The Grand Fall

While the rupee falls, values all around us have already fallen to unrecoverable lows. Atleast there is some hope for the economy to recover, if not now then sometime later. But will we recover, ever?
The holy men caught in unholy acts. In the name of who, I wonder! When caught in the act, these spiritually uplifted men have no qualms in victimizing the victim. In this world, when the traffic makes it so difficult to be on time, how can we expect God to find us on time?
Rape seems to be a favourite sport of the nation with no age limit. From the old to the young, it seems whoever is bored and wants some media glare, goes ahead and commits a gang-rape. Guess the Dark Ages where less dark for the fairer sex than this!
Relationships don’t last and we seem to move on too fast, faster than our city’s metro. The funniest thing, is those in a relationship are looking for opportunities to be free. And the singles are desperate to tie themselves down. What we fail to understand is that nothing comes for free. From the effort to pursue, to depreciating bank balance-first to impress, later to depress leaves most frequenting the counseling sessions.
Cuts in every form rules our days. Job-cuts, cost-cuts, budget-cuts, power-cuts, water-cuts, road-cuts…but what about the morality cuts? The feeling of deriving pleasure from the cuts of others and being oblivious to their pains, so much so that we drive away seeing the bleeding wounds of a fellow traveler just because our time is too precious than their survival time.
It is time we at least give a thought to the value-fall, maybe not as much as the rupee-fall but some thought to begin.

Black Beauty

On one of my morning drive to work, I bumped into the “Dark is beautiful” campaign of Nandita Das. The FM radio presenter started with the phrase “agar rang nahin hain, roop nahin hain…” and went on a sympathetic tone. I felt offensive.
Well, well! I am dark and I don’t belong to the category of crowd-pullers. But does that mean that every person who has dark skin colour is ugly? In other words, if you are dark are you ugly? I know few people who are dark complexioned but extremely beautiful. They are successful and do manage to get admiring glances from people around. And mind you, I am not talking about celebrities. I wonder how they will react to this perception and media-popular image of beauty.
As a kid, I too had an obsession towards fair skinned. I knew I was dark and did many things (under elderly guidance offcourse as they were more worried than me) to lighten my colour. Nothing worked though and with age I began to accept myself. Especially with a sibling who is much fairer and beautiful, I managed to get quite unhealthy comments on my looks. To be honest, it was painful but I learnt to live with it. And now I am even celebrating my difference. But the question remains, why do anybody, for that case, have to go through this phase? Why can’t we keeping feeling good about the colour we are in? Why don’t we grow up to the idea that a beautiful face may not be a fair face? Why do the matrimonial sections in leading newspapers still scream for fair-skinned sometimes even “extremely” fair-skinned candidates?
Why does our society not live without the various fairness cream, in all fairness why do we even need a campaign like “Dark is beautiful” to tell the world, that I am dark, I feel beautiful irrespective of the fact whether the world acknowledges it or not…I do not need celebrities to speak up for me. And if you think I am not, so be it?

I Can

In a body of imperfections
With stretch marks that is more stubborn than I am
Not beautiful, by-your standards
I just know that I am special
Because only I can
Look into the mirror and say, “life must go on”
Despite the setbacks, the heartbreaks, the numerous downfalls
And with every fall, I know I will still stand up
And yet be ready to tell you that “yes, I can”.

Things for forever

It has been a while since I wrote a new entry. It is not that I don’t write anymore, rather, my writing has been put to some serious test over the last few days. Thanks to my profession, now writing will be taking care of my bills (well almost). With a lot of change around me recently, some things I’ve discovered will never change.
Like the concern of my parents when I reach late, or, don’t call my maa immediately after I reach my office
The deadlines which keeps getting shorter day by day
The brief which are too brief at times
The traffic jams every time I hit the road, just because we have a penchant for chaos
The fuss over what to eat and what to wear
The pain you go through when you’re cut or bruised
And, most importantly it does hurt, just the same, with the realization that you are no more wanted
The neighbours who mind your business, because they have nothing more to mind
The love for your one and only car, even if it is second-hand
The joy of reading the SMS alert that your salary traveled to your account safely
Do you also have a list of things that never change for you? Or like me, maybe you don’t want them to change?

The end-less love story

“Met her after 11 years and you know I still love her,” declared the elderly do-all-good colleague of mine. Me, not such a good judge of love, was wordless and thought it better to continue listening. He went on, “we loved each other a lot, but we parted and I promised never to meet her again.”
The very conventional elderly and highly respected colleague of mine was not the types to break the norms. At least that is what I thought. But his confession was a shocker and what followed left me so hopeful in life, in love.
His love story still continues in a very non-norms way. His wife was not somebody he could go home and talk about work. Neither was she indifferent towards her wifely duties. With kids filling up their time, life was as usual and that of happy co-existence.
Then he met a young colleague, good-looking, intelligent and desirable from every aspect. Strong friendship grew first and then love followed, gradually. Both knew he was married and there was no future. But they never could give up on each other and most importantly their friendship.
There was no element of expectation and nothing illegitimate ever happened, yet the bond was stronger than any other partnership. Time flew, she got married. They decided not to meet ever again. They lost touch but not the feeling of being touched.
After 11 years, she called up just to meet him. They met, enjoyed each other’s company and talked about each other’s family and life in general, more so retirement plans.
I don’t know about her but he still looks so much in love with her. The sparkle in his eyes couldn’t hide his emotions.
Such a different love story without any ending, but, he still looks so much complete. Do such stories still exist in today’s time of instant gratification, or is it limited to that generation yesterday? How I wish I could have a similar story like this?

The ad-mad world

In a profession, where writing takes care of my bills, well almost. Sometimes I even manage to go beyond my bills to take care of my little indulgences. I am baffled by the variations of work, the tight deadlines and the stiff-necked clients who never give you the freedom to be. After a self-imposed break of few years, I am back settling and recovering. Reality has dawned on me and despite the time gap I now, know that some things will never change in this world:
Like your client briefs – they are too brief to comprehend
Like your clients – you just can’t afford to prove them wrong so each time you choose to be wrong
Like your English can never be better than that of your clients so you let him write most of the times
Like your servicing team will sell client’s ideas to you and not the other way round (they are harmless and sandwiched souls)
Like your ideas are as cool or un-cool as that of your client’s whims and fancies
However,
I’ve realized how lucky I am to be surrounded with colleagues, less normal than most (and so much like me).
They don’t ask me the usual. Most importantly, they don’t do the usual and neither do they expect me to be the usual. Whoever, said that this is “A BIG MAD WORLD” was talking about my world of Advertising, a world that has always welcomed me with open arms. Thank you, GUYS!

Daddy's Little Girl (not little for the world)

During the growing up days, it wasn’t easy to talk to Baba (Dad) on most things. Even the faintest names of guys would trigger a tremor too great to withstand. And it would result on a week long Hitler rule of:

* No guys calling at home
* Curfew after 7 in the evening
* Usual search of belongings to ensure the safety of my innocence
* Cross-checking my whereabouts to detect loopholes
The list was endless…and too embarrassing to get into the details at times.

Time changed, I grew and so did his rules. But one thing that never changed in Baba was his innate desire to ‘protect’ me from this big, bad world. Life hasn’t been too kind to me and with my homecoming after all these years he still wants to take care of his little girl (who is now in her mid 30’s soon to fall in the category of auntyji). So much so that he has no qualms in repeating directions to me and even goes to the extent of teaching me how to cross the busy roads. “Look on your right, then on your left, again on your…,” I interrupt too embarrassed. “So what?” he says, “You will always be little for me”. And still I see his eyebrows form that familiar expression hearing a male voice on my phone. More importantly, he never shies away from the patent statutory warning, “be careful”.
Today, when I brought his beloved car to work for the very first time in my life; I did feel his love clouding me. I drove very carefully, more cautiously than ever knowing that I can’t afford to make a mistake. Almost, as if I could overhear the all familiar tone, “Bete, be safe”.
I know it is not easy to stay with your parents at my age, but sometimes I do feel I am blessed. I know I am not too easy to live with, I scold him and he doesn’t protest. He continues fretting about me unfazed by my mood swings.
Thankfully, HE IS THERE! (And so is his car)