Drifting Thoughts!
Let there be write.
Thursday, February 15, 2018
Someday I will have my own home
Not a poet, anymore
Friday, March 27, 2015
NH10: Truth is scarier than Fiction
Dhoni, one of the most successful and respectable captains in the history of Indian cricket and a man of integrity and splendid sportsmanship was brought down by many as the reason that incites violence in the hearts of the 'blue-blooded' cricket fans. Because throwing stones and breaking walls of his property is a pretty legit reaction.
And the 'panauti' Anushka who was solely responsible for Kohli's dismissal and not the Australian bowler and fielder. Wow, this girl has some influence and magical powers to have it all in her to go ahead and piss off a billion people with just her presence. Brickbats, social media rampage, cruel jokes, cyberbullying, collective hatred is normal and definitely doesn't show any violent thought space.
But wait, her film NH10 (A) is TOO VIOLENT for I cannot go and see it with my kids. Just like every other film with the (A) certificate and content. That is what a good parent does, goes to see films with certified 'Adult' content with their kids and later complains how it was unsuitable for their precious little one.
Let us talk about NH10. Well, she is a hell of panauti in the film. Rural Badlands that most of us have had a chance to experience in some form of it are savage as thy ve been d.
People who disliked NH10 are the ones who would rather sit in Gold Class Lounge for Happy New Year and Hamshakals.
Acceptance of truth is a lost virtue. Second class citizenship of women has achieved new levels.
Friday, January 9, 2015
Decoding an Indian Wedding
So to keep it short, this is the only blog page I will continue updating. Oh also, I am getting married within a month. I will whine and rant as well as share insights and experiences (even though nobody takes my advice seriously). When I won't be busy hyperventilating, I will be spreading some weddingy cheer here, my online wedding journal.
#3 Pre-wedding photography: I can't give you money, here is your exposure
The only thing I am thankful for in life is I have so many photographer friends. Nope they are not some punters with a DSLR but real professional photographers with real skill and talent. The thing I don't have is MONEY, to pay for my pre-wedding shoot. Hence, exploit! *evil laughter fills the bathroom*. They have often complained about clients saying things to them like "we cannot give you money but we'll give you exposure". I feel you bros!
I am still trying to grasp the concept of a pre-wedding photoshoot. Though I have recently come across some really beautiful pre-wedding shoots with a lot of energy and joy yet something doesn't seem right. One of the partners always has that 'why me?' expression. It's like 'yes baby, of course I am having fun' yet *dying of embarrassment inside*. But then again, who am I to judge? Afterall, I am just a snarky cynical social media junkie.
So while contemplating for my pre-wedding shoot decision, these were the different stages I went through:
Photos taken before wedding
We have been dating for a few years now, and since we have lived in the same city and hung out with each other a lot, we have a million photos together, some natural, some super-posed and mostly selfies (obviously). So pre-wedding photography?
Confusion
Does it make sense to hire someone to take some cheesy "romantic" completely awkwardly Bollywood fairytale-ish posed photos of the 2 extremely weird people that we both are? Awkward, awkward, awkward.
Is it real?
Where did the concept of a pre-wedding photo shoot come into being? Like a lot of other "western" nuptial traditions we have quietly adopted and Indianised, is this one of them?
Let me Google
I tried to look for its origin online but didn't really find any intel on the whys and whats of PWP. There, however, used to be published engagement pictures over a century ago for engagement announcement in local newspapers. So it is a relatively new trend. Okay.
Should I?
If it is a new trend, and will continue for a while, will we as a couple, miss out on something very important if we do not participate? Tell me AM I MISSING OUT ON ANYTHING? TELL ME!
I am still trying to make up my mind, do we want this celebrated pre-wedding candied (is the spelling right?) photo shoot. But are we ready to sell our souls to pay for it? Or we just do this:
Awkward Vearmas are Awkward |
#2 Marriage vs Wedding
Couple ya Coup? |
*stomach begins to churn* *brain starts to burn* *the need to smash my head suddenly rises*
Marriage: (according to Google)
the legally or formally recognized union of two people of the different or same sex as partners in a relationship (though the only accepted communion in our country is of a man and a woman).
Wedding: (Yes, Google said it, don't look at me)
These 2 words often interchangeably used, but nope THEY ARE NOT THE SAME THING! ARGHHHH!
Okay. Now the question nobody asks themselves is whether they want to get married or do they just want a wedding. Because often than not nobody seems to see beyond the flower studded car. Correctly represented by the fade to black at the end of Uncle Studio wali shaadi ki CD when the doli departs from the venue. Rest becomes a mediocre, uninteresting, nobody-gives-a-shit-about-until-you-begin-breeding history.
Weddings are all about pretty things, family reunions, more reasons to hang out with friends and a whole experience full of warm, fuzzy and mixed feelings.
Marriage is real. It is up to me and him to either make it kick ass or let it fizzle out just the way we are constantly reminded it does. Wow just the kind of pep talk I need a few weeks prior!
I am also told that there is just one wedding day where I need to look my best. But what about the rest of the thousands of days of my married life? I know I cannot look my best on each day, hell I will look my worst in them too. Trust me, it is okay!
But for some reason I cannot bring myself to buckle down under this pressure. I do not wish to turn my wedding day into a beauty pageant. Did you know that these makeup type bigwigs charge a good 30-40 thousand rupees for a day's makeup. For real! Because they airbrush gold dust on your face and later serve you diamond fritters on a platinum platter to choke on.
Oh wait we do not have any of that 40 grand left. You know why? Because we bought the most comfortable mattress and bed with it and still had enough money remaining to take a trip to Dharamsala and back. And I will get to sleep on that comfy bed each day including the night of the wedding, obviously after having washed off that gold dust from my face. Yes that is marriage!
#1 The wedding lehenga
Bad pictures are epic! |
So there is a wedding budget and then there is a wedding lehenga budget. We are Punjabi brides, we don't wear a saree on our wedding day. HOW DARE YOU?
I was asked to keep a lac and above separately only for the wedding lehenga. Or like they say for a North Indian bride, your wedding dress can be any colour as long it is red.
"How can you not spend (waste) a meagre 50k on the wedding lehenga?"
"What kind of a girl are you if you don't shell out an outrageous amount for your wedding dress?"
"No red or maroon lehenga????? Chheeee blasphemous! How can you even live with yourself?"
There were these few remarks and then there were saleswomen who would ask me to leave their store because I hadn't chosen a RED LEHENGA for MY own wedding!
True story:
Me: "Ye sab jewellery mein to maroon stones hain, can I have some other colour?"
Saleswomen: "Arrey red ke alawa aur kya hoga? Aapka lehenga bhi to red hain na."
Me: "Nahi actually, it is pink and ..."
Saleswoman: *shuts all jewellery boxes and turns away like I never existed*
Me: Forgive me lord for I have sinned!
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Dare to take #TheRedDare?
I am here to tell you a little bit about this challenge. Dental hygiene is a very basic yet an important part of life. Yet most people tend to brush it off from their discussions, quite literally! So how do you start a conversation around dental hygiene? How do you make people understand its importance or the lack of it? I will tell you the problem with this approach, nobody likes to be told what to do especially when it comes to their personal space.
Therefore, Dabur’s idea is brilliantly simple. Yes, #TheRedDare! #TheRedDare is a fun challenge by Dabur which delivers the message in a very subtle way. I was nominated by a friend on Twitter to take up the dare.
#TheRedDare Package |
- Send a WhatsApp message to +91 9910818814 to get your own #TheRedDare box
- Inside the box there will be 7 Dare Cards and a Dabur Red toothpaste
- You choose any number of dares out of the locations
- You film yourself BRUSHING YOUR TEETH using the toothpaste from the box in the unlikeliest of public places
- In the video you nominate 7 of your friends to take up #TheRedDare
Friday, June 20, 2014
Sajid Khan knows you’re a Dumbass!
If you're one of those, whose check-ins look like this:
"week end funn wit mah hubby - was watching Humshakals at DT Moronica Cineplex."
You should know that this genius director, brother of the director who *ehmmm* directed *coughs* Tees Maar Khan, is SAJID KHAN. And he already KNOWS that you're a dumbass! Do not be surprised. Your secret is out. He figured it out years ago.
Let me take you through his journey from Witty to Shitty. Over a decade ago, he hosted this unconventional, ground-breaking show on television 'Kehne Mein Kya Harz Hai'. The show was about him nitpicking on typical Bollywood formulas, over-acting or what he would laughingly refer to "Hamming" and his insanely hilarious critique on how our films and logic cannot see.
Anyways, his wikipedia page reads: Khan is famous for making atypical cringe-worthy Bollywood movies.His movies are famous for illogic,racist,toilet humour which has a small but notable fan-base in india.
Friday, November 8, 2013
What Perfect World?
Where is the world that we thought existed in the deep corners of our imagination?
Lost prose, faded polaroid, dusty books, rusty film.
It lived, it existed in our thoughts and dreams, it was a part of our lonely curriculum of words, lines and colour.
That world was made up of bits of memories, wants and Nostalgia.
It happened, it is gone, buried. In a stash of smiles, laughter, smirks or tears.
Nostalgia is a pain equal to a low jab into the stomach, leaving you gasping for breath.
Nostalgia is redundant, it is reprehensible and worse than dreams.
Dreams give you hope, Nostalgia brings yearning.
We yearn for that perfect world which was supposed to exist but doesn’t.
Is there an antidote, a cure, an answer to that desire?
But if that world came alive today, will you cherish it? Will you stop complaining?
Will you accept its flaws or worse will you stop finding flaws in it?
O Human, you wish for a perfect existence but you the epitome of imperfections, you will never let it exist; for you O unhappy one, you will, in a selfish stride, not tend to it and find solace in the gloom of its ashes!
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Weight and Watch - Then, now and later
Tuesday, December 25, 2012
Small Town Girl of a Big City
GOD FORBID, if you let your hair open and be seen on the street like THAT. You'd be gawked at, like you were a piece of meat, lewd remarks branding you as a slut, and many times groped and molested (I speak of this from personal experience). I once made a mistake of wearing a sleeveless shirt with a group of 8 women from my own family. A college-going student couldn't keep his hands off and behold another groping right in front of the family as he sped away on his I-am-a-hunk-I-grope-random-girls-cos-my-dad-gifted-me-shiny-bike. I was left aghast and scarred. I made up my mind that very instant, I will not stay in this town where girls are mere objects. Where I am constantly threatened to fend for my safety and dignity. Where going to a market alone after 5 pm seemed like a wretched thought. I had made up my mind to head back to that safe place, that awesome city I had known since childhood. I came back to DELHI.
Friday, December 7, 2012
When Beeba Trended before the World Ended!
#FacePalmMoments |
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Daughters, Women and Anger
Because I am proud of me and my amazing little sister! |
Monday, September 10, 2012
WE THE PEOPLE
Thursday, March 29, 2012
The Death of Conversation
Tweet, Tweet, Tweet; find you hot but you're not so sweet!
Run, run, run; where are you going? thought you were the one!
Blah, blah, blah; What's wrong with you dude?
Only months ago I was lamenting on the fact that there are one thousand friends, acquaintances or people I have made eye contact with, but there is hardly anyone with whom I can sit over a cup of coffee and talk. I don't want a puppy listener but someone whom I can have a real conversation with. An argument would all the more hit my intellectual G-spot. But sadly that was all the lamenting I could do.
So being highly and now reluctantly addicted to the social media. Twitter now more than Facebook, all I see floating around are random jokes, sarcastic jibes, quirky and shocking one-liners, sheepherding of humour as I would like to call it. One original guy leads the way for the herd of hundreds of followers to imitate him. Since short-lived and quick appreciation is the greatest gratification in this trend. I personally follow some of the wittiest and funniest people ever and with follow I don't mean just clicking on the 'follow' tab on Twitter, but trying to know these funny and interesting fellows more closely and personally.
But again I am not limiting my argument to just these fantastic comical people but just about anyone and everyone, online and offline. The 'Conversation' being my real pursuit here, I am not averse to gossiping and idle chit-chat anymore. In this desperate need, I am willing to count it all under the ambit of my ever-eluding "Conversation". Time, the real devil, is one of those luxuries not everyone can afford or enjoy. Being on the run is the need of the hour, and even I do oblige. But when you sit down after a long day at work or a long weekend of drinking and getting hung over, you are obviously not left with much in your system.
Forget talking to your mother about your day, forget bonding with your siblings over dinner, forget discussing your future plans with your dad, forget chatting with your friends about that guy you've been ogling for a while, forget telling your spouse how important they are in your life, all we care about are things that are mere distractions. Random, irrelevant, gratifying or combining them all - fun.
Where does my beloved 'Conversation' fit in this fast-tracked life? We talk, we hear and we move on. We don't think (unless we want to sound spectacularly hilarious to the world online), we don't analyse, we don't psycho-analyse; instead we like this spot behind our monitors and we need Dutch-courage to communicate. We want to be heard and applauded but we are not willing to stop for one moment, make time for ourselves and others, we just don't want to have any conversation. We want to embrace randomness and we proudly do it. But in this endeavour, the real casualty is the intellect. And that my friend marks the death of the 'Conversation'! R.I.P.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Suicide
Painful illusion
Disrupted all her plans
Punctured ego
Nightmarish moment
She never could understand!
What happened?
She asked herself
Her guts revolted
The thought froze her
As it crept in
Then all went blank!
The night more evil
The cliff like death
The wind bore her
Astute as it seemed
It all had withered
Laid wasted on the land!
In the quick moment
She saw it all
The life that had gone bad
But never had she imagined
In the worst of times
Content never could be had!
Dark it was
But clear she saw
The blood, Her blood
Murky it seemed
After the thud
The mistake was rash!
The mist shrouded her
It was no glory
No quiet, no gain
Nothing she thought
It brought
Was shame and more pain!
Undo my death
She could only wince
Undo my loss
In seconds she knew
Kill she made of herself
And a bitter surrender!
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Did i mispel it?
Of a chaotec ofice
Typeing away to etarnity
Ammending pety speling erors
Corecting inacurate gramar
Expennding my vocabulery
Checkking minescule puctuations
Prroof reeding sesions
Duing a thankles job
Of shouttings and fihgts
Of unstopable comotion
Dirtty politcs consumming eaech alive
Presures only add to the misry
Fricshions and its repercushions
All are a parrt of the parcell
That they call advartising
In my opiniun is Madvartising
The mosst cladestine beings
Of this ecentric contraption
Are us the copyriters
Ooops did I mispel it?
Thursday, June 18, 2009
ciao!
Jumped off my ship
Kicked away my life boat
Tore away the life jacket
Now drowning going deeper
Deep, deep down
Lost myself completely
Brooding over yesterday
The misery surrounds me
Holds me tight and takes me with it
Deep, deep down
Arrogance wins modesty loses
Powerful lives weak dies
The way the world turns
Yet it still stings
Deep, deep down
Losing it all with both hands
Crushing all the hopes
No fear no perception
Just letting myself fall
Deep, deep down
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Hope and happiness
Unhappy with my introspection
But the hope still flickers inside
The one with whom now I abide
I will survive after all
I won’t be the cause of my fall
Clinging too tight to tomorrow
Dreading anymore sorrow
One little thing, a genuine smile
Kept eluding me all this while
But happy is what I will be
My moment will come to me
A complex cycle of joy and tears
Our treasured innocence it cuts and shears
My existence does have some implication
As there is no reason for this humiliation
In eternity we seek satisfaction
Searching answers in this cosmic contraption
Even in distress we never cease
To look for the curve that straightens every crease
But why should I not defy the unjust
Why should I lay battered and bust
For I deserve a right to rejoice
As happiness is such a simple choice
Friday, May 8, 2009
Suicide
Painful illusion
Disrupted all her plans
Punctured ego
Nightmarish moment
She never could understand!
What happened?
She asked herself
Her guts revolted
The thought froze her
As it creeped in
Then all went blank!
The night more evil
The cliff like death
The wind bore her
Astute as it seemed
It all had withered
Laid wasted on the land!
In the quick moment
She saw it all
The life that had gone bad
But never had she imagined
In the worst of times
Content never could be had!
Dark it was
But clear she saw
The blood, Her blood
Murky it seemed
After the thud
The mistake was rash!
The mist shrouded her
It was no glory
No quiet, no gain
Nothing she thought
It brought
Was shame and more pain!
Undo my death
She could only wince
Undo my loss
In seconds she knew
Kill she made of herself
And a bitter surrender!
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Marriage- the ultimate resort or an obsolete notion??
I was wondering today where do we stand as a society, have we really progressed in terms of culture and lifestyles? People say we do!! I want to know are we really free to do what we really want to do? I m certain we are! But who decides what is right or wrong? Family, friends, colleagues or us? Why I ask marriage is such a big deal even today? It certainly is for the spending party i.e. the girl n her helpless parents whereas the opposite party gets an all expenses paid trip to the land of free gifts, extravagant feasts, fun and frolic yet they have all the rights and guts to grumble about that Gulaabjamun that didn’t taste so good in the wedding.
As a female I want to ask why do I have to get married before turning 25? I m not talking about a small town conservative family setup, I mean living in the capital of the country in a family which claims it is as modern as renaissance in the 16th century, who are spending lakhs on my education after school, are ready to shell out even more for my MBAs and various professional diplomas. I m talking about the mall-culture family. Why is it when I turn 24, they start getting uncomfortable with the sight of me earning a 6-figured salary and leading a financially independent and a professionally respected life? Why do they want my money should go into the pockets of my in-laws? I have no complaints with what I have, its payback time for me, pay my family back everything they have given to me since the moment of my existence. Monetarily, emotionally I want to take care of them now without them worrying about monthly bills. Why do they start getting uneasy when my 25th birthday year begins? They start asking all our relatives to suggest a “good boy” for me, go through matrimony websites that is only if they are that tech-savvy and secretly print ads in the matrimony section of the classifieds.
They start spending sleepless nights over thinking about my marriage. If I have a boyfriend they start bugging him too asking him all sorts of questions regarding his career, his family, his future plans, his ideologies which were never asked in our courtship of 4 years and god save me if he is my age or younger. I still am talking about the same ultramodern mall hopping family. He would be considered immature and ineligible someone unworthy of me. Well how does that matter now when we have been in love for years and they been updated with his every step already? Well that’s not my point here. I mean I maybe on the threshold of a promotion or a transfer to the office abroad with a raise but I still would be questioningly eyed around because I m almost 25 and not engaged. People start making indirect digs at me between their conversations over a cup of tea at get-togethers or family parties like their obedient daughters are well settled with “respectable” lawyers and CEOs in
I totally agree with Rani Mukherjee in Hum Tum when she asks everyone to back off from fixing her up with strangers “Why don’t people take a hike from getting every girl married?” Is that the only thing a girl is born to do? A very relevant question indeed. I haven’t been vindicating all this while that people should change overnight because a handful of girls have questioned their ethos by being very vocal about their preferences in life. But all I want from this society is that it should stop interfering and judging my life and respect the notion of individuality and personal choice after all I never advised to have or not have their second baby or their third car to anybody.
Marriage clearly should and will happen only when I am ready for it in all respects and not because I blew 24 candles on the cake this year till then I am content dancing at other people’s nuptial ceremonies.