I Need Feminism Because..

This blog on tumblr is pretty awesome. And it got me thinking about something I've wanted to write for a long time, but been too lazy to - one thing that I really detest about sexism.

I think absolutely everything about sexism is wrong. I can't choose one aspect that is "wronger" than the others. I've been lucky - personally, I haven't faced much sexism. But lately, the one thing that is really affecting me personally and I am really starting to detest is the tendency of people to attribute a lot of things a woman does to her gender.

"She doesn't like sports? Of course, she's a girl!" "She doesn't like beer? Of course, girls don't." "She wants to get married and have kids? That's what girls want!" "You're fighting with a friend/boyfriend? You're a girl, must be PMS." "Of course you like cooking/shopping/cleaning/talking on the phone/trying on clothes/using make-up, you're a girl!"

I've seen this attitude a lot lately, in men and in women. Attributing everything to "being a girl" not only offends and stereotypes women as a whole, but also discounts me as a person with personal beliefs and thoughts and desires that do not stem from "being a girl". And the thing that makes me the most uncomfortable about this attitude is the obligation I feel to modify my own behaviour! If I want to go shopping, I try not to mention it to people I know will crack a you're-such-a-girl joke. I avoid using make-up even though I'd like to put some, just to break a stereotype. I try to minimise the time I take to get ready, because if I'm late, it's not just my fault, it's the fault of all women. And if I ever do skip dessert or try to cut calories, I excuse it as being full or not in the mood, because god forbid my efforts to lose weight prove to some jackass that all women want to be "thin and beautiful".

At the same time, I catch myself feeling "proud" of things that I like/do that break stereotypes. For example, I don't want to get married and have children. I feel the need to make sure everyone knows that, just so they know that there are women out there who want different things. I feel proud of not wanting children, because I feel I'm breaking a stereotype. I like beer, I don't want a boyfriend, I like one night stands, I'm not too fond of pink, I follow politics, I dislike cooking and on and on and on. These are not things that should inspire either pride or shame. Liking pink is not something a feminist should be ashamed of, just as not liking pink is not something a feminist should be proud of. By feeling proud of the ways I break stereotypes, I'm feeding the stereotypes and making women who are different feel worse.

A friend once told me that she wants to have lots of children and grandchildren. And she immediately apologised for being such a "bad feminist". She felt bad for wanting the "conventional" things. Another friend said the same thing when she told me she wants to get married and start a family early. That is not the point of feminism! Feminism says that women are free to choose what they want without being hampered by their gender. You can choose to have seven kids or no kids, to get married at 23 or 30 or never, to use lots of make-up or none at all, to wear only pink or no pink, to like sports or hate sports, to drink beer or drink Cosmopolitans. We should do what we want out of free choice, and without our personal choices reflecting on our gender as a whole.

So, for the Who Needs Feminism blog: I need feminism because I want to be proud of my choices because they're the right ones for me, not because they break a stupid sexist stereotype of women.

Clarity

Clarity

The thing I want the most now

The thing that seems the hardest to find

The paths leading to it have been built

I need not find the road less travelled

I just want to find the highway

Confusion doesn’t suit me

In courses, jobs, decisions, friends

It makes me stupid and frustrated

I want to make informed decisions

Randomness or baseless analysis doesn’t suit me

But I don’t have the information I need.

There don’t seem to be any street lights

Highways never do have any, I’ve noticed

I have to find the highway without a map

I’ll stumble around, take a few wrong turns

I will eventually find clarity, I know

I’d just rather it be now, than five, ten years from now.

But I Don't WANT To!

The first time marriage became a topic possibly relevant to me was when I went to college. No one had ever talked about it in terms of me before: not my parents, not my friends in school, not my cousins or sister. We'd discussed the "ideal boyfriend", what we want to be "when we grow up", colleges, dreams, travel plans, how to change the world etc, but never the “ideal husband” or marriage.

Within the first couple of months of college, however, during one of those late-night talks when everyone's just trying to get to know each other and make new friends, someone asked "So, what age do you want to get married at?"

That was the first time I'd even thought about the idea of me being married. I was only 18, I'd just begun college in a new country, I was as confused as ever about what I wanted to do with my life. Marriage, frankly, had never even occurred to me as a possible part of my Plans for the Future. I was genuinely surprised at the question. "You mean to say you guys have an age that you want to be married by? You've actually thought about this before?"

That's the first time I really understood that there are families which have expectations from their children regarding marriage. My best friend at the time, a boy, had a long-term girlfriend that his parents knew about. He knew he was going to be married around the age of 25, because his girlfriend would be 24 at that time and already past the "ideal marriage age" for girls in her family. Another close friend, a girl, said that there was no way she'd be allowed to be unmarried past the age of 24, and that's if she managed to push it to 24.

This was all new to me. My parents had never even mentioned their "plans" for my marriage to me. They still haven't, and I'm fairly sure they don't have any such plans anyway. I couldn't imagine a situation in which my various uncles and aunts and grandparents could pressure me into getting married at any age. Why would it be any of their business? And why would disapproval from them lead to me making the life-altering, very serious decision about getting married?

Since then, I've talked more to my friends, and while I still can’t understand the pressure and the expectations that they face because I’ve never faced that, I’ve accepted that there are such pressures. My advice to just “screw it and do what you want” may not work in all situations and for all people. I may not be able to empathise, but I can at least sympathise.

I’ve also had more time to think about marriage. And it still doesn’t feature on my Plans for the Future. For many reasons, I don’t understand marriage as a concept, and until I am convinced that there’s a real reason why I should get married, I don’t plan on getting married. What really bugs me, however, is the dismissal that I encounter if I voice this opinion. “Oh, you’re still young. You’ll change your mind in five years.” I have heard that countless times. Especially so if I add that I don’t like kids, and don’t want to have any of my own. The indulgent smiles from many adults really annoy me. Yes, I’m 20, but that mean that my opinions will necessarily change magically when I hit 25? Why are all women expected to want to get married? Why am I expected to want kids just because I’m a woman?

Do guys face the same indulgent smiles and general disbelief? I don’t know, but I’m inclined to believe not. A guy saying that he doesn’t want to get married or have kids will probably be more believed than a woman saying that (I may be wrong here). The expectations that a large part of society has from its members are extremely gendered. I may want to change my mind later on in life, but the desire to not get married just to spite those who were so convinced that I would change my mind is very strong.

I feel a little stupid even writing about this, because I do feel too young to be even thinking about marriage. Not because I’m too young to understand it and have an opinion about it, but because I feel too young to be thinking about it affecting my life because it’s never been discussed as part of my life in my family, and won’t be a part of my life for a long, long time, if ever. But I have friend who might be married two years from now, solely because the society she lives in has set this schedule that her life must follow, and marriage is part of it. Her not wanting to be married at 24 is abnormal, stupid and against everything they believe in, and hence, the childish desire must be ignored and squashed. And my opinion that marriage as an institution doesn’t make sense should die a similar death.

About Helplessness and Frustration

I'm living in the "international dorm" in my university in Florida. Half of us in this dorm are international exchange students. The group of friends that I've made consists of people from all around the world. The diversity of the group often leads to discussions and comparisions of life back home, from food and shopping, to governments and laws.

Last week, when we were looking to rent a car for the weekend, the talk turned to driving. We discussed the differences in driving laws - I mentioned that all my driving test consisted of was one U-turn, my Peruvian friend said that in Peru, you can get out of traffic tickets by bribing the cop, I agreed with her. From which point, the talk turned to the police and law implementation.

All this tied in with some articles I've been reading recently. Tehelka carried an article about the botching up of the Aarushi Talwar case by the CBI, Annie Zaidi published links to articles about further incompetence, brutality and corruption of cops (here and here), Dilip D'Souza poignantly displayed the utter stupidity and blatant incompetence of police offers in a court case. And I remember walking with a friend and talking about how I've never been asked for ID in any bar in Delhi, and how easy it is to find drugs or bribe a cop to get out of a traffic ticket in Delhi. And I remember telling her that we read and hear a lot about the corruption of cops, or their incompetence, but we never really hear about the good cops. Surely there must be some.

But these succession of articles are so frustrating, so shocking, they leave me feeling so overwhelmingly helpless that I start doubting that belief. If there are some good cops, where are they? Why do I hear only about events and behaviours that should be hard to believe, but sadly are so familiar that they're not even particularly surprising?  Why is it that I'm beginning to doubt my comment that there are good cops in India, they're just never talked about?

What went wrong? Why are there so many bad cops? Corruption is one thing - at least there's some gain to be seen, which provides an explanation for why. But what do police officers gain from imprisoning and harassing 23 men without even telling them the reason for their arrest? How can that possibly not sound blatantly wrong? What reason could a public servant, an officer of the law in a democratic country, have for doing that?

I believe that I've been lucky. I've never been stopped by a cop, nor ever needed a cop for a crime that happened to me. But I'm still so scared - what if someday I need the police? What if I need them to solve a crime, and they display their incompetence? What if someday I'm at the receiving end of their incomprehensible bullshit treatment of citizens? It's frustrating and depressing enough about to hear of such things happening to strangers. How would I handle it if it was me, or someone I cared about? Is there even a way of seeking redressal? Is there a way out of a situation where the police refuse to protect evidence or do a thorough investigation into a murder? Is there a way to do something, anything when trumped up or incomprehensibly random "evidence" is used in a trial to convict a citizen?

How Does That Happen?

From all the time to once a week,
From meetings to emails,
From calls to texts,
How does that happen?

From so close to secretive,
From acceptance to accusations,
From forgiveness to bitterness,
How does that happen?

From understand to confusion,
From laughter to silence,
From sureness to jealousy,
How does that happen?

From love to indifference,
From caring to convenience,
From best friends to acquaintances,
How does that happen?

Further CWG Embarassment

I have not been following the news about the Commonwealth Games in Delhi much. I know that there are problems, to say the least, and I read a couple of articles about corruption allegations. And since I was in Delhi during July and August, I saw the ongoing construction and the supposedly "ready" sites.

However, my knowledge about what went wrong with the CWG is very basic and unresearched. It is obvious, however, that there are problems. Clear, serious problems. During August, I would drive past a board that flashed a digital countdown to the CWG, and I would scoff. Because even though I wasn't reading the newspapers and reports regularly, I knew that the situation in Delhi was definitely not what it should have been a 60 days before the games.

The whole CWG affair is becoming more and more embarassing. CNN has reports of Delhi not being even close to ready. Countries are delaying the departures of their athletes, and some athletes have even backed out of the games completely! And to top it all off, there are now reports of child labour.

There are so many things in just one report to be sad and embarassed about. The first thing is that it doesn't even surprise me: I've seen small children on construction sites in Delhi all the time, of course they'd be used for CWG construction. And the fact that the pictures that go along with this report are scenes that I have seen multiple times before is sad.

Sheila Dixit's response is another embarassment:

"If this gentleman... had come to us, told us that this is what was happening there, we would have taken immediate action," Dixit said.The minister also went on to say that "she had wished" somebody would have come and told her of the allegations.

She needs to be told about this? A person who lives in Delhi and travels on its roads does not need to be told of the existence of child labour in construction, let alone the matter of the chief minister of the state wanting to "be told". Who's going to take this comment seriously? The student who reported the child labour did, it turns out, try to contact the ministry of labour, but we can all guess how that turned out.

There is a week left for the CWG to begin. There are reports now that say that Delhi is working hard to finish the preparations, and that all this last minute work might actually pay off. Hopefully, the actual carrying out of the Games won't be as great an embarassment as the preparation for the Games were.

Untitled

I need you sometimes

More than you think

I can’t always take

Mistakes that you make

We have different beliefs

We have different ideals

We want different things for the world

Why can’t you respect me?

You don’t read what I write

You don’t hear what I say

You don’t see when I’m sad

You don’t care when I’m mad

Your issues above mine

Your theories over mine

Your wants over mine

Your opinions and thoughts above mine

You over me

Always

Don’t call me a bimbo

Don’t call me a slut

Don’t laugh it all away

It’s not always okay

I was sad in the morning

It wasn’t your doing

But I’m sad now

And it’s your doing

You mean so much to me

But I don't know if that's enough

I may not regret

But you'll be hard to forget

Misuse of The "Elegant Sari"

A friend told me about this article in the Calcutta newspaper 'The Telegraph' today. The article talks about how the Bengal government didn't take any action against bandhs organised by "so-called Congress supporters" in Calcutta; how the police stood to one side and let the bandh supporters torch buses and ransack private property. I don't know anything about this claim, and that's not what my friend wanted me to see in the article. He thought that I would like to see the picture that the Telegraph printed with the article, on the front page of today's newspaper. He was right.

The article doesn't interest me as much as the picture does. The photo is a depiction of the Police Commissioner, Director General of Police, the Chief Minister, the Chief Secretary and the Home Secretary of the Government of West Bengal. All wearing saris.

The article doesn't explain the picture, but it seems clear that the saris are meant to emphasise the inaction of the administrators the article holds responsible. The masculinity, strength, power and abilities of the five men have been challenged by showing them in saris. The picture says "Depict the men as women, because after all, their inaction and inability to control the bandhs shows that they are women". Women are the ones who are incapable of handling a tough job and helping run a state or a city. They are the ones who should stay home in their saris and leave the real work to the men, so how are these men any different from women?

And to top it off, the caption below the picture reads "We apologise to women who may feel the elegant sari has been wasted on our administrators". Because, of course, the first thing that will enter a woman's mind after seeing the picture will be "Oh my god, how can they waste our precious saris on such useless men?? They are not worthy of wearing them!" Annoyance and indignation at the gender discrimination and the extreme sexist statement made by a state newspaper are unlikely to occur. Since, you know, our job is to wear the "elegant sari" and stay home while the men are taking care of the country.

This pictures brings up something I've always wondered about: why is that for men, being called a "girl" is such an insult? There is a guy in my college that a lot of us don't like. To make fun of him, many guys (and some girls also) say that he's "such a girl trapped in a guy's body". I don't understand why this is such an insult. Even if, for the sake of argument, I assume that having an interest in fashion and cooking, and shaking your hips and hair while dancing, and liking to shop, are "feminine", I still don't get why a guy being "feminine" is something to be ashamed of and made fun of.

So, while I mull over the inexplicable ways a guy's mind functions, I think I shall write to/email the Telegraph and ask that instead of apologising for wasting my "elegant sari" on people so unfit to wear them, they might apologise for practicing gender discrimination right on their front page.

But I know Viola! I kissed Viola!

I’ve had quite a lot of time on my hands this vacation, and as usual, a lot of that time has been spent watching movies. Over the past few days, I watched a lot of “romantic comedies”. The string started with The Accidental Husband, went on to include 100 Girls, She’s The Man and Chasing Liberty, and ended with The Proposal today. And while all these movies left me with that fuzzy feeling inside that I always get after watching/reading a romance, and a stupid smile on my face, none of these movies are going to stay with me. I doubt I’ll ever even watch any of them again. I just didn’t like them that much.

The first problem that I’ve noticed in a lot of “romantic comedies” is that the protagonists seem to be able to get to know each other enough to fall in love. Realistically, I mean. They do fall in love in the movie, but the time that they spend together, the time in which they apparently get to “know” each other, always seems way too short to me. Take The Proposal as an example. Margaret (Sandra Bullock) blackmails her assistant Andrew (Ryan Reynolds) into marrying her so that she can get a visa-extension and stay in the Unites States. Andrew duly agrees, and the “happy couple” visits his family in Alaska to announce the engagement. Except, of course, Margaret actually falls in love with Andrew, and runs away from the fake wedding, only to be proposed to by Andrew who comes after her. They get married, she gets her visa extended, and they “date” and presumably live happily ever after.

In this movie, Andrew has been working for Margaret for three years, and has hated her for all of those three years. She’s shown as being “tough”: she’s the office bitch. But in the three days that they spend together in Alaska, Andrew apparently sees the “real” Margaret and falls for her. But there is nothing that happens in those three days that could negate the effects of a three-year-long hatred. She shares a couple of personal stories about her past and tells Andrew about her tattoo, and that’s that, apparently.

There’s one scene that really bugged me in She’s The Man. The movie is about Viola who impersonates her twin brother Sebastian in order to join his school’s soccer team, and in the process, falls for her [brother’s] roommate. In the scene in which “Sebastian” is revealed to be Viola, a girl, the roommate Duke is duly shocked, though not because he spent so much time with her without realizing that she’s a girl. No, his disbelief was because “I know Viola. I kissed Viola.” The only contact that Duke knowingly had with Viola was a kiss they shared at a “kissing booth”. That, apparently, is all Duke needs to know Viola.

The second thing that annoys me about these romantic comedies is that the heroine never seems to have enough of a personality. There is nothing that comes across in the movie that would make someone fall in love with them. In Chasing Liberty, the First Daughter of USA runs away with a photographer to get away from her ever-present bodyguards, not knowing that the photographer is also a Secret Service agent. The couple spend a few days traveling around Europe and end up falling in love. Throughout the movie, the only aspects of Anna’s personality that we see are a demand for independence and a penchant for creating “theories” of life, neither of which seem to me to be enough for Ben (who did display some personality) to fall for her so badly.

This is something that I’ve disliked in many books I’ve read too. The heroines never seem to have a personality! In nearly every Mills and Boons I’ve read, the guy is always a handsome, strong, rich playboy-type, generally sarcastic and arrogant, with an inclination to play Knight in Shining Armour. But the heroines don’t have a personality at all! They’re all beautiful, of course, and seem to love being the Damsel in Distress often, but beyond that, there’s nothing!

Georgette Heyer’s romances are really good with respect to time the “couple” spends together and personalities of the women. The main romance is always developed properly, over a long period of time, even though the stories of the side characters may be hasty and synthetic. Her main heroines are always more than just a pretty face (several of them are not even pretty, which is a massive step up from many other romances). This is also one of the reasons why I love Jab We Met. Kareena Kapoor does have a personality, a very memorable and strong, though fairly annoying, one.

I’d like to watch a light-hearted romance in which the story seems real and plausible. Made of Honour is a movie that I really liked: Patrick Dempsey and Michelle Monaghan were friends for ten years before they fell in love. I can’t think of any other romantic comedies I’ve watched that had a reasonable storyline, but I’m sure there are some. Recommendations?

Of Butts and Long Legs

The numerous, often un-explainable glitches in the Indian fashion industry continue to baffle me. For one thing, I’ve never understood why when one style is “in fashion”, it’s impossible to find something of a different style. For the past few months, low-waist jeans have been “the fashion”. And for the last few months, I have been unable to find any jeans that are at my waist, not four inches below it. Today, I tried on nine pairs of jeans (I counted!) before I found one [hideously expensive] pair that I could wear. “Madam, aaj kal to yeh hi chal raha hai” (Madam, this is what is being worn these days) was what I was told every time I asked for jeans that were not low-waist.

Besides, I can’t even understand why low-waist jeans are so popular. Unless I’m wearing them the wrong way, low-waist jeans seem to be especially designed to display my underwear to the whole world. Of course, it is entirely possible (probably, in fact) that these jeans are designed for girls with butts significantly smaller than mine. On their small-sized butts, maybe the jeans look stylish, instead of bordering on inappropriate or obscene. And since I haven’t seen many girls showing off their Jockey or Enamour underwear, I guess those jeans really aren’t meant for me.*
Whatever the case, I refuse to believe that there are no girls who don’t want the entire world to know the colour of their underwear, or alternatively, girls with butts as big as (or bigger than) mine. Why oh why won’t Jealous 21 or Pepe Jeans realise this? How can they not see us and our [big] butts?

Another phenomenon that continues to mystify me is the utter non-existence of shorts for women in the market. I went to Globus, Lifestyle and Pantaloons today, looking for jeans and shorts. After spending half an hour in the trial room in Pantaloons (and severely testing the patience of the guy who was assisting me), I did manage to find a pair of jeans. But the only shorts for women that I found in any of these shops either reached three inches below my knee (too long) or three inches below my butt (too short). Where were all the knee-length-or-slightly-shorter shorts that so many girls need in the Delhi summer heat? I finally came home with three pairs of grey and black cotton shorts for men, found in Big Bazaar.

There is, of course, the chance that I am shopping in all the wrong places. I did try Sarojini Nagar for shorts, came home with shorts meant for men again. Delhi-dwellers, any ideas?


*Which brings me to a complaint I’ve always had: the problem of not finding clothes in my size. I’ve written about it here, though today, for a change, I actually found nine pairs of jeans in my size. And a dress.

Facebook it!

I know many people who, after every vacation, insist on showing me each and every picture they took. I am obliged to sit for half an hour looking at photos of people I don't even know, and to add to that, listen to the background story behind every picture! Why do people assume I'd be that interested? I mean, for my close friends and family, yes, I'll ask for the photos myself. Butwhy do people I spend next to no time with think that I'd really care enough to look at photos of them in their new house, with their new dog, with their old friends or vacationing in Shanghai?!

What people should do is put up their pictures on Facebook. That way, I can go through them if I want to, at my own pace, skipping as many as I want. This is the one actual good use of Facebook that I can see.

Man On The Flight

A man was sitting next to me in my flight home last week. A fairly annoying and talkative man. Every time I tried watching a movie, he’d start a conversation that would force me to pause the movie and talk to him. He started with “Your good-name, please?”, and then went on to ask me what I do in Singapore, how long I’ve been there, and how much I paid for my ticket home. He then proudly informed me that he was a doctor and proceeded to advise me to not bite my nails or play with my cuticles, because doing so greatly increases the risk of infection.

I have never been very open to advice, especially the unasked-for variety, so the free medical advice was the first thing that irritated me. Then the various, un-encouraged attempts at conversation turned me off. And then came the touching.

Jet Airways allows very little personal space to its passengers. So, I couldn’t be sure whether the ‘touching’ was intentional or not. But throughout the 5-hour flight, I was at edge, on my guard. There wasn’t a lot I could do at this point, except pointedly putting my cushion on the arm-rest between the man and me and keeping my knees tucked away from his side. But I kept thinking about how sad the whole situation was. Here I was, sitting next to a man who could easily be perfectly respectable and decent, but I just couldn’t convince myself that he was perfectly respectable and decent. As far as I was concerned, his elbow that was always ever-so-slightly on my side could as easily be a precursor to more contact.

I’ve been felt up in crowded markets and malls more than once. So has almost every girl I know. And because of this, I can’t trust any stranger. I’m always suspicious, always on my guard. Was the elbow that poked my ribs supposed to do that? Is his knee touching mine under our meal-tables intentional? Is he getting some perverse pleasure from leaning forward when I do and leaning back when I do? Is this man trying to make a pass at me?

The sexual harassment most women face everyday doesn’t just affect us at that moment, or spoil just one day. My experiences at the markets and malls affect how I look at strange men everyday. Every invasion of my personal space is a potential threat; every seemingly innocent touch has a deeper, uglier purpose. And every male neighbour on a flight is potentially a reason to call a steward for help.

There is Something I Don't Like About the LOTR Trilogy

I just watched all three Lord of the Rings movies for the second time [this week], and I found two things I don't like about them.

One, Frodo. Yes, he's the main character, the "saviour of the day" and all that. But what does he really do? First movie, when the Fellowship is stuck in the Mines of Moria, and they get attacked by orcs and trolls at Bali's tomb, Frodo gets hit by a spear that would have (in the words or Aragorn), "skewered a boar". Except he doesn't actually get skewered. His coat of Mithril saves him, and he's barely scratched. But what does Frodo do?* Instead of pushing the spear away and showing he's unhurt, he promptly falls on the floor (as if dead) and then plays dead while the others get rid of the orcs. I mean, I know most of the drama of him falling, and the sound effects, were probably to scare people watching the movie, but it just seemed so silly!

Throughout the trilogy, we keep seeing examples of Frodo not really being able to do anything at all. He puts the Ring on on at least two ocassions that I can think of that really could have gotten him (and everyone else) killed, he sent Sam away in the third movie when Sam was actually the only reason why he actually got as far as he did, and then, to top it off, he refused to throw the Ring into the fire at the end! Yes, I know that the Ring is evil. It has the power to influence people, to capture their minds, but it all makes Frodo seem so weak. I generally tend to forward the parts of the DVD that feature him.

The second thing I really didn't like was the Arwen-Aragorn-Eowyn love triangle. More specifically, it's solution. I'm all for the love triangle. It's very understandable that both women would fall for Aragorn. But why would he choose Arwen? The only time she actually showed some spirit was in the first movie, when she took Frodo to Rivendell. Otherwise, she doesn't really seem to do anything.

Eowyn, on the other hand, has all my admiration. She does her "duty" for the first two movies; she leads the women and children to Helm's Deep when orcs attack the people of Rohan, she stays with them in the caves during the battle of Helm's Deep. But we can see her yearning to fight, to do something to help! Finally, in the third movie, she not only dresses as a man to go to war, but takes Merry with her. And she brings down an elephant on her own, and kills the Nazgul and it's rider (whom no man can kill) by herself. Seriously, what is cooler than her dialogue, "I am no man!"??

Aragorn is my favourite character, but I would love him so much more if he'd fallen in love with Eowyn.


*I haven't finished reading the books yet, so I don't know if all this is just a dramatisation in the movie

Thoughts on College (1)

I used to live in Kanpur. I had a big group of friends, many of whom I've now known for nearly 18 years. Then I moved to Delhi and made new friends. I remained in touch with most of my Kanpur friends; I visited them in Kanpur, they visited me in Delhi. Then, I came to Singapore for college. Again, new friends, new life. This time, it was harder to stay in touch with everyone. I talk to three my best friends regularly, but I lost touch with the fourth. And with many of my friends whom I wasn't so close with but still liked a lot.

Facebook shows me bits and pieces of the lives that my friends are now leading. Of the people they live with, of their new friends and their colleges. And I just realised how weird it is that I'm not in any of those pictures. It's almost freaky how different our lives are now. We live in different countries, we hang out with different people.

I have good friends here in Singapore, but honestly, I've known them for too short a time for me to be really important in their lives. And maybe they're not as important in my life as I think they are either.

In three weeks, my holidays start. All of us go back to our separate lives in different cities. And while I'm very excited about meeting my old friends, and going back home, I'm afraid of losing touch with my new friends. It's been my experience that half your life can seem very unreal at times. For example, when I used to visit Kanpur, my life in Delhi would seem very unreal. So, when we all go home, meet our family and old friends, Singapore may seem unreal. And that may mean that we lose touch with each other for a month. And I don't want that to happen.

I Would Have Hated the 1950s

Was it really this bad back then?

There And Back Again

I went home to Delhi last week, and I returned to Singapore today afternoon. Neither going home, nor coming back have been as I had thought they would.

Home was a little exhausting. My mother and I are close: I was at home for most of this year, since my school gave us study leave in January, and I spent all of that time with my mum. My mother is a very emotional person. So, talks of me leaving home and how much she misses me happen frequently. And they make me uncomfortable. Although I do think I'm a fairly emotional person, I don't display it very much. I prefer to cry alone than on the shoulder of a friend, I prefer to write about things that bother me than to talk about them. So, home was a little exhausting.

Besides, last week, I had a lot of idle time to think. And I finally accepted to myself that what I'm doing in college is not what I want to be doing. I'm not studying (at all), I'm being very, very lazy, and I'm breaking all the promises I made to myself before I started college. I'm a very lazy person, and I hate that about myself. I stopped singing simply because I didn't like my teacher and was too lazy to find a new one, and now, I've lost most of the skills and talent that I had. In school, I didn't participate in many activities, promising myself that I would be more outgoing and active in college, but here again, I'm making excuses for myself to not go for the clubs I joined. I promised myself that I would do very well academically, another thing I didn't do in school, but again, I'm trying to get out of project meetings, not listening in class, behaving very irresponsibly. Not only am I not working, I'm even constantly badgering my friends who are working. And all this introspection, healthy though it may be, makes me panic, which is very exhausting.

Coming back to Singapore was just a little bit of an anti-climax, I guess. I was looking forward to coming back, and I know I tend to build things up in my head, imagine situations, what I would say, what my friends would say, so I should have expected this. I know I was only gone for a week; nothing amazing is supposed to happen when I come back. I just wanted it to.

(Lack Of) Creativity

I have come to believe that out of all the qualities a person can possess, creativity is the most important. Primarily because it can prevent one from getting bored. And right now, boredom seems to be the worst thing that can hit one. Even if it does last just a few days and does not kill you. It does, however, force me to turn to TV, and I'm sure long hours of House MD, Bones and Scrubs are harming parts of me other than my eyes.

My school has ended, but college has not yet begun. Results come out tomorrow, but forms on the 2nd of June. So, for the next ten days, I have nothing (not even the filling out of forms) to entertain me. I have spent the last few days of my vacation being utterly bored, and looks like I'll be spending the next few days the same way.

I lack creativity. I don't know what to do, I can't invent anything to entertain myself with, and thus, end up spending 8 hours a day watching the 160GB worth of TV shows I've downloaded. Even old hobbies do not seem enticing.

I am at a loss.

Woes of Fatness

The world of female shopaholics is divided very firmly into two categories- fat girls, and not-fat girls. I unfortunately belong to the former.

My main issue with my fatness (I say "fatness" because "obesity" sounds so much fatter) is not that I can almost never look good. Or that my powers of attracting guys are next to nil. Or that I'm so heavy that my future boyfriend can definitely never sweep me off my feet. My problem is clothes. I can't buy many of the shirts that I really like. Anything that is "pretty" is not available in my size, which is generally two sizes larger than XL. I can't shop at Sarojini Nagar for cheap clothes because many of them turn out to be too tight later when I try them on. And for me, finding clothes is even more traumatic because I happen to have big breasts. So the clothes that may actually be big enough to house my stomach are too tight at my chest. Most shops here apparently don't believe in making nice clothes for fat people!

I even have large feet! My foot-size is one size larger than the largest size available in markets. I can't buy wedges or pumps (which are terms I learnt recently), so I'm forced to wear the chappals that are open at the back so that my heel can stick out a little.

I am currently forced to satisfy the shopaholic in me by shopping for my friends (all of whom happen to be thin with regular-sized feet).

Stupid, stupid months

God, I hate these two months (Feb and March). The not-so-dreaded class 12 board exams are approaching, and this apparently means that I am expected to be confined to the... confines of my room all day, speak in hushed and serious tones (preferaby about the 'progress of my studies'), and look exhausted and over-worked. The facts that I am not stressed at all, still try to enjoy small pleasures such as watching TV, and actually spend at least an hour a day on the phone are constant sources of astonishment, and, occasionally, awe.

But what I hate most about these months is not studying the same bloody chapters and the same bloody subjects again and again, or the fact that spending two hours on the phone everyday constitutes what I call my personal life, or the weekly calls of one of my more studious friends, explaining in great detail what she's studied over the past few days and what she's planning to study over the next few days, and actually believing that I'm interested, or the fact that my history teacher actually tripped over nothing when I told her I still have eight chapters of the syllabus to finish (this was in the first wek of February), or all my teachers asking me how many hours a day I'm studying, and telling me in appropriately dramatic tones that they are relying on me to get about 95 in each subject, or the fact that my last meeting with any of my friends was a week ago.

No, what I hate most about these months is that everytime I step out of my room, and start doing anything else, my parents immediately say "Yeh hum kar lenge, tum apne kaam karo" (We'll do this, you do your work). And saying, when I take it to be an indication that they think I should be studying, that "work" does not necessarily mean study ("you have to, of course, take breaks"). All they want, apparently, is that I not burden myself mentally with anything other than my approaching exams.

It's not that my parents pressure me. In fact, I'm better off than many of my other classmates. They don't even directly tell me study. It's just that I know that even I do something as simple as make reservations for them at a restaurant for Valentine's, they think it is unnecessary. These months, even if I don't study much, my 'mental focus' has to be on my studies.

I do realise that since I chose not to take up Science/engineering, my board results will, effectively and unfortunately, decided which college I study in, and which subject I study. But I am just so tired of the assumption that just because my life-determining exams are near, my life should consist of nothing but studying. That is not going to happen.

On Much Hated Noise

I hate Indian weddings (do I mean Hindu weddings?). I sincerely, truly hate them. I hate the loud music that sends everyone who is unfortunate enough to be living in a locality near the source to near insanity, and I hate the fact that weddings are considered a valid reason to block the roads so that a very, very slow-moving procession of dancing revelers can pass.

How can people be so insensitive?? Your/your son’s/your daughter’s wedding is no cause for celebration for people who don’t know you! It is a bloody pain in the ass for those ill-fated souls who are being forced to put their work on hold because of your insanely loud music, and for those poor people stuck behind the baraat while trying to reach their various destinations on time! Besides, the massive loudness of the music is completely unnecessary anyway. If it is loud enough to bother people (i.e. send them out of their minds) who are not in the shamiyana, then it is definitely loud enough to make civilised, normal conversation between the guests in the tent impossible.

I also hate all kinds of loud music played by temples, especially when it starts at bloody 5 o'clock in the morning. Yes, we all understand that you are, for some unfathomable reason, required to wake up at 5am and start pooja, but do you have to force your disciplined habits on everyone withing hearing distance of your loudspeakers?? I don't want to wake up at that profanely early hour! I wish everyone in the world (or at least in places where I am) would refrain from imposing their religious views/cause for celebration on everyone else who has the misfortune to be living near them.