You know you are losing it when...

You go on eBay and feel the thrill of life when you spot the Electrolux Cordless Vacuum Cleaner on sale at the Global Easy Buy. Worse it leads to a series of fantasies in which you imagine situation where you remain calm and collected (like foreign woman doing yoga in white threadbare kurta that looks good only on her) even when the maid calls to say she is sick and therefore unable to come for the next three days. You imagine yourself cleaning the chocos off the sofa, the bits of craft paper off the floor and the various discarded pieces of parantha your son has artfully hidden around the house in a jiffy, because ta....da..this vacuum cleaner is a cordless one and moving it around is a breeze.
At some point you give yourself a mega shake and come out of your vacuum induced reverie. You even recover enough to open a new window and check out the latest fool-the-world gizmo Apple has on offer. But old habits (or recently acquired strange habits you thought only old people had) die hard. You return to the household appliance section and order a mini accessories basket for the dishwasher. Along with a wall mounted kitchen scale and swim diapers. And you feel the thrill of wonderful shopping wash all over.
Like I said. Help is surely required here.

Being Indian

You feel absolutely authorised to comment on anything and everything be it your neighbour’s son’s constant refusal to agree to an arranged marriage or your irritatingly slim gym partner who never seems to put on a pound despite the energy and chocolate bars she constantly consumes. Indians feel they have the birthright to comment on anything and everything all the time. It could be your appearance, you weight, your choice of school, hospital, lifestyle, brand of beer, the number of children or lack of it. We should replace unwanted comments as our national sport instead of kabaddi, which nobody seems to play these days.

You brave traffic, screaming toddlers and rampaging crowds to visit discount sales in a far off mall. All because you spotted the irresistible offer of a melamine dinner set free if you shop for Rs. 3000 in the morning paper.

You want Bollywood to get original and esoteric but would still pay good money to watch Band Baaja Baarat than Love Sex or Dhoka.

You spent your twenties dating ‘fast’ and ‘modern’ girls (read smokes, drinks, swears, thinks nothing of wearing a mini to work according to your mental dictionary) yet when it comes to getting hitched, you depend on Mummy and ask her to find you the gharelu seedhi saadhi type.

You crib about the lack of hygiene and cleanliness in trains, stations and even airports, yet think nothing of chucking a candy wrapper out of the window of your car. After all, there’s no trashcan inside and you just got the car cleaned and serviced.

Weddings are completely Bollywoodised events in your mind thanks to Yash Chopra, Karan Johar and clan. In fact, you cannot think of a wedding without band, baaja and baraat or the mandatory mehendi ceremony, even if weddings in your community are a completely different affair altogether.

You believe in being eco-friendly, saving the trees, stopping eve-teasing, helping Tsunami victims, cleaning up the streets of your city and saving the tiger. In fact you believe in many causes and champion them all. As long as they require you to sign a petition online and forward an email.

Friendships are very important to you. You spent several of your formative years trying to ‘make friendship’ with the girls from your local college and now you have 475 friends. All on Facebook. In fact, you can’t even remember meeting some of them.

You may not know who’s the new telecom minister or the name of our Vice President but like everyone else, you believe that politics is a dirty game and love to rant against money-hungry, land grabbing politicians. In fact, you are absolutely certain the country is going to the dogs. You just don’t know the names of the breed.

The Second Coming

One of the advantages of being sleep deprived is you can always blame your slightly erratic and weird behaviour on it. For instance, thanks to the wonderful Vodafone network at home, I received a friend's congratulatory message at 4 am the other day (night? dawn?). She had sent it the previous day. "Thanks a ton." I immediately texted, thrilled to have something else to do apart from being a human rocker for baby and making mental notes on the vegetables to be ordered the next morning. And then, just to demonstrate what a thoughtful friend I was (the ideal 4 am kind), I also added, “And how is little A? Fever gone yet?”

Big mistake. Little A is her son alright but the fever happened to Little B, son to yet another friend whom I had spoken to just that evening, a time that at 4 am seems million light years ago. Then again, I had the best excuse in the world. “Sorry,” I texted (and lied), “message meant for someone else. Blame it on the lack of sleep.”

The sleep deprived state also comes with other advantages. For instance you could always avoid boring dinners with the excuse that you need to be up and about a bit and night and therefore need all the rest you can. “Oh of course we completely understand,” says the not so interesting acquaintance before launching into an account of her own nigh time feeding schedule and how she always slept when the baby did, when he was born 10 years ago. “I do the same,” I say in my well practised heavy with sleep voice and go back to reading some enriching literature like Julia Quinn, which I plan to finish through the two mandatory wake up calls at night.

In the meantime, being a human rocker is fast becoming a habit. Went for a regular baby check-up at the hospital and had to remind myself that it was a) the nurse who was carrying the baby who b) was fast asleep and therefore c)I needn’t go back and forth on my heels.

Need to also stop posting baby pictures on FB, though can’t help myself with some nice ones. Since baby photos invite the mandatory coos and awwws after a point I run out of things to say apart from Thanks. Now would you ever do that in offline life? If a friend came over, looked the little bundle up and down and said awwwww, would you say, hey thanks? Probably not. So there.

I spent one of the most uncomfortable evenings of my life sitting in Gladys Staines’ living room in Baripada, Orissa. The discomfort was not because of Gladys, who was a wonderful host, taking me around the leprosy clinic that her husband had set up in the morning and inviting me over for tea in the evening. The discomfort was all mine. I couldn’t just get it out of my mind that here I was sitting in a house that had once seen three kids running around, two of them boys who must have played football, chased the dogs and done all those things that boys generally do. All that was left of that for this woman were memories, haunted by the worst possible end any mother could imagine.

Sitting there, I didn’t have the heart to interview Gladys or remember the list of questions I’d prepared. It seemed enough that she had shared the work she and her late husband had done at the leper clinic with me in the morning; that I had seen her interact with the people she was caring for and the people who worked with her. It felt normal to sit there and simply talk to this amazingly strong woman who shared memories of her husband as and when they came to her, smiled if an object in the room associated with the memory caught her eye, spoke about her daughter who was then studying in Australia, spoke of her ailing father back home and the support she got from people around her in India and why she forgave the fiends who committed that heinous crime. She never mentioned her two sons. I never asked. There are some things you just can’t intrude upon. It feels like slapping the person awake from a stupor that's probably keeping them sane.

I wasn’t a mother then. Very far from the thought actually. I’m one now and cannot even think of what Gladys as a mother must have gone through after that horrific night. How would you feel if your husband and kids who weren't even 10 were burnt alive as 50 men with sticks ensured they couldn't escape the inferno? Would you feel they were converting people into their religion forcefully and therefore deserved it in some way, something the court judgement reeks of when it calls this crime not the rarest of rare and comes down heavily on conversion, completely ignoring the work done by the same man in other areas altogether?

So when I heard of the Supreme Court verdict that has removed the noose off Dara Singh’s neck, I thought of Gladys Staines. And prayed that Dara Singh’s conscience, which apparently tells him he’s innocent, gives him an equally horrid death within the walls of the jail where he will hopefully spend his life term now, mentally, physically or otherwise.

Happy New Year

To all those who still come here. Spent New Year's Eve at home with friends having potluck party. Had plans of making exotic food with complicated name as a gourmet type start to the year but realized most people I know prefer paneer makhni and butter chicken to pesto sauce and prawn croquettes. Eventually had the table laid with very odd combinations that included dal makhni, pulao, gobi mussalam, dahi bhalle and chicken biryani courtesy me and my friends. Have become complete behenji type and will never be employed by Brunch or Mint where recipes are only about interesting sounding things like onion tarts, honey glazed pork and apricot ginger cake, best had in a French spa type ambiance.
Chances of employment though are very weak this year as have baby number two coming soon this February. Yup, I seem to be a sucker for staying up nights and going in the cow mode again. Jokes apart, we really are excited and that includes the young man who alternates between wanting a baby brother and a baby sister. Though am not quite sure if it's because he expects the baby to emerge ready to play with him.
Speaking of babies, what a difference the first time and the second time is! The excitement is still the same but the preparations are different, mentally and otherwise.
The first time I had a list of baby names by now and had shopped at every baby store I could find in Bangalore. I had also memorised What to Expect When you are Expecting and by this time had started practising my breathing exercises.
Have since then given away my dog eared copy of What to Expect to a friend and between reading out Cat in the Hat to the tyke and trying to finish my own review copies have had little time to read anything else. As for shopping, I have a lot of the tyke's stuff that I could use for the little one and some lovely generous friends. Oh of course I am shopping for new stuff but I am older and wiser and no longer fall for 'this is a must have for baby' spiel by salespeople and books written for American readers.
The names? Perhaps it's time to get started on that.

Five

The biggest development has been the little man sleeping in his own room. It has been decorated with planets, stars, rockets and aliens and has worked its magic on our man. He still finds his way to us from time to time and curls up in between though the days he wake up in his own room he's rather proud of the feat. I'd thought getting him a fancy new bed would do the trick but it's the simple space stickers (some made by us in joint mother-son collaboration) that actually did. You can never tell what works with kids!

North Indianizing

The American woman sweetly asks if I am celebrating Karwa Chauth. I smile sweetly and tell her no. She seems surprised and I decide to use the limited time we have in the lift to tell her that it is a festival mainly celebrated by women in the North of India, while I come from a family that is from the East, where we don't celebrate it. She is extremely surprised and perhaps a bit confused. The papers this morning (Bangalore papers to be precise) have informed her that this is the day when women across the country fast and pray for their husband's long life.
Really?
I grew up in Farakka, Orissa, Goa surrounded by my parents and their circle of mostly Bengali friends. Karwa Chauth was as alien a concept to me as it is to the American lady I met in the lift. Of course we had enough Punjabi friends and neighbours so over the years I did hear about it, though the first time it probably made an impact to make me remember it enough was in Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge. Thanks to that movie, every year on KC day when I get the inevitable call from a hungry friend asking if I can spot the moon from my balcony, I have DDLJ's Karwa Chauth track running in my head (complete with the sickening line: tere haath se peekar paani, dasi se ban jaoon rani).
KC is also alien to a lot of my friends from the South or from Gujarat or Assam. So I absolutely do not get it when newspapers declare it a festival celebrated by women across the country, unless their version of country doesn't extend beyond Delhi and NCR limits.
I'm not speaking against Karwa Chauth though I couldn't fast to save my life and don't exactly agree with the basic thought behind this festival. However, to each her own. I do know many women from other communities who do the KC fast voluntarily. A friend from Shillong keeps it for her Punjabi husband, despite him urging her to eat every year for the last 15 years. A Tamilian friend fasts with his Punjabi wife and a Bengali cousin fasts for her longtime boyfriend who of course thinks she is being dramatic and influenced by Yash Chopra. But I do wonder how a festival that's essentially limited to certain parts of the country gets a national assumption? It's like saying every Indian groom comes dressed in a sherwani, sitting on a horse with a dancing baarat. Or that Jamai Shashti is a festival celebrated across the country. If you don't know what that is, it's absolutely alright but it does make me wonder since when KC became an 'assumed' national phenomenon.
Is it because we have several uninformed newspaper editors? Or is the Johar-Chopra gang more deeply entrenched into our national psyche than we believe them to be?

The Great Man's Wife

An old post I wrote after meeting someone. It was lying in draft. Had forgotten to post it, God knows why!

The Great Man's Wife spoke with the faintest hint of an accent. All those years of first doing her masters in the US and then spending a considerable amount of time living and working there had left their mark on her speech. Her home was open, big and for the want of a better term, earthy. Red brick walls on the exterior, limewashed walls with the right niche hollows in the interior, plants spilling tastefully into the living area and the lawn giving a view of the greens outside. The outdoor furniture was simple but possibly expensive and you couldn't miss the discreetly kept but too prettily painted to be missed terracotta kitchen waste composter. The drink was organic as were the biscuits.

I nibbled on all that health as she told me the story of how her business came along. Though it wasn't as much business as 'economic empowerment.' as she repeated. The Great Man's Wife enlisted women from villages in the outskirts of Bangalore to transfer her much researched creativity onto silk stoles, blouses and on special customised requests, usually from her expat friends who 'understood and appreciated these things' sometimes even on a jacket, a wall hanging on a sari.

Thanks to the soothing combo of the garden breeze, juice and often heard words, I may have been part asleep as she spoke but did catch words of vital importance like 'at the grassroots level,' 'self-sustaining' "at the ground level,' 'preserving heritage,' and so on.

It's good work no doubt but I do wish it was done without the congratulatory self-pat on the back, that is meant to be invisible but yet, is visible enough. And then I thought perhaps I am getting too cynical, that even with the kids abroad, the huge house in the middle of the city and the works of art dotting the walls, she does mean it when she says that at heart she still is very middle class. That she belives in giving as much as she has got. That even now, everything she does is centred around the Great Man and his approval.

And somewhere through the chink, I couldn't shake off the feeling that I spotted a rather lonely woman.

I'm listening to Alanis and crying my eyes out. Sometimes life turns out so different from what you expected or imagined it to be. It doesn't mean that you are unhappy or dissatisfied with what you have and the bed is probably of your own making but yes, it does make you sad at times to imagine some things that could have been. Some things that you have stopped being.

Yes the setbacks are temporary and there's no other way to go about it but that doesn't stop the sadness from creeping in sometimes.

Don't be alarmed. Just a bit low, it's one of those days and the only way to deal with it is to write it out. Otherwise in many ways this should be and is a very happy time.

Random

Was happily watching Aisha with friend, drooling over Abhay Deol and generally enjoying the froth until she, Sonam Kapoor that is, appeared in the hospital (having apparently rushed there because her sister went into labour) wearing a jacket and mini dress with a Dior bag. Forgive me if I goof on the details here because I was laughing too hard to concentrate. Yes I know this is a film where style is what matters but a hospital? And that too when she rushed because her BIL poked his head into her room and said the 'drop-everything-grab-wallet-car-keys' word It's Time!
Couldn't they have shown her at least in skinny jeans or jeggings or whatever they are called and perhaps a loose top? Who wears a party frock/mini to the hospital in a hurry? Unless she packed her designer tote along with sister's hospital kit? Or perhaps rich, super stylish Delhi girl do these things. Who are we to know. Anyway forget that bit and the punchless end and the endless L'oreal and Dior ads and it makes for quite an entertaining film. Especially if you've had a bit of experience of the party hard, bitch harder Delhi chics the film talks about. Teeeheee ;-p
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When some long lost acquaintance sends me a friendship request on FB, I assume they at least wish to say hello if not share their lifetime secrets. Was quite surprised to receive one such request from a former colleague I rarely interacted with. While accepting the request I sent a message to the ex-colleague asking how she was, saying hello, etc. Got this in return: 'Oh hi, it's you. I did one of those Find Friend things and I guess FB emailed all my gmail contacts. Never mind!'
Thankfully it was a message and not a wall post or it would have been public mein dhulai. I was a bit taken aback at first and did find it rude though as I thought about it, I couldn't help but be amused. In a world where friendships all but skim the surface at the click of the mouse, it's good to have a reply that's forthright. In whatever manner that may be.
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Watched Tere Bin Laden. Badly shot funny movie. But not as funny as expected. Or pehaps my filmi streak is diminishing. Don't seem to love things as I used to earlier and usually find some fault or the other with everything. Age takes your blinkers off when it comes to Bollywood I guess.

Yikes, now they are demanding the Kohinoor back. What if the Brits demanded all the stuff they built back from us? We'd have to dismantle legendary things like Howrah Bridge and pack it off among other things, thus depriving future generation of Bongs to enjoy the priceless joke, 'I'm enjoyeeng the breej on the breeze'. Though must say, good of Cameron to admit that Brit museums would empty out in a flash if they started to give our antiques back. At least he was being honest. As for the Kohinoor, remember standing in queue to see it at the Tower Museum and coming back utterly disappointed. It looked lost in the hideous purple (or is it blue, can't be bothered to google) crown and much much smaller than expected. Instead what moved me and made me want to write patriotic comments was Tipu Sultan's automated tiger at Victoria and Albert museum. Was feeling patriotic enough to write 'Wapas Karo' type stuff in the Visitor's Book while going out. Have no idea why, perhaps it's because I devotedly watched The Sword of Tipu Sultan (Had strange taste in those days), whereas nobody ever made a serial on the Kohinoor diamond. That figures.

A friend of mine went to her alumni dinner some days back and came back rather disgusted. My friend has not been working for the past few years because of illness and other crisis in the family. She's what you would call a housewife and Femina would stylishly call homemaker. At the dinner, teeming with ex-friends and ex-batchmates who are now AVPs, VPs, CEOs, GMs, TLs and suchlike my friend says she felt like shit. And it wasn't because she realised what she had been missing all along. It's because most of the her ex-batchmates recoiled in polite horror when she came up with an honest answer to THE question: So what have you been doing?
Nothing much, she replied. I married soon after we graduated, had two kids and have been basically at home with them.
"Their look said it all. It's almost as if I was nothing. Not being a working woman or having had a career," she said.
You can't blame her, given the super achiever CVs that were dropping off people's lips the moment THE question was asked.
Why is it that achievement is always measured in such tangible terms? Where do you work or what do you do and how much you make? Why do we tend to look at a woman, label her a housewife and think she has done "nothing with her life" simply because she chooses not to work?
It's a tricky argument I know. With no side doing anything right or wrong. What really matters, and this took my silly brain years to figure out, is what you enjoy doing. And if it is setting up your home, taking care of it and being there, so be it. If it is being at work, getting things done, getting a high when you take over a new team, touchwood.
My friend married her boyfriend right out of the institute whose alumni dinner she attended. The boyfriend-turned-husband was setting up his own business and had a family that was on a rather rocky patch due to several reasons. Without being asked or pressurised or being forced to as is generally assumed, she decided to help him set up his thing and be around for his folks at home till the rough times were over. Before she knew it she had one kid, followed by another and in her own words, never found much time to get herself a job she liked.
But instead of just lounging at home watching serials, baking pancakes and chasing the kids to eat (as the popular cliched image goes), she has been going about a lot of work. The kind she liked doing, without anyone asking her to.
She has been the husband's unofficial consultant/telephone operator in the arly years/brochure designer/content editor and the family's anchor, financial planner, head chef, travel guide for many many years. She's one of the most content people I know and one look at her and you know she is no pushover. Doesn't that count as achievement?
Apparently not. You need to be earning a salary in multiple figures to qualify for that. In the process you may have ignored your home, kids and relationships but who cares? You earn. You hold an important sounding designation. That's all that matters. And before anyone jumps on me, I'm not saying working women ignore their homes and children. If you think that you are missing the woods for the trees so stop reading :)
My friend did try to take up a job once, after her first child. She had a supportive family and good help so she gave in to everyone saying 'Don't waste your talent!' and started work. She lasted five months. "Because this is where my talent was. I loved being home. I loved doing craft with my kids, taking them to the park, cycling. I loved all that," she used to tell me, when the monkey was smaller and I used to be perpetually confused about to work or not to work. "I see myself doing this all my life and still being happy and if you can't see yourself doing it forever, you should get a job."
It settled my mind and I decided to freelance. Because I couldn't get away from the child and I couldn't see myself enjoying craft and staying away from work either. Even if it amounted to almost nothing in terms of money. And today my mind is settled. I know this is what I'll be doing. Working from home. Perhaps increasing the volume as time goes on but perhaps never taking up a fulltime job, unless circumstances demand it.
But this isn't about me. It's about my friend who is very clear in her mind about what she wants. She has good degrees, she has intelligence and the required amount of smartness to get some kind of a job if she wants. She's a favourite in her family. She's built bridges between broken relationships, mended illnesses and done a thousand other things many of us are too timid or indifferent to attempt. Yet in her hi-profile alumni dinner she feels like nothing because she doesn't hold a job, an enviable salary and a blackberry. Not fair, this achievement calculator.

The IT book

Just got mail from big bookstore inviting me to event where ex-IT honcho (according to PR) who has written life-defining book will be launching his book and be in conversation with ex-BPO honcho who has looked at the intense trials and tribulations of the BPO industry in his previous book. Since it's in the evening and I'd be unable to go and attend such a stimulating event thanks to lack of babysitting, I decided to waste my time on the computer by imagining the conversation. Please read at your own risk.

Ex-BPO: Hello Sir famous ex-IT honcho, what prompted you to write this book?

Ex-IT: You know I was always stuck in Bangalore's horrible traffic jams while getting back from work and used to be so bored. After all, there's only a point up to which you can pretend to be busy on the laptop, play with your iPod, etc. Calling up friends I had no time to call otherwise was a big no as it used to be only around 7.45 PM and I didn't want them to think I waslukhkhaand had absolutely no work. Which was the truth but cannot be admitted after all, right? In fact, there have been times when I have left the office at 5 and deliberately taken the stairs from the 10th to the ground floor and then admired the fountains in the office buildings, the leather Italian sofas in the reception before proceeding to Coffee Day downstairs and placing the most complicated order I could think of. Since those buggers take several minutes to process any request other than for simple cappuccino, this way I was able to waste precious time before reaching the exit gate and calling my driver to get the car around at the (almost) respectable hour of 6.30. In fact, there are times when I have asked the driver to stop at 3 ATMs on the way home even if I had money in my pocket just so that I'd not reach home before 8.30 or 9. After all, my wife also has to maintain standards with her kitty friends and tell everybody how late her husband comes home, right? The pity is that I don't even travel much so she's really not left with much topic for conversation. Oh sorry, I'm really blabbering a rather lot, aren't I?

Ex-BPO: That's alright sir. It's good for the heart. So your book came out of these traffic jams, did it?

Ex-IT: You could say it did. As I saw the beggar woman hold her bowl near the car window, the grumpy looking driver of the big Volvo bus honking behind my Scorpio, the autorickshaw driver who looked like a copy of the Kannada hero Upendra, people standing in queues for buses as us lucky ones in cars whizzed by stuttered by, I realised how uncertain life was. You could be here one day and there next. And you could be anyone, autorickshaw Upendra or Volvo driver or person who had to wait for bus even if it was over crowded. It gave me meaningful insights into people's lives and I decided to turn it into a book.

Ex-BPO: How interesting. But didn't you also describe your experiences of working in the IT sector in the book?

Ex-IT: Of course I did. I didn't mean to first but since I also wrote most of the book in office (a great way to motivate yourself to stay back beyond 5.30) parts of it kept getting in. I also realized it was beneficial for my ego. When I went to the canteen at 7.30 to get a cup of tea instead of my earlier 4.30, the canteen man looked at me with utmost respect and said in a worshipful voice, "working late sir?' The best part was hearing my wife tell her cousin on phone that I was very busy and working very late, so she would see if we'd be able to make it to their house for dinner on a weekday. It almost makes up for the non travelling part.

Ex-BPO: There are some memorable characters in the book. Are they from real life?

Ex-IT: Shhh...my ex-boss' wife is at the reading. (Loudly) Of course not. Though I must say it was inspired by different instances and people I came across at home, shopping malls, get-togethers. Not at the office. The setting was inspired by my office though. It's such a boring beautiful steel and glass building that it's difficult not to get inspired.

Ex-BPO: You were inspired by your office building?

Ex-IT: Yes, why not? Also by the security checks at the entrance, the ban on camera phones, the smart looking identity card...

Ex-BPO: I'm speechless sir.

Ex-IT: Are you being sarcastic?

Ex-BPO: No sir. I'm too moved to speak. In fact I thought I was the only one inspired to write by these smart looking office things. Now that I find a kindred soul I'm overcome by emotion to talk. Why sir, in my book 'BPO Baby,' I have devoted one entire chapter to the office I-card, how it defines your professional personality and inspires sameness, the problems if you lose it. I've also talked about the almost dress code like adherence to blue shirts and brown/black pants by men in corporate world Sir. I've had people sending me fan mail saying how much they appreciated the deep thought process and insight that went to writing that particular part.

Ex-IT: I can understand. I myself am very attached to the episode where the department shifts from C-Wing to B-Wing and the employees had to abruptly switch over to new ways of sitting, dual screen monitors, new desks, chairs, cubicles and coffee machines, etc. It was an evolution that took some time to get used to resulting in interesting dramas and developments. For instance, there's this character who has a horrible day that starts because she's unable to figure out the new and complicated Italian self-vending coffee machine in the corridor and it sets of a chain of events. Also the B Wing being nearer to the new Indo-Chinese-Thai restaurant outside the office complex, I was able to weave in a romantic angle as well.

Ex-BPO: Yes sir, I can totally understand. And it helps to have seen these things first hand. For example, Cafe Coffee Days play a big role in all my novels, because they are the breeding ground of blooming office romance. I have seen it Sir.

Ex-IT: Exactly. I'm touched by your understanding and I'm sure that there are many more like you. This is the reason why more of us from the IT/BPO sector need to come out, write and share these experiences with our fellow readers.

Audience member: Sir, could you please share some tips for successful writing and getting published?

Ex-IT: Sure. Should be based in office. Should have one frustrated protagonist who doesn't get a promotion or the girl in the beginning. Allow a lot of scandal and gossip to flourish. Maybe a suicide but not at the workplace. Give some real life instances like off sites, team outings in the evenings which make great setting for clandestine stuff, office lunches, team dinners, etc. Write about things people identify with like bad boss, good mentor at workplace, traffic jams and mix in some jargon like brand extensible, web-enabled applications, etc., to show your audience that you know your stuff. The story will write itself.

AM: But sir, what about those lesser fortunate Volvo drivers, people waiting at bus stops? I couldn't find them in your book!

Ex-IT: Oh that. See they gave me this germlike germ of an idea which developed into something different. But don't worry. Someone will write about them too. What are Indian authors based in foreign countries for?

@McDonald's

"But sir the coke is free. It comes with the meal."

"I know that but I don't want it. I already got one with the meal my wife ordered."

"Sir but this one is for you. Two meals, two cokes."

"No thanks yaar we want only one coke. You take this one back, why waste?"

"But it's free sir!"



@buffet lunch

"Arre, why only two desserts? They are charging us for the other sweets also na. So you must try everything!"

"No no I'm off sweets."

"To buffet lunch mein kyun aye? Ek din me kuch nahi hota. You must try everything."


Always makes me wonder what the takeaway boy/insistent buffet lady think after such an exchange. Did takeaway boy think we were too slow on the uptake and unable to comprehend the magic term free which means anything you don't have to pay for must not be refused?

Did insistent buffet lady think you were new to the buffet culture and therefore needed education which certainly is load your plate even with things you do not want to eat so that every morsel justifies the 400 odd bucks you were paying?

Random

It's one of those days when I have to key in 2000 words by tomorrow which means I get going tonight. True to tradition have written only 20 words so far and have spent the last hour watching The World's Extreme Restrooms on TV and finding things like http://recipes.bbclifestyle.com/. Given that I drive myself and the girl who helps me around at home batty wondering what to cook everyday I sure need this. Though I wish they had a section on India too. Much as we love Seafood pasta and Summer couscous salad, a life without dal really isn't sustainable for too long. At least in this household. Off to watch Castle on Star World now. The husband is away on work and the son is asleep and though the double decker words need to be written, procrastination is too long a warning to remember!
Oh and by the way finally found a copy of Embroideries by Marjane Satrapi at Blossoms. See that's what I love about Blossoms. The good children at Landmark would ask you to pronounce Satrapi five times as you resisted the urge to type the name yourself and save them the trouble of remembering their alphabets. They'd then possibly announce they're out of copies or disappear in the pretext of finding the book. At Blossoms, you simply park yourself on the ground floor, point to a copy of Persepolis and ask in a rather distracted manner if they have that 'book called embroideries' by her and it materialises like magic in two minutes. Neat haan?

Of crazy tarantulas and bloody oranges

Cannot get myself to like Quentin Tarantino's movies (will be cold shouldered by brother for the rest of my life now). In my mind, they are all jumbled up in a profusion of profanities and guns. And the overdose of gore is a big turn-off. I never understood Reservoir Dogs (bunch of men abusing each other in warehouses and cars) and though I did sit through Pulp Fiction I think that was mainly because of Travolta and Thurman, both of whom I love. Managed to watch Kill Bill 2 up to the point where Thurman kills her former fellow assassin and tells the little daughter she'll have her chance of revenge later. Would've probably gone ooh and aah at such coldly sassy attitude earlier in life but by the time I watched the movie I was a mom and had started turning teary jelly at any suggestion of cruelty to kids in any movie.

Which brings me to the koshchen that who decides which movie is great and which isn't? Because what you like and dislike is so subjective. Remember queasily sitting through Clockwork Orange in my mass communications film class as the slightly unwashed documentary filmmaker taking the course gushed over it. Couldn't even close eyes halfway and pretend to watch all that blood and gore as had to dissect film after that. Your call that classic cinema? Yeah sure. Just like Tarantula's Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs is called one of the top independent cult films ever? Vat nonsense. At least in my world. Gimme In The Mood for Love or Rashomon or Breathless or Lost in Translation anyday over Tarantino's capers. At least they do not have psychotic men trying to cut each other's ears as justification of crazy plot that involves four different gangsters doing four different shootouts in a disco/warehouse/church all the while going f*#k, f*#k, f*#k, f*#k. My thoughts exactly. Yeah.

In Bombay...

...For the week with the boy. This time the brother has shifted conveniently to Bandra so the bad mamma is dragging the boy around, showing him her old playground. And guess what he's mesmerised with? The street food vendors. Of course, he is far from trying anything out yet but he loves standing in front of the sandwichwala, bhelwala and dosawala to see how thy work. His eyes go wide as they deftly go about slapping chutney-butter-aloo on bread and circle dosa batter nonstop on the tawa. He also loves what he thinks are very fancy 'machines' even if it's the just-pressed sugarcane juice his mother would stay miles away from after a college time gastro scare.
All this awe and admiration has made me suddenly realize the lack of street food scene in Bangalore. At least a visible one. Sure you have the nariyalpani vendor and the peanut and fruit sellers but those aren't essentially streetside junk, like Delhi's Chole Kulchas or Momos or golgappe and the abovementioned lot in Bombay. In Bangalore, you're better off walking into a darshini or KFC for a quick hog. In the last five years I don't recall eating anything exciting at a street vendor and no, Empire's late night chicken dosa doesn't count. That's a shop. Street food, as it thrives in Delhi, Bombay and Calcutta is surely missing in Bangalore. Wonder why is it so? Or am I wrong? Any idea, Bangaloreans who perhaps still read this blog? Any street food memories in the city that you think I missed? Please to tell.

In Vombay]

Was asking A to eat his vegetables (carrots really) when he declared that he positively hated them and asked me why I was eating mine. "To grow strong," I said, giving the standard boring Mummy answer. "For what strong?" he demanded to know and when I was silent for a second provided the answer: "Oh to shout."
Did not know whether to laugh or cry or be proud of son's excellent sense of humour like good Indian mother. The husband, predictably enough, was in splits. And once I stopped choking on my peas, couldn't help but think is that how he sees me really? The mamma who's always shouting? The mamma whose favourite word is No?
Did not get too emotional about it as by the time your child is four and half you know that kids really do say the wildest things. So quite a pro at this by now, though this is the first time very teenager style, let's poke fun of mamma comment has happened. If anyone needs a self help cum how to boost your spirits book it's us moms. Perhaps I'll write one. Hmmm....

Why do they call it water cooler moment?

Why not the Chai Wala Gossip or Ciggie Break Talks. Think the Water Cooler is a very foreign concept but some people (esp the kind who think it will make them sound witty) do end up using it. Met a former finance guy ("Wall Street is an addiction") who kept talking of the "watercooler moments" that inspired him to start the venture he's now running. 'Wait a sec,' I wanted to tell him, 'All you guys ever did in that swanky office was buzz around the watercooler? Didn't anyone ever want chai or coffee or a soggy sandwich or even an artery-choking mayo-rich salad at the cafeteria?'

To me, a Watercooler conjures memories of school on hot afternoons when everybody's bottles had dried up and the area around the watercooler would be stamped with muddy shoeprints, lost hankerchiefs or bottle caps. We would let the cold water trickle down our throat, inside and outside and hope to God the PT Sir wouldn't make us play Kabaddi in the hot sun. That is the image I have. Certainly not of a workplace gossip session. That usually involves a certain amount of milk powder ki Chai, watery Nescafe and a lot of smoke.

In every place that I have worked, gossip sessions invariably bring to mind the office staircase or as many would call it, the fire escape. Whether you smoked or not, it was the place to escape when you wanted to bitch about the new babe who wore so much mascara it looked as if she had it surgically inserted or the boss who had no idea how long it took to travel from Bhayandar to VT. Does anyone ever think of watercooler? Now that I freelance and spend most of my working hours at home, I'm wondering what could be my chai escape equivalent and there's only one sad answer: The kitchen!