Marriage

Marriage is on my family's mind. All my cousins and close friends are slowly beginning to get married. This has made me realize that people were lying when they said that your 20s were going to be fun. No one told you that in your 20s you'd make some really bad decisions regarding education, friends and people and then basically drown under the stress of not having a job, various skin problems, various other problems stemming from the fact that this bloody law course is not fucking ending and of course the parents. (I think this needs to be elaborated upon):


Indian Parents:

Normally found all over the world (because we are after all lots of people) and majorly concentrated in the Indian subcontinent this is a species with severe double standards and appalling levels of hypocrisy running through their veins. There are certain rules that all Indian parents follow regarding their children and other people's:

1) Try to discipline everyone else's child but your own.

2) Live under constant delusion that your child is the best

and the most important one

3) Parents know best

4) Most in the country believe staunchly in arranged marriage


I find the last point very scary and slightly disturbing. This has me thinking of my days in school in Prague. By that time I was used to being a third culture kid but even then I was as little prepared for the question asked by my class mates as I am now : " So like your parents are gonna find you a husband?". It was high school. I was the only coloured one present. I shrugged and nodded with a sheepish smile. I had no idea what to say. But I was not prepared for what came next: "So they're like gonna pimp you out?!" and certain immature white children fell about laughing. I was quick to defend what was my culture. However, as I grow up, I realize that I think like that too!

Coming from a middle class family, I haven't really been exposed to others, so my perception is shaped by what I've seen growing up. The girls are trained, taught to cook, to keep quiet, dress appropriately and behave themselves. These are qualities that will later be shouted from the rooftops when they get of marriageable age. This is what you are being sold on. There exists such a place as the marriage market. Your entire life, your existence boils down to what you look like and how fast and well you can cook. You may be a rocket scientist for all they care. This brings in the parents. Those people that take you to malls and pick out hideous tops and sweaters for you to try and then look disappointed when you pointedly turn away. I mean people who are not equipped to pick out clothing for you from well stocked stores in hugeass malls are the ones in charge of getting you a life partner. Don't get me wrong, in some aspects parents are quite wise but if picking out a husband is based on a silly newspaper ad then it just shows that either they're being plain lazy about the whole process or the entire country has taken to heart that "hope makes the world go round."

Not one parent of a girl that I have spoken to has said "I know she will be happy." They all said: "I hope she will be happy." Not a single one found it appalling that their child was about to become part of their biggest gambling strategy.

So basically, parents that never allow you to have boyfriends, or go out at night or basically even talk to boys unless its about school work, are completely ok with the idea of spending shit loads of money, getting you dolled up in gold and red and then shuttling you off in some idiot's flower decked car. The idiot you went for coffee with thrice before your marriage (as more times was not seen as appropriate). Upon reaching his house, after the family's done welcoming you and kick in some rice at the door, you will be pushed into a room where there will be a bed. A bed decorated with flowers. An unknown boy's bed. You are supposed to sleep with him (pun intended) on that bed. Because you went round and round around a fire with him. Wow.

I know what my newspaper ad will say: Match wanted for, tall, slim, convent educated girl. Early marriage. Contact P.O. Box no. etc. etc.

This ad describes half of my class in school. I say half because some were really short, although all were of course convent educated. It doesn't say anything about me. It scares me. I am disappointed in the low value attached to some Indian women by their families. Any guy will do. As long as you get married before you turn 28. Any guy will do.

The Dirty Picture - Please Kill Me Now

It is a movie made on Silk Smitha's life. And it makes you want to take your own. It hurt even more because I had chosen to watch it in the middle of exams and from the first scene it smote my conscience since it was precious prep time wasted. For those of you that haven't seen it this is the story narrated by Emraan Hashmi's character, Abraham, who might as well have gone and drowned himself off the coast:

In a place a little way off from Madras a young girl dreams of reaching the skies. She literally attempts to do the same by getting onto a ladder before her mother basically tells her to get her ass back on the ground and proceeds to accomplish the same by shaking the ladder till the girl falls off. For a second it had me hoping that the film would proceed on how the girl made it big with the help of prosthetic legs and became a dancer or something in south indian films, but sadly this does not happen and so I dolefully settled back into my chair to watch what seemed to be a below average-waste of time movie.

As the girl grows up in true South Indian, plump, ghagra wearing style she develops a mantra to justify all her stupid decisions in life. It goes something like this : "Jab bhagwaan ne ek zindagi di hai toh do baar kya sochna?" (When God has given you one life then why think twice?). No one bothered to tell her it's because God hoped we'd respect life more as the better evolved species. Anyway, so one night Miss Reshma (yes that's her name) jumps out of her window (we later find it's the night before her wedding) and runs off. This provides ample time for the film makers to show the names of the people who have been cast in this pathetic venture.

So Reshma (Vidya Balan) reaches the big city and begins to live in a hovel which seems to be part of a brothel or atleast shares one of it's walls with it. While living there and surviving on crumbs from her 'steel ka dabba', the only thing she bothered to run away with from home, Miss Reshma learns the art of making sex sounds and thus entertains herself at night. There is also an Amma who she is friends with and who she conveniently discards once her career takes off. One day Miss Reshma is hungry and goes to become a heroine. The guy tells her he can't help her and sends her off with 5 bucks. She uses that money to watch Suryakant's (Naseeruddin Shah) movie. Suryakant is the shit in the movies and she has apparently always loved him. Inspired by what she sees, she goes back to the guy who blew her off and as happens in these situations gets to be part of a song sequence because the other girl conveniently fails to turn up. This is the point where the audience is supposed to think : Fate, Destiny, Kismet etc.

So Miss Reshma, our plump beloved sets the screen on fire with her sultry, vulgar dance moves coupled with a jiggling pot belly and of course the hunter which is the deal breaker. Alas, the movie is an Abraham (Emraan Hashmi) direction and he is English speaking, Literature influenced, attempting to be Guru Dutt but not even managing to be himself director who abhors all vulgarity and insists on cutting the scene because he is against making the audience think from their balls rather than their brains. When Reshma goes to see the film, her scene isn't in it!! Haww!! All that hunter time wasted! Tch. Tch.

However, the producer of the film laments that his film is not selling and is then told of the director's censoring of the song. He watches it and after salivating over images of the hunter wielding Reshma decides he must have her! After a long search (I forget how they did it), they finally find her, name her 'Silk' and bring her in for the 'Oooh la la' song with none other than Suryakant. A timid Reshma fails to give the required shot and this puts Suryakant off. Off he goes in a huff and a puff into his changing room where Reshma follows him and offers him 501 sessions of sex in response to his boast of more than 500 lays. What follows sadly, is not the end of the movie or an unplanned pregnancy but they give a perfect shot and she's a hit and in everyone of the over-age star's movies.

Soon, she's as famous as he is! One day she's at his place and his wife comes in so he hides her in the bathroom and sleeps with his wife instead. Reshma is devastated after watching through the bathroom keyhole - delusional fuck that she is. She goes off the bender and decides to go bet on horses. The horse that wins belongs to none other than Suryakant's brother Ramakant (Tusshar Kapoor). They start some sort of an affair which ultimately leads to nothing because of course 'bros before whores' and blood being thicker than water etc.

During all this time, she has moved into a bigger house and is also an alcoholic. And where is Mr. Abraham you may well ask ? He is busy hating her and doing nothing else in particular apart from saying a few deprecating sentences from time to time in the background about her. There's also a journalist called Nyla doing the same, but she's just there for the big bindi effect.

Lest the audience think that Silk has been completely unaffected by all of this, she gives a very 'i have baggage and therefore shall justify my actions' speech at an awards ceremony and rather than hitting Mr. Naseeruddin Shah on the head with the trophy for agreeing to do such a bad film, she walks off with it.

Later, as time passes, people realize she's not that special, her popularity dwindles and she predictably goes into depression. She puts all her money on making a movie with her in triple roles which is supposedly an idea copied from Abraham's movie. This is her downfall, since his movie does well and hers doesn't. Therefore, she loses her head completely and ends up in a porno film shoot from which she escapes because the police arrive and then hallucinates on the streets.

Anyway, this whole time that Abraham's been hating her has actually been good for him because her downfall makes him realize he loves her and in the middle out of nowhere, after she's been ditched by Suryakant and Ramakant (who wanted to marry her) he turns up at her house for drinks and smokes and they become a couple. A proper couple. How we know that is because they don't kiss until their stupid song is over and that's much later but also because she goes to sleep with her head on his shoulder rather than down south and this is supposed to be an indication for the audience that she is now seriously in love.

The movie ends with her killing herself and with Abraham not reaching her on time. Poor bastard had gotten her mother to come visit too! *sniff*.

The entire time after intermission, a small child kept howling in the movie hall as if trying to express what the rest of us could not. The fact that this was an 'A' rated film had obviously not been a deterrent to his parents. Overall, pathetic performances by Miss Vidya Balan whose stomach flab had more screen presence than she did and Mr. Naseeruddin Shah who was an absolute and utter waste. Mr. Tusshar Kapoor was only in the film because he's Ekta Kapoor's younger brother and thus he can be ignored completely. Emraan Hashmi's character did nothing but act all pissed off because Silk Smitha stole his thunder and then acted all weird and sad in the song that was picturised with him and Miss Vidya Balan. But they kissed in the end, so I guess it was all good. A very badly written script, and an insult to the audience and their money, this movie should have been given a 'P' certificate for -Painful and Pathetic.

Confessions of a Sick Mind

What do you think all day long?

Where is it that you disappear?

Is it some place where you finally belong?

Some day will you take me there?

Do you think that we will have that place?

To belong to each other ?

I wonder if I will be a part of your space

Or perhaps create another.

Some people just always seem to belong. To a place, to each other. To themselves. There is no sense of restlessness about them. They live their lives or exist in them without worry or care. Some people have it sorted.I am not one of those people. I live my life through the eyes of another. There is always this feeling of being watched. Of being judged. Of being evaluated perhaps.Over the past five or six years I have grown up. I feel like a tree. One whose roots got stuck. I do not know if its a bad feeling.

I am surprised today. This hasn't happened in a long time. My ego is finally like the feathers of water birds. The water either slides off.

Hushed

Peace of mind or a mind in pieces. A piece meal way of being peaceful. They say ignorance is bliss. I disagree. I think that void is what eats us all up on the inside. You must fill it. With whatever you choose.

Someone asked me a question the other day: "What is your first love?" I was surprised at how promptly I answered : "books". I was also surprised at how relieved I felt that the question hadn't been "Who was your first love?"

On stone benches beneath leafy trees, on shadowy stairwells and sometimes inside empty classrooms is where it all began... The only love affair that I am proud of. There was commitment to a fault and loyalty to none. As I devoured hungrily what they had to offer they took from the right to shape my dreams, my love, my life. Each and every sentence that was written was for me and each and every time I was smitten with how selfish I was allowed to be. There were sentences I wanted to say and hear and found myself whispering in imagined conversations. There were meanings of love that I had been looking for my entire life and that I eventually found on turning a page...

__________________________________________________________

They were probably words she remembered from a different life time. Or perhaps she had found them in the various rooms of her head. There was a certain disgrace in her many desires and she had many useless and futile battles with herself and them. The day she met him the words came tumbling out. He was wonderfully kind.

A Hundred Years

I cannot stay.
With you is life and never presume I want that.
I wish.
Death spurns us because we are not wise.
It swishes past with it's cloak of scorn
and looks down it's nose at our mortality.
I breathe with you and feel judged.
Somehow the closer you are,
the hollower it is,
until
the void (not made of hunger) increases and pushes you beyond.
I hope.
Of course I will weep.
Despair does define us.

Ruin

The first selfish straw broke the camel's back. If I could tell you I would tell you this - I was trying to be perfect. I was trying so hard to be perfect for you.

Belief. Principles. You. Me.

I feel like I'm walking on a land mine.

There is a frenzied running from room to room. They are searching for papers. Paper that I know they do not have. I wish they'd stop. And tell me that I must help. The air is filled with useless panic. And it is filling me with hate. I wonder if the anxiety is genetic. I wonder if they will care if I tell them that it is unbearable. I wonder if they will stop panicking for a second to care...

Arzoo

I am Arzoo.
and all of the nights
and all of the days
I think frantically of beating hearts.

I dance crazily in mirrored rooms.
I whirl, swirl, and twirl in red skirts,
And laugh hysterically at the flashes of red!

The mirrors on the walls,
Smile inwardly
At the pain I fling into the room.

Turn Back Time

"One day you will meet someone and fall in love"

What does that even mean? Best friends will say it after every failed relationship and even if there never have been. It's a huge deal. For me. For them. For everyone. Every single person.

No one ever bothers telling you what happens afterwards. Does life become better? Are you happier? It's a state of mind. And ultimately you are kidding yourself. You will never register it. Except when it is over. And then it will be all that you think about.

Like the rivers that cannot flow backwards...

Like those people that are nowhere to be found...

Like the cold sun that refuses to shine...

Like those seasons which pass on by...

If ever there was a moment I do not think I know.

I have a memory

But I seem to forget...

Perhaps I have left it lying with dried flowers

In the pages of an old book.

Perhaps it meanders on

And meeting people on the way

Tells them my story:

The one that everyone knows.

The one that I have forgotten.

Mind

My mind feels bewildered. There are countless thoughts and ideas that swoop in one after the other and exit almost as fast. It's like children visiting a fair ground where the stalls haven't been put up yet. I wonder why she won't stop talking. It's easy enough and I want to know if she's ever tried. So I turn towards her but she's blissfully unaware that she's annoying the crap out of me. So I go back to twiddling my pencil and trying to smile while there's a war in my head.

I can feel them being resentful like angry little pixies who have found no place to land.

A poem from Richard Wilbur comes to mind.

Mind

Mind in its purest play is like some bat
That beats about in caverns all alone,
Contriving by a kind of senseless wit
Not to conclude against a wall of stone.

It has no need to falter or explore;
Darkly it knows what obstacles are there,
And so many weave and flitter, dip and soar
In perfect courses through the blackest air.

And has this simile a like perfection?
The mind is like a bat. Precisely. Save
That in the very happiest intellection
A graceful error may corret the cave.

Eclipse

The moon had thought she was dying. For the last hour she had watched petrified as the Earth sidled up and discreetly took her place between the Sun and herself. When it was over and she was visible again she realized that the disappearing had taken a lot from her. She had finally come to know that the abundant beauty she shared with everyone was the result of light reflected from a mere star, the sun. She was furious the next day and bounced angrily off all surfaces she could see.

He assumed that they were words she remembered from a different life time. Or perhaps she had found them in the various rooms of her head. It was always going to be difficult. To love her. He had decided to try anyway.

A Silly Thing Called Love

They say love conquers all. It definitely conquers people. It conquers those in love and those out of it. It begins with destruction and ends with it too. It doesn't mean that you get happy endings. It means you get an ending. Whether it's a happy ending or not depends on how your respective delusions work. If they do, bingo, you have your soul mate and need not look ahead. If they don't good for you, you'll always be looking ahead. So basically it screws you over and takes what's left and leaves you behind for your friends to call you jaded, and a person who carries too much baggage.

Speaking of baggage. It's not a bad thing. It keeps some of us grounded. From not floating around with our heads in the air and assuming that this this is life. It's not life. Life is not to be born and to meet someone and then to live with them and be happy. Life is to be something bigger and if you meet someone in the middle of it, then wonderful. However, life will always be about you and if you let a silly thing called love rule it, it will conquer you. The day that happens, life will stop taking you seriously and begin to bully you.

Sometimes I wonder if people ever stop and think. Love to most is an emotion for another person, who's usually of the same age and of the opposite sex. It means coffee dates, and little gifts and sex and secret rendezvous. Love is not an emotion that you're supposed to dole out to people of choice. It begins and ends with you.

You should never tell someone you love them, lest they take you seriously.

Tale

For wherever she walked, there was blood.

It fell in tiny droplets upon the stones of the street

and soiled her shoes as she walked.

There were voices crying out for her and still she went on and on.

Everytime she looked back, they would weep blood.

It was a dark,dark night.

In the darkness, she left behind a trail of red.

When morning came, the red sparkled on the cobblestones.

And in the distance there was a fiery red glow where she lay.

The Child Bearer

Do not dwell on betrayals,
for even they will betray you.
Memories never stay loyal,
and minds are seldom true.

She had always protected me. From sharp corners, from bad dreams and sometimes even from herself. Little did she know she was bringing up a complete antithesis of herself, who on the inside was furiously battling her stubborn twin. From inside her womb, with my little fists clenched tight in distrustful slumber, I dreamt and vowed never to be what she didn't want me to be : a mere continuation of herself. It became a silly battle in life, to be and to protect her from something identical. She'd catch glimpses of herself sometimes in my rash, negligent acts. It seemed to break her heart that her free spirit still dwelt somewhere deep down inside her little one. I have denied myself a thousand lives, just so that for another thousand moments she may breathe knowing I didn't turn out just like her. Or that even if I did, no one will ever know. In such a way we have protected each other from each other, her and I, and failed each other repeatedly and miserably with each new sacrifice.

Forever

Sometimes you make the wrong choices, and you hope that they are the right ones. And sometimes the right ones that you make are wrong beyond recall. It is always just a matter of time before everything falls into place, or falls apart (whatever is most likely in your world). There's a reason people are forgotten. They are meant to be. Broken hearts are just an excuse to express random sorrow. The kind that's accumulated over trivial affairs and the lack of them. You can keep holding back. You can keep assuming that there is going to be a reason for you to break free. You can keep kidding yourself and nurse a broken heart and perhaps learn to sing.

Semblance

They peeked from corners and winked at me through mirrors,
the eyes that saw everything.
And everywhere her eyes looked
they shattered into shards of agony.
The pieces reflected small holes.
Or small wholes perhaps.
She didn't know which.
They lay unobstrusively on the ground and glittered
with her glory.
In them she lay hidden,
Reflected for all to see.

The Masters

Those Men...
They've found a way to make rotten fruit look good,
They've found a way to make the dead come alive.
Those men that live in those tall black towers
Have found a way to mine the skies.

They drown little children in shallow pools
And hold maidens close by hooking
Their fingers into the crooks of their dimpled elbows.
Their breaths reek of forfeited beatitude.

They have given up their youth,
For the rest of their life.

Recluse

Once again I find myself standing at the window, watching the world pass by. The shoulders are defiant yet stooped and there is a tiredness about the eyes. The world will see coronations of kings. I will simply wait to be called, as a witness. It is not simple. In the process of weeding out the bad, entire lumps of the good are scattered in the winds.

Kiss Good Bye

Is it what you feel or what you know? Deep down inside at the bottom of your heart where you're busy churning love in various new forms is probably where it all begins. The mediocrity of people combined with yours makes one big average. It's more average than the individual spirit. And then the standards are formed. To which one must conform. The big average becomes the guideline for things good and small. There are moments when you can feel yourself floundering and lost. And the scariest part is that you relinquish that too. Because it's alright to flounder in everyone's combined average angst. You sacrifice your anger for a time and once it finally comes and pats you on your back you drown it and yourself in misunderstood rage and selfish grief.

There is hardly a point to life. Except to simply feel the fact that you exist. Every single day. Just that. And everything else is simply a bonus - good friends, a decent place to live, loves of lives and the occasional craving for blueberry cheesecake.

Her Own

There was never a moment without her. But there were always moments when she didn't remember. She had run out of sweet nothings to say to herself and eveyrthing was the same as before.

To want someone dead is perhaps the most horrible thought that can cross a person's mind. The sheer contemplation is disgusting. I cannot help but marvel at it today. All human beings were made to reproduce. To procreate. The right to want another's life extinguished may not and does not accrue. To be frustrated with life and want your own demise is suicidal and depressive thinking. It's not any better if it's regarding ending another's.

Sometimes she wondered if she should have killed him.

A Bundle of Craving

My heart has begun to beat slowly for him
As if the yearning itself is naught but a whim.
My breath, it comes in short gasps,
And days and weeks consist of gaps.
Eternity has forgotten to live in space,
And flits peevishly from place to place.
In the whirlwind daze of things,
Time suddenly has a pair of wings.

The Love That I Will Choose To Keep

Where desires will be throttled, and hearts shall weep,
that is the love I will choose to keep.
When the nights are quiet and the moon hangs low in the sky,
when it's dark enough for the stars to cry,
I imagine I will stand in curious wonder
and give myself in wonderous surrender.

Cars and why

I drive a lot. I love doing it. These are some of the things I have realised about various cars on the roads these days. Since this writing is based on empirical evidence, it is obvious that most are not included:

The Alto : Let's face it. It's the car that everyone should bully - if cars were alive and they all had a playground, the alto would have been the most bullied of the lot simply because it has that pathetic vibe. It's so possessed with an indolent spirit that I want to smack into oblivion. It's the kind of car that you want to race a bullock cart with and then have the bulls damage it. Because:
a) it never goes above the speed of 30.
b) it infuses it's owners with spirits of zombies.
c) it is ugly.
d) it basically makes you want to tear your hair out because despite being so fricking small it still manages to get into everyone's way.
e) it is an indolent vehicle.

The Santro: Ok so I'm a little biased coz this car gets me places. But yeah santro owners are a generally well-behaved lot. This may be due to the fact that they know their car's limits unlike the Alto weirdos. I love it because of very personal reasons:
a) my first ever power steering!
b) fuel-efficient
c) one car I can park comfortably in most places.
d) big enough

The Swift: Again a little biased towards this car and again for purely personal reasons but this car is kinda awesome!
a) smooth drive
b) heavy enough and sits on the road well.
c) big enough for anything!
d) is like a little tank - handy in bullying altos out of the way...
e) awesome awesome pickup! and it's owners are averse to driving slow. Thank God.

The i 10 : Can't say I like the way the clutch and accelerator placed. Sort of small and totally pointless as a vehicle. But cool enough to get away with it. I think it's fine because:
a) unobstrusive on the roads - even if it's right next to you, you won't notice it.

The Zen : Hmm.. No power steering. Small and fast though. Don't like it much because:
a) it's owners drive like old ladies unless they're weird dhinchak dhitchik east delhi boys and then they just drive like psychos.

The Wagon R : Like who were they kidding when they named it that? I still remember the slogan: "It's a wagon, it's a car, it's the Suzuki Wagon R!". Seriously? Another one that deserves to be bullied because of ownership patterns which consist of:
a) either weird, paunchy, lecherous uncles who give you dirty looks if you overtake them while they choose to cruise along in morning traffic at the speed of 20 when you're trying to get to work.
b) or weird ugly chicks with huge shades, huge hand bags, huge asses driving along like they think they're the shit which is just plain annoying because they're not and are usually the weird loserish kinds who hold hankies in one hand and yak away on their cell phones the whole time they're driving.

The i 20 : My papa's gaadi! I like it in maroon, we have it in copperish grey. I like it because:
a) It's comfortable
b) It never gets dirty looks, unlike the alto.
c) just the right size.
d) good heating and AC

The Honda City : The old one is a pretty design, the new one looks like a boiled egg if it's white in colour, the newer one is slightly better but yes these cars are in the price range of the upper middle class and are seldom the cause of nuisance unless the upper middle class has been stupid enough to hand them to a driver.

The Accent : Love it. Wouldn't recommend it because it drinks petrol and no mileage. Buttery smooth gear changing.

Empty Rooms

In empty rooms there are countless breaths
with myriad beginnings and numerous deaths.
The stories always begin with a place,
and old women sitting on street corners.
They also always end with a certain face.
Silently, he roars
to inner tumults and strife.
That rage inside,
is something of a legacy,
a source of pride, a perennial guide.
He always begins to hum as he pours
His drink down the
Drains of his life.

Daylight Happiness

When it starts to be light outside and the sky is a tentative blue,

I lie back and close my eyes, ready to drown myself in you.

Love so tender it comes ripping through

Laughing at us, at me and you.

In cold dawns and frosty dusks, it has often come and awakened me thus.