When The Table Turns The Other Way

You’re busy twirling that boy around your finger. He loves you, he adores you, he says it ten times a day. You frustrate him, you tease him, you coax him, you push him away. Always playing games. Till one day the table turns the other way. Suddenly you’re waiting for his calls. He said this…does he mean that?! Two days and he hasn’t been online! Am I blocked or unblocked?

My tryst with the temperamental table coincided with Backstreet Boys releasing Quit Playing Games when I was a teenager and continues till date.

The second big time fate’s itchy hand spun that table around was when I was in Africa. Now, I am not a brown skinned desi. I am a desi with wheatish complexion. Difference? You have to be in Africa to fathom the huge difference. Before I knew the local word for hello, I knew the word muzungu. It means white person. And I was a white foreigner. . . according to African standards and even according to Indian diaspora standards.

The tables had turned and spun me into a tizzy. I was all of a sudden ‘superior’ just for my skin color. A little black kid bit me “to taste your skin” I was told. I was given preferential treatment everywhere- I got a table at a restaurant when there was none, I got an appointment when someone was "in a meeting", I got ripped off Ugandan shillings because I most definitely looked like I had the monies. And in reality, this was me- a struggling student… one of 1 billion Indians and counting.

My latest freelance assignment is centered around the IPL after match parties. It’s my first project as a writer. I write lines for the anchor to say on screen which means I have to be present at the parties with the latter in the event of changes to the script. And as I watched the anchor deliver her lines, I realized how surreptitiously the tables had turned again.

I hadn’t before written lines that somebody else had to deliver. For two years I had been in front of the camera. Just a month ago I had anchored another show. I had had my dresses sorted out, someone to do my makeup, give me the script; it was me who felt the heat of the camera light and the curious stares of onlookers. And now, I was part of the anchor’s entourage. I watched her get made up, read the script, face the camera, plaster that smile and deliver her lines. Crazy.

It’s like a heady drink- being on the other side. Of course, it puts circumstances into perspective, but it’s also an out of body experience… because it seems so unreal. I couldn’t possibly be groveling for love, I couldn’t possibly be white, I couldn’t possibly not be in the limelight. But I am. I’m on the other side, that's for sure. And there’s definitely grass here too. I just don’t know which is greener.

For Rent

When I got resurrected a freelancer, I gave up weekends, medical insurance, Provident Fund, free stationary, unlimited internet access and finally my apartment (which I could no longer afford). So when a friend offered me a room in her home till I found a cheaper place, I shamelessly planted my butt in her territory for four months till boom! Life did a cartwheel, finished off with a back flip and landed me in real estate (long overdue). The time had finally come for me to rent my own place.

I have this feeling that it isn’t just me who almost always picks up the most expensive item for sale at a store and then kicks herself for having tastes her debit card can’t match. So you will empathize with me when I say I wished to stay in an area in the city where recently a fully furnished 2,700 sq ft house was leased out for a monthly rental value of Rs 2.85 lakhs. I had my eyes on Bandra.

Yes, indeed there is something about Mary. But there’s also something about Sandra in Bandra. Because unlike Sandra in Dadar or Santacruz, in Bandra Sandra can wear hotpants, a strappy top, have blue highlights in her short cropped hair and tattoos running all the way to Timbuktu… and no one would give a damn. And I wanted no one to give a damn. I also wanted to walk in little bylanes where wrinkled old bungalows were still fighting for life… where you’re just as likely to be greeted by a ‘graffiti-ed’ Amitabh Bacchan as by the sight of flesh and blood SRK entering his house… where the brooding sea is just as close as a pub playing Pearl Jam which is just as far as a Columbian coffee joint.

So I started my search. I had three weeks to find a house.

Week 1
Budget- 8k a month. We were three girls looking for a place. Armed with 24k, we quickly realized our ammunition would only get us a 1BHK in the area. That would mean two chicks in the bedroom, one in the living room and the kitchen for sex. We still looked.

Week 2
Budget- 10k a month. One girl drops out. Hmm! With 2 of us and 20k in tow, we could now only afford a studio apartment, albeit a furnished one. That would mean eating, sleeping, walking in the same room and crapping in a bathroom the size of 2 Godrej cupboards. We looked.

Week 3
Budget 15k a month. 2nd girl drops out. I could now get a studio for myself. Which wasn’t too bad. Except that I didn’t have 50k to put down as deposit or another 15k to pay as brokerage. And come four months, I would be living the true bohemian life in Bandra as a vagabond on the streets by which time my savings would have run out.

My final option. I could stay as a paying guest for much less. Maybe even 8k! But wait. I’d have to answer to a gnarly old lady every morning. I’d have to be home before Cinderella, I’d have to limit the social company in my room to myself and I’d have to clean up my liver and my lung (who does that at 25?!).

Time had run out. As had the patience of my brokers who had replaced mom and close friends on speed dial. Could I, should I, must I compromise and stay as a paying guest just to be Sandra in Bandra? I moved to Andheri.

...30 days later, here I am wondering if Sandra could have and should have managed with one glass slipper and fingers to keep her company in Bandra. Seems a better proposition than having her entire life feel like the inside of a pumpkin- damp, bland and waiting to be transformed. 

It's A Wild Thing

Now while we emphatically deny to our unworldly-wise foreign friends that cows, buffaloes, camels and elephants amble along our Indian streets, the truth of the matter is that more often than not, you are more likely to make acquaintance with atleast one of the above four before you can boast of making a new friend in the city. I decided to add one more animal to the list just in case my homo sapiens circle of friends threatened to vanish all together; the beast of burden complete with rippling muscles- the horse.

My quest for a close encounter with the fine animal took me far and wide- from my doorstep to my friend’s neighbourhood two streets away, where every evening little children trotted on horses at a speed of 5km/hr, competing very closely with friends on tricycles. Sensing my anguish at the underutilization of such beautiful muscles, my friend invited me to the races that weekend, where a horse does what a horse was meant to do- run.

Hello! magazine was hosting its Hello! Million 2010 event, a glitterati-oozing-multi-million juvenile race and it appears I went with the right person because the moment I stepped on the lawn, light bulbs flashed in my face and for the first time I had a “oh, I’m almost famous!” moment. After my tryst with the paparazzi, I was whisked away into the V.I.P section where the smell of sushi mingled with chicken hors d’oeuvres and wine glasses clinked all the way to the restroom. It was an effort not to be distracted with all these fancies.

The main race was just about to begin. Like a five year old who’d just been handed her first balloon, I stared wide-eyed as thundering hooves cleared a turn and dark skin strained under the expert hands of jockeys in a mad attempt to reach the finish line. Behind me there were shouts of joy and louder laments as money exchanged hands. Where a week ago the value of a horse was reduced to Rs 50 for a round of Jogger’s Park, today there were millions riding on the back of each beast.

In the milieu of stars and socialites around me, I felt the headiness of power. You sit there in your large straw hat, dripping with diamonds as you sip your wine and nibble your cheese and you see in the harsh sun an animal being tamed and commanded to race...to entertain you because you can afford the price of that raw muscle. No matter how much you bet, when the race is on, you are part owner of that deafening sound that reverberates in the stadium.

I say all this from personal experience. To get a whiff of that power surge everyone seemed to be crackling with, I almost bet all my life savings on a horse- I put in Rs10 and got back Rs13. I was high. The next morning as I crossed Jogger’s Park and saw two horses saddled with children again, I felt a dull ache. Trotting around a park versus racing at the whim of the rich- to my ignorant mind the latter seemed the lesser of two evils. I bought the two horses Rs13 worth of peanuts.

Kashmir- Phir Milenge, Chalte Chalte

Should I make excuses for not writing last month….umm…yes! I was traveling, working as an assistant director on a documentary on the history and culture of Pashmina, which catapulted me to the balls- shriveling-cold-climate of Kashmir (no, I’m not secretly a man but I know). To call my twenty days of travel ‘great’ would be so twitterish that I’ve decided on a blog entry to revolt against the 140 character curfew.

For starters, the moment I got out of Srinagar airport, I noticed that most people seemed to be potbellied (or pregnant) and were missing an arm or two. I found this phenomenon to be strangely commonplace and was quick to point this out to our driver. Two minutes later I was just as quick to recede into a shell, promising never to emerge again. It just so happens that it wasn’t fat or child that the masses were carrying but a harmless wicker basket called kangdi, fitted with an earthen pot and burning coal. Everyone held this under their long, woolen coats called pherans (this explained the flapping coat sleeves) and the contraption generated heat close to the body.

While at this point it was my face that was rapidly heating up, during most of my travel, it was other parts of my body that seemed to be on fire. And that’s because the men in Kashmir are hot! Hot like butter that sizzles on a dry frying pan (no metaphor intended). I am a firm believer in the theory of natural selection and here high up in altitude I solidified my belief. For the fruitful longevity of my line, I was ‘naturally selecting’ the chiseled face, the light eyes, the dark hair and long limbs of the baker, the grocer, the driver, the weaver…anyone I laid my eyes on. And Kashmiri men are no less. Flirting comes as naturally to them as snowfall in winter.

And as naturally as hartaal or general strike almost every Friday of the month. Whether it’s the hoarse cry for autonomy or indignity over the Shopian case, the Kashmiri youth is always ready to spring into action- marking the field, sniffing out the opponents and pelting stones at government vehicles with the speed and accuracy of an Indian bowler. It’s no wonder therefore that the phenomenon of stone pelting has actually been nicknamed Twenty20 in the Valley. Not as drawn out as Test Cricket but with the same vigor. We were instructed to not visit certain parts of the city on those days, but otherwise, life moved on.

Everyday, as a ritual, I would jump out shivering from the shower, and don not one, not two but three layers of clothing- gloves and socks included. And where I grabbed every opportunity to arm myself with the coal burning kangdi, all around me kids were running barefoot in open courtyards. I asked a lady once what she wore beneath her long coat. She showed me her salwar kameez and one layer of woolen inners over very hairy legs. I marveled at her immunity to the cold and her freedom from waxing for the better part of the year.

Kashmiris are by and large one of the most hospitable people I have ever met. In every house we entered, we were welcomed with open arms and always, always a spread of tea and biscuits. Kahva is the traditional tea of Kashmir, ingredients of which include green tea, cinnamon, almonds and saffron among others. It is by far a drink for the gods. And have you ever had Iranian biscuits? Light brown cuboids, sugary and heavy on the first bite, but with so fine a consistency that crumbs magically dissolve on contact with the palette? Those were the types of biscuits that accompanied kahva and our fat cells relished them atleast twice a day.

Kashmir is just as famous for its bakery products as it is for Pashmina shawls, yet it’s the latter that has put the state on the world map. It’s quite something else to visit an aged weaver or embroider regaling the days gone by rather than google the history of Pashmina on the internet. We collected enough material for the documentary, yet there is that dissatisfaction of knowing so much more than you can fit into a 45 minute film. Little cultural nuances and larger political issues will be skirted around in our attempt to stick to a storyline. Like the fact that Kashmir has the world’s largest military occupation yet most locals start a conversation with “Koi baat nahin [no problem].” You can't match that.

My Country In Bed With Me

I went to my hometown a few weeks back for a surprise visit to my mother. Three days later, while President Pratibha Patil was probably doing an extra kilometer on the treadmill preparing for her historic flight in the Sukhoi, I was slowly losing my health to my first major illness ever- dengue. Not that I was complaining. It was after all the gravest thing happening to me since common cold four years back.

I lay there, in the hospital bed, feeling like shit, vomiting, venting, sweating. And like the IV fluid that snaked its way through my system, in the rest of the country, memories of 26/11 were surreptitiously creeping into open minds. The first year anniversary of the Bombay terror attacks was drawing close and people were venting, sweating and spewing…has security increased? Do we have better arms and ammunition? Are the victims compensated? The date was drawing close.

Seven seas away, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was warmly welcomed by President Barack Obama. 350 guests were privy to the young President’s first state dinner, complete with curry prawns and aged basmati rice. I, on the other hand, was restricted to mashed rice and lentils. But I had guests visit me as well...relatives I hadn’t expected to see, certainly not every day at the hospital. I was happy they gatecrashed. Don’t know if Obama can say the same about his two aspiring reality star guests.

In total, I spent 7 days bedridden at home with a fever that stubbornly refused to leave my side. On the 8th day, I broke our relationship by getting admitted to the hospital. I spent 5 days there. I thought of Bombay everyday. I was itching to get back to my life. I had an interview lined up as well! And while I itched to get hitched to a production house, Bigg Boss starlet Shilpa Shetty was planning to get hitched to multi-millionaire Raj Kundra at one of the most hyped wedding ceremonies in Bollywood. I didn’t have a job at hand. The soon-to-be-Mrs turned down £75,000 for rights to her wedding pictures. I was keeping score.

I’m cured! And I am on my way to Bombay! I have a meeting lined up at noon. I take the train, then the bus, all the while taking in the city I sorely missed for three weeks. Ecstatic, excited, impatient, overwhelmed- emotions wreak havoc with my system. A friend calls, tells me of a new website- stereomood.com. A music playlist for your every mood. I select sloth. Yes, I’m back!

26th November. I can’t keep track of the money flowing out of my pocket. Train- Rs 4. Cab- Rs 60. Movie Ticket- Rs 200. Drinks- Rs 500. Small solace- the rest of the country doesn’t seem to be doing too well with money either. Latest report- food inflation jumps 1% to 15.58% in a week. Potato prices are up 132% since April this year! And that’s not even the news. The Opposition takes a dig at the PM on the price rise issue and 7 out of the 11 rows of Treasury Benches in the Parliament are empty! Less than a dozen Congress MPs are present to counter the Opposition’s attacks on the day inflation numbers are announced. This on the same day we’re celebrating the first year anniversary of 26/11, when Idea Cellular runs a campaign called Talk for India Hour, donating call revenues for better protection gear for the police. Wonder who’s doing the talking. Certainly not our elected officials.

PS: I’m still glad to be back.

She's Always A Woman To Me

(She can kill with a smile
She can wound with her eyes…)

Lips the color of fire. Flaming red, raging. That full mouth, moistened ever so slightly with the tip of her tongue as she scrutinizes herself in the mirror. She presses her ring finger against the metallic insides of her silver kohl box and expertly applies black midnight to her eyes. With the curve of her hairpin she extends the line of darkness, arching it up, outside her eyes making them appear so big you can glimpse the universe in them.

(She can ruin your faith with her casual lies…)

She blinks once, twice, then reaches for the white packet, removes the transparent cover and peels off a big round bindi. Red again, this time a ball of fire that rests in the middle of her arched eyebrows.

(And she only reveals what she wants you to see…)

She stands up. Her white petticoat rises and falls with the curve of her hips down to her tapering ankles. Her blouse outlines her cleavage, teasing, taunting, working its way from her bosom to the hollow of her shoulder blades and then gliding down to her elbows. With the flourish of her hand she opens the sari lying neatly ironed on the bed. 5 meters of cloth- white with thick stripes of red and gold catches the wind, bellows and settles on the floor with a whimper. Round and round she wraps it, tucks in the folds just below her navel, smoothens out the creases with her hand and as the finishing touch shrouds her bosom with the free end of the cloth. It sticks on for dear life, hugging her frame, touching and letting go- her long legs, her flat stomach, her heaving breasts- before throwing caution to the wind and flying freely down her back.

She was almost done. She lifts her hands to tie her mass of black curls into a loose knot at the nape of her neck. Tendrils tantalize her bare skin, leaving her with waves of goosebumps when she walks. Glass bangles slip on effortlessly over her delicate wrists and with lowered eyes that hide the anticipation mounting inside her, she leaves the room, ready to meet the man she was to marry.
(She hides like a child
But she’s always a woman to me…)