On People and Animals

Prettiness for air hostesses

2010-05-28T07:52:00.001+05:30

It's a given that air hostesses must be pretty. When you travel on a flight you see them--they are attractive, with makeup painted on and often wear figure-hugging clothes.

Along with being pretty, they are frequently snobbish and cool. I see two ways of looking at this. One, the view that many take: they are conceited because they look so good and have a fair amount of control in the plane. Two, perhaps they have had bad experiences of men making passes at them and the like, and so maintain the frosty attitude to keep away such advances. Just because a woman is dressed that way does not mean she is 'available'. If the uniform were more dignified, she would look more dignified, and people would behave more decently towards her.

What I'm wondering is, why does an air hostess need to be pretty or have a model-like figure? She must know how the flight works, the policies of the airline, how to do her job on board, take charge in emergency situations, and be efficient in taking care of passengers' needs. Why has she got to be eye candy?

True, many training schools and airlines say that hostesses don't have to be pretty, just tall enough (to close the overhead cabins?), but there's obviously a belief (based on observations) that they are pretty/attractive. Some time ago, the papers and people were talking about the hostesses on certain Indian airlines being 'too old' and ugly to be employed!

Search for 'air hostess' on Google Images to see what the world thinks of them.

Designations and Hierarchy

2009-04-06T16:40:00.003+05:30

I chose to be a freelance writer about ten years ago. During all these years I have had the same designation, except that I added 'editor' also to it as per my experience.

I look at my colleagues of ten years ago in business networking sites and see where they are today--they have designations like President, Asst Vice President, something Manager, Head something else, and they have gone from being simple writers, visualisers, programmers and artists to marketing, branding, business strategy, various areas of design and management. It's almost like a different language--the language of today, and it seems to my eyes and ears a noisy, loud language that needs translation and gains status from its complexity and verbiage.

If I had continued working for companies, maybe I would be listing my areas of experience with this same language, and hold a similarly grand(iose?) designation. I raise no objections to the way life is here, but just observe from a distance because I have remained aloof from the flow in a way.

But few people understand or appreciate being different from the crowd. Parents want their children to have these designations and salaries, the means to showing off and not being different--quite like the Dursleys in the Harry Potter series.

Even teachers appreciate students who have gone into the same race, all running with foreign labelled clothes, smelling suavely of perfume and cologne, clocking so many hours of work a day, driving cars, buying houses in the plural. Definitely they deserve much appreciation for the race is tough and you need to survive it everyday with various skills.

But the few who choose to stay out of the race and try to live their dreams deserve no less. Some friends have said to me, I wish I had the courage to do as you did, leave behind the good salary and the security to take on the adventure of working as a freelancer, on your own terms and pace. But most other people are unimpressed, even sorry for the likes of us. :)

"Beef Cattle"

2009-04-01T10:18:00.008+05:30

Cattle raised for meat, and also possibly leather, are called 'beef cattle'.

I take huge and deep offense to this term and this concept. It's a thing of nightmares.

Who are we to force animals to give birth according to our wishes, to control them for our 'needs' (wants, means of livelihood, wealth) and slaughter them (even calves!) to supply meat for human consumption?

There is something deeply wrong about what we're doing. We have stopped even thinking about these things any more, it has become taken for granted so much.

People will sneer and laugh at my outrage because they think this is how things are done, have always been done, and will continue to be done. They will say 'You can't take these stupid moral attitudes for this sort of thing' - they expect everyone to blinker their senses and kill off any such questions and rebellion that come up within them and just go with the trend, go with the flow.

We're living off other creatures. We're not just ordinary parasites, we're cunning, cruel, vicious parasites.

This has got to stop. At least let us stop cheating ourselves into thinking this concept of beef cattle, mutton sheep, and the like are OK. It's not. Remember, it's not acceptable, it's not right, it's not normal.

Yes, we're omnivores, but we used to live differently back then when supply chains had not been invented. It would do us good to remember that.

Men versus Women

2009-03-18T11:43:00.005+05:30

I just got this joke in the mail:

A biker was riding along a California beach when suddenly he hears a booming voice from the sky. The Lord said, "Because you have tried to be faithful to me in all ways, I will grant you one wish."

The biker pulled over and said, "Build a bridge to Hawaii so I can ride over anytime I want."

The Lord said, "Your request is materialistic. Think of the enormous challenges for that kind of undertaking. The supports required toreach the bottom of the Pacific! The concrete and steel it would take! It will nearly exhaust several natural resources. I can do it,but it is hard for me to justify your desire for worldly things. Take a little more time and think of something that would honour and glorify me."

The biker thought about it for a long time. Finally he said, "Lord, I wish that I could understand my wife. I want to know how she feels inside, what she's thinking when she gives me the silent treatment, why she cries, what she means when she says nothing is wrong, and how I can make a woman truly happy."

The Lord replied, "You want two lanes or four on that bridge?"

Really, I get tired of these kind of jokes. It simply perpetuates the myth that women are hard to understand and please, and that men are mystified by them.

The man could understand his wife if he put in the effort to understand her. Want to know what she feels inside? Try asking her. She will be touched that you care enough to ask. Then, listen to what she has to say. Asking is easy, listening is tougher, and accepting/understanding what she's saying is the toughest because if you want the easy way out (like the bridge to Hawaii) and cannot think beyond your own needs all the time, you cannot access anything good and long lasting in life.

Good parenting

2008-11-21T13:22:00.003+05:30

This is what good parenting should be:
'Father to Son' - Phil Collins
.

What Kind of Flower Are You?

2008-08-11T23:01:00.003+05:30

"You have a shy personality. You tend to hesitate before trying new things or meeting new people. But once people get to know you, you open up and show the world what you are really all about."

Pretty true, I think.

Check what kind of flower you are.

Book Quiz

2008-03-07T17:24:00.008+05:30

You're The Poisonwood Bible!
by Barbara Kingsolver

Deeply rooted in a religious background, you have since become both isolated and schizophrenic. You were naively sure that your actions would help people, but of course they were resistant to your message and ultimately disaster ensued. Since you can see so many sides of the same issue, you are both wise beyond your years and tied to worthless perspectives. If you were a type of waffle, it would be Belgian.

Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

I think I will only focus on the "wise beyond your years" :D I must also look up the Belgian waffle.

Incidentally, this is an Excellent book (I've reviewed it here).

Send a Book, Plant a Tree

2008-01-19T11:55:00.000+05:30

We booklovers do feel a twinge of guilt when we buy books, because of the amount of paper used to make books. I personally prefer a paper book (a real book!) over an e-book in spite of the guilt.

Now, Bookmooch has tied up with Eco-Libris (who are into planting trees in Africa and Central America) to help even out, to a small extent, the book to tree ratio. For each book you give away on Bookmooch you can help plant a tree through this program.

Read more about it here.

Hi, Sweetie!

2007-11-22T16:10:00.000+05:30

Avoiding the long walk to the escalator, I chose the lift to move to a different floor in a mall. It was quite packed but there was enough room for me and my three-year-old daughter. We stepped in. The lift glided to the next floor in about 30 seconds. In those seconds a man standing next to my daughter had lightly pinched her cheeks about six times.

I know, I ought to have given him a piece of my mind. But the lift was full, mostly of men, and my little one wasn't upset, though she didn't like the pinching either. I didn't want to make a scene or embarrass the fellow, who was likely doing that to show that he found her cute. Anyway, by the time I decided that I would indeed tell him to stop it, the doors opened and we let ourselves out.

I've seen every so often that someone will treat a child like she's a doll--something cute, open to anyone cuddling her, and with no mind of her own. There's no respect in the affection - no pause to think whether the child would welcome their attention or not.

Sure, babies and little children are sometimes so cute that you want to reach out and brush their cheek with a finger, or smile at them and say Hi. But there's a nice way of going about it, the way that makes the child smile back and her parents, too. I'm not going to get into points on the nice way and the not-so-nice way here - in general, remember the respect bit - if you have that for the child, you're likely to go about it all right.

Soap Operas and the News

2007-10-08T23:49:00.000+05:30

A lot of people look down, down, down their noses at those who watch soap operas.

They think, "HOW can someone watch these over-dramatised episodes about people's sordid affairs every day of the week? As if such things happen in real life! What a waste of time."

What these people watch eagerly instead are news channels. Engrossing themselves in real-life events legitimises their time and interest.

They will follow the news for hours and days about an Indian village boy who gained an American accent and scientific genius overnight. Even though it is clear enough that this is more of a psychological problem or the simple human need for attention, these people will watch with rapt attention to discover whether this is indeed a miracle as it is made out to be by the channels.

A boy and girl elope and get married in secret because their love was not accepted by their communities. They are traced and the boy is slaughtered by the girl's brother. The girl is dragged home through the streets. This is news. It is real, and it is worth watching.

I am no advocate of soap operas but people want to watch them, let them. The audience obviously needs something that is satisfied by soaps.

For instance, in soaps there can be single-dimensionally good characters and fully evil, rotten ones. The audience identifies with the good-but-suffering-and-misunderstood woman, and allows itself freely to hate the evil one. In real life there are neither such perfectly nice nor wholly bad people, so one is forced to make allowances, to keep referring to one's conscience about how best to deal with things. It's relaxing to not have to rack one's brains about who is good and who is bad, and to also have it all clear in black and white, with no shades of grey.

The news is informative, no doubt, but it is also depressing when one is the kind who wants to make a difference and stop the wrong things from happening. The minister for environment sees no need to try to save the mangroves of the Mumbai coastline, he says why not allow construction there and allot equivalent area of land elsewhere within the city. The minister
obviously didn't need a relevant qualification to get his portfolio.

Another chief minister is reported to have said to tiger conservationists that when people didn't have enough water to drink, she could not prioritise saving the tiger. Even a basic level of interest in ecology will show how crucial the tiger's survival is for a decent supply of water in the country.

What can one do when one learns of such things from the news? Not much. One can spend some energy ranting about it to anyone who is willing to listen, but really doing something about it? No, not really.

True, there is news and then there is news--so many different qualities and flavours of it on different channels. Similarly for soaps. One's hands are tied in both cases. But at least with soaps, more people are likely to know the characters and root for the same ones, uniting them in their 'common cause'.

Continuum

2007-09-28T19:53:00.002+05:30

I close my eyes and listen to my three-year-old daughter's voice. The pitch, the baby lisps, the mistakes she makes. I'm glad I can record bits and pieces and store them on my computer to savour next year when her speech is clearer, or a few decades later when she will be embarrassed by her babytalk.

And then a thought occurs to me. Why don't I record myself speaking? Or my husband or my sister or my parents? Are these voices not precious or worth storing?

But it feels silly. After all, my daughter does not record her own voice, I do. I am her mother, I want to save her voice for memory. Who would want to save mine? I don't ask this out of self-pity but out of curiosity.

When do we pass from childood to adulthood? Is it the day we reach physical maturity? Are we really mature then? One day still a child, the next day a woman?

A child is endearing and interesting to an adult perhaps because of the huge differences between them. A baby cannot walk or talk, but we understand him well enough through his body movements and his facial expressions. We go into raptures at his single-syllable sounds. Another reason could be their dependence on us. This forces us to know them intimately and be tuned to their every little progress.

So does interest slacken as the youngster becomes an adult, once the dependence reduces to a minimum?

How is a sixteen-year-old similar to a thirty-year-old? The teen might think she knows it all and better than her mother for sure, but inside, she craves the parent's attention and love. She may never accept this when said aloud but it's true.

I am still bewildered by the world, but perhaps less so than I was ten, twenty, thirty years ago. You're learning continually--from turning over by yourself, and learning to walk and jump, to facing your peers and the times you live in, making money, working a marriage, learning to be a parent, the list goes on.

Somewhere along this learning slope, we change from the adored child to the responsible adult. It must definitely vary for each person according to his circumstances, but it does make you wonder, doesn't it?

Envy: the Evil Eye

2007-04-18T23:49:00.000+05:30

I don't believe much in the evil eye, nazar, drishti. But after my little daughter's fall today, badly hurting her front two teeth, I found myself reaching for the evil eye philosophy—so that I could have some control over what happens to her, to be able to ward off her suffering.

Maybe if I removed the evil eye often enough such horrible things wouldn't happen. I doubt this would have avoided this fall, but who can say? She just fell suddenly, she wasn't doing anything precarious or dangerous. She was indoors and suddenly she had fallen and banged her teeth on the floor, bleeding all over, crying like she couldn't breathe. Makes you feel so helpless, blind, grabbing at anything to help the child.

While watching her sleep off her pain, I found myself thinking about the evil eye--in other words, Envy. Even if envy had nothing to do with the pain in my house this evening, I examined it and have this to say: Down with envy! For it damns us.

Nobody can be envied--be they rich woman, successful man or happy child. Because whatever we envy in someone always comes at a cost. Nothing is free.

If a man is rich, he may be riddled with heath problems, or cheated by those he trusts. A child is happy in her innocence; she will soon have to face hardships, too. Why not let her have her happiness while she can? A man who is content in the quality of his work must sacrifice money or family time and health; if he earns a fat salary, he may hate his job. If a woman is beautiful, people envy and hate her for it, but what if her beauty were suddenly marred? Their hate turns to shame of themselves and pity for her. They suddenly discover and appreciate the person she was all along, more than just a pretty face.

Let us not even envy youth, for we had our chance at it. You know how tough it is to be young, eager, feeling invincible but unsure of anything, making foolish mistakes and getting your heart (and worse) broken.

And that thing we envy most: love. It is so slippery, ephemeral—who can say how much love really exists in a couple, in a marriage? Love and truth often play a game of hide-and-seek: when one is seen, the other is hiding. When both co-exist, it should arouse our admiration and respect, instead of envy.

It is hard, of course--is anything but the negative and wrong easy?--but let's try really hard to at least be conscious when Envy enters our minds, and look at it cold and hard to see what the truth really is before we use it--positively (to strive to reach her level, to do better than him) or negatively (as we say in India, May he get a stomach ache for he eats what I love without sharing).

Killing Strays in Bangalore

2007-03-07T23:49:00.000+05:30

There is a petition to stop the municipal authorities (BMP) from killing stray dogs and to adopt more humane methods instead at http://www.petitiononline.com/blr123d/petition.html

I've signed it. Others who feel strongly about this, please do sign it, too.

Do think about the comments you leave with your signature, though. I happened to read some of the comments on the site, and frankly, if I were the commissioner, I'd be hard put to read the requests rationally. There are comments such as "Killers!" and "BMP must Die!" Are you thinking about whom you're writing to and for what, when you send these comments? Sure, you feel anger against their actions, but calling them names is not going to solve anything. After all, these online signed petitions are mainly to show numbers of supporters, so your name is enough.

But if you must say something, do say something to contribute to the cause rather than antagonise it.

Somebody writes that he would kill people rather than dogs. It is this mentality that pushes some authorities to go overboard to kill the dogs. If you respect people as well as animals, can see the problems stray dogs create and give a balanced view of things, the other side is likely to listen.

Some busy people have sent in their comments in the latest language of the world today--SMS lingo. One says "heartless pple!" while another says "u hve no rite 2 kill dogs".

I do hope the commissioner is a kind and patient soul to get the feelings and intentions behind the words and not think "Oh, they're calling us idiots and killers, and they want to tell us what to do, too?" and scrap the plea without a further glance.

Baby's One Size Too Small

2006-04-04T18:25:00.000+05:30

This has to be one of my pet peeves where babies are concerned. Why do parents dress their children in such big clothes?

Yes, babies grow very fast. Yes, their clothes, toys, everything of theirs is expensive. You hate this fact but buying bigger clothes so they last long, and making your little one wear them while they are too big is to ridicule your child.

The other day I met a couple with their one-year-old son. He was wearing a stiff shirt that was sticking out of him as if it were made of card paper, and a pair of thick stiff pants/shorts/capris--I couldn't tell what they were supposed to be because they didn't look right on the child. The child just started walking a month back, and here he was being forced to wear cumbersome pants that kept making him lose his balance, and making it hard to get up again.

It is summer now, and the parents were saying that their son likes to run around with minimum clothes--of course he would! After a while they took off his shirt and, presto, there is a sleeveless vest underneath! And even that is too big.

Only when the boy came close and put his face close to mine could I see him for who he was without the "fittings" - such a sweet child. I felt like pulling him out of those clothes and letting him roam around in a vest and diapers.

Another demeaning thing is the habit of defining a baby's eyebrows with an eyebrow pencil and lining the eyes (beyond their ends) with kajal. Result: an ugly child STARING at you with an odd unchildlike face. WHY do you do that? Are you saying the baby's eyebrows are not pretty enough and need your help? That her eyes are not as big as you'd like?

Leave them alone. Let them be as natural as they are. Let them be three months old instead of six-going-on-four with the extra large clothes. Respect your child and accept the size he is, his rate of growth, and that he will, indeed, outgrow his clothes faster than you'd like.

Being an Ambassador

2006-03-29T19:39:00.000+05:30

The Internet, at a glance, seems to be a mass of unknown and hidden people. You can live an entire new life with a new name, gender and profession online.

But that is only at a glance.

Spend time here, and you get to know people, get to know who's faking, who's real, and you also get to make some good friends.

Even in this gigantic network, chances are, you won't meet people of many countries--or, you may meet just one from a country new to you. And this person forms a lasting impression--Bam!--in your mind. An impression of what his country is, what kind of people live there, how they think and feel and behave. All based on your interaction with this one person.

You can argue that this is not fair, it's not balanced, not right. But it's the truth; it happens.

So, let us be careful and be our best, especially in our conversations with people from other countries, online or otherwise. You may be having a bad day and shoot off a hasty, rough reply to the message from your new Mexican acquaintance. You think you can apologise later, if you remember, but your reply has already made an impression.

I'm not saying be perfect (how Boring that would be!) or pretend, but be courteous, be nice, and be yourself, too.

I don't know how many people I have rubbed the wrong way, but I do know that I've made India a good place for a few people in other countries. It was wonderful to get a mail from an editor I worked with (online) in the US; he wrote to me saying:

"India will always be a warm place to me because I have known you."

Thanks to my own interactions with such ambassadors on the Internet, Malaysia, Ireland, USA, England and Australia will always be warm places to me.

Parlour Parlance

2006-01-21T23:58:00.000+05:30

It should be a treat to go to a beauty parlour (ugh, what a name) to get a facial, a pedicure or a haircut, but I always postpone the visit as far as possible.

You could be a genius at your software job or be the managing director of a company but when you step into a parlour you're under scrutiny. Are you dressed appropriately? Are your toenails painted a cool colour? Is your hair shiny, bouncy and thick?

Obviously, you'd think, that's the reason you've gone to the place--they're in the business of making their customers look better. Right, but this scrutiny is done on their own, not on your request. They do it, the women who work at the parlour. The women who will talk to you in English and talk amongst themselves in Kannada or Tamil, as if you can't understand.

It is in a rare parlour that you will find your work done in a peacable silence, maybe even with music in the background. In most of them there is constant gossip among the girls working there, and in the worse ones you will be sucked up in the gossip yourself--told about this-one-and-that and asked for details about others, like it or not, unless you're willing to be rude and refuse--and risk a bad job done on you.

These girls, often poorly or moderately educated, will be well "maintained" - waxed, bleached, painted and styled - almost furniture jargon, eh? So they'll make personal comments on you.

Getting your face bleached? She will say, "You have a lot of facial hair, see..."

Getting waxing done? The comment: "Have you been shaving? Your hair is very thick."

Haircut: "You have dandruff." "You have grey hair." "Your hair is very thin."

Whatever part of you is being worked upon, you will be told its features and faults.

If I have dandruff, I know it; how do I benefit by being told this piece of information anew? How does SHE benefit? If she were to say, "You have dandruff, we have this treatment that could help you" it's clear we both gain, but it will never be said this way.

Does anyone like being told these things? Do the parlour girls think that by making these observations we, customers, will jump up and take our hats off to their knowledge?

More likely, we'll never go back to them again. Instead another parlour, another comment, another, another....

Lamps, Lights and Crackers

2005-11-02T07:55:00.000+05:30

In our country of myriad festivals, it's the Deepavali season now.

It never used to be a "season" as far as I recall while growing up. We shopped for clothes and crackers a few days before Deepavali and lit up the first deepams and fireworks early on the morning of the festival. The rest of the crackers we finished in the evening or over the next one or two days.

This time I'm in Mumbai for the "season". It was Ganesh Chaturti for nine-ten days; after a short break it was time for Navratri for nine days and nights; and the break between this and Deepavali was so short, it feels like the celebration has continued over to the current season. We are an enthusiastic nation.

Deepavali used to be synonymous with fireworks and crackers, but today firecrackers are available and used almost year-round, for every other festival and every Indian cricket victory. Then why the greed to start setting them off three days before Deepavali? Especially since people just finished satiating their cracker-bursting urge a few days earlier for Navratri.

I thought we were becoming more conscious of the environmental pollution we're causing but is it just me or have you, also, noticed that we're sending up more fireworks into the sky than earlier? We do have more money to burn.

Many of us still light the traditional mud lamps with oil and cotton wicks, but every year more homes are buying strings of electrical bulbs to light up their windows and walls for Deepavali. Obviously, this goes with the new lifestyle--bright, easy, available everywhere, and so-what-if-it's-going-to-consume-more-electricity. How much power could a few little bulbs consume? About 25 to 50 bulbs per bulb-lit home at the lowest estimate. If you look at any apartment complex, in one sweep of the eyes you can see at least half the number of windows lit up.

On the other hand, it was touching to see almost every tiny hovel in a long line lit up by a modest garland of coloured lights. The space inside the asbestos makeshift walls is stifling for one person, leave alone the four- or five-member family that resides in each one. The colour of any of them can be described as rust brown--the walls, the clothes, the people, even. The upper "floor" is on the roof of this one, home to another family, and the only way to get into it is by climbing up a ladder, always kept leaning outside.
But, inside such a space I saw, as I passed by in a car, one neat space filled with clean pictures of various Hindu gods. They decorate their areas with lights and stars and paper lanterns. In a site of such despair, these people pray to God, hope and smile.

For the earthquake victims

2005-10-17T10:46:00.000+05:30

You've read about it in the newspaper--the recent earthquake in Jammu-Kashmir-Pakistan where people anxiously await basic things like warm woollen clothing to keep them from succumbing to the bitter cold there; many little children have already lost the battle and died.

Please send your contribution, however humble, to "The Indian Express Citizens' Relief Fund" organised by one of the courageous and true newspapers in India, The Indian Express. For e-payments credit the amount to ICICI Bank account number 001301043658. All contributions are eligible for tax deduction under Section 80G.

Every rupee, dollar and peso counts, so please do help!

If you've contributed after reading this, do keep me informed--I'll at least feel I've done a small, tiny bit in passing on the word and getting some aid to those suffering out there.

Listening to Kids

2005-10-02T22:41:00.000+05:30

Adding to my post on the art of listening, I just read about the importance of talking and listening to our children--what a crucial role it plays in their lives and helps them become stronger and more secure people as adults.

See this enlightening short article in Psychology Today magazine here: http://cms.psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-20050919-000007.html

Drums and Drinks for Ganesha

2005-09-07T17:26:00.000+05:30

Last night just after my one-year-old had finally fallen asleep, the drums started playing.

This is when many people here in Mumbai 'bring home' their idol of the Lord Ganesha. One person carries the prettily painted idol while a big group dances and plays music to celebrate the arrival of the god.

I thought I had read in the papers that noisy celebrations were to stop by midnight, but last night the major celebration started at half past midnight with loud, rhythmic drumming, and firecrackers and bombs that jolted us out of our sleep.

I tried covering the baby's ear and holding her against me to reduce the volume of the sound but she didn't like that. With difficulty I managed to get her to stay asleep. But the drums sounded so joyful and alive that I couldn't resist putting on my temporary spectacles and looking out of the window.

I imagined wild crowds dancing on the street, but all I saw was a small cluster of drummers and a few people standing around; two young men were dancing. A big car was parked outside the entrance to the slum, into which, probably, the idol had been taken. The car, I suppose, belonged to some important person who had 'graced' the occasion. Quite likely that the person will soon be coming along asking the slum dwellers for their votes in the election.

These slums have existed, I believe, for the past twenty-five years, and are home to about six thousand families, according to my maid who rents a home there. Even if we reduce the figure by half to allow for exaggeration, it still means 3000 families, and 6000 votes at least.

My maid tells me (she is the source of a lot of information, coming from that 6000-home-slum) that people drink 'a lot' during this festival. She says it with a mixture of admiration and resignation. The holiness of the celebration gives people the license to drink; the women see the frantic dancing and yelling of 'Ganapathi Bappa Moriya!' as religious fervour, even though they know that the men are abusing the liquor by overdoing it. This happens in the poorer section of the community, though, and not in educated homes.

Most people, educated or otherwise, will celebrate their festivals as loudly and carelessly as they wish, irrespective of whether it disturbs others around them. You daren't ask them to lower the volume unless you're prepared to witness a flare of righteous anger on the grounds of religion.

As with most things, we use religion to satisfy our selfish needs. There is a thrill of the generally not-allowed now-allowed when you can stay out late in the streets, shouting, dancing and creating a racket.

I'm sure the elephant-headed god of wisdom would be just as pleased with a quiet pooja as a joyous celebration on the roads.

Being Free

2005-08-28T17:58:00.000+05:30

When the Indian Independence Day arrived on 15 August, I found myself pondering the word 'independence'. Such a long word.

From a family friend who studies evolution, the origin of languages and the like, I understand that the words that evolved first were the smallest--ma, pa, go, no--the longer words with more syllables came with evolution and more complex thinking.

So, independence, a four-syllable word, must have arrived pretty late on the scene. Free is a smaller word, more basic. It is natural to be free, unnatural and more evolved to be chained, dependent, or independent.

Becoming a mother takes away much of one's freedom, even though it provides huge compensation in the way of blessing, love and fulfillment. Becoming a father needn't change the man very much.

This evening my husband told me he has to go away on work to Hyderabad for a few days. This means that I don't have his help with the baby even for the few hours in the morning that he is home on most days. I threw a wild, baseless question at him, "Why don't we come along with you?"

He came up with all the expected reasons and uncertainties, and since I had no intention or hope of going anyway, the discussion came to a stop. But he got a phone call at this moment with the details of his ticket for tomorrow. He is to reach the airport at 5.30 in the morning. He accepted this information calmly and went about other work.

To me ANY time that I have to reach an airport, railway station or even a café for a friendly chat means involved planning, timing and scheduling, taking into consideration the fact that the baby will wake up when I want her to sleep or vice versa, that she will be hungry at an unexpected time, that I will have forgotten to have a bath, or that I'll have no ironed clothes to wear at the last minute.

The minute I am told that I will have to reach somewhere at a certain time, my eyes will widen, and my mind will go into superfast computing mode.

So I looked with amazement and awe at the man's calmness. Suddenly I could picture myself in his place. All I'd need to do was to get back home after my work at the office is done, eat whatever's left for dinner, crash into bed, wake up, stuff a few clothes in a bag, and head for the airport. Sit in an auto or taxi, feel the cool, fresh air of the morning on my face and let the driver manoeuvre me to my destination.

That's called being free.

Killing Rains in Mumbai, July 2005

2005-07-28T17:03:00.000+05:30

When it rains it not only pours, but it floods. From the safe haven of my home on the fifth floor I could see the road below filling slowly, making steady progress every five minutes I looked, until it was a brown muddy stream of flowing water.

I can see a range of hills from my window when I look up, and the rain in which I saw columns of water wafting across, looked beautiful against this backdrop. Below is the human reality: slums of people who have lived here, this way, in makeshift-permanent homes for the past twenty-five years. There is no drainage system here, nor a system of waste disposal. What they do is collect their garbage, wrapped in a plastic bag, walk a few metres and throw it to join the hundreds of other plastic bags littered there at the foot of those beautiful hills.

When the heavy rains came on 26 July, all the dirt as well as the precious belongings were lifted up and floated out of these homes and into the collective stream outside. Along with the belongings would go little children, dogs and cats and calves if they were not taken care of.

There is a small cowshed--there is no proper shed, just some sort of rough shelter--that housed five cows and three buffaloes. When the water rose to the stomach-level of the cows, the owner thought it prudent to cut loose their ropes so they could escape if the water increased. One buffalo panicked and lurched forward blindly into the deep gutter in front, slipped in and went under the water. The others rushed forward to do the same. Eight cattle lost in one evening.

My maid took the trouble to make a phone call to me to say she wouldn't be able to come. Of course you can't come, I said, How are you managing? How is the baby? She lives in one of the slum shelters with her husband, two sons, two daughters and two granddaughters, one of whom is not yet two months old.

They strung up the baby in a hanging cloth cradle and they huddled on the single cot, probably in turns. Water had entered their home and flooded it to calf-level.

My neighbours, both, husband and wife, luckily working in the same company, couldn't get home on 26th but started back at 4 AM on 27th and got home after two hours of so much tension that they were relieved to find their apartment complex still standing. The girl's father was unreachable until today when they learned that he had been stuck in his office and now, although he had reached a point just half an hour away from their home in Kalyan, was not being allowed to go further by authorities because the roads were bad.

We had no milk or newspaper on 27th. On going out and searching, we managed to get a litre of watery milk at nearly one and a half times the usual cost. The provision shops did their fastest sales and the store was half empty by afternoon. There was neither TV nor Internet--the cables were affected. The telephone kept beeping "Entering Service Area" and within a second, "Leaving Service Area". Many mobile phones refused to work. And there was no power or water on the 26th for several hours.

My husband returned from a shopping adventure (for milk, bread and eggs--all in short supply) to say that thick slabs of tar road were floating in the water along with dead cows.

The rain has reduced since yesterday and today I think it has only drizzled. From the edge of the exposed hillside where men have made a quarry for granite there are pretty cascades tumbling down.

Whenever a natural catastrophe like this occurs it makes you wonder Why. And most people hate the answers:
* If this city were not so overcrowded the damage would have been less.
* We shouldn't stray so far away from Nature or abuse the natural resources we have.
* If we plan to live the way we do, at least let us do a good job of it--build solid, dependable walls, roads and houses instead of quick and rash buildings and repairs that look OK for the time being.

Money and Happiness

2005-07-18T19:37:00.000+05:30

You know that money can't buy you happiness. It can make you happy when you get it in the form of a cheque or a bank transfer, true, but happi-'ness' it can't.

Did you also realise that happiness can't give you money?

This is why people are running behind the money and leaving happiness standing way off behind them, so far away that they can't hear if it called out to them about a pot of gold.

Everything is measured and weighed in terms of money. You colour your hair with the most expensive formula because "you're worth it".

Your time is money. But you're insulted if your child offers you money for an hour of your time and attention.

Where are you running, running, running? Is there an end? A destination where you will stop and sit down and catch your breath? Or sit down on a rock by a pool of calm water and heave a sigh, knowing this is where you can let go and relax?

It is a mirage. The end is always eight kilometres away. But you keep forging ahead because the mirage moves along with you, and seems just a little beyond your reach.

The Art of Listening

2005-06-18T14:47:00.000+05:30

I would think it ridiculous to call this an "art" if it were not true.

There's a passage--or a whole chapter, I forget--in *Crystal Roger's "Mad Dogs and an Englishwoman" in which she writes about the way Indians listen--or don't.

She talks about her visit to one woman's house. The hostess asks Crystal to talk about her trip to some country she has returned from recently. When Crystal is midway through the second sentence, Mrs Hostess cuts her short to tell her little son to go play outside. Then she turns to Crystal and says, "Please continue?"

When she starts again, the tailor arrives to discuss a blouse for the Hostess. Then her husband has a question. The room is too hot, and the servant is called to increase the fan speed. Each time Crystal starts and is interrupted. Finally she sums up her narrative in a sentence and leaves in a hurry.

Rogers's observation is absolutely true. Somehow it seems that we don't want to listen but, of course, we want to be listened to. In some homes you may have noticed that kids are told not to interrupt when grown-ups are talking, but the grown-ups never hear the child calling--asking, pleading--for attention until he decides to pinch his mum's arm to make her look at him.

And there are other homes where you cannot have a decent conversation with the Mom because her daughter keeps interrupting and Mom's attention is perpetually on the interrupting child.

In group discussions before job interviews, students used to be told to "talk the most" but today the ones selected are those who make good points, listen to others, and then know how to argue their case when contradicted. If they don't listen, they might as well be sitting there alone, yelling their heads off. Of what use would a manager be if he were an ineffective communicator?

A good listener listens actively. She's not listening out of politeness because you want to say something but because she wants to know and understand what you're saying--and what you're not saying as well.

Even though we live so constantly with ourselves we still luxuriate in expressing ourselves--what happened to us, what we plan to do, who we are and what we dream about. But it can get awfully boring for the listener if he cannot participate, too, share relevant experiences of his own, give an opinion, or ask a question.

Who wouldn't like an active listener? One who is quiet long enough to let you initiate conversation, then listens with interest, absorbing the expressions of your eyes, face and body, laughing when something strikes him as witty, and then asking you about something you missed mentioning, or about what happens after this, or what set this going.

But there are also dangers for the good listener: what if he gets a non-stop talker?

I'm a chronic listener--I'm diseased with it and cannot help listening, actively, and have had to bear many never-ending, self-centred monologues from a particular friend in hostel who would go on and on late into the night and refuse to end despite my stifled yawns--then open, rude yawns--which would solicit an "OK, I'll go, I think I'm boring you, no?" with a bravely wounded expression. And pathetic case that I am, I'd say, politely and automatically, "No, not at all" at which she'd go on for another hour.

When I tried to put in a sentence of my own, she'd overlap it with her own without noticing that I had said something. When she herself finally had run out of things to say (for the time being) she'd get up abruptly, say, "OK then, good night, have to get up early tomorrow..." and lump off.

The song "Video Killed the Radio Star" is appropriate for the art of listening as well. People want to listen with their eyes rather than their ears--a few years ago, they preferred to read rather than listen; today they like to watch TV or surf the Internet.

Isak Dinesen says it well in Out of Africa (although she says this of Europeans):

"Fashions have changed, and the art of listening to a narrative has been lost in Europe. The Natives of Africa, who cannot read, have still got it; if you begin to them: 'There was a man who walked out on the plain, and there he met another man,' you have them all with you, their minds running upon the unknown track of the men on the plain. But white people, even if they feel that they ought to, cannot listen to a recital. If they do not become fidgety, and remember things that should be done at once, they fall asleep. The same people will ask you for something to read, and may then sit through an evening absorbed in any kind of print handed them, they will even then read a speech. They have been accustomed to take in their impressions by the eye."

--
*Crystal Rogers is the founder of CUPA (Compassion Unlimited Pus Action), an animal care organisation in Bangalore.
--

Scruffy Carpets And Cat Hairs

2004-08-05T17:42:00.000+05:30

"This cat fellow has scratched all over the carpet and spoilt it," Papa laments, but his use of "cat fellow" gives away his affection for the culprit.

I usually look with one eyebrow raised at the carpet at this point (since he says this quite often) and say, "You can't make out, Papa, it looks fine."

But he's quite right, I discovered, as I was sweeping off some crumbs from the carpet this evening. I was examining the carpet in more detail than from my usual place at the sofa, and I saw that the mild brown synthetic material has been pulled up here and there, creating patches of scruffiness--or should I say scratchediness.

After sweeping, I glanced at the golden package of fur blinking nonchalantly at me from Papa's favourite chair and knew that I'd rather have a cat and a patchy carpet to go with it than an impeccable rug with no cat hairs.

And I realised that, despite his complaints, that's how Papa feels, too.

Good-looking's good

2004-08-03T12:24:00.000+05:30

Think you have an advantage if you're good-looking? You might, you know.

It comes quite naturally to people. We cheer for good-looking tennis players, footballers, even quizzers. Not that we do it intentionally always, but we do it nonetheless. Of course, we may be fans of plainer-looking sportspeople or actors, but that's because they've proved to be good at what they do. If you were watching two new candidates, guess whom you'd lean towards?

What you find attractive in the person may be just a dimpled chin, her toothy smile, or his style of dressing. Everything helps.

Think back to childhood--who were the kids you wanted to be best friends with, to hang out with? The most popular ones: the ones that had the looks, the smartness.

I read a Reader's Digest article some years ago that proved children are attracted to good-looking faces. The observations were made watching babies and very young children so that there would be no chance of prejudices or "learnt" choices. Shown two pictures, the babies turned towards the better-looking face. Good-looking faces were found to be the ones that were symmetrical--faces that look the same in a mirror as in reality. Notice how many of us have a crooked smile in a mirror that we don't in a photograph? These faces are unsymmetrical.

I'm not saying that everybody likes only pretty girls or handsome men. I believe that looks hardly matter after a while, when we get to know a person--personally, or at their profession; then it's only what they say or do that's relevant. But I notice that there is a tendency in most people to lean towards good looks--at the first instance, at least.

This happens in the case of animals as well. When we want to select a puppy or a kitten from a shelter, or a litter, it's the most active and the best-looking of the lot that we choose. The runt of the litter is usually the last choice.

Of course there are the unbelievably beautiful who happen to be unbelievably dim, but there are many takers for this kind as well. Fewer, perhaps, opt for the intelligent and caring, but unattractive ones. But who said life was fair?