Stream of Unconsciousness

April 2007: Capturing the chaos and craziness of this moment in time with some fun stream-of-consciousness writing.

Friday.

Tired tired tired tired. Yawning in Yari road. Must leave for work. Will sleep in auto. Auto man will be tempted by mountainous tits. Will be driven to brothel and sold into sex trade. Will live for rest-of-life horrifying about unwashed chaddis left behind due to much postponement and lack-of-time, while having to practice chore-bazaar wala erotica-wale positions.

Ohh… I want Nirula’s Hot Chocolate Fudge now. Now. Well, technically cannot have saliva-inducing kill-with-calories Hot Chocolate Fudge now as am sitting on the pot. But will be in more socially acceptable and receptive position by the time it arrives from Delhi.

Must not fall asleep on pot. Must not fall asleep on pot. Will cause much embarrassment. Office day ahead. Sleep. College project on social impact of porn. Boyfriend. Ummm… boyfriend and pornography. Umm… sex. You know you can sleep when you’re underneath during missionary na? Oh temptation.

Man’s World article submission. College porn project. Regular pays-the-bills part-time job. Many deadlines loom. Much gloom blooms. Sleepless. Many days of much work.

Workday begun. Good morning sun. Eyes unprotected in spite of dark circles like sunglasses. Have glued contacts into protesting eyes. Watchman looked at me as though I’m Frankenstein’s monster. Have realised that my unconditional-love-giving strays are also afraid. Am in auto. Am being stared at as few red and bleary-eyed women work on laptops while in poor-man’s transport. Fear of autowala-selling-big-tits-along-with-me returns. I must stay awake. I must stay awake. Awake. Cake. Bake. Brake. Power Brakes says backside of truck ahead. Need to brake. Need a break. More than I can take. Multiple money-related activities. Literature MA Missing in Action from my Master of Arts. 

Workday is over. Deadline doom. Friday fun? No, none. MA assignment till 2 tonight. At least. With snatches of article writing. Both due Monday. Friday = Fry Day.

Saturday.

What? What? Oh-my-God! Saturday morning! Oh no! Saturday noon! Was meant to be a brief nap at 7 PM. Many alarms were set. Many friends were put on ‘wake-me-up’ duty. Horrible let-downing friends. Betrayals and true colours and all. Oh. Alarm rang. And rang. Many million missed calls. Multiple messages. Oh. Puddle of exhaustion-induced drool on my pillow. Must write MA project. 2500 words at least. Cannot fool brilliant lecturers by spinning a web of confusing words. Ooh. What can I do? ‘Pornography and Sex Studies and Their Impact on Women and the Concept of Female Identity’. Interesting topic. So interesting that my professors will actually read it. Shit.

Must avoid philosophical conversations (arguments/fights) with Catholic mother about the redundancy of religion, and the reasons for my interest in erotica and porn. Must not show her what I’ve written on this article so far (the words ‘mountainous tits’ didn’t go down too well) along with what I’ve written on my porn project so far. Must then learn to activate Super Woman-type protective shield to avoid those killer looks. Must certainly avoid these conversations-that-invariably-turn-into-fights when am sleep deprived, cranky and menopausal. No. Certainly meant PMSing, not menopausal, though don’t know whether there’s a difference. Okay. Back to work.

Am being badgered by mad friends to go out. MAD = Me Alcohol Dependent. Am aware that my popularity stems from being a teetotaller therefore a sober driver. Nonetheless, cannot go. Must stay and work. And I will sleep at the wheel anyway, so, sober or not, I can’t be driver tonight.

Am just wondering… when I die of exhaustion, will someone please put a disclaimer on my body saying, ‘Tara* didn’t really have dark circles that reached her chin.’ Please, please. Anyway, I’m going to bed now.

Sunday.

Surveying progress. Shit. Am done with only 1400 words. Have to spin more yarns to reach submittable 2500 word limit. Love my Mans’ World editor but hate that when he says ‘deadline’, he means he’ll kill me if I don’t deliver. Wonder whether this bit will be edited out. Back to porn project.

Surveying room. More junk food wrappers than you see outside McDonalds. Chips and chocolate and Coke and stuff. Oh weight problems. Also breath that smells like a dead cow. These things are not good for me. Coke-shoke and all. Will just make me fat and dissolve my teeth. Toothless tomorrow. Toothless before my 25th birthday. With dark circles. And overweight. Horribly, diabolically intelligent, but that’s before evil enzymes released from junk food will jelly-fy brain. Oh might as well not study for Masters and stuff as will not have brain to do anything with education. So can technically abandon this college project right now. Oh evil thought. Back to work.

Why? Why? Why is my life like this? Why must I have regular part-time job and freelance jobs and padhai to do? Why can’t all the unders and overs in my life be exchanged. Then I’ll be under-worked and over-paid and under-weight. Must rue over this great philosophical revelation with my eyes closed. Ummm….

I’m going to be repetitive here and say oh my God! Overslept yet again! Oh my God. Ever notice how nap is a short word, sleep is a longer word and oversleep is the longest out of the three. Okay, so I hit the longest one. Now what? Now what? Must focus on the fact that people say I work well under stress. Shanti, shanti, calm down. Okay Tara*, you have about 12 hours left to leave for work—which means 12 hours to sleep, write this article and finish porn project, which I have to print out at work, as it is due straight after. Aaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrgggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhh. Dead faint.

Monday.

Okay, it’s four am. 2400+ words done. Include name-shame and all of that and that 2500. Oh thank God. And other thing to do—finish this article. That’s done too. Now for the final thing on my check-off list—sleep. Goodnight.

---

An edited version of this article appeared in Man's World in April 2007.

Sick Minds, Freud & the Interperversion of Dreams

April 2007: I self-analyse my dreams and invite you to do the same with yours.

I’ve never read Freud. But my Literature classes contain a reference to him at least once a week. And terms like the ‘Oedipus complex’ and The Interpretation of Dreams are traded fairly freely in regular life. (This is especially true of when us girls get together. It’s a great way to justify why that worthless sucker our friend was dating had the balls to dump her. I mean, the boy has some serious issues. So once we’re done with all the tears and snot wiping and reach the stage of semi-drunk boy-bashing, the Oedipus complex is a trump card! “Oh babe, he’s just not worth it. Such a mama’s boy!”) So as I was saying, one can’t help having some of Freud’s notions and theories floating around in one’s head in a rudimentary, if half-baked form.

A part of me is fairly sceptical about this interpretation of dreams thing though—not that I know much about it. I mean, why can’t dreams be just dreams—a movie in your head, entertainment, Spielberg-in-the-making, a Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi-style recap, your brain's way of beating boredom? Why must they be a thesis on your thoughts? Why?

Needless to say, the last para was my way of forming my defence. Pre-fabricating it. Because, just the other day, to kill pre-exam studying induced boredom, I analysed my own dreams using my rather sketchy knowledge of Freud’s principles and symbols. And here’s what I discovered.

I am a complete pervert. Complete. I should be locked up and have the key thrown away. I should be in a mental asylum seeking shock therapy for sexual depravity. I should be kept miles away from other life-forms including cockroaches and lizards—you never know what I’ll get up to. I should at least be under house arrest after dark. I should not be allowed into public toilets and other people's homes. I should have to wear a t-shirt saying 'I am a sex offender'. My two stray doggesses and family and many friends (who have obviously been traumatised by depraved ways) will have to seek therapy.

I’m presenting the tame examples of my analyses. Ones that don’t desecrate the memory of my father who recently past way (given that Freud’s most popular theory is the Oedipus complex). And ones that won’t get me stoned on the street.

Dream #1

I am boarding a local train in Delhi. (As if I’ve not been traumatised enough by my because-of-poverty DTC bus days!) I’m first in line and enter the empty compartment followed by throes of humanity. And there, on the seat, is a little panther cub. (I have no clue how I arrive at this conclusion because the cub is brown, and looks like a combination of Simba from the Lion King and a Bull Mastiff puppy!) Anyway, to save this cub, I have to take him to Chandigarh. (Of all places?) The cub and I hold hands and skate-fly all the way to Chandigarh. (The cub, by the way, is also flying on skates, standing on his two hind legs, and has suddenly morphed into a larger-than-life Scooby-Doo-type cartoon dog.) I reach Chandigarh and meet the Sardar who owns the famous animal shelter. (This has obviously come from Lucky Singh’s character in Lage Raho Munnabhai that I’ve just watched.) I feed the cub (who is now back to original size) some water from a tap, leave him at this animal shelter and leave for Delhi in a car.

Here’s what (I think) Freud and other psychoanalysts may have thought of my dream. I enter a local penis (train = long slithery snake-like thing), where I perform a rescue operation (= cure erectile dysfunction). Flying through the air means one of three things to Freud—that I a) have an erection (a biological impossibility), b) have penis envy or c) have an erect clitoris as I’m aroused. As a symbol, water gushing from a tap could mean nothing but male ejaculation. And after this, having accomplished my mission (= cured an erectile dysfunction in some sort of sexual surrogate role!), I leave the scene happily.

Analysing ones’ dreams is such a simple and fun way to pass time, isn’t it? Let me teach you how to with a practical exercise. Let’s try and analyse my next dream together…

Dream #2

I am (finally) a multimillionaire. (Dreams!) I enter the huge penthouse that I have just bought. I open the first of many zillion rooms. (Okay, let me change that to multibillionaire!) As I walk in, I see a box that I open. Inside the box is my old maid, Mary. (Old, as in, maid who took care of me when I was very young. She wouldn’t be older than 40 now.) An autopsy is being conducted on Mary, even though she’s alive and smiling at me. (Dr Frankenstein, anyone?) My scream echoes down a tunnel. I leave the room and enter another, where I see a bed and a writing table, on which I find a big, thick pen, which is a permanent marker. (Studies and sleep, the two constants that have an inverse relationship in my life.) I pick up the marker and go to the other room where I write on the box ‘This pen works’. (“Oh does it now?” says Dr Freud…) As I walk away, I realise I’m leaning on a cane, though I’m perfectly okay. I fall into a hexagonal tunnel. (My sense of aesthetics remains intact.) I land on a soft, gold hammock, where I’m sit cross-legged, with a bottle of Diet Pepsi in the triangle of my legs. I am fiddling with the cap and then the bottle erupts.

No, this dream isn’t about ambition or wealth, as I’d you’d assume at first. Can’t you see? Oh come on, it’s so obvious! Interpret my dream and here I’m a bisexual with much penis envy. It’s like this—I finally manage to enter a world with many vaginas to chose from (many rooms = crevices, silly! Start thinking perverted). Inside a vagina inside a vagina (box inside a room) is my old maid (woman, not Mary specifically. This is what is called ‘symbolisation’—when repressed urges or suppressed desires are acted out metaphorically. See, my analyses have got better, more in-depth and all). Besides, the fact that she’s having and autopsy is a positive thing—it could mean that new and interesting experiences are ahead for me, especially in a sexual context. (You didn’t know that, did you? The net serves up many such interesting bits of absolutely useless information.) And then I scream (in pleasure, perhaps?) down a vagina (tunnel! Oh come on, this was easy)! I walk into another vagina, in which I have sex, or want sex, with a man (marker = cylindrical = phallic symbol = man) on the bed. And yes, I assert my bisexuality (over boring-old simple lesbianism) by telling the vagina (box) that the penis works. (Oh really now!) But then I abandon a useless man (cane = phallic = man = patriarchy) for the comfortable cushion of a vagina (that inviting and soft golden hammock) where I fantasise about having a penis and ejaculation.

Fun, isn’t this?

Disclaimer: Play this game at your own risk. The management is not responsible for any of the following scenarios—

1)      You actually think your analyses are right

2)      You loathe yourself to bits

3)      You scare yourself to death

4)      You stop sleeping for fear of dreams

5)      You become religious to prevent impure thoughts

---

An edited version of this article appeared in Man's World in April 2007.

Daddy’s Darling

March 2007: In October last year, the man I was most attached to died holding my hand. He was surrounded by all those he most loved—his wife, father, uncle and aunt, closest friend, and only child, me.

My dad was diagnosed with cancer in 2004. It chose to strike at the worst time ever—our family was in the process of immigrating to Australia. Mum and I were already there, dad was wrapping up and was scheduled to leave in nine days when his ‘bone cyst’ showed up in an X-ray. Mum and I flew back. The cancer was discovered on the operating table.

The two years that my dad fought his cancer were the two years the family battled to stay sane. Emotionally, each of us fluctuated between hope and reality; despair and faith. Every positive result put us over the moon and validated every belief in the goodness and justness of the world: every negative development drowned us in despair through which hope and belief in miracles, realistic or not, were the only saviours. In some ways, being on that emotional rollercoaster was worse than having to deal with his death now that he’s gone and that’s final. It changed us all.

I drove head-first into a full-blown depression that I’m just about coming out of. Mum, who I’d describe as a questioning Catholic, decided to ‘mannat maango’. She bartered with God—turned vegetarian if only he’d spare the love of her life. He didn’t. I think she might as well revert to non-vegetarianism. Our family, which is educated and decidedly non-superstitious, took to consulting saadhus and astrologers, going to Haridwar, and doing foolish things like throwing quantities of wheat and jaggery into the Ganga. The depths of desperation.

Dad was the strongest through this. There were moments of bitterness—“I’ll die out of a suitcase.”; there were moments of grief—“I’m ruining everyone’s life”. But those were rare. The way he lived his life and nurtured his relationships ensured that my grandparents’ house in Dehradun was always filled with friends from the world over. His optimism through the pain was inspiring. In fact, after he died, I discovered a letter I’d written to him when the cancer had just been diagnosed: the envelope said, ‘Open only when you’re really depressed’. It was unopened.

There are many ‘what ifs’ which lead to much guilt and regret. They don’t really include the fact that my career and educational aspirations and marriage dissolved around dad’s illness and my need to be with him.

One ‘what if’ grips me with guilt. You see, my telling on someone when I was really young caused a rift in my father’s family. It resulted in an on-again-off-again relationship with a really close relative who is a very competent doctor. It’s been speculated that my dad’s cancer was caused by radioactive iodine that he took to kill his thyroid that was hyperactive. When my dad got his thyroid ‘blasted’, we were on an ‘off’ stage with this doctor who told me, when dad died, that, had he known about it, he wouldn’t have let my dad take the nuclear medication because of the high cancer risk. If I had just shut up all those years ago there wouldn’t have been the ‘off’ stage: the doctor would have dissuaded my dad from taking the iodine: the cancer wouldn’t have struck: he’d still be alive…

The other major ‘what if’ leads to a feeling of pure regret. Chemotherapy was purported to be working for dad. The test results were all positive after his first round of chemo. Then his tongue got paralysed and there was a second round. He was confident he’d beat the cancer. While on his second round, he consulted this very well known homeopath from London, who has cured people we know of cancer. This doctor arrived at our doorstep in Mumbai one day, at the same time mum was at dad’s hospital being told that dad wouldn’t last long. I saw this as a message too strong to be a mere coincidence. This was December but dad didn’t start his homeopathy until early May—he said the dietary restrictions would stop him from eating the little that chemo had left him with an appetite for. I kept urging him, forcing him to start the homeopathy. When he did start it, it was too late. The homeopathy had great results but the cancer was too far gone. My dad believed he would conquer cancer and didn’t see the urgency to start the medication that could have saved his life. A lesson learnt—it’s great to believe in your abilities and to be positive and keep the faith. But it’s a fine line between that and overconfidence, which will lead you to foolish decisions.

And there’s the ‘what if’ he didn’t smoke, drink, eat red meat…

His death was poetic and glorious in many ways. He waited until all of us were by his hospital bedside and then took off his oxygen mask, waved his hand and said, “Bye.” Mum was holding his right hand, I was holding the other. I started crying and had a sinking feeling in my stomach, though mum was very calm. He told us not to hold him back and said, “Forget it” repeatedly. Mum and I told him we’d forget it, forget all the pain. Mum said, “Fly away baby, fly away.”

And he said, “Flying away, flying away, flying away, flying away…Flown away.”

And he was gone.

In his last moments, I remember his reaching out instinctively and desperately for mum, holding her hand, kissing it. Arguing with the doctor as he put the oxygen mask back on. An uncouth relative whispering loudly in the background, disturbing the sanctity of the last few moments. Those moments are so special, and are so hard to write about.

I’ve been a crazy daughter—went through my wild ‘bad daughter’ days (years!) before I became sane and turned out okay, if a bohemian dilettante who writes for a living. I feel I ran out of time with my dad—that he’d barely started seeing the fruits of his patience and toil. I’m 23 now: the recognition is arriving slowly, the money is just about starting to be significant. But he isn’t here to see it: to feel the pride. My mum is, but I’m convinced she needs me and validation of her sacrifices way less than he ever did. I’ve had these grandiose dreams of settling my middle-class ex-Naval officer dad and mum in luxury. No time left for that.

I am left with many childhood memories. At the moment they’re all overshadowed by the more immediate pain of dad’s cancer and death. I have nightmares—most involve being told that he’s not really dead. And if it wasn’t for a very strong support structure—my parents’ and my friends—mum and I wouldn’t be ‘okay’.

I’ve always scoffed at people who’ve turned to religion and God in times of adversity—I could never understand it. I’m agnostic and see religion as nothing but rituals and a way of life, and God as nothing but a crux for the weak. I’ve always believed I’m too intellectual for blind belief—that everything has a scientific and logical explanation. But this experience has changed me. Not only do I understand the need for religion and God, I must admit I was tempted. In a way, I feel that I want to believe: that I wish I could believe.

I want to believe in karma: that the pain he’s suffered in this life will ensure that he has a pleasant journey ahead.

I want to believe in reincarnation: that I will see him again.

I want to believe in Heaven: that he is happy now, having lived a good and moral but unfulfilling life here on earth.

I want to believe in ghosts and spirits: that he’s still around, here, somewhere.

Oh, I want to believe so many things.  

But mostly, I want to not believe it’s over.

---

An edited version of this article appeared in Tehelka in March 2007. Read the obituary I wrote for my mother-in-law here.

Eve Empowered

February 2007: A battle cry for feminists.

I am not good looking—at least no more than averagely so. I am 5 feet 9 inches tall; have a short crop of hair that’s growing out of being bald; am fairer than I’d like to be; have a pretty but acne-scarred face; and am busty but overweight. Oh, I pray for better looks—for a skin that is chocolate brown like my mother’s, and blemish free; to be many, many kgs lighter than I am; for a toned belly; etc. I pray for better looks almost always—there are two exceptions. One, when I remind myself of Naomi Wolf’s The Beauty Myth (then I feel silly and gullible to media imaging of women—I really have nothing wrong with me!) and two, when I am in too-crowded or too-lonely a place (then I’d rather look absolutely terrible).

Everyone I know—women of all ages and shapes and sizes and stages—have been 'eve teased' or more all over the country. Delhi is particularly bad, Mumbai is okay, but no place is really safe. Getting harassed, flashed, felt-up or molested is a rather common phenomenon. And perhaps my looking terrible won’t solve the problem—the only criterion seems to be being a woman.

The sexual incidents are vivid memories. I was in Mumbai, about 10 years old. I got flashed in a bus by an old man seated next to me. My mum was in the seat ahead. Again, I was about 12, boarding a bus, still uncomfortable about my budding breasts, when a man squeezed them, hard and painfully—the first time I realised what a problem they’d be! Since then, it’s been series of incidents in crowded places, lonely places, all places!

I had the misfortune of going to school and college in Delhi. Everyday, I’d come back from school traumatised because something or the other would have happened to me on the way back. Everyday, I, arguably not feeble looking, not even overtly good looking, would come back from college angry because I would invariably get felt up in the bus.

But there was an incident that changed my perspective on things. You see, realistically, being flashed, for example, is not bad in itself. Really, you’ve seen one cock, you’ve seen them all—no offence meant! It’s the fear, and the intrusion: the lack of choice. Anyway, here’s what happened. My 12th boards were around the corner, and classes were out. I had gone to school to get some doubts clarified. Walking back, I peered into my classmate’s driveway, in the hope of seeing her and saying hi. I saw her father get into his car—I recognised him from photos she had brought to school. I walked on—only to find, much to my shock and disgust, that her father was driving by and harassing me.

A few weeks later, there was a post-boards party at this classmate’s house. The fear on her father’s face, when he recognised me (with some urging on my part) as the person he had harassed, changed my life. He, the perpetrator, was afraid, not I. This was when I decided that I would fight back whenever I could. I’ve done some pretty pro-actively aggressive things. I guess it helps that I’m not small built, and can get aggressive. I wear these solid silver rings—one, an elevated Nandi bull, is a deadly weapon. I have used this to hit someone who was sticking his erection into my thigh on a Mumbai train.

I have used the knife that I used to carry to college—no, not to kill anyone! A man who saw me walking a lonely stretch promptly got off his scooter and went behind a fence to flash at me. He watched as I opened my knife with relish and ripped the seats of his scooter apart.

At a rock show, it gave me great pleasure to hit the guy who squeezed my boob in the crowd and scream, "I’ll cut your balls off, you bastard," before any of my male friends could react!

And this is it. All the incidents, every one of them, where I did not retaliate, have left me with a sense of violation, these many, many years later. I am still haunted by them. I seethe with anger at the man who got away with flashing at me, feeling me, using his sexual power against me. I have felt victimised. But each and every time I’ve fought back, and hurt or humiliated the aggressor, I’ve felt whole and complete. Perhaps, on a small scale, it is my sense of justice, my closure.

And it’s not only me. My aunt was in a girls’ hostel during her college years. Men would come and masturbate against the boundary wall, despite repeated complaints to the police, leaving the girls feeling sick and powerless. Until they filled buckets with urine (patiently, over three days each) and flung the contents at the men on the wall. The incidents stopped. This was a practical solution—making those men realise that they couldn’t really get away with everything in a lawless land. It was also a solution that empowered the women against the few powers that men can still wield against us—the sexual and the physical.

For those of you who watch Frasier Crane, remember the episode where he uses force (against a rude guy in a coffee shop), leading to his listeners using his example as a license to get unnecessarily and disproportionately violent? I sincerely hope that is not what happens here, even though this article reads like it belongs to the feminist version of the legendary Al Qaeda Handbook. My perspective is this (for men as well as women)—seek justice for wrongs done to you. Get closure—legally, or in the most practically harmless way possible.

For, as much as I appreciate Gandhiji, and am glad for this new surge of Gandhi-giri that has come about, sometimes, I believe Gandhi-ism is not the answer. If I turned the other cheek, they’d both be pinched.

---

An edited version of this article appeared in Tehelka in February 2007.

Pinocchio No More

January 2007: How my nose job solved psychological issues more than it did the (non-existent) issues of my nose.

When I was really young my mom (who I insist I love in spite of this!) said Barbara Streisand and I had similar noses. Which, in itself, is not a bad thing to say. But then, a few months later, completely oblivious to the fact that I had a better memory than hers even when I was six and she was thirty, she said, “Barbara Streisand has a really ugly nose.” This comment, for a reason that completely escaped her, caused her little daughter to weep and weep until my little heart nearly gave way! Now here’s the thing—no one has ever said that I have an ugly nose since. Not one person. And on grown-up analysis, I am well aware that my nasal organ looks nothing like the legendary long-nosed singer’s. In fact, I am convinced that my mother has needed spectacles since she was thirty. However, the memory of that childhood scar has remained.

My nose isn’t crooked or anything. In fact, it is perfectly straight. It did have a hook at the end though, that I grew up with a complete complex about. It looked to me like something you’d stick a ring through if I were a cow. Knowing this complex, my ex-husband would lovingly call it a ‘Lousy Cowsy nose’ (better than his ‘Pakoda’ I always retorted)! I would avoid posing for photographs that intended to take my profile, and I was convinced that that was really not ‘my best face forward’.

So when I was in god-forsaken Dehradun for a long time, away from civilisation on family business, I decided to finally do it. At 23, after 17 years of being complexed (23 – 6 = 17). Go under the knife. Get that little loop chopped off. My father, who was very sick at the time, gave his approval in a drugged haze. My mother agreed 'once she approved of the doctor’. She also insisted I consult our neighbourhood ENT specialist, quite oblivious to the fact that I was embarrassed to death because Dr Bhatia was a very close friend of my grandparents’ and had seen me grow up! So, all background done, I went for my first consultation to this famous plastic surgeon. And then, after having got a few tests done, I went back for my second one, mother in tow. However, this time, for some reason, there was a huge police presence outside the hospital when we reached it. My mother was immediately suspicious. You see, her ‘once I approve of the doctor’ literally translated meant ‘once I meet him, talk to his family, examine his degrees, check whether the hospital has violated any building norms, speak to his professors, meet his wife, see if his own nose is up-to-the-mark, etc.’ No one, doctor or not, was too good for her dear daughter’s nose. Anyway, she spoke to the police and gathered that there had been an acid attack on some small-time actress’s sister, who was admitted to the hospital. My surgery was scheduled for a few days later…

I will now give you and example of my mother’s hyperactive imagination. You know what they say—an empty mind is a devil’s workshop. I was out the next day when I got a call from her. Sitting at home, she had come up with a theory that would have made Sherlock Holmes proud. “What if,” she said, “your (harmless and sweet!) doctor has orchestrated the attack to bring publicity to his hospital, the only one that’s advertising plastic surgery in this town?” I am fortunate to have a little more sense (and a less idle mind) than she does! In light of this creative use of her imagination, I quite forgive her for drawing a non-existent parallel between Ms Striesand’s nose and mine.

Anyway, I’d thought about it long and hard. Would I tell people, would I not tell people? I decided to tell because otherwise it would just get complicated—who I had told, who I had not told, who’d noticed, who wouldn’t... So, on a medium as public as it can get, here it is… I had plastic surgery a couple of months ago to get my long nose shortened. My kind doc, who had originally told me I’d have a small scar at the base of my nose, said very proudly when I woke up, "Oh, I managed to do it without a scar. Now no one will even know!" Here’s the thing—there are two reasons no one would know I’d had a rhinoplasty (why such a mean name)? One, of course, was that I had no scar. Two, I looked no bloody different! I might as well have decided to not tell a soul!

So, here I was, recovering from a surgery that might as well not have happened, in my grandparents’ house. They were completely flummoxed. “Kya naak katake aayee hai,” said my witty grandfather. My dear Dr Goyal said he’d do the surgery again, for free, and snip a little bit more of. And he did. I look marginally different to other people—those who I’ve already told. Others don’t notice a difference at all. My aunt, in an effort to make me feel good, kindly said, “Oh, but this is the true test of plastic surgery—you shouldn’t be able to tell!” And then, what exactly is the point?

Before my surgery, I was taking to my friend Shibu, who sent me an SMS saying, “No need for a nose-job babe, you’re beautiful as you are.” Baggy, who I was chatting with on Skype, was meaner. She said some quack in Dehradun would cut my nose off and then I’d look like I have leprosy and then, big tits or not, no one would look at me. After the surgery, Shiv has been teasing me about my new weight-loss plan—getting rid of 20 gms at a time by chopping off body parts.

But you know what, difference or no difference, pain or no pain, money down the drain or not, I’m feeling much better about myself. Much better. I no longer feel that Aishwarya Rai is any competition at all…

But tell me something, all those of you in the legal profession. Do you think I have a case? Seriously, if I sue, would I stand a chance? Would I be able to get my mom to reimburse my medical costs—considering that it was her genes and her flawed imagination/terrible memory that led me to the surgery in the first place! And then, what about compensation for mental harassment, huh? Do you think I would win?

---

An edited version of this article appeared in Man's World in January 2007. Read another article about my experiments with plastic surgery here.

The Reduction of Seduction

November 2006: Is seduction an outdated art?

Perhaps the most telling indicators of how dramatically the art of seduction has suffered over the years, are the results I encountered when I Googled the word. Here’s what I encountered—

The first site that came up was a semi-porn site, which promised ‘100% free dating tips, sex tips and seduction secrets’. It also featured the promising article ‘How to seduce your ex’s friend’.

Following this promising start was a site on ‘Speed Seduction’ (registered and all huh!), a theory created by one Ross Jeffries.

Third in line was a site that would teach me to use ‘hypnotic tricks, phone techniques, kinesthetics, power rules, foreplay, along with a host of tricks to seduce any woman’.

This search also yielded a porn shop and a lingerie brand called Seduction. The word also showed up in a variety of porn sites…

Here’s what I didn’t know—old-fashioned seduction is truly outdated. It took a Google search to teach me this hard fact of life—years spent waiting around for my knight in shining armour didn’t get this fact into my thick skull!

This painful realisation made me think long and hard about why the art of seduction is dead—or dying at any rate. (Oh, by the way, I came across a site detailing the ‘science’ of seduction as well—reminded me a little of that chick-flick… can’t remember what it was called… where this girl equates men with cows or something and relates mating behaviours.) From a sociological perspective, the reasons seem to be different for Western countries and for India.

Sociologically, seduction, when applied to sexual behaviour, refers to persuading a person to do something that s/he may later regret and/or would normally not want to do. Seduction is the stage before sex: the many-fold and complicated steps involved in convincing a person of your charms and desirability.

In the West, where arranged marriages haven't been the norm for a while, seduction became a huge part of sexual and social consciousness during the period between extreme prudery and absolute sexual liberty. It was during this time that a man (it was usually a man) had to use his charms and powers of persuasion to convince a woman to go to bed with him. However, the advent of the sexual liberty of the '60s reduced the need for elaborate seduction… going by the traditional definition, women didn’t need much convincing to go to bed, as it was neither something they ‘wouldn’t normally do’, nor something they’d  ‘regret later’! The final fall for this dying art form came with the advent of the internet and the impersonal and brazen sexual norms it brought about—my profile on Skype, which is neither inviting nor too interesting, gets me several offers of ‘friendship’ and more every day!

We, in India, have got the short end of the stick where it comes to our exposure to this fine art. With our arranged marriages, seduction on a purely sexual level was rare and restricted, particularly after the British came to India and left us with their unhealthy Victorian morality (that the RSS has promptly adopted as being part of authentic Indian parampara). Literature and myth in India have several accounts of sexual seduction, and describe a number of gods and their sexual prowess. Lord Krishna and his gopis, the Kamasutra and Khajuraho are all a part of our culture.

Anyway, when dating and sexual liberty finally became mainstream in the '90s, the internet-porn generation emerged simultaneously (or perhaps the emergence of dating and sexual liberty has something to do with the emergence of the internet and free porn—it’s not really a question of what came first: all social movements are interdependent and feed off each other). There was never a chance for subtle physical seduction—we went straight from the eyes staring meekly from under the ghoonghat to them staring wide-eyed at the wonders the internet presented. We now have new and improved virtual ways of meeting, flirting and planning/having sexual liaisons. Unfortunately, the era of seduction has, by and large, passed us by.

Such is the pity. Where are the old-fashioned men who wined and dined a woman, who picked us up at the door and escorted us back home? My friend, lets just call her ‘S’, gets drunk fairly frequently—and does so with a group in which more than one guy is seriously interested in her. However, the guys (and she) think it perfectly all right to deposit her, almost passed out, in a cab to get her home. I mean, come on! Forget chivalry, think safety maybe?

But hey, I understand that everything comes as a package deal. If I were with an old-fashioned guy, who did all the right, romantic things, he’d perhaps also be conventional enough to be intimidated by my sexuality, would probably keep me from writing brazen articles and want to do it missionary style all the time! On the other hand, an unconventional man will probably not do all the chaste and romantic things Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty had done to them. But he’ll accept me, as I am, and I will not be judged for having sexual impulses and making moves as and when the feeling seizes me.

But then, we’ve all grown up reading happily-ever-afters. (Now completely rubbished in our cynical feminist heads—why did Sleeping Beauty need to be rescued by a man? Her ‘happily ever after’ probably consisted of placid domesticity. And why couldn’t Cinderella just run away and become a big-time Bollywood actress if she was so beautiful?) But really, we really want the best of both worlds. We want the seduction and the romance, the flirting and the flowers—not for too many intelligent women are the internet ‘friendships’ and the cold hook-ups (at least not more than once in a while). We all want the best of both worlds—I want the man who treats me like a Princess, but doesn’t expect me to do nothing but sit on a throne! I want a Prince without old-fashioned gender definitions.

My knight in shining armour? The old romantic legend, slightly modified and updated, infused with a liberal dose of feminism and modernism—and of course, schooled in the art of seduction. All the chivalry and none of the chauvinism!

---

An edited version of this article appeared in Man’s World in November 2006. 

And so much has changed—for me and in the world, in general—since I wrote it! Tinder coexists with shaadi.com, living in is par for the course, feminism is in wave five. And that knight in shining armour I was dreaming of? I found him! :)

Think Drink

September 2006: How’s life from a non-drinker’s point of view?

Right off the bat, let me establish that I don’t drink. At one point of time I would add ‘never ever’ to my ‘I don’t drink’ statement, but now that I’ve had alcohol eight times (ginti se!) in my whole life, the ‘never ever’ tag no longer applies. Nonetheless, I can say that I’m not a social drinker—each of those eight times, I’ve gotten completely drunk. Completely shit-faced. It’s a very funny feeling looking at the world from behind a haze of alcohol. It’s rather like seeing everything through a honey-coloured filter while spinning on a top: all things are beautiful and nothing is stationary. More on what I think of the world when I’m drunk—and what the world thinks of me—later.

I don’t really know why I don’t drink. Maybe I don’t care much for what alcohol does to/for me in small quantities. (The jury is still out on what I think of what alcohol does to me in large quantities—I’ll keep you posted!) Maybe I don’t like the bitter taste—I have more than a sweet tooth, I have sweet teeth, and alcohol, well, just tastes terrible. Maybe I don’t think it’s worth the calories—I need to give up something for all the sweet calories I ingest. Maybe I’ve watched too many social drinkers slur their way through fauji parties to want to be like that. Maybe I’ve listened to too many lectures delivered by my mom to my dad about his drinking—thought it’s surprising they’ve affected me when none of her lectures against smoking have. 

I honestly don’t know why. But even when I turn down drink after drink at parties, very few people actually take me at face value when I say I don’t drink. You see, I am cool, dress well, speak well, party hard—and people believe the two just don’t match. On further probing, I say, ‘I don’t drink on principle.’ This adds to the coolness factor and my whole woman-of-substance-and-mystery persona. And this really throws my friendly host, besides being great party conversation, especially since my dad worked for an alcohol company and I’ve written this trashy little e-book on alcohol. (I know, tell me about it—the things we starving writers will do to keep the home fires burning!)

Not drinking has made me very popular with a certain section of the population. Firstly, I am a very cheap date. Secondly, I get invited to all these society parties, with my society-type friends, where I am very out-of-place with my kajal-panda eyes and jhola. I have always marvelled at my own popularity. I fit in everywhere, I thought. I am fun and friendly and oh-so-popular! It was only recently that I realised my popularity had its roots in my being the designated driver, a cheaper alternative to employing a driver or taking a cab. Of course, this realisation has done wonders for my sense of self worth.

But boy, have I been drunk! The first time I got drunk was in Jaipur. I was there with my parents, all of 16 years old. At this party a friend kept handing me this pretty blue drink. It was a beautiful blue, and in my mind, anything blue is attractive and positive. And it wasn’t bitter. So I drank and I drank, in spite of my mom warning me that it was quite potent. By the end of the evening, I was completely smashed. Sufficiently lubricated, I ended up telling my parents about quite a few indiscretions I would, under normal circumstances, have paid to keep from them. My first taste (quite literally!) of how alcohol can make you say and do things that you may not have said and done in a more sober state.

A few years later, I was seeing this guy. The Christmas-New Year’s holidays came along, and I wanted him to come to Goa with me. I begged and pleaded—all my friends were going. He said no and we didn’t go. Three days before New Year’s, I was single again—dumped and heartbroken. I was all alone in the city—with all my friends on the warm, sun-kissed beaches of Goa. I decided to get drunk on New Year’s Eve, all by myself, miserable and pathetic, as my parents went out partying. My maid watched amused as I proceeded to blow chunks a few minutes before the clock struck 12. And that’s when my parents called to wish me. My maid, in a well-meaning attempt to shield me from the consequences, told my parents I was in my room with someone, and that the door was locked so I couldn’t come to the phone. I spent the New Year drunk and heartbroken, with my parents furious with me in the mistaken belief that I was locked in my room with a new boy.

Though it still escapes me why anyone would want to have sex with a drunken woman. I’m convinced—and this comes from personal experience—that men who have sex with drunken women suffer from latent necrophilia. Really, how else would you describe someone who would willingly sleep with someone completely unresponsive! I have refused to turn over, cooperate, kiss or even wake up to acknowledge the sex that is being had with me—yes, I use passive voice deliberately.

Anyway, coming back to my interesting drunken episodes. A few weeks ago, I was at a little celebratory get-together at a bar. I was goaded into drinking, and once I decided to drink, I went at the free booze like a true alcoholic. I drank four Long Island Iced Teas like they belonged to Lipton and not Long Island. Soon I was drunk as a feather in the wind. In the company of close friends, I decided to close my eyes and go to sleep, queasy as I was. Except, I have noticed that seats get remarkably slippery when you’re drunk. I kept sliding under the table, and would wake up sitting there, facing someone’s crotch. I also remember having to pee a lot—alcohol does really fly through your system, doesn’t it! I finally fell asleep on someone’s lap, and was woken up only when it was time to go home. I was being, well, the word may be supported or dragged—I’m not quite sure which—out of the pub when I realised I wanted to puke. I threw up on my friend’s shoes, and then again on mine. This someone has since sent me a laundry bill, for the large saliva stain on his pants on which I had drooled when asleep, and another one for new shoes—to replace the ones I puked on. By the time I was taken to the ladies’ loo and was made to stand appropriately poised over the sink, I was done. Anyway, I was driven home in a taxi, asleep on the back seat. When we reached home, however, I heard the negotiations between the cabbie and my friend—and was conscious enough to do the calculations for him and tell him that we were being over-charged by a hundred bucks. I don’t think the brain ever really shuts down, you know.

The one great saving grace is that I don’t get hangovers. Not at all. My dad tells me this is hereditary—he never gets hangovers either. For this supernatural ability, I have been persecuted, branded a witch, and have nearly been burnt at the stake by my friends. ‘What a waste of such great genes,’ they rant. I have even had marriage proposals from men who, aside from my beauty, brains and all of that, have wanted to pass on this great ability to their children. 

Through all my drunken episodes which I’ve enjoyed thoroughly, I’ll say this when I’m sober—I’d much rather watch people drunk than be drunk myself. I’ve seen some really funny things happen.

People say you’re the most honest when you’re drunk. I certainly hope that’s true. I met Tanya when I joined college. Tanya is this stunning, composed girl-you-want-to-be type person: not a hair out of place, never had a clothes-that don’t really match episode. I thought she was snooty—and realised she was just shy. Anyway, by the third year, Tanya had thawed and we’d become really close. A few months ago I got a call from her, late in the night. Nothing new there. I picked up my phone and was taken aback when I heard my formerly shy and unexpressive friend declaring undying love and her ‘forever friendship’ to me. Of course, when I called her the next morning, I convinced her that she had declared a diametric deviation in her sexual preferences and had wanted to leave her boyfriend for me!

Yet another one of my friends once came back home after a party and had almost convinced his parents of his sobriety, when he asked to be excused to use the loo. He then proceeded to walk into the kitchen and pee into the sink all the while proudly grinning to himself at having pulled of his little farce.

I am done now, I think. I prefer my woman-of-substance-and-mystery persona to being the mysterious substance on the floor. Henceforth, as far as I’m concerned, the Romanovs belong in Russian history, Old Monks in Dharamshala and any Royal Stag I meet will walk on two legs.

---

An edited version of this article appeared in Man’s World in September 2006.

 I still don’t drink, though I’ll have a Bailey’s once a year or so. I have got trashed once since I wrote this article 12 years ago, on the insistence of my spouse who said he’d never, ever seen me drunk… Verdict: I am a boring lightweight who falls asleep soon after one drink. And yes, he verified—drunk, I’m as terrible in bed as I said I’d be.

Mad About Milind

August 2006: A crazed fan expresses her love (lust?) for top model Milind Soman, the month after his wedding.

I brought it upon myself.

I’ve been meaning to write this article for a really long time. I finally sent it in to my editor this morning. A few hours later, I got a call from a friend telling me that Milind Soman got married a few days ago in Goa. I’ve had to rework this article with teary eyes. It was just bad timing…

I have been madly in love with Milind Soman for a painfully, heart-breakingly long time. I first saw Him when I was 12, staring down at me from a large hoarding at Chowpatty. He was beautiful and nude (that’s how I remember it)—and I had my first love-at-first-sight moment. That was 11 years ago. I’m 23 now. And I’m still in love.

Now, any other, less madly-in-love, less obsessive, less committed woman would have just given up. She would have said, ‘Forget it; get on with your life.’ Can you imagine being steadfastly in love with a man who doesn’t even know you exist for 11 years? Well, I am, and it’s painful!

The thing is, the man is gorgeous. His long, lean and absolutely beautiful expanse is covered with silky olive skin. His physique is just right—not gym pumped but swimmer natural. His black eyes crumple perfectly into His clean-cut face; His wavy locks snake seductively over His forehead. Ohhh… I could write a Mills and Boons novella with Him as the archetypical male hero.

In other words, Milind looks like a God. [Oh, we’re on first-name-basis, you see—in my brain, as inventive as Thomas Edison’s, we’ve shared many-a tender moment, not to mention some not-quite-so-tender!] I pray to Him and I pray for Him. I’m agnostic when it comes to a God in Heaven: when it comes to my God here on Earth—well, I’m the most fanatical devotee there is. Oh, these crazy South Indian movie fans, with their temples to their Movie-Gods: I completely empathise! I remember pretending to agree with a bunch of my friends who found this devotion bizarre. Tara*-the-Intelligent even genuinely agreed with them. However, Tara*-the-Crazed-Fan (who takes over during conversations even remotely pertaining to Milind) completely understood the fellow crazed fans’ point of view.

Considering the fact that I live in India and have made it my second job to hunt and have Milind, I have never ever seen, let alone met Him! Some God in Heaven has decided I shouldn’t have this one thing that matters so much—any wonder I’m agnostic? Lesser fans—even those who aren’t fans at all—have seen/met/touched/hugged Him. Why? Is that fair? I’ve had so many near misses. So, so many—

Jaya, my friend in college, came to class one morning, and, looking me straight in the eye, said, "Oh, I saw Milind Soman at the American Diner yesterday." Did she know how much she was hurting me? Such incidents happen all the time…

This has to be one of the most painful ones. I went to a party in Delhi with my then-best-friend and then-boyfriend. It was his friend’s party, and Neha and I had more interesting things lined up. Soon, we peeled off and went to a pub nearby for a rock show. The sound check was endless, and the music, when it finally happened, wasn’t worth the wait. My phone rang. It was Shiv. "Serves you bitches right," he said laughing, "Milind Soman just came and left." I hung up stunned, ready to kill Neha for having dragged me to this terrible show. She reasoned with me, "Oh, he’s probably just pulling your leg. Call up Shibani and find out." I called up Shibani. "Oh, oh, don’t talk to me," she screeched breathlessly, her ecstasy jamming the phone line, "I just saw Milind Soman walk around bare-foot in the garden!"

Then, there was the time, a few years ago. I was in London with my parents. My aunt Beena was driving us to Eton. Staring out of the window at the stream running along the road, I caught a glimpse of a movie set and of… Him. Yes, Milind, breath-taking in a white shirt, was singing to some chick on the banks of that stream! What? "Stop! Stop!" I yelled. But it was too late; there was too much traffic behind us. I spent the day sullen, happy only in my daydream, where the car stopped and I ran into His arms. Somehow—and I’m not quite sure how—He ended up singing to me, with the bimbette floating downstream with her arms flailing wildly.

When I was based in Chennai, I was asleep one afternoon when my phone rang. I looked at it groggily. It was my closest friend in the city, who worked for Mani Ratnam. I rejected his call. Again. And again. What was wrong with him? I called him back that evening. "Oh sorry," he said, "I just thought you might have enjoyed dropping by the office today. Milind Soman spent the afternoon with Mani Sir." Damn, damn!

This same friend decided not to give up on this little matchmaking exercise and, on my birthday, informed me that his present to me would be a dinner with the man Himself. I told absolutely everyone I knew. But there was a catch, you see. I would have to pose as a screenwriter and pitch a fictitious movie plot to my heartthrob. My first meeting with Milind riddled with deceit? Had I really sunk that low? Hell yes! For Him, I’d be the Queen of Sheeba herself! However, fate had its own cruel plans and Milind, it turns out, was out of town and asked for the synopsis to be mailed to Him. I had a lot of egg to wipe off my face the next day, that’s for sure.

Now the thing is, I’ve had His email ID but I considered it beneath me to send Him an email. After all, I needed to play hard-to-get. I am a lady. I decided I could not go around making first moves on random men. Discretion, I thought, was the key. I couldn’t just tell Him. So now, for that folly, I’m destined to sit in the shadows, my heart broken, Milind on my bedroom wall, Milind in my pocket (Yes, I carry photu of Him, phull philmy ishtyle.) Sigh!

Well, it was bound to happen, sooner or later. I was having a long shower one morning, blissfully unaware that my life was going to change. My phone rang, and I extended a soapy hand to answer it. "Supplement, page one," said my friend talking in terse code language, befitting the disaster that was lurking in the newspaper. There, there she was, a pretty French actress, proclaiming her love and commitment to Milind, and telling the world how happy she’s going to keep Him. MY Milind. And now he’s married! He didn’t wait for me!

Well, to be fair, Tara*-the-Intelligent has always had a feeling. It was an uncomfortable realisation that I chose not to acknowledge. Milind, Man-of-My-Dreams-Milind, well, I never really thought we’d get along. My collection of articles on and interviews of the man all told me one painful thing. We really wouldn’t get along. He’s a morning person, I’m a night person—we’d live in different time zones and would barely meet each other. He’s a hill person, I’m a sea person—the hills make me queasy and depressed. He wants to settle in an apple orchard away from people, I want to settle in a busy city—I’d die without people. But when it comes to matters of the heart and hormones, the sane voice is often not the loudest.

---

 An edited version of this article appeared in Man’s World in August 2006.

Shortly after I sent in this article, many people around me were like, 'Oh, you like Milind? I know him too! My wife is his stylist/my son and he go trekking together/we’ve been friends since school/etc…' And I was like, 'Haven’t you been listening to the whining of my hormones all these years?!' Suddenly, many people were volunteering his number, and after this article was published, I sent him an SMS telling him to read it. He did, and SMSed me back (saying he was scared of me, but that’s besides the point). For years after, until I dunked that phone in water, I preserved our conversation, to be able to tell our kids, ‘Dekkho, papa aur mummy aise mile the.’

 And, would you believe, over a decade of working in the media, living in the same city, having many common friends, conversing on Facebook later, I only laid eyes on him at an airport last year (small ‘H’ now). Ha.