I could have been there

An acquaintance from Delhi was in Mumbai on the 26th and I was to go to VT to meet him. I had an uncomfortable feeling in the evening and told the person I won’t be coming as it will get quite late and we made plans to meet next day. From work I went home instead and in the night got a call from my sister’s friend to inform us about the attacks. We turned on the TV and couldn’t believe what we were seeing. Just an hour back I had recommended Leopold to the guys from Delhi for drinks and Bade Miyan for dinner. Thankfully though they had gone to Leopold they did not wait there but moved on to have dinner. Small mercies for me! I was transfixed to the news on TV when suddenly my mom said if you had gone to VT today, you would have been there. Solace for my mom that I was home but I could not feel any relief. I think we have crossed the point where we can be happy that MY family, MY friends and I are unharmed. What about the next time!

I went to sleep that night hoping that when I wake up in the morning, everything will have been sorted out. I think it was clear to everybody by morning that it was not one of those attacks that we have gotten so used to, where there is a blast, we hear about it we call our loved ones and if they are fine thank god for it, feel a little bad for the victims and carry on with life. I feel it is not just resilience that puts us back on our toes the next day, there is a lot of numbness too; as long as everybody we know are fine we almost go about our business with robotic precision. It wasn’t surprising that so many of us were getting restless and impatient and couldn’t understand why the defence operation was taking so long. The longer it went on the deeper went the grip of unease. The frustration and helplessness of the situation got hammered into us and for the first time since so many attacks across India I have noticed people haven’t been able to shake off the sense of loss and carry on unaffected.

There is a lot of anger towards the politicians and of course towards Pakistan. But these are not the only factors that can be held responsible for the attacks we face time and again. Somewhere the citizens of this country are also responsible for the Government apathy towards our security concern. A lot of self-introspection is needed at the individual level. The only time we have a sense of nation and shared identity is when the national cricket team is playing. The rest of the time the state and language divisions are so important to us that even the Indian expatriate community can not overcome it and around the world we see Bengali, Telugu, Gujarati… committees and groups. It is so easy for a Thackarey or a Singh, or a Modi, or a Gandhi or a Yadav to instigate us against each other.

Sometimes I feel we got independence from the British at an inappropriate time. More of our masses should have been educated before we became a sovereign. Even today we have a large vote bank that can be bought for as cheap as 100 rupees per head. From our first Prime Minister to now we have had only opportunists governing us simply because it has been so easy to manipulate and divide on the basis of religion and language. What is disheartening is people still fall for it.

It would be ideal to live in a world with no boundaries and religions. We don’t, but how difficult is it to live in the real world by accepting and appreciating diversities. For a change can we stop hating or differentiating the other person because he does not speak the same language and think as one nation even when India is not playing cricket?

Reverse Osmosis

Of late I have been meeting foreigners – various nationalities; each one of them finds it astounding that people speak more of English than any of the native languages in Mumbai. I try to tell them that we learn it as first language in school, so we are used to it. They still don't see why we can't talk in hindi among ourselves. Since these encounters I have consciously tried to keep track of conversations I have with people. I have found that very few educated people will reply or talk to you in Hindi or Marathi. Ask a question in Hindi or Marathi and 99 out of 100 times the reply will be in English. Some people just refuse to speak anything else. No wonder so many English speaking classes have sprouted in the city.

One of my friend teaches in one such institute in the western suburbs. Recently I went to meet her at her class and she asked me to talk to the students and give them some tips on how to prepare for interviews. I asked each one of them why did they want to learn to speak English. Everybody believed that English was the key to profesional success. One guy said he works in the purchase department of a company and finds it difficult to communicate with people as many talk to him in English. He stated because he studied in vernacular medium his English is weak and he wants to improve it. I have never liked the word vernacular. I said to him Marathi is not vernacular it is far superior in syntax and structure than English. It is nice to learn English though, it is the most dynamic and inclusive language and much help in the professional world. It is amazing how this term 'Vernacular' has become synonymous with Indian Languages. A bunch of arrogant colonists term some of the richest languages in the history of humankind in terms of both literature and dialect as vernacular and Indians continue to be the torchbearers of a dead past. Allow me a chuckle here.

It is amazing how the English dailies unfailingly use this umbrella term every time they have to refer to any Indian Language. Now since English has become as much Indian as any other language why still the distinction. Can't do much about our psuedo-intellectual, elitist media, they are best left alone. But what's stopping me from having fun. It's time for reverse osmosis (don't ask me what it is, I like the term). I am going to work the ask me anything in English and I will reply in Hindi trick on everybody. And if someone throws a fake accent devil help them.

I abhor Shopping

After a loooooooooong time I went shopping yesterday. As if it wasn't bad enough before, during this time (my long sabbatical from shopping) clothes have managed to get even more crappier and costlier. What's with Lifestyle, Shoppers Stop, Westside, and all other such stores. Are these shops dumping grounds for badly made, psychedelic clothes? For the first time yesterday I was a little envious of men, dressing is still simple for them and they still get value for money. I see that giving up on clothes is not a choice available, humanity is stuck with its invention. The best option is to keep wearing the same clothes (unless you put on weight, in which case you borrow clothes from your elder sister, who is on her own weight gain trip. If the elder sister has nobody to borrow from, well her fault, you didn't ask her to be the first born). Men too can follow the above example, although life is easy for them (it always is).
Some advantages to give up buying new clothes:
-You save money.
-Looking at your old clothes nobody will expect tips from you.
-Men and women will not get attracted to each other (I think I am on to something here)
-Friends (including Kathy in my case) will start gifting you clothes more often
-I will never go into depression again.

"There is no point of getting a promotion on the day of your breakup. There is no fun in driving a car if your back hurts. Shopping is not enjoyable if your mind is full of tensions."
- An excerpt from some speech Chetan Bhagat gave to some students.

Balance in life!

It came to me just now. The answer. I know why I am always dozing off in the office. Most of the lifetime I have spent trying to stay awake in broad daylight. I am a superhero(female)by the night. Now I also know why every morning I have this mass of tangled, jumbled, mumbled, wayward, every woman's nightmare mass of hair on my head. I forget to wear a helmet when I am flying. That's all that came to me, rest of my superhero identity still escapes me.