Blip.

Do you have times in your life when you are not sure if its the mind or the heart which makes you do things? I do. And I am at a loss to understand which one. You would think that its the heart, coz thats the fickle one, but I am not so sure. Somehow there is a more intelligent mechanism behind it. All signs point to the so called stable, intelligent thing, aka the mind. Its the mind that shelves and maintains those partitions of your thought processes, memories and moments.

Almost like this huge RDBMS where all you need is a random trigger or a key of a thought. (Sorry, geeko that i am!) Ram wrote once about emotional triggers and such. I agree with it so much. But i think there are times when that rapid time traversing in your mind does not even need a trigger.

The heart is a very inexplicable thing. It really is the most unscientific working object that you will come across. Absolutely without any rhyme or reason, it makes the mind to race between all those partitions you have in your head.

Absolutely no reason...

TOI

There are many an issues I have with TOI and the way it has shaped itself over the last decade or so.

But.. sitting so far away, trying to clutch at whatever semblance I see of home country, to feel being a part of the bigger scheme, to take pride in being a fraction of what can only be seen as a significant phase for the country..I find myself putting up this link.

First language

Convo with my 8 years old cousin last year:

Me: Ok Anju , whats your mother tongue (yes, I have weird convos like this, my way of keeping the kiddos entertained :p)

Anju: English

Me: ??

Me: (What ? How ? ) Why do you say that pappu ?

Anju: Thats what we speak na Radhika didi.

Me: Ya (and realizing that it is true and I was speaking to her in english).. hmm .. ok do you know what a mother tongue is ?

Anju: No (:) Shez only 8, give her a break!)

Me: Ok, its the language you speak at home.

Anju: So thats english na Radhika didi.

Me: What? How? (slowly feeling like the dumb one in this conversation) You don't speak in english with mummy and papa.

Anju: Yes, I do. Everyday.

Me: Umm. Ok let me put it this way, mother tongue is what your mummy speaks in. So what does you mummy speak in..

Anju: (confused for a while) Malayalam

Me: (Oh no!)

Me: Well .. with some people, but what she talk to your papa in? (My aunt is from malluland, can't blame the kid!)

Anju: Tamil

Me: Seee (with a sense of accomplishment) Thats what I mean, she speaks in tamil with everybody right?

Anju: Ya but she talks to me in English na Radhika didi.

Me: (Stumped)

This was a while ago and I should have got the message. English is fast replacing all our local languages even at home. All these kids who go to private or convent schools are taught to speak in English thru out the day. And they bring the same back home with them, either due to just being used to talking like that during the day or to impress folks at home. And impressed we are, every time we hear a kid talking ever so nicely in english we are so impressed. Ah new words, new sentences, all so impressive..

Slowly the language creeps into every conversation with every member of the family.

And this phenomenon is not prevalent only among the kids (tho it is more scary that the future generation is oriented that way). We all are falling in that category where English is not the first language just in schools anymore, its rapidly becoming our first language anywhere.

In most metropolitan/cosmopolitan cities, the companies we work for demand that we speak in English. I know I can't generalize it, I still see people talking in local languages in many cities and believe me I am the first one to get pissed about it! Its quite unprofessional too if you ask me, essentially because a workplace especially in IT is an amalgamation of people from different parts of the country and most of who do not speak the local language.

In this situation, its quite unprofessional (and irritating) to talk in local languages.

Which reminds me of an episode about 5-6 years ago when I was in this project which had this one guy who was ever so quiet. He was generally soft spoken and quiet so when he chose to be like that even during our team meetings and all the name calling meetings (:p), we just thought maybe thats how he is. After about 8 months, the project gets over and we have this gala project closure lunch at a restaurant.

We: So S, are you always so quiet, you hardly speak during the meetings?

S: Oh, thats because I don't understand what you people are saying, you all talk in Hindi and I don't understand Hindi.

We: ????

This was 8 whole months of a project mind you! I must admit, that by some quirk of fate, we were all Hindi speaking people in that project so talking in Hindi I guess became natural (not that I endorse that). But imagine this poor south Indian guy who went thru 8 months of really not understanding completely what the rest of the gang was saying!!! I was quite appalled...

Anyways, i digress.

What we also do not realize that we are at work for most part of our day anything ranging from 8-10 hrs. And things like the language we speak for 10 hrs a day tends to seep into our personal lives whether we like it or not.

I find that hubby and me talk in English more often than not, its really not like we cannot both talk in Tamil. But we talk in English... Somehow its becoming the most convenient language that we can communicate in.. Soon we will really forget how to form sentences in our respective mother tongues I am sure..(yes, we have a couple of languages we consider to be mother tongues :P)

I remember when my family moved to Bangalore from Delhi and we were living with my grand parents, thatha wud rap me on my head everytime he would find me speaking with my bro in Hindi. But we just couldn't help it, speaking in hindi was/is second nature to us. In fact till date, i dont think I ahve ever spoken to my bro in tamil, we always always talk in Hindi. Its weird, I know.

But the point is, after a while, thatha gave up and said you guys are useless.

Now, I find that happening with English. I am sure very soon 2 generations from now, kids especially from nuclear families will have very little linguistic skills in their respective mother tongues (so called)

As for my children, I can only feel sorry for them, they will get telugu from the dad, tamil from my mum, hindi from me, kannada from the school (its become a mandatory language in primary schools), mallu from the rest of my family and of course english from.. hmmmm just the air I guess :)

Can women have it all..

A thought I have been chewing upon for a while now, nicely put across by soumya here. There are reasons i didn't put across anything out there. More than anything i think it was the mental block of not being able to get into the shoes of the working or non working mums out there. And its a valid point because, no matter what i think or say, there could always be someone who will step up to say, you know what- you cannot know what we go thru because you cannot relate to it. And I agree, I don't relate to it because I am not a mum and I am not in that predicament really.

But, does not mean, I cannot empathize..

As a woman, I believe, these are issues that you always tend to think about with or without having children. Any woman who is also a professional has had this thought process at some point or other in her life.

And its a very very pertinent chain of thoughts because they help deciding how your family will shape in the future. And I think thats huge !

Not many know that every working mother out there is guilt ridden, there is and always will be a small 'what if's' kinda conversation that she will have in her head at some point of time. I know.. my mother has worked all her life. When I was growing up, I guess i never really talked to her about it but now I think she is more comfortable in sharing those thoughts with me.

I remember when I was in school, there was this mid afternoon radio chat show which wanted to talk to students with working mums and by some quirk of fate I was chosen. I was asked how it felt to have a mum who worked. And for some reason, they always make it sound like a drudge-y and quite a helpless situation. I begged to differ and said not every woman out there is working because she has to work. There are many who work because they like to, because they have a passion for what they do. I still think its an alien concept for the typical indian mentality to fathom that idea, The concept that a woman will chose to have a career, in fact chose a career despite the fact that she has a family to take care of. Its an alien concept that woman can successfully have both and if it comes down to it, can make her choices or priorities and stick to it.
Anyways, i proudly told the world in that radio show that I was proud to have a working mum and cited instances where i thought i was empowered to be independent and confident due to fact that mum was not around. My mum heard that show and burst into tears.

I was baffled. I wondered why she would break down like that. I insisted that I meant it in a good way, and i was really proud of her. She just looked at me and said, you know the thought that I am never around when you come back from school breaks my heart.
I didn't know what to say to her then, i was just 16 and not a very articulate person. I wish I had the maturity i have today to talk to her, I wish i had responded saying- You know what, no matter what, you made me a better person by just letting us fend for ourselves. I dont think I would be half this independent or capable of having and holding my own if not for you to look up to. You taught me that women could have it all and still raise children who are independent enough to make their life's decisions themselves and mature enough to be accountable for every decision whether it was right or wrong. That itself is a huge achievement any one person can hold a claim to.

At the threshold of settling down so to speak and start a family (in the distant future, with emphasis on distant), I find myself digesting all this and more.

Some insightful thoughts in Soumya's blog which talks about the lack of a support system, lack of men stepping up to part-take that raising children responsibility. But I think her blog is mostly about stay at home mums and working mums.
What do I aspire to be, you may ask.. I want to be a working mum who has the choice of staying at home if she so wishes.

Baffled? Well, i guess I mean professionally be able to work from home whenever I want to. I completely understand that this solution/proposition is not for women in all professional spheres. Its probably a choice that you see very seldom existing in this world, but by virtue of being in an IT world, its possible. And i think in some ways, I am working my butt off right now, so that I can enjoy that privilege when it comes to it. Some jobs, sorry most jobs do not allow people to work from home, some jobs are just not feasible.

Which is why I think a lot of corporates and organizations out there need to understand and respect a woman's choice to work and raise a family in parallel and more importantly in tandem with each other. I think working from home in a lot of ways may improve efficiency, less time wasted in travel, less office chit chats and most importantly the peace of mind to know that you are keeping an eye over your family. A quick trip to office maybe once a week or on need basis when you have an important meeting is not too much to ask for. I think many IT companies out there are beginning to encourage that and I think its a brilliant trend. A professional woman who goes on maternity leave or takes a break when she has a kid should not be looked upon as a potential gap to fill for the other male colleagues around her. And no, its not such an unimaginable thought, I see it happen all around me. No matter how much we progress I feel sad to say that some men in this world regress even as I type this.

There are men out there (fortunately not too many of them) who still think that they are more deserving on a job or a position simply because they are men and historically speaking they 'need' to work to support a family and a woman 'doesn't need to'. Its sad....I had this uncle in my street who was in a supervisor position at an educational institution and he told me this long ago- If a man and a woman come in to my office for a job, I would rather give it to that man even if he is less qualified because if he gets the job, the whole family is provided for. While, if I give it to the woman, I am just enabling a family to live a notch better.

Very insightful I must say, and he said it with a lot of conviction. We went into quite a bit of tangent after that debating about what if the woman was a single mother or about the choice which one must make depending on who is the most deserving and not the most needful. But anyways, I digress. The point was to emphasize on the fact that there is a certain frivolous tone associated with working women in our country.

Sad to say, I am not sure when we will overcome that. I think its easier to overcome demons who are physical manifestations of the degenerate thought system we have rather than the inner demons in our heads.

The support system that Soumya talks about for a mother, should not just remain a support system of friends and family. I think the society and the thereby the country needs to become that support system that we lack today.

The support system which enables a woman to make her life choices and not be riddled with guilt on the account of choosing one thing over another. Despite the fact that I personally think guilt is a hell-sent gift women are born with, and I think thats because nature intended them to be the nurturers no matter what. And when you divulge even .1% from being that, guilt ensues.

Feminism is not about a women competing with men in this patriarchal world, in fact its about the empowerment of a woman to be able to make her own life choices, without being subjected to prejudices or archaic notions, and co-exist as a partner with men.

hu ha ha

Post lunch tit-bit again..:) ( I am gonna soon start charging publicity fee very soon :p)


For all the desi dudes and dudettes

http://www.desithreads.com

wistfully yours...

Post lunch read (actually spent quite some time on it :p)

http://www.asianamag.com/bachelors/results.aspx?referenceGroup=bachelors2007

Sighhhhhhhhhh, wish I was in UK..

ps: for that matter also wish i was single :P :P

Post lunch tit-bit

http://in.promos.yahoo.com/atp/

yep...

March 8th is the day ...

Ahem...

I have this post in my drafts folder which i started after seeing the movie Guru.. I know I told some people to wait for it as well, implying that its almost there.. But its gonna take a while..
You see works been a bit crazy and i really wanna write something sensible (D'uh!)..
so... yeah....

Blip...

I am a bundle of contradictions ..

There, i said it ! I think if i were to ever go on a talk show an be asked to describe myself in one sentence, thats what it would be...

that I am a bundle of contradictions...

I have consciously tried to avoid facing up to that teensy weensy bit of a fact but what the heck, its the start of a new year an all that.. Might as well face it....

so, keeping in trend with that, I put down things that i miss/missed from my so called housewife-y days... (I swear, i never imagined myself ever writing this, even now i attribute this to the wine :p)

a. The ever so often trip to the gelato place late in the evening or night. The gelato's rocked!
b. The dedication with which I used to cook every single afternoon. I mean, stuff to make my mum proud.. and you don't know the extent of dedication you need to go into to make my mum proud! I don't think i ever repeated anything during an entire week.. wow....(ps: I don't so much as cook once a week even now)
c. Hubs coming home for lunch every single day and to see him eat a proper meal instead of all that salad nonsense.
d. The daily ritual and cliche of kissing him good bye with a 'try an come home early today' !
e. The walks every other day at the park just coz we missed going to the gym :)
f. Afternoon siestas ! Damn how can i forget that.. Luvvvvvvvved 'em ! Thats probably the one single factor which resulted in those extra 15 pounds that I am packing.. But man, what a pleasure to sleep in the afternoon.. awesome!!!
g. The weekly cooking ritual of making either a sweet dish or a chutney. Boy, I miss that.. Its used to be that one single event i could empathize with mums back home. The weekly chutney/pickle or the sweet/baked dish.. I used to religiously make something or the other every week. sighhhh i made my mum so proud...
h. The fact that I had so much time to moisturize, slap on a face pack, just simply pamper myself thru the day.. Boy.. I miss that....
i. Catching up on all my online reading..I keep sneaking in time frm work to do that but it just doesn't add up...
j. The ever so regular voice chats with all my buddies from around the world.. It just doesn't happen anymore :(
k. Last but not the least, the fact that I could really get up at noon if i wanted to :) every single day mind you :)))

Post lunch tit bit

This is such an awesome idea :)

Yummy

There are men who r yummy an then there r men who are yummy-ier.. and then there is Keanu..

Ho Hum !

Familiarity is such a comforting thing. They say it leads to contempt and there is such a things as too much of something. But at the end of the day its familiarity that lends us that warm and fuzzy feeling in this ever changing world..

Like that warm blanky that you always slept with, or that cushy pillow you would guard more fiercely that anything else!
No matter how old you are, no matter how stupid you get (:p), the thought of such things always bring you that much needed feeling of security and comfort.

On a particularly irksome day when you talk to an old friend, a good friend, there is a certain sense of deja vu, there is a certain bridging of physical space which makes you smile.. It could be something your friend says or does. To me, thats familiarity, that feeling of warmth re-created all over again...

A feeling I can retain for the entire day and play it over in my head to get me thru crazy days..

Its very comforting to know that no matter what, some people don't change, some behavior patterns don't change. That goes for me as well as people around me.. And thats a good thing. Because you don't want certain things to change..

Whether its how a certain friend is quiet protective of you
Whether how goofy a friend is at times
Whether they have the capability to talk non stop nonsense..


Or just plain and simple fact that no matter what or how crazy their lives are, there are some special people who will always take out time for you, who make that effort to talk nonsense or chit chat for half an hr every few weeks or so...and when weeks go by without any chat, send you 1 liners saying - "I havent spoken to you in a while, remind me to talk to you" :)))))))