APRIL IS (NOT) THE CRUELLEST MONTH...

It is just such a relief...

...to finally wind up my two-year-old Minor Research Project on Blogging in India. Yes, the monkey's off my back, off my laptop, off my pen-drive and has gone ahead to be printed and is soon going on to be submitted to the University Grants Commission. Yes, the long tail of bureaucracy is still wagging - reports have to be written, bills audited, expenses calculated and accounts made and sent. BUT RIGHT NOW, I AM WAKING UP FREE AND WALKING ON AIR. In the past two years, I have (admittedly intermittently) delved deep into blogs, blogs and more blogs, critical writings about blogs and books on blogs (and blogs on books). Totally neglecting my own blogs for quite some time. As always with me, the pressure mounted as the deadline approached. And the last two weeks has been a flurry of worry, work, writing, war-zones,waking up all night, and more...After drowning in blogs, I've finally re-surfaced in the free and airy space of my own blog. THANKS TO ALL YOU WONDERFUL BLOGGERS OUT THERE, BECAUSE YOU RESPONDED TO THE QUESTIONNAIRE I SENT. The survey I conducted with your support and was primary research that was very important, not least because it added gravitas and academic weight to my project....

Talking of weight....

It is just such a relief...

....to finally see Kareena Kapoor fattening up from Size Zero to her recent plump-arms-and-oh-is-that-a-paunch avataar, yet looking as haughty and glamorous as ever. Vidya Balan has done it, I know, but the more of our hopelessly slim stars join them, the better. Kareena's April pictures come as a breath of fresh air to all women struggling-to-retain-weight-loss-and-succumbing-to-Snickers-and-Twix-and-lemon-tart-and-icecream-temptations. You know who I am talking about. If Kareena can, we can...give in to weight gain.

What a relief!!!

HOME ALONE

This past week, I have been home alone.

The spouse and the kittens have all gone to Kolkata, and I'll be joining them in a few days, when my College will deign to give us our Diwali Holidays.

The first few days were miserable.

I was buried under an avalanche of semester-end exam papers to be corrected. Correcting bad exam papers, paper-after-paper, for nearly 500 papers always give me a feeling similar to a bad bout of influenza. I feel feverish, my neck and back ache, my eyes feel dry and blinky, and in my sleep I toss and turn in nightmares.

Then I really had a flu onset and a stomach upset.

Then I had a cleaning frenzy, fighting against every particle of dust that dared to enter the flat.

Gradually, I settled down. Watched back-to-back-back movies all evening-night, slept way past afternoon, curled up on the sofa eating lemon tarts and drinking jaljira-spiked (Diet) Cokes, dipped my feet in warm water-with-lavender-bath-salts.

And, of course, I went out.

To work, boringly.

To other places, excitingly.

Shopped at my favourite stores like Fabindia and Crossword.

Strolled at Carter Road and window-shopped at Linking Road.

Discovered a tiny shop called Shimmer at Atria Mall that sells tops and tunics in the most lovely understated shades.

Picked up vintage maps and posters from Philips Images in SoBo.

Grabbed, at Satguru's, a vintage Sholay poster and a tiny brass table fan that actually works.

Chatted with an old, smiley-bearded painter outside Jehangir Art Gallery and bought some tiny sea-scape watercolours.

Browsed through the Museum and Museum Shop and marvelled at our handicrafts.

Just as I was warming up to the experience, it is nearing its end. And really, I am so looking forward to being with them all again. And being back in Kolkata for my annual nostalgia pilgrimage.

Ah well, time flies...

MOTHER COURAGE

The past week everybody was busy about the first anniversary of the 26/11 terror attacks on Mumbai. While we remembered those hours which defy ordinary epithets, life went on - before, during, after.

This is about one such ordinary life. Almost every day, while going to college fairly early in the morning, I see a mother escorting her daughter, dressed in her blue-checked uniform, to the school bus. The daughter suffers from cerebral palsy and does not have much control over her limbs. Usually the mother half-pulls, half-carries her, but if they are running late, then the mother has to carry the daughter in her lap, cradling her lolling head on one shoulder, schoolbag slung on the other.

The mother is painfully thin and gaunt, the child is almost a teenager. It is quite a long walk from their chawl (slum) to the Highway, where the bus for that special school comes. I have never seen her lose her temper, even when she is half-running to catch the bus, even when the child is throwing a tantrum.

A daily walk of unsung courage that humbles me every time I witness it.

LOVE ACTUALLY…

…WAS (once upon a time, circa 1990s) asking the (yet-to-be-) spouse, “Have you taken the class-notes properly?”
(Both of us studied English Honours, so being together in Honours classes was not the problem, but I had Philosophy as a ‘Pass’ subject, while he had ‘History’, and he would shrug his shoulders at my anxious query after the very few History classes he actually attended without me, and state philosophically that ‘History’ was past, so it was better to forget about it.)

…IS (now, circa 2009) asking the spouse (-since-decades), “Have you taken your cholesterol medicines properly?" (I have a job where I leave the home early, and he has a job where he comes back very late, so marital communication, and romantic conversation, is chiefly via a series of questions over the phone - asked anxiously, answered with philosophical calmness and assurance).

As the great philosophers said, "The more things change, the more they remain the same". Class-notes, or cholesterol, I seem to have been in worrying-Mother-mode for the past (nearly) two decades. Pscho-analyse that, if you will.

Love, actually = worry! (Thank God, I don't chew my nails when I am worried, or I would not have been able to write this post.)

OUCH!

THE ADVENTURES OF A POLL-ITICAL OFFICER

Or, how I almost got caught in a stampede on Polling day. A step-by-step report:

POLL-ITICAL PARTIES
On the last day of training, we met the other members of our ‘polling party’ (comprising a Presiding Officer – me, that is – an Assistant Presiding Officer, two Polling Officers and a Peon). There were several such parties under each Zonal Officer, and each party would be in charge of a Polling Station, reporting to their respective Zonal Officer. We exchanged phone numbers and listened to a long lecture on the what-to-dos and what-not-to-dos and how-to-manage-things-if-youv’e-done-a-‘what-not-to-do’.
Mystified by the Marathi, I dozed off in the middle.

RANDOM RAMBLINGS
Next day, the day before the polls, we were supposed to meet at the Central Polling Station, collect the polling materials (including the star of the show – the Electronic Voting Machine) and go to our Polling Stations to set up things for the big day.

However, the authorities had decided brilliantly to ‘randomize’ the allotments. So, our zonal officers had been changed and the ‘polling parties’ under each officer had also been shuffled out of sequence. Chaos Theory ruled. We had to wait for announcements to learn who would be our zonal officer, and then we had to weave through an increasingly restive crowd to find these fellows. People kept colliding into each other, like the random movements of atoms, and it took hours before each molecule (polling party) was formed. It was like a bad Hindi lost-and-found movie, with everybody searching for their team members. Matters were not helped at all by the fact that we were all hustled into a huge and hot basement where cellphone networks were not working. I don’t know why they did not put up lists about who-would –go-where; it would have made finding each other much easier, and the poor fellows who shouted themselves hoarse at the announcement counter could have spared their throats a bit.

READY FOR TOMORROW, SIR!
Anyway, after six hours of sweating, swearing and searching, the teams were assembled and we went in police-escorted taxis and trucks to a school building where our Polling Station was located. Our building had seven Polling Stations who were given a room each. We spent the next few hours checking poll materials, partly filling up numerous forms and envelopes, putting up signboards and arranging who would sit where. The most interesting bit was actually operating the EVM and conducting a mock-poll. There were 23 candidates contesting from our constituency, some with really intriguing symbols like balloon, whistle and comb. Two candidates were perhaps hoping to cash in on the IPL craze – one had a cricket bat as a symbol and the other had opted for a picture of a cricketer.

V – VOTING DAY; O – ONLY 42% TURNED UP; T – TEAMS WORKED TOGETHER WONDERFULLY; E – EVERYTHING WAS FINE TILL 5 P.M
There were giggly first-time voters, there were feisty old ladies and doddering gentlemen with walking sticks (one had recently undergone a heart operation). Some were clear in their choice – they strode in, hit the button straight away, and strode out, head high. Some were confused – peering at the ballot units, scratching their heads, looking at us for inspiration and taking ages to make up their minds. The rush hours were 10 to 2, with long lines snaking out of the rooms into the hot sun. Voters might have cribbed, the process is slightly long because of the various checks and balances. My team was efficient and experienced and I learnt a lot from them. It was a friendly, let’s-all-get-this-thing-done-as-well-as-we-can and don’t-worry-when-we-are-with-you kind of feeling and, although it was my first time, I sailed through confidently because of them.

ORDER INTO DISORDER
By 7 p.m, the voting machines were closed and sealed, reports all ready, envelopes filled but stomachs empty. The Zonal Officer had checked everything to his satisfaction and we were ready to leave. Only, we did not. We left at 8.30 and went, under police escort (I was feeling tired but important) to the Central Polling Station to deposit everything. Read CHAOS PANIC STATION. There was one counter to collect the EVMs and some documents of 75 polling parties. There were four other counters to submit four other sets of documents and stuff, each having a mile-long queue. Each envelope was opened and contents checked (didn't they trust the Zonal Officers?). We then had to put everything back and form another queue just to hand things over. It was bureaucracy at its duplicitous, slowest, worst.

The only violent incidents of the day took place at the EVM-deposit counter. Polling officials, who had all started work way before dawn, got mutinous and manic – queues were broken and the EVM- carrying -cases were useful weapons to push and shove. Tempers got frayed and policemen had to be deployed to maintain discipline. We had to stand on the steps leading to the hallowed counter for over three hours. I, by virtue of being a ‘ladies’, managed to jump the queue and my adroit Zonal Officer helped me in my underhand activities. Too trodden-upon to feel guilty, I took unfair advantage.

Crushed,exhausted, hungry and battle-sore, thus ended my first tryst with the democratic machinery. It was, as Pandit Nehru had said, a ‘tryst with destiny’, and, almost true to his words, it had ended post-midnight.

FREIDA PINTO - MY (UN)FAIR LADY?

Poor Freida Pinto. While whooping it up at various parties all the world over in the wake of Slumdog Millionaire's super success, our poor little girl in the limelight has been hounded by bad press.

Apparently, in her baby steps up the fame-and-fortune ladder, she has been stepping on a lot of touchy toes. There was the ditching of former fiance/husband Rohan Antao (gleefully played up by the media, with photos of a mopey Antao wishing her all the best). There was the snubbing of Wendell Rodricks, the Goan designer who gave darling Freida her first break in modelling. Wendell makes delicious free-flowing gowns which can grace the red carpet as well as any other. Instead, 'international' Freida is opting for Dries Van Notens and Gallianos galore (the blue net gown at the Oscars got a very mixed reaction).
And there is the simpering smiles and cosying up to the eligible Dev Patel, a budding romance which seems constructed only for the cameras.

All this rankles. Latika (her character in SDM) was a woman who was forced to compromise, yet who always rememebered her past loves and loyalties. Freida's press-created avatar comes across as a girl who chose to compromise, and who has willingly and quickly forgotten her past - loves and loyalties included.

There seems to be a moral which is being subtly created and reinforced - the glamour of the West (Hollywood, etc) turning the head of the gullible Indian girl and making her forget her tradition and culture.

Maybe I am being over-critical, maybe Freida is really a manipulative-miss-on-the-make, but then we have never really come across a clarification from her, have we? And it is so easy for self-righteous guardians of Indian values to point fingers and say, "See, what a slum-bitch she is." I can recall a similar anti-Aishwarya Rai campaign in the press when she tried to make her mark in Hollywood. Maybe India likes to keep its heroines under a metaphorical purdah - at home in Bollywood, rather than creating a flutter abroad?