A Love Letter to Myself

This year at the Jaipur Litfest I was lucky enough to attend a workshop by my beloved professor of journalism at Sophia Polytechnic Mumbai, Jerry Pinto. A noted writer and veteran journalist not in that order, what I admire Jerry for is his ready wit and sense of humour. His ability to make the mundane sound dramatic, his sarcasm, his frankness and a characteristic charm in the form of opinion that he is ready to expel at the drop of a hat makes this man an unforgettable individual for a lot of us. And by us I mean generations of students who have attended his lectures and experienced his style of teaching. The latter is accompanied by a lot of rambling, yelling, joking and occasionally lifting of chairs in the air at no particular person in question and for no particular reason mind you.

Coming back to the point. His workshop was about creative writing and delved in to many aspects of what we know as fiction. As someone who has always nursed the dream of becoming a writer some day, I was naturally keen on absorbing everything he said and at the end poured myself in to this exercise he made us do. The topic of writing was addressing a love letter to myself. This is what I was able to come up with in ten minutes by the clock.

To the living being who makes life worth loving...

Beloved light that shines on no matter what the odds, How harsh the winds, How cold the world around you, the warmth in your heart can melt a thousand hearts, make sparks fly out of dying embers and instill joy within the dullest and most sordid soul.

And yet you are no saint are you? Only your hidden desires know about what you really want to be, which direction you wish to take flight, what world you really belong to.

You derive strength from those who have created you, blessed you, strengthened and supported you, gave you wings, egged you on and endured and embraced you with open arms no matter if the tide swept high or low.

The burning flame of hope keeps you moving on, the positive flow of optimism replenishes your spent energy: keep loving, keep living, keep flying.

Because my dear self, you are the queen of your castle. You make your existence living proof of the fact that life truly is a gift.

A Lover's Lament

I can be your lover but I cannot be your friend
Because I wish to hold your hand right till the end.
I want to stand through every storm, every hurdle around the bend.
For I am the warrior on whom you can always depend.

The first time I saw you I knew we would have a story,
Between us we could weave a fairytale,  eternal with all it's glory.
In a truly fated match, our lives were meant to seamlessly blend,
That's why I can only be your lover, and I cannot be your friend.

The world compels me to stay apart, repress the feelings of my heart.
Why must I sacrifice myself at the altar of convention, to which I claim no part.
I fail to fathom these orthodox sermons, they are not mine to apprehend.
Because I believe I can only be your lover, but I cannot be your friend.

You may push me to the brink, refuse to acknowledge my presence.
But I forever pledge to be yours, happily ensconced in your essence.
I am compelled to stay true to you, whether you accept or offend.
Your every doubt I can tend, every mistake amend for dear heartbreaker I can only be your lover, but I cannot be your friend.

The Pihu Diary- Quote Unquote

So as a parent what is the most precious possession you can leave to your children? I am no seer or prophet neither do I have a fortune to sign in Pihu's name. But there is something I can leave her with and that is my learning through life in the form of these little nuggets of thoughts that she can follow through life. I hope it strengthens her every step of the way as she navigates her way through her amazing journey ahead. Read on.

There will be friends who love to hang out with you and there will be those who nurse you through a hangover. Wisdom is in knowing the difference.

Never ignore the Voice of Reason. It has a strange way of creeping up on you later.

Staying calm under pressure has been my biggest strength. Stress never helped kings win battles. Strategy, courage and will power did.

Don't measure your wealth by the money you make but the good will you earn. The richest man can have a pitiable death if no one cares when he died.

Work hard but at something you are good at. That way even if you get lukewarm success, the struggle would be worth it.

Trusting people blindly is like walking on thin ice. Sooner or later you will lose your balance.

Chase more than one dream. If you have inherited my determination which I am sure you will, you will end up fulfilling many of them.

Be a woman of your word. It will bring you both respect and credibility.

Love can happen more than once. Loving the wrong guy and suffering a heart break is its side effect. Don't be afraid to love. It will definitely make you wiser if not happier in the end.

Finally, believe in good karma because your just acts will get rewarded in unexpected ways no matter where you are.

The Pihu Diary - A new life, a new beginning

One Friday night, the weekend before my last working week in office, I started feeling cramps in my lower abdomen. After three hours of enduring the same thinking it's a stomach upset, I woke my husband. We waited thinking it might be false labour. Soon I could neither stand nor sit without wincing and moaning and before long my water broke! That was our cue and we rushed ourselves to the hospital as recommended by my doctor. Once there by when I was already breathless with the pain, I was told the baby was ready to come out!!! I didn't know what to do but ask for my doctor who rushed in to confirm the same. So there I was, sprawled on a bed in a labour room delivering my baby almost a month before she was to come out.

Well into her ninth month but a little too soon than expected, Pihu was born to us on a bright Saturday morning at 7:39 am, slightly stressed and tired but absolutely normal and strong as ever. That morning confirmed my belief that God has his own plans while we keep making ours. Hell, I would have been at a film festival on that day if not delivering my baby! Now that I think back on it, the labour pain, the trauma of unexpected delivery, the actual process of getting her out and the healing thereafter is all part of a job well done, a mission successfully accomplished and a blessing that has been bestowed on us.

As cliched as it may sound, when I  look at Pihu's angelic and innocent face, it all seems well worth it. As anxious as I get about how good a mother I will prove to be, I am also deeply excited about what lies in store ahead, and how she grows up to be. When I let her curl her tiny and pretty little hand around my finger, I feel an immense urge to protect her, and fend for every comfort I can offer no matter the cost. As she grows a bit everyday, I wonder if I will ever be able to wean myself off her, for a career ahead, for independent holidays or occasions which are off limits for her. 

In the end, motherhood is an extremely humbling as well as heroic experience that you must go through if you are not afraid to test your endurance, patience and level of sacrifice. It is also a definite path to self discovery with immense scope for learning, laughing, love and long-standing commitment. One you must take only if you are sure of it and ready to be led to places you never knew existed. I now respect mothers a whole lot more. Not because I am one today but because I now realise the price they pay for it.

Pihu will go down in my list of accomplishments in this lifetime. I take it as a new responsibility to bring her up to see, enjoy and appreciate the bright side of life and gear up for the rough and tough part of it. I love kids; have always wanted one of my own. I have fastened my seat belt for the ride ahead. And so it begins...

The Pihu Diary- Gearing up

My second trimester also advanced speedily. Looked like this wasn't as bad as people made it out to be. I was eating and sleeping well, was active and able to cook and do any daily chores around the house without feeling exhausted. So far so good until one night in my sixth month when I couldn't sleep a wink. It will increase in your third trimester I was told. Gulp! Really now. This wasn't something I had signed up for. Then came the breathlessness on doing simple actions like taking the stairs and talking at a stretch.

The third trimester brought with it weight gain, an inability to change sides while sleeping without wincing, swelling up of feet so that soon I couldn't fit into my own shoes. Giving up on heels was one thing, not being able to walk in flats as well was unbelievable. It was all happening! Anxiety about the actual delivery as the d day drew closer started keeping me awake at nights. Saying goodbye to my professional life for a while and may be for a whole lot longer than I would like started looming ahead.

I started mentally preparing myself for the long break. Encouraging my team in office that all would be ok and that they would manage just fine without me became part of my exit mode pep talks. Internally I was wondering how I would manage not being a full-time professional! My last week of work approaching, I felt disappointed when I was told my management didn't encourage working from home. What was I going to do with all the spare time? Thankfully, fate had other things in store for me

The Pihu Diary- The Discovery

Nothing can prepare you for motherhood. Not your mother's advice, reading self help books, watching childrearing videos on YouTube, scanning websites that tell you everything that comes with stepping into the parenthood stage of life...well nothing.

And unless you are one of those eager beavers who count every day to the moment you conceive, even if you have been planning a baby with your spouse, the initial reaction to the news that you are really pregnant can vary from person to person. In my case, I was so taken aback by the revelation that this is it and now there is no turning back, that I initially didn't know how to react. Holding the test that read positive, I realised that I was actually holding the ticket to a new phase of life. One that was going to change my life FOREVER!

I guess my husband went through some of this confused befuddled reaction himself when he came to know it. It takes a gulp and a half to let it sink in that finally your life is taking that twist you were warned, scared and mildly worried about. Papahood beckoned and God knew what lay ahead.

The first thing you want to do when it comes to such big news is let someone more credible confirm it, in most cases the doctor. So when my doctor just took my word for it and started prescribing supplements and calculating a delivery date, I stopped her. But am I really pregnant, I asked. She replied without raising an eyebrow, you said so. But wait, aren't you supposed to confirm it? I asked. Ok. She made me undergo the test again and it confirmed the pregnancy in my face. There was no hiding from it now. So I braced myself for everything that lay ahead, took a deep breath, smiled an encouraging smile at my husband and graciously accepted fate. We had wanted this. How prepared we were for it, time would tell...

The first three months or what is known as the first trimester seemed to pass like a breeze. I travelled to Jaipur with a bunch of friends to attend the Litfest and enjoyed not looking or feeling pregnant but knowing the truth deep inside. Those predictable symptoms of nausea, throwing up, fatigue, exhaustion etc. spared me their torture so that except a couple of occasions, I don't recall being sick or setback by my condition.

When I actually announced the news to the world, apart from happy reactions, little did I realise that I had also opened the flood gate to a host of advice givers. You can get bamboozled into believing that everybody, yeah even people much younger to you would actually know much more about pregnancy than you do. This is a topic that intrigues people and makes whatever they know about it legit. So you will get umpteen lists of dos and don'ts, predictions, reinforcing of myths, superstitions, friendly advice, even warnings and ill fated stories to scare you into believing every word they say for your good. By the end of it, you will want to borrow Harry Potter's invisibility cloak and simply disappear when they start. My advice to you to counter such people is let them sound wise, seem interested, give an impression that you actually are listening and then just use your own head and do what suits you best.

I fell back upon my doctor's advice and my mom and sister who had both undergone this phase with relative ease and shared my practical stance on life. I did everything I was told to do for the baby, sacrificed on everything I was told to abstain from and never forgot to smile, laugh and just be normal. It helped that I had a supportive husband who held my hand every step of the way and actually enjoyed the pregnancy vicariously through me. As my bump started showing, we looked at it together fascinated by the odd changes that my body was bringing about. I was hell bent on not letting life's little pleasures pass me by so hell, I even took a trip to meet my dad all the way in Bhubaneswar!

The Disgrace of Monaco

(The Jhopda office.)

The awards on the display wall gleam bright in the mid-day sun. Colourful posters of glitzy heroes serenading dreamgirls in the Swiss Alps adorn the precincts of the tastefully done up office. Memoirs of an illustrious legacy still going strong. A huge life size picture of the veteran showman himself occupies pride of place in the spacious den. A bespectacled rather diminutive looking man with a perpetual frown on his face and worry lines on his forehead seems to be tallying some numbers on a neatly typed sheet of paper. The phone rings waking him from his concentrated efforts at making sense of it all.

Tujhe dekha toh ye jaana sanam, pyar hota hai deewana sanam….

He picks up the phone.

A: Yes, my queen. A very good morning to you.

R: Errr. It’s 12 in the afternoon, Adi. When will you learn to make use of that Swiss watch I gifted you after your last hit film earned 200 crores at the box office? Oof! You and your absent mindedness.

A: Oh ya, sorry. Lost track of time. Have been looking at these accounts for the past couple of hours. They don’t seem to match up. When was the last time we threw a party for friends? Why don’t I remember this?

R: Hai meri jaan. How can you be so slow. It was last week to celebrate our shaadi which took place last month. Obviously you don’t remember because you weren’t present for both.

A: Oh, errr, wait…ya of course. Now I remember. But of course I was present in both. Behind the screen remember. Don’t you remember I put the sindoor in your maang darling?

R: Yeah, by thrusting your hand through the gauze like screen that hid you from the public eye in case someone captured our pic on their smartphone and surreptitiously mailed it to every journo and tabloid in town.

A: That’s the beauty of being a filmmaker sweetheart, you always get to stay behind the screen J He he.

R: Grrrr…anyway. Ok listen, I called because today I plan to make my first public appearance after marriage at that big NGO event happening in town. It’s in the neighbourhood and all the media will be there to click me after marriage. Don’t you think you should come with me?

A: Event? Media? Click? No no no click and no pic. No sound bytes or photo ops. I am out of this. The last time they shot us together was at Mumbai airport after our cosy vacation abroad. I still cringe when I see that picture they have been pasting over any kind of news related to me.

R: That’s because you never give a chance to the photogs to take a decent pic of you. Today is the perfect opportunity with me by your side. Come on, let’s do this. How will it look if people see a new bride who comes unescorted by her beau. What will I tell people?

A:  Use your 1000 watt smile babes. It’s what sealed the deal for me. He he. And no need to go alone love. Take Ma with you. Anyway, she could do with a change of air….(the phone gets disconnected)

Sighing, Aditya gets back to replacing the account sheets with his files full of unread scripts.

His brother Uday enters.

U: Yo bro, what’s up what’s up. (Puts his legs up on the table and hums…Dhoom dhoom…)

A: Chote how many times have I told you not to make such a dramatic entry. It has not worked in a single film of yours till date. What makes you think it works in real life? At least the audience can swear in your face. Main tera bhai hoke who bhi nahi kar sakta.

U: Chill bhai chill. I think bhabhi se baat hui hai. She is going for that event today right?

A: Yeah whatever. She knows me better than to expect me to accompany her there.

U: Main chala jata yaar. What the…Isi bahane do chaar photo kheechva leta with some sizzling newbie stars. I have heard that pretty looking chick who was in your last film is going to be there. As well as my ex-cum-occasionally still around gf.

A: Uday, please grow up. I think you need to start working on your new avatar of a Hollywood film producer. You have just come back after rubbing shoulders with Nicole Kidman on the red carpet at Cannes. You need to start thinking big now.

U: I am Adi bro. I was thinking big even at that moment. I realised how big my feet looked as compared to the dainty feet of Nicole’s. And how big and overpowering her aura was in front of me. The moment when she gently stepped on my foot and turned her face away when I attempted to plant a kiss on her cheek also hurt…BIG time!

A: Well, you know no one knows you there.

U: Like anyone knows you huh.

A: Precisely why I made you the face of this division. At least if the film didn’t do good business, it wouldn’t make me lose face when people ripped it apart in the reviews. I steered clear of this business so that my credibility in holding up the YRJ banner remained intact.

U: Oh come on. What do you mean, I don’t have a reputation? Dude, the man at the parking lot at Cannes told me he had seen all my films and especially loved me in the one where Matt Damon gets to beat up the shit out of me. He thought I was a natural.

A: Really he did. Except that without googling you wouldn’t even know who Matt Damon is. So when did you get so convincingly beaten up by him I wonder.

U: You don’t get it do you? This fan of mine was trying to say I resembled that guy who got beaten up. He was just too conscious to compare me because he knows my stature in the Indian film industry.

A: You mean that of a side hero’s side kick?

U: Ugh…it’s no use making sense to you. I need to connect with like-minded people. And fyi, Nicole loved my black tux. She wants to buy a similar one for Keith. And that reminds me. You have to pay for the facial, Thai spa massage and the tux that I wore for the event. They’ve been irritating the shit out of me. Everytime I get an ISD call and think it’s those Americans to discuss some new script it’s someone from the housekeeping of the hotel I stayed in wanting to clear my laundry bills.

A: Lol. They have Thai spas at French hotels? And what good does a facial do to you if you get spurned by Nicole even for a peck on your cheek. I am not paying for those expenses you incurred buddy. Or wait, let me see if I can adjust it to the paycheque you last received for your role in Dhoom 3. (taps some keys on his pocket calculator) Nah, they don’t suffice. You owe me bro. I’ll put that in your account till the next Dhoom film.

U: Oh you just know how to ruin my morning don’t you. You wait till my next Hollywood film sends the cash registers ringing from Los Angeles to Tokyo and everyone from Jackie Chan to Robert Downey Jr. wants to work with me.

A: Hmm…I will wait indeed. Now if you allow me, I have to get back to my script reading.

U: Huh, what do you know about how much effort it takes to lobby for a film so that someone big in Hollywood okays the script and decides to star in it. It’s crazy bro. Tera kya hai, you don’t need to worry jab tak your script mein hai Khan.

A: Ooo…getting witty with titles. Speaking of which, next time you name an English film, try not to popularise a domestic biscuit brand without getting them to sponsor some part of the film. Remind me to connect you with our aggressive marketing team for this if you can’t do it yourself.

U: Dude, you are rude. (Walks off in a huff only to retrace his steps). Btw, Abhi and I caught up at Cannes. We were having a ball of a time standing on the sidelines letting our leading ladies enjoy centrestage you see. He wants to talk to you about this amazing superhero script he overheard being talked about by this well-known director who made that amazing Spiderman flick. So he so said may be next time he can be part of this film under my new banner and we can both take the lead by showcasing our film at the next Cannes. Abhi wants to make an entry in one of those autos he drove in our last film. Do you think they’ll let us do that? It will be like a coming of age film for the both of us. Ash bhabhi can probably put in an appearance in the film but I am thinking my ex-cum-occasionally on and off gf will make a good co-star opposite Abhi. The biatch owes me one after I took her sailing to the Gulf Coast last year. (Winks and turns away in a filmy swagger)

Just imagine…Abhi and me enter the gala event on our cool Hayabusas. Roll sound Dhoom Dhoom.

The Impossible City

Years ago, I picked up Suketu Mehta’s ‘Maximum City’ after the hype around it piqued my curiosity. Although not a fabulous literary exposition on Mumbai- the ‘city of dreams’, it did narrate fresh stories dipped in realism with a dramatic twist. I have always found the ‘fly on the wall’ perspective of telling stories very engaging as it makes the story or narration even more relatable. As a student of journalism, this approach was further instilled in our young minds by my earnest professors. So not surprisingly, I have been inspired to share my experience of living in India’s capital city Delhi in the only way I know how to- through my point of view. 

Why ‘Impossible’ you ask? Because this is a city that refuses to budge from its seat- whether it is a neta from his kursi, your neighbour’s old battered car in the parking lot, the cracks on the ceiling in your rented apartment, the accumulated fat on the friendly next door aunty’s waist, the dancing baaratis at a busy traffic signal, the narrow minded theories in the typical conservative North Indian’s mind...somebody stop me!

Breathe in, breathe out. But well, I must admit that two years of living in this city I presently call home (trust me it has been difficult giving it the status) has made it endearing in certain ways and strongly dislikeable in others. For reasons given below and so on and so forth:

Autos here think it is their birthright to overcharge the fare for whatever distance- short or long. So always expect to be fleeced every time you board one especially during night time. The auto meter is conveniently disabled and more like an unnecessary accoutrement. Who needs meters when you can strike an odd bargain every time a customer wants to hire your services? 

The divide between the business class and the white collars. So here we are comparing money and education both. The businessman is born in to wealth, usually lives in a joint family and has no official hours of work. Part of his job is to keep an eye on everyone around the neighbourhood, has the high-handed attitude of the nouveau rich and has three cars parked outside his house just to drive the point home. The lady of the house if usually portly, bored and saddled with immense responsibilities like arranging kitty parties, shopping at malls, gossiping about neighbours and bitching about their mother in laws. 

The white collars are identified by their 9 to 6 schedule, usually have a single kid or none at all and regular members at the local gym or salsa classes. They snort at the business class, dismissing them for lowly, classless and ill-educated individuals who don’t even bathe every day. The man reads Business Standard, the woman browses through Cosmopolitan, they take off for office in the same car to save fuel and usually party late in to the night every weekend. 

You have often heard non-Delhiites complain about the lackadaisical attitude of the locals as if they seriously don’t have much work and nowhere to go. Higher education is a choice you make and usually graduation is enough for the average middle class boy to be packed off into the family business and the girl to her sasuraal.

Food is usually limited to feasting on rajma chawal, chole chawal, dal makhni and matar paneer with lots and lots of rotis. Breakfast is alu paranthas, gobi paranthas and mooli paranthas depending on what vegetable is available in the market. 

Westernization is still at a surface level so yes, the world’s best imported luxury cars are in the market but the ones behind the wheel can’t pronounce Hummer right. Their notion of English music is Gangnam style and they still prefer Yo Yo Honey Singh any day. They wear Puma, Nike, Adidas and Reebok like second skin and are proud of the latest imported gifts from Amreeka, Caneyda and Southall, UK. Imported Whisky flows thicker than blood but ask them to dance and they start the bhangra angrezi beat pe!

Women unfortunately are slotted in to two types- the behenjis and the glamourous divas. And there are a whole lot of those who are simply in between trying to make the journey from being a behenji to a gorgeous (read modern, well-groomed, shapely) goddess.  

Navratras are a rage here. None of your garba dancing and fish feasting West Bengal and Gujarat associate with the festival. And so is Karvachauth- you see it’s all about loving your family errrr…traditions. Also, you will rarely find a Delhiite who hasn’t been to Haridwar/Rishikesh/Vaishnodevi or Badrinath once in his or her lifetime. Be ready to be labelled a philistine if you haven’t been to any of these pious places of pilgrimage. 

Because of the North Indian majority, if you are a South Indian in Delhi, people will usually demand that you get idli-dosa for them every day and while gorging on it, make fun of your language, dressing, accent etc. And God help you if you give back. 

Swearing is a way of life. You passed in an exam, swear. You failed in an exam, swear. You got through an interview. Swear. Someone banged your gaddi. Swear. Somebody almost banged your gaddi. Swear. You banged someone’s gaddi. Swear. Your friend got married. Swear. Your friend got ditched. Swear. A random guy on the road winked at you. Swear. A random guy on the road who you were ogling at, didn’t look at you. Swear. 

For all this and more, Delhi is a city that is one of its kind. And for all that people warn you about, it’s something of a phenomenon to be experienced at least once in your lifetime. Give it time, soak in the time-tested culture gradually trying to catch up with the times, and you will see emerging a lifestyle that is as energetic as it is lethargic, as mad as it is sane, as systematic as it is chaotic and in a nutshell, impossible to gauge and surmise in a blog post!

An Idiot’s Guide to Litfest

The first thing you notice about literary festivals is the hype attached to them these days. So whether you like it or not, news and updates about them are so in your face, that by the end of it you have decided that if you don’t attend even one by the end of the year, you run the risk of getting ostracised by your social circle. From knowing which authors are the ones to watch out for to what will pass as the right outfit without looking under/overdressed- there is plenty you must catch up on before you decide to unleash yourself on the literary world of writers, wannabe writers and writers who are anything but that. Now whoever said you need to have read a single book before you attend one probably has never attended a lit festival before. 

All you rather need is a look of nonchalance coupled with a snobbish expression, a book or two in your hand- so what if you don’t even know what the title means or who the author is and finally, an appetite to hold all this through the duration of your stay at the Fest. Even with these helpful tips, it might take two-three festival rounds before you can finally pass off as an accomplished visitor of literary festivals. Newbies and green horned wannabes are both known to many a time let their cover slip with that one inane remark or silly query that may give them away. So here’s a list of things you must not say, overheard at the recently concluded Jaipur Litfest at the Diggi Palace if you want to pass off as a true blue litfest goer.

1) You know what’s the best part about litfests? It really feeds my hunger for knowledge. Come on now, let’s go grab a pizza. Do you think they will have diet coke around here?

2) The atmosphere here is simply thrilling, don’t you think? Do you think that girl just gave me a second look? May be I should go upto her and strike up a conversation?

3) Of course I know Jhumpa Lahiri. She was really active during that Narmada Bachao Andolan. I saw her on TV with Aamir Khan. Isn’t she gorgeous?

4) My Mom told me to lose my eyebrow piercing before I come here. And then I saw people with unibrows, no brows, low brows and mismatched brows. Now if I could only take some pictures to take back home.

5) Who said I am behaving like a hysterical fan? These pictures with the authors are for my high school project.

6) At the bookstore: Jeez! I don’t ever think I will get around to reading this book but I so want that cute British author’s autograph on it, I will buy a copy only to see him grin like that when he hands it over!

7) Now that I am here, I know I don’t ever want to be a writer in my life. 

8) I read this guy’s last book. I think it’s his wife whose doing all the writing dude. Just overheard her chatting with some journos. She was so much more smarter and well-informed.

9) Yawn! I am so bored. Thank God, there’s a beer café here. 

10) Shashi Tharoor couldn’t make it. He was my sole reason for attending this fest. Pity, his wife had to die at this time. Damn, I want a refund for my flight ticket.