Woman's World, contd

Research done in the States, published on the New York Times website this week, shows that while men have actually grown happier since the 1960s, women have grown unhappier.
Also, men have found more leisure time than women. The clincher for me was that the researchers said a key factor to this freaky evolution was that since the 1960s, we have more ‘working women’. And we all know work is never any fun. Get back in the kitchen woman, and then see me in the bedroom later! You’ll enjoy it! Just kidding.
For the full article go to
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/26/business/26leonhardt.html?em&ex=1191297600&en=031f43e2931176fb&ei=5087%0A

Woman's world

Call me sexist, chauvinist or just plain old-fashioned, but I was never an ardent supporter of the ‘working woman’ concept as emancipation of the female from gender bias. If a woman has a talent or passion and pursued it and made money from it, then it’s lovely. But to just take any job to make a statement about individuality didn’t quite ring true for me. This is with no disrespect to those women who have to take any job because they have to make ends meet. Why am I talking about this? Come back tomorrow and I’ll tell you.

Writer's check

I originally began this site with the noble, missionary zeal of writing for writing’s sake. And I was doing pretty well, until I discovered this cluster map thing you see on the side, which tells you who visited and from where. That was going pretty well too, as I always saw hits. But unless the cluster thing is not working anymore, I checked today and it showed no visits. My missionary, noble, for-art’s-sake plan went pretty much down the drain. It reminded me that it matters when people read, but, never to write only because people are going to.

WTF is it with this spelling shit?!

Everyone at some stage wishes they were black. Especially, if you’re into music and sport. When I abuse I’m black. When I dance to hip-hop, I’m black. When I play basketball, I’m black. When I rap I’m black. When I get rapped I’m black and blue.
I write this as a black man. What is it with spelling out of words in rap lyrics?! Are people writing this shit imbeciles, or do they think we can’t figure out C-to-the-O-to-the-O-to-the-L, if it were just said out: Cool. Nigga, if I wanted to do spelling I would’ve stayed in school.

A new era?

Is this a new era? Can India raise a true team in this galli form of cricket (nevertheless played on a world stage, with world-class players)? These questions fill me with dread, fear and excitement. Dread, because if this is a flash in the pan, then Australia will demolish us, at home, in the upcoming ODI series.
Fear, because I find myself actually wanting to watch cricket again. I had almost stopped watching because of the commercialisation and corruption.
Excitement, because this bunch under Dhoni are like a breath of fresh air.
Well, I’m holding my breath for now.

No Facebook after Orkut

I’ve had more invitations to join Facebook than an orphaned Afghan would get from Al Qaeda at a terrorists’ convention. I have resisted. Thanks in no small part to my Orkut experience. I’m anti social networking sites. They take relationships into cyberspace, where there is virtually, no real human interaction. Online, there’s an uncomfortable comfort level one gets from interacting with a screen. Also, it’s no fun discovering your ex-girlfriends, forever-loves and playmates have not joined the convent and are all living happily ever after you. I ditched Orkut and as sure as hell, am staying away from Facebook.

Yuvi20

I’m a purist. You have to have supplied me an illegal substance to know how finicky I am when it comes to purity. Which is why cricket’s Twenty20 version was met with a skeptical glance of my sports-loving eye. However, I did predict it would change cricket, even the 50-over and Test game (see July 27 post).
But Yuvraj Singh has singlehandedly, actually with both hands, and bat, made a believer out of me. He showed that to hit sixes, you don’t have to slog. Carnage can have class, style and poise. He has raised the bar for cricketers.

Memories of my family's 'school morning' concert

Whoever said school years were Wonder Years missed school mornings in my house. My siblings and I were not what you would call ‘morning people’ so, every day there would be what my mum aptly called ‘the concert’. Melodramatic contralto, gnashing snarl Rob Zombie-style, occasional hymn in desperation for divine intervention and not rarely, the definitive crack of the stick on someone’s hide; all this packed into an hour between 7 and 8am, aimed at getting four sleepyheads to school on time. There was no reality TV back then, but my family concert would’ve been quite a watch.

Iftar-esque life

I have to make it a point to write before the iftar. Once I’ve feasted... brain, fingers and keyboard seem to be continents apart.
So, when I said the iftar comes to you, I meant it. We have a buffet laid out in our office for those who do not mix work with pleasure, but still have to eat.
The menu changes every week. This week, it’s a biryani, with a meat stew, pasta, hommos, some kind of Arabic khichdi, one vegetable dish and an array of sweets. Did I not say life in the Gulf has its moments.

Ramadan Kareem

I don’t mean to perpetually bitch about my life in the Middle East (though there is a good case for that). Life here does have its moments, though, like Hershey’s Kisses they melt away all too fast in the desert sun.
Ramadan here is an altogether different experience, basically because it’s a Muslim country (someone slap me for stating the obvious).
One advantage is that you can get free food almost anywhere in Dubai during Ramzan. In India you have to know where to go for a free iftar. In Dubai, the iftar comes to you.
To be continued…

In exile

It’s Ramzan in the Muslim world and in the world where there are Muslims. It’s also Ganapati time in my kingdom and that means, it’s homesick time for me. I have close Muslim friends back home, so close that during Ramadan it was a ritual to do at least one serious iftar in Mominpura, the heart of Muslim street cuisine in Pune. I have close Maharashtrian friends, close enough for me to be on the way to joining the Kasba Ganapati procession as a drummer. Ok, I exaggerate, but you get the point. I feel so much in exile.

Calling it

Another Super-Rooper puff up (see Aug 20 post for disclaimer on self-praise). Part of being a crack journo is being able to step back and predict where the news is going to happen next. I made a habit of this in my career: calling the news before it happens. It takes a lot of reading and tracking of what’s happening in the world to be able to cultivate that instinct. Luckily, I enjoy it. However, sometimes it is just coincidence. Go to my Sept 3 post and then read this piece http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/12/dining/12tong.html
Tongue in cheek, eh, that’s calling it.

Just some crazy shit

Across the road from Forever, in a house called Yesterday, lived a man called Tomorrow. Presently, Tomorrow wasn’t doing much except sitting around waiting for his wife Time to come home so they could sit down to a dinner of seconds. Tomorrow was poor and Time worked double shifts. Most often their neighbours, Hope and Charity shared their leftover food with the couple, sending it over to Yesterday.
Tomorrow hoped to get a job everyday, but Time wasn’t on his side when it came to being patient. For her every minute mattered. Not for Tomorrow though. He had Time.

Tour of duty

The most humiliating experience is to stand in a line, waiting for residence papers to be stamped in a country that is not yours, that you don’t want to reside in, but, because of circumstances, are forced to.
There is some deeper meaning to my Gulf experience, which I can’t see now. There has to be, or I’m going to kill myself, given how much I hate the place.
In the old days men used to go to war, do their tour of duty and then come back and live bitterly ever after. This is my tour of duty.

Airport observations: Tandoori kudi

This was my first trip north of Bombay. In my entire life. So, I was taken aback.
If you like meat on your women, the kudis at the Delhi airport, man, they are filled out. Not fat or overweight, but just really filled out. At Mumbai airport, in contrast, the women are generally thin and often petite, but at Delhi, they are all tandoori chicken man, gavran tandoori, that too.
I’m now really, really keen on visiting Delhi to see if the average Delhi woman is generally filled out like the female airport staff. Killers! Delhi, here I come.

Airport observations, prologue

On a recent trip to India I had to spend four hours at Bombay airport, and then, six at Delhi. A lesson in patience and a reminder, that I must fly as little as possible. For the record, I hate flying. Nevertheless, there’s only so much you can read, eat, drink, smoke and shop at airports. Basically, that's an hour-and-a-half done. So, the rest of the time you stare into blank space and at the face of humanity that fills up the airport. And as airport observations go, tomorrow’s post will be typically male and bordering on chauvinistic.

Hey, woman!

Hey, woman!, don’t be fooled,
As you laugh like a lark
My heart is brooding,
Lost in the dark

Hey, woman!,
You like what you see?
Torment, death and misery;
Of a soul that was once wild and free

Hey, woman!,
Are you sleeping in calm?
Relaxed, relieved that I can
Do you no harm?

Hey, woman!,
Are you over me now?
A cross on the wall,
Skeleton in the closet
Don’t let him in the hall!

Hey, woman!,
Like summer after fall
I thought you would call
At least to see
If you can still dance with me

Mirror, mirror on a page...

Finally read Gregory Roberts’ Shantaram. It’s good when someone holds a mirror to your face. Roberts does it with honesty and, thankfully, devoid of the intellectual comeuppance that most writers (in English) on and from India, bring to an Indian tale.
Much of it for me, the slums, and even the underworld, to an extent, hits close to home, so it’s almost like getting a chance to be part of a story, and a very good one at that.
If you’ve followed this blog then you know how I love original one-liners. Shantaram packs some amazing ones. Read it.

Have you ever eaten tongue?

Have you ever eaten cow or ox tongue? It’s a delicacy that is often overlooked by meat lovers, who prefer to be drawn in by the hype surrounding lesser-tasting entrails and pseudo-exotic dishes.
Imagine the juiciness of redmeat, the tenderness of chicken and a flavour all of its own… that’s tongue.
I come from a family that specializes in unique cuisine. Tongue was a favourite and over the years my mother and her mother have all perfected the art of making it, from a curry to just plain smoked roll. If you haven’t eaten tongue, you are missing something.

Don Juan de Whacko

The man versus woman debate is as old as old can be, and, having spawned multibillion-dollar business turnovers, from movies to books to divorces to bar sales, sits as jaded and clichéd as a spinster grand-aunt at her niece’s hen’s night.
Which is why, I prefer to observe rather than compare, to collate rather than compete, to endure rather than entreat, but most of all, to sit back and simply be fascinated. So, when I woman-ise, it is not womanising in the worldly sense of the word. It is a very pure pursuit. Does that sound convincing? But it’s true.