. Whatever it is even if I say that my friend ALSO washed her hands through the window(which is my most commonly used excuse) he’d just say he dint care about anyone else. Well if he cared about me then he should have just signed that diary!

What happened next is history. Papa refused to sign, there was a lot of angry gyaan, I cried some crocodile tears and then there were talks about how my last name was also his first name and that it was shameful. The next day Papa escorted me to school.  He met the teacher, she was mighty pleased, they spoke and occasionally looked at me, and I stood there facing my shoes.

Papa was very satisfied with how seriously the school took its rules, the teacher happy that someone took her seriously, and I still couldn't see my face on the shoes.

Travelling with The Hulk.

Travelling with a baby is one thing. Travelling with a baby and a bag that should be treated like a baby is another.

I am back from a rocking vacation to Singapore that drained even the last droplet of energy left in me. Going by general health levels I have hit rock bottom. My friend told me not to worry about rock bottom they have Hard Rock café over there :-/ My eyes have sunk into their sockets. I got a tan which says I had actually been on a vacation to the sun. I am not bragging or anything but I returned from Singapore looking like the Devil. 

The highlight of our Singapore trip was 'The Hulk', the star passenger with us. The Hulk is an over-sized camera bag, and it was nicknamed very appropriately for its striking similarity in color, dimensions and general outlook to the incredible superhero. The Hulk bag is bigger than a normal backpack, but smaller than a house. It is also heavier than a backpack, but lighter than a house. Throughout the journey, The Hulk got to sit on cushions and on people’s laps (not necessarily ours) when other bags were either dragged or dumped in the boot.  Well, my husband maintains that it contained his camera and its accessories. However the bag looked like it contained a camera, its accessories and an ogre.

Well if I look at it from a layman angle I should admit it was none of my business because the owner of the bag did not make anyone else carry it. Second thing is, if he asked any of us to carry it he would have carried that person all the way home. Thirdly it is difficult to watch a person walking around pretending to be very comfortable all the while carrying a cross on his shoulders.

At bus stops and metro stations, the bag was not placed on the floor or the very cleanly maintained waiting benches. That was when we realized the dark and glaring truth that was always there, right in front of our eyes . The reality that is always bitter and it was our turn to take a bite of it. It was the time to accept The Hulk into our family as an extension of hubby. It was now an unspoken yet painful fact that at any strange and crowded location, the chances of me and my son getting lost is high as compared to the bag.

We are also not allowed to badmouth this bag. For example remarks like ‘Please put that down we are going to be in this queue forever’, ‘Shift the bag out of the way this is a public place’, ‘Move the bag out of the seat for the physically challenged’ will be met with fuming grunts and scary frowns coupled with rolling of eyes that you can almost see angry birds flying out of his ears. Sometimes I think compared to us Roger Federer can go on completely peaceful vacations with his n pairs of twins. At least he has a hope that his babies are going to grow up some day and become people.

One fine sunny morning at Sentosa, Singapore, we hopped on to a cable car. There were seven of us, and the cable car capacity was eight. So the guy at the counter kept us waiting before he closed the cabin, waiting for any single weirdo who would have come to Sentosa all by himself. When he peeped into our cabin he found the seven of us, sitting slightly cramped and the bag on the seat royally placed. And he said ‘Okay this car is full’ and closed it. Because seven human beings + The Hulk = 8. I am just glad he dint charge a ticket for it.

And so this ogre laden bag followed us everywhere. I am sure during one of those tiresome walks in the hot sun, the hubby secretly wished the ogre to come out and hold the bag for once. On our way home from Sentosa we hired a taxi and hubby asked the driver to open the boot. The driver said he could keep the bag inside. But hubby insisted. The driver opened it and he kept the bag there. The trip to the hotel, hands free, was a liberating experience for all of us.

Finally at the hotel:

Driver: “Sir 19 Dollars”

He: "But your meter shows 16"

Driver: “And you used the trunk which is 3 dollars”

:-o

Once more, the bag showed its worth, that it can travel business class even in taxis.

Image courtesy: Google images.

How intelligent Moms pack for a vacation !

Tomorrow my vacation starts (yay!) so this week is like an overstretched Friday. Like on Friday it’s the weekend so at work the laptop, unread emails and colleagues are all pushed to a secondary, insignificant place where the mode is set to ‘ignore’.  I did not mention ‘bosses’ in the above sentence because they are already in that place we don’t need to push them.

I am not a systematic person unlike both my parents. I pack in the eleventh hour and I’d been that way ever since….. err…ever since I had to pack myself. That is, around the time I got married. Thankfully till date I’ve never forgotten any important stuff like comb, eyeliner etc., but I admit that couple of times I did forget irrelevant stuff like e-ticket and passport. I don’t understand why my folks back home were so mad at me for driving back home to take those – they were acting so hysterical like I forgot my toothbrush or something.

Basically my house is in a complete mess right now. We have two bedrooms. The master bedroom, which is mostly maintained well with most of the things in place (don’t judge me; this is a major achievement in homes of toddlers) because this room is partially visible from the entrance. The other bedroom has a Queen Size mattress which is on the floor as cots are dangerous for my toddler who seems to ride roller coasters in his sleep. He usually sleeps next to me, but wakes up somewhere else we literally have to hunt for him in the morning under his Angry Birds pillow or under a pile of blankets. So for safety reasons we did not buy a cot for this room. There is also a computer table and chair. It is better for one’s mental and emotional health and peace to prevail in the house if the items on this table are untouched. Even my toddler understands this. Besides the bed and table there is also a wardrobe, and what is left of that room is a portion of floor that can accommodate two malnourished adults. This portion of the floor is the place where the suitcases currently rest, obviously with nothing in it, but it is opened so that we don’t forget to put something in it and go home tomorrow. So if I have to put the toddler to sleep in this mess it becomes a Herculean task to move these suitcases one by one, and the chair and other stuff we shopped for the family. Suppose I successfully navigate all these, something or the other catches the fancy of the toddler and sleeping becomes an impossible dream.

Even a bachelor's home on a Friday night may not be as messy as a home which has enthusiastic toddlers in it. Like the other day I found almost half a kilo pearl onions from the gap between sofa cushions, vegetables and fruits are found from places that we least expect it to be. There is no standard place to search for a TV remote. If there are children you search for TV remotes in shoe racks, the fridge, kitchen drawers, and washing machine, these being some likely places. So imagine packing in such a situation. When I pack, it is like demonstrating Newton’s third law of motion, because my action is met with an equal and opposite reaction– my toddler unpacks it. And the stuff that is unpacked needs to be hunted. For an absent minded Mamma like me, I may not even go to such lengths to find something I may just ignore it could be the key to open the suitcase or something.

This is why I pack in the last minute. At the last minute the hubby experiences temporary deafness due to the stress of packing his countless gadget accessories and power cables and the toddler will be busy choosing the toys he can’t live without. This is one of the few rare occurrences in our home when nobody is talking, and I can pack with a rational mindset.

I hope this explanation will be convincing enough to Papa who had been asking me to pack since New Year.

 Image Courtesy: Google Images.

Why most women hate each other ;-)

We, women are intensely guarded about ourselves. This makes us shrewd in a way that is mostly harmless, but it adds to our list of enemies. For example, let’s say we walked into a party and liked a sari, jewelry, blouse pattern or a handbag of another woman, and we wanted to know how and where they bought it from, or got it customized.

Firstly, the distance between us and the woman in question is full of the unseen reality called ego topped with a fog of jealousy. It is so heavy and opaque that it weighs us down. Complimenting another woman or asking her where she got it from is like losing our dignity for life. Some people have no qualms to appreciate anything that they like, even complete strangers have given me compliments but for majority others, it is a mammoth effort to break free from their comfort bubbles (where they are reigning Queens and everyone else are just subjects) and ask the question. It hurts.

Once Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) said in F.R.I.E.N.D.S, ‘Oh its okay, women hate me’ with pride. So we can safely assume that if you are someone most women don’t keep too much company with then either you have something that is too enviable ( rich husband, luxury car, branded wardrobe, diamond jewelry being the common reasons) , or you have a great figure.

Now comes the second part of it. Suppose I leave my ego at home and walk into a party ( in reality this is not possible, it’s like the critics telling you to leave your brain at home and go watch Golmaal series) and let’s say all women are wearing enviably pretty accessories.

Me: Hey your blouse is so pretty and perfectly stitched! Where did you get it made?

Other woman: “Oh this is my mother’s blouse…hers is a tailor near our family home…I think that tailor relocated…’

Mother’s blouse! It looked exactly like the one Shilpa Shetty wore in one of her item songs.  This woman will tell you her email password but not her tailor’s address. She safeguards his identity like one of her deepest secrets which can be revealed only by conducting a narcotic analysis on her.

***********

Me: ‘Hey nice shoes! Where did you get these from?’

Other woman: ‘You like it ? I don’t know where it is from. Someone gifted it to me.’

Since when did people start gifting shoes to adults? :-o

***********

Me: ‘Hey! Your earrings are beautiful! From where did you get these?’

Other woman: ‘These are my sister’s earrings…I will ask her and let you know.. .’

This is a temporary escape. We will not ask further questions about where her sister is, as it is obvious that she doesn’t want to say it. But if you insist she will not hesitate to say that her sister is a nomad with no permanent address.

***********

Me: ‘Hey your kids are so well behaved and speak so fluently! Which school do they go to?’

Other woman: ‘Thanks! They go to XYZ School. But the fee is high and they spend a lot of time commuting to and fro. Also the admissions have closed…it difficult to get into, you need to have recommendation letter from Barack Obama…blah blah…’

This is a full sermon. She does not want your kid to go to that school. Amen.

***********

Me: ‘Hey, what a gorgeous Kurti! Where did you get this from?’

Other woman: ‘I bought this like five years ago…I don’t remember exactly…’

It is brand new. She bought it for this party the day before. I am not a donkey I know what five year old kurtis look like.

***********

Me: ‘Hey how did you bake these cookies? Can you share the recipe?’

Other woman: ‘Sure I will mail you dear.’

This woman’s first priority will be to block you or anyone who asked the recipe from google chat.

***********

Me: ‘Hey how did your chicken fry come out so crunchy outside and soft inside? Any tip you can share?’

Other woman: ‘No…I just put the chicken in oil…and I did it in the last minute yaa’

We have tongues, woman. And we use it to taste food at meal times. (Henceforth we will use it to badmouth you).  And we have had fried chicken before; it’s not our first time.

***********

Me: ‘What a beautiful neckpiece is that! Where did you get it from?’

Other woman: ‘Oh thanks! My grandmother gave me this. It was made by a goldsmith known to her. If you want I can ask her’

This woman I talked to is already in her late 40s. The chance that her grandmother is alive is thousand to one, and even if she is, she may barely remember her own name. And if you ask her this goldsmith question she may even die trying to remember it.

***********

So basically, women don’t tell you anything. We divulge nothing about ourselves, but  try to extract every single detail about other women. If we are successful enough extracting a little bit we are very creative to fill voids with assumptions and spicy details. The secretive behavior even to our best friends is one of the reasons why we say women are more complicated than the intricate design on their antique jewelry.

Last week I met my husband’s friend at the supermarket. He’s a cheerful guy and while talking to him I noticed his wrist watch which looked very elegant.

Me: ‘Wow what a watch! Tag Heur?’

That guy: ‘ Arrey, nono! It is Swatch. You know the Qurm City Centre? When you go to Carrefour supermarket, there is a Swatch showroom on the right no? I bought it from there. They still have it’.

I dint even ask him.

 Image courtesy: Google images.

Surviving the Lenten Season.

On Ash Wednesday, March 5th started the Lenten season, and ended on Easter, April 20^th. This was a time of vegetarianism, a time of stifling temptation and persistent fight against the non-vegetarian demons trying to lure me into chicken biryani. The ‘demons’ are basically my family members, yes, thank you very much.

Lenten season had been a challenging one for me. My hubby does not believe in any season or day that stops him from eating non vegetarian food. My toddler is yet to come to terms with the fact that food can actually exist without meat in it. So I was basically caught between two hard core carnivores during Lenten season. Usually I have no problems surviving it, but this time it was different. Each day I had to listen to mini lectures about how faith is good but there is no hard and fast rule that you should avoid non vegetarian food during Lenten season. My mother called me and said that she skipped church and is going to a Muslim wedding instead because…Mutton Biryani, baby! Basically I dint have anyone including elders in the family for spiritual support during this time.

However there are some people who follow Lent and then act like they are being crucified as well. That they are following Lent is shouted from the rooftop and showcased as an act of spiritual publicity. We all have that friend who is desperate to show that she is religious by propagating faith through social media. Living the faith is different, so I completely despise the hypocrites who err more than any other, yet share religious quotes on facebook.  

Lenten Season does not give me liberty from household duties, so cook non vegetarian, I must. Otherwise the resident carnivores may be pissed and that is the last thing I ever want to happen. Basically they are not so demanding. One non vegetarian side dish and everyone sleeps happily. My only side dish for a month had been Al Marai yoghurt, and by consuming just that for over 40 days I am so bursting with calcium right now that I can almost hear it.  

Appam

After the long wait of what felt like ages, came Easter day. The day of resurrection and sanctity. And for us foodie Christians, it is also called the day celebrating the victory of meat over vegetables. Christians all over the world eat like crazy on that day. For us Mallus, the day begins with Appam and stew (mostly beef). And by noon we treat ourselves to such a feast that whatever was missed for the preceding forty plus days would be evened out. By evening, it becomes impossible for us to move. That’s when we clumsily laze around the couch and watch movies back to back. 
Ah the joy of Easter!

Beef stew.

For anyone who wonders what Lent season is, I will embark on giving you a small idea. 

Lenten Season is the period from Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, to Easter, calculated to be 46 days. Lenten Season is a period of preparation for Easter, along with remembrance of Palm Sunday, Last Supper and death of Christ on the cross. So Christians usually follow some spiritual discipline that includes fasting prayers and vegetarianism marking the Holiness of the period and to mirror Christ and how He resisted temptation, endured and defeated suffering. This is something that is instilled within us as children and Christians of different denominations have their own way of observing Lent.  

Like I told you, when we give up something we love most it has got to be food. And that is how vegetarianism continues to be the most common Lent practice. Some people even give up alcohol and smoking too, but you don’t see them in public ;-)

Easter was a blessed one for us, our families and friends as well. It was great on our tummies too!  And unlike the last 40 days, hens will continue to be pepper chicken and cows, beef ularthiyathu like they always have been. 

Image Courtesy:Google Images (for the first Lent poster)

The 'Gelf' Malayalee.

Everyone knows Nancy, who writes at Reflections. Mom of two, exuberant and perpetually young at heart, all her loyal followers knows the names and hobbies of her beautiful daughters like their own. For example she could write about a simple power cut in her home so interestingly, that by the end of it you’d realize that power cuts are actually fun. She turns around any situation into a party. Each and every post of hers has left me smiling and feeling better. After some persuasion, I got her to write a guest post on my blog. Yay! She was busier than a bee all these days due to personal reasons, which I hope she will put it up on her blog soon, but she remembered my request . Thank You Nancy !

 I hope you all enjoy reading it as much as I did… !

The Gelf Malayalee!

In the 1970’s & 80’s a tiny state in South India witnessed a mass migration of its people to the gulf countries. The discovery of oil and shortage of man-power in the gulf was like a prayer answered for  many young men faced with bleak job prospects in their home country.

Every man took whatever job he got, worked hard and sent home almost all the money he earned to pay up debts, to educate and to marry his siblings off into good families. After a decade or so the family woke up to the fact that he was also unmarried and scurried around to find him a suitable girl. They got him married to a nurse/pharmacist/physiotherapist[select any one] and sent both back to the desert. Both husband and wife worked day/night shifts, scrimped & saved to educate their children + send money to their folks back home, all the while aware that they were better off than many of their countrymen.

The way the post is moving you can be forgiven for thinking I’m kind of glorifying the Gulf Malayalees’[GM] achievements. Seriously I’m not. Oh all right maybe a little. But my post is not about their trials and tribulations in foreign land….it is about a few traits all the Malayalees living in the Gulf share whether they like to admit it or not;-).

#So jumping right in, let’s start with food…..the Gulf Malayalee’s eating habits did not undergo any major transformation because he was living in the Middle East[ME]. Rice and the usual curries were made in his kitchen as traditionally as it was made in his tharavad[family home]. His only weakness was Kentucky Fried Chicken. He never, ever got fed up of it. He ordered it for birthdays, anniversaries, when guests dropped in, for farewell parties, in fact he is even known to carry KFC home when he went on annual leave. The next time you travel in a plane from UAE/Qatar/ Kuwait/ Bahrain/Saudi to Kerala and happen to smell KFC, remember you heard it from me first;-).

# As soon as the GM got his residence visa stamped, his first priority was to get a driving license. His first car was a sturdy, practical model because at that point owning a car itself was a huge achievement.  But as time passed he unconsciously nursed a secret desire in his heart. In his eyes the ultimate status symbol was a Mercedes, which of course was way beyond his means. So he did the next best thing. He bought a second-hand Mercedes and proudly drove it around till the end of his stay in the ME. Not much has changed even today…..his children who are all grown up now have a thing for 4 wheel drives mainly Prado & Range rovers.

# Another dream the GM worked hard to achieve was his ‘own’ house back in his home country. He lived frugally and saved hard to make this dream come true. No matter what his job in the ME, the house he built for himself came under the category of mansions. It would have a huge hall, 3-4 bedrooms with ‘attached’ bathrooms & 2 or 3 kitchens depending on his means. Not to forget all the light fittings, plumbing material and sofa/bedroom sets he carefully cargoes in from the Gulf. Now for the saddest part…..this house would remain unused for the better part of the GM’s life. By the time he decides to go back to live there for good, his children would have settled down elsewhere leaving him & wife to use just 1 bedroom & kitchen with the rest of the house shut off to avoid further wear and tear.

#Another peculiar quirk of the GM…….he talks nostalgically of his hometown every chance he gets; how he climbed trees, bathed in rivers, walked 8 kms to school every day, how his home town was the best and how he yearned to go back. But that’s all he does….he just talks. When it comes right down to it he delays his going back using every excuse he can find. Simply put, he is afraid to give up this comfortable life and start all over again. But he’ll never, ever admit this, not even to himself.

Other regular quirks associated with GMs’…

# At any given point he’ll boast about the number of visas he has taken for others and how they prospered because….only because he took their visa and made their life.

#The GM’s luggage when he went home for vacation was sure to contain among other things huge tins of Nido, Tang, Galaxy Chocolates, Reynolds pens, Fa Soap, Nivea cream, Yardley Powder, Axe Oil and countless bottles of Tiger Balm to distribute among relatives, friends, neighbors, the church priest, the village doctor, the midwife who helped bring him into the world…..the list is endless.

# Unless he was a professional, nobody back home knew what exactly he worked in the Gulf as…..he could be an office boy, carpenter or a delivery boy slaving day & night for his Arab boss but when he went home on annual leave he wore a gold chain thick as a rope around his neck, a gold bracelet adorned his wrist and heavy rings on his fingers that everybody assumed he had a great job in the gulf.

# Before the Gulf Malayalee goes back to his home country for good, he makes sure by fair means or foul his children too are well-settled in the same place he made his life. It’s another story that the children are eyeing US, Canada and even India[something GM parents simply cannot comprehend] to settle down…

Like I said, that’s another story.

Does anybody want to agree/add value/defend the subject of the post???

Anybody who knows a Gulf Kashmiri/Gujarati/Bengali/Tamilian can also give their take:-).

[This Gelf Malayalee claims to be no expert on the subject and writes[tongue-in-cheek] based solely on personal experiences & hearsay.]

Three years an Ambivert.

Dictionary sends me a new word and its possible meanings each day to my inbox. Most of which obviously I dint know existed, because otherwise you would have seen them extensively splashed across this blog. Today they sent me a word, ambivert.

According to dictionary, Ambivert is one whose personality type is intermediate between introvert and extrovert. As soon as I read it, I knew I was one.

Basically, I am not an introvert. I do not sulk in a corner of a party hall. I do not stew in my worries or success. However, at the same party if someone asks me to dance I may need a diaper. And that, my friend, is a quality of an ambivert. If you think about it, most of us are. Remember our teachers? They scream and yell at us all year. And the day our parents are called for the meeting at school, they are all sweet and extremely well behaved, and our parents are like ‘ You better stop talking about your teacher like that…she is a female version of Swami Vivekananda …just look at her!’ and there she is, saree clad with a halo circling around her head. On other days when she yells the saliva droplets travel at the speed of light to reach the backbencher’s nose, and there are fumes instead of the halo. So she is the best example of an ambivert. It can also be technically defined as- intelligent situational smartness or the lack of it.

We, ambiverts, are basically the convertible type. I mean, when we encounter negative criticism, we transform ourselves into extroverts. Whereas when there is a general knowledge quiz, we are introverts, or even invisible! We are completely flexible and this does not mean that we have no character or backbone; it just that we are chameleons in human form, newly christened as ambiverts! 

My almost-three-year-old was an introvert until he was one and a half. He would sit on my lap, wishing that nobody looked at him or pulled his cheeks. Later he became an extrovert. He would just walk into parties and transform into a tiny party animal. He wouldn't even turn to check if we were still around. Now he is almost three, and is in nursery. His teacher tells me, ‘He is so cute he doesn't even cry or yell over here’ and our neighbors say ‘what a cute little guy you've got.. We don’t even get to hear his voice…he is the silent type isn't he? You are so lucky!’ My husband and I are completely speechless at this stage and we just pretend to agree as our eardrums are already partially damaged by the person in question.

My sunglass is now in three pieces, most of my hair pulled out from its roots, the furniture broken at the ends, torn, spat on or scratched, you wouldn't believe that our walls were once white, some dresses have chocolate/sketch pen marks that refuses to go, and when he hangs from the sofa headrest upside down (that is how he watches TV), he gives me a feeling that he was Mowgli in his previous life. My eardrums are insensitive to smaller sounds now, as when he is a fraction of a millimeter away from me he yells ‘Ammeey’ into my ear which I could have heard had I been in space.

 But at parties, he is the kind of boy anybody would love to pamper and cuddle with. He puts up this innocent look and angelic smile, the combination that floors many female toddlers. And by ‘floors’ I meant, that when nobody is looking it is possible he could literally FLOOR them. That is how one displays the quality of being an ambivert. 

There is another word called antevert. According to the dictionary, it is a verb used ‘to displace (the uterus or other body organ) by tipping forward.’ It was when he tried to antevert me that I ended up in the labor room.

Image Courtesy:Google images.

Give me a high five... I turned FIVE !

March 2009. 

I was working at a MNC in Bangalore, as a software programmer. Even so, I was on bench. Bench is defined as that situation in an IT industry, when the organization pays you to stay away from their projects. Like my Mom who was at a point ready to pay me to shut up and stay out of the kitchen. However I got a workstation assigned to me that involves a revolving chair whose ability to revolve was completely baseless as there was no John Abraham sitting in the adjacent cubicle. In fact there was a malnourished guy, who was also so short that he looked like a 7 year old. With such people around we should have opaque cubicles and chairs that do not allow us to look around. The computer assigned to me was prehistoric, and looked like a front load washing machine. The only sites we got to browse were the portals of that very organization which otherwise we wouldn't browse even at gunpoint. Those were orkut days, Mark Zuckerberg was still in college, whatsapp was not conceived yet and Yo Yo Honey Singh was still roaming around with his Bio data and nursery school light music video on Mumbai Locals.

 I was newly married, my husband worked at a firm whose CEO was charged with corruption and sent to jail and future looked completely bleak for them. Global recession was at its peak, some of my friends on bench where I worked were fired without any notice, and my career was basically hanging from the edge of a cliff. We started our wedded life thus, on a ship which hit two icebergs at once.

But then for newly married couples none of this matters. We could drink just water and live in a mediocre house like it was a Beverly Hills mansion as long as we had each other. It was one of those days when I came across some popular humor blogs. Simple everyday events and conversations were so hilariously written. I started going to the archives and read between the lines. Then the thought came to my mind, why not start a blog of my own. Why should mankind be spared from my literary torture? In fact the characters in my family were the rarest of the rare in terms of temporary insanity and other matters. I dint even need to hunt around for topics to write or improvise on existing ones. And hence the blog was born. 

However I was too naive to blog anonymously. Instead I used my real name, email id and photograph. The blog became a topic of conversation and content scrutinized at marriages and baptisms. Many active bloggers of that time quit. There are a few who survived and even found their way into my friend’s list on Facebook. I even won a contest, received complimentary hampers, participated in tags, found some great friends, and somehow the inspiration to write some rubbish or the other continues to this day! I mean my will to torture people just ceases to diminish:-o

The consistency of my blog can be mainly blamed on some loyal readers who liked the stuff I wrote. They never missed to comment. They did not write ‘Hey great post! Mind-blowing! Breathtaking! Nice! Creative! Magical!’ after every post because it wasn't any of those. They shared their thoughts with me rather than indulging in compliments. And they complimented me genuinely when they felt I deserved it. And these are the people who helped sustain this consistent ride, so if you have any problem with the content of this blog, please blame them. Do you see the top 25 culprits on either side? And they inspired me with their own blogs, which were equivalent to reading full-fledged best sellers. They taught me how to be unique in one’s own style.

       Thank You !

And the ones who have always taken pride in my blog, and often been my subject to tease or quote, were my parents and the hubby. They have always been there, and with simple comments and loving gestures, were the pillars of my existence in this journey .Without the hubby’s jokes, or those blunders that happened really frequently, it would have been difficult for me to update so often!

So, my blog turned five and counting! Who would have thought that the outcome of the devil’s workshop on a bench could actually last this long! I hereby take this wonderful opportunity to thank all the people of that company who kept me on bench and on the verge of unemployment for so long, that I woke up and realized that blogs were fun, unlike software codes. I also thank Microsoft Word for your eternal patience, putting up with all my horrible spellings and grammar.

 I am also immensely grateful to all the neon shoes wearing females, who thought that I was some narcissist who overused Microsoft Word, instead of ogling at the pink lipped, gel headed gay boy at the cafeteria. Last but not the least; I thank everyone from the auto driver who dropped me at Dairy circle and charged me half my month’s pay, the neighbor who peeped through my kitchen window, and the stray dogs of Bangalore that ruled the streets, for being unintentional inspirations to various posts of mine that finally adds up to 181!  ( I used a calculator for that one. I have only ten fingers)

I've heard my family casually talk to others about my blog. I must say that nothing can be a bigger reward than realizing that the people I love are proud of me, this being one of the reasons. And it has steered me along for five whole years, with plenty of support from peers on blogger.

It was indeed an amazing journey, because I did not start the blog to win contests, or become famous. Something I started as a time pass has become an extension of me, and it has become a place where I can be honest without getting fired.

Picture courtesy: Google images.

The true colors of Holi.

It’s been an awfully long gap between posts here, and even though no one really noticed, there, I brought it to your notice. I dint update this space for past two weeks because whenever I think of something to write all I can think of is some random rants. 

March is not the best month of the year for me, so far. I also think Holi brings out the true colors of some people.

A colleague who thinks if he says something with a smiling face anything rude will sound sweet, a friend of decades showing her true colors, unexpected hurtful comments and misunderstanding coming from all possible directions, my whatsapp has witnessed it all this month. Suddenly I am that line on the periphery of the dart board, where all the darts eventually land. I suspect that everyone thinks that I am responsible for that missing plane! People, honestly it’s not me, I am praying for its safe arrival too so stop throwing your dirty socks at me.

Long ago when things went wrong I succumbed to my couch with a tub of ice cream watching F.R.I.E.N.D.S episodes back to back. It is still an effective therapy. It makes my problems appear insignificant. My favorite character Phoebe, whose father was in jail, mother committed suicide, twin sister a porn star and no education or a secure job was so happy! None of these issues are applicable to me and I am so grumpy. :-o

I have to refrain from saying a lot of things here, because I am not anonymous. Everyone from my neighbor’s dog to the security at office knows that I blog. So even though I am locally popular as a blogger, this popularity is not really anything to do with the writing, it is more like being scrutinized word by word, line by line and being interrogated inside lifts, grocery bays and parking lots.

So on the whole March is a mess. And there is a missing plane which proved to the whole world that our ‘technology advance’ is limited to face recognition and fingerprint scanning on smartphones. Both of which doesn't work if you wear too much make up or suffer a cut from dicing vegetables. Beyond that, there is just thin air. We are just a race who thinks we are great but a whole jet with 239 people is gone and we are still looking up at the sky, mouths open.

And then some people resort to facebook to make jokes about the missing jet and create cartoons out of them. Is it possible to replace those 239 persons on MH370 with these inappropriate facebook jokers and some others from my hit list? Just asking. Because in that case, we could just stop searching.

Hope you guys had a happy Holi! Mine was colorful too, colors mainly being black and brown. 

Don’t ask.

Image courtesy: Google.                                                                                                                              

How to cure the 'Lazy Husband' syndrome !

It all started with a TV remote. In the times of Doordarshan or DD-1, there was no need of a remote control and it was somewhat easier to agree with parents. And then there was DD-2, the first ever reason why we disagreed (over the TV). However, when we switched to the 8:00 pm inevitable English News on DD-1, we got up from our chairs and pressed the tab on the right side of the TV monitor and came back to our seat, thus burning about 3 calories. And this was celebrated by Doordarshan by playing the most depressing tune in the history of music as if it was a prelude to the equally depressing people who were about to read it. So the TV never got us addicted to it, thanks to the sad jingles, programs, outrageously fashion retarded cast or the grief stricken anchors none of which changed since Independence.

Later, the TV started swelling and eventually bursting with channels. It also made twice the number of disagreements as there were people in the family. More differences, more rooms, more TVs and lesser compatibility. Earlier all I had to worry about was Mamta Kulkarni or Manisha Koirala who may do the most inappropriate act, at the most crucial time (when parents were around). But now I flip channels completely warned and aware that anyone from Sunny Leone to Dora the explorer may strip at any point of time. It is impossible to watch TV with kids L

Weekend trips to the Electricity, Water and Telephone offices to pay bills, register complaints etc. were replaced by online portals, and now there are apps so that trip is saved. But when we did drive to the office and stood in long queues, we were taught the value of time, money and most importantly patience. As a bonus, few calories were also burnt without our knowledge. Similarly, we don’t need to go to the railway station to book a ticket; it is done by gliding those fingers on the phone. But this website gives us the real feel of actually driving to the railway station on an exhaustingly sultry day. That’s our very own IRCTC. It teaches the internet generation what it is to be in a queue, and wait patiently under the scorching sun until we are given a seat in the Waiting List Number 786. Everyone from our internet generation should book a ticket in IRCTC to learn some moral science.

Trips to the library are completely avoidable as we can read them at our convenience on the tab. In most cities there are facilities to get groceries delivered at our doorsteps so no need to go there either. Pizza is delivered to my couch, and tomorrow it may be delivered to my mouth. Washing machines, dishwashers, blenders and food processors do most of the cleaning and chopping. A lot of work is thus reduced.

We used to set timers on cameras to click family pics, now there are remote controls to do that as well. Movie tickets are available online. At least 95% of bank transactions and school fees are paid online. Clothes and shoe shopping is booming on websites. And I look at the jammed roads and wonder…Where are all these people going?

Basically, the reasons our parents had to get off that chair and do some errands do not exist anymore; which is why we need to work out and eat right. However a certain someone at home has not worked out since last five months. Each day there was a new reason not to do so. I wonder there is some app on iphone which generates ridiculous excuses every day? Otherwise how on earth is it possible to come up with ‘There is a dog on that route which I suspect has rabies?’

It is really tough to inspire people and get them to do something for their own health. And it is tougher to inspire them on a daily basis, as there are lesser inspirational stories than there are excuses.

Here is my million dollar idea for the existing Nike-iphone app that counts calories while walking. Hubby WAS a regular user of this app, when he used to walk, long ago when Atal Behari Vajpayee was the Prime Minister.  This can be upgraded for an additional feature: When the user does not use the app on a certain (lazy) day, the iphone should just shut down until the next day. The ipad should synchronize the same command and shut down as well. Nothing cripples men more than this. And I am sure the fear of the phone shutting down will get the laziest of men run for their lives health. All the ladies who have excuse generating husbands will thank iphone for this...at least I will.

So as I was at my desk thinking of productive ways to get the hubby to exercise, somewhere else in the world, Nike came up with another brilliant idea. Someone designed new running shoes the laces of which will tie on its own. This is the same person that constructed an elevator to his gym.