If...

I read Rudyard Kipling’s If for the first time when I was a kid. It remained vivid in my memory during my school years. Then it went sleeping deep down, overshadowed by various other things. Today, years later it surfaced again and I felt every line (which did not happen when I read it as a kid). It was absolutely soothing and inspiring, probably this should help me to have a balanced approach towards life. Poetry and music…. and tears, they know no frontiers.


If

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

Chupke Chupke, Anyone??

My count is 64. Or may be even twice that, who knows. And its strange that everytime I am as involved, as enchanted and as fulfilled. It so happens that on repeat viewing, one tends to pick up the nuances that one has lost earlier, but I am past all that. Now the ONLY reason for me to watch Chupke Chupke is that I enjoy watching it. Over and over again. Just as much as I enjoy watching Bawarchi,Golmaal, Choti Si Baat, Khoobsoorat, Naram Garam...I am a huge Bollywood fan and these middle class family entertainers manage to retain a peculiar resonance even today.
There is something about this genre that connects me in a unique way. The intensity, simplicity and the exceedingly good-natured characters makes repeat value of these movies quite high. But I feel there is a deeper reason why these movies appeal to us to such an extent and for such a long time. For these films are the best ads for what we see as our 'middle class values'. Each of these films evokes a world that we long to be a part of- a warm kinship unsettled by an odd idiosyncracy that gets comfortably correctec, so that all is well again. And they manage to do this in many different ways.
The characters are a far cry from the Eastmancolored Hyper-heroes with biceps and maaa (I love them too btw); they usually live in small houses and take the local train or bus. The dramatic tension usually comes from the constraints imposed by human whimsies. In Golmaal, there was Utpal Dutt who insists that his employees sporting a moustaches and in Naram Garam he is driven by astrology. In Khoobsoorat,there is a matriarch who is fixated on discipline and in Guddi, a young girl is obsessed with movie stars. Regardless of whether or not the porotagonists live in scarce circumstances, their problem rarely arises out of poverty. The minor flaw in an otherwise "perfect" world is usually corrected by taking recourse to harmless subterfuges that create mayhem, before things settle down at a higher level of equilibrium.
Unlike other mainstream Hindi movies which arrayed around some key axes of conflict, the primary among them being the battle of an individual to get some sort of a freedom,enacted of course with the quintessential melodrama, the middle class family entertainers left enough room for the individual; the characters here were more than the Vicky Malhotras that otherwise dominated the screen.
It is interesting that these movies fulfil the same purpose as the other genres. However unlike the other family movies, which usually depict an ideal family breaking up and reuniting after a lot of cravenness and tears, the breezy comedy does that in a much more sophisticated way. Lessons are gentle and rarely overt.
Yesterday, I was having this discussion with my mother about today's definition of a "good job" and a "good life". That moment I just thought about these movies and I just could't stop smiling. The main reason why these movies continue to appeal to all of us is that they tell us that happiness is independent of money. Just look at Bawarchi and it's remake-of-the-sorts Hero No 1. In both the movies the protagonist is an impostor do-gooding servant who brings peace to a disintegrating family. However, if in Bawarchi the instruments employed for the reconciliation are good food, classical dance and music, and an occasional wink at the drink, in Hero No 1 it is the power of money and influence. Rajesh Khanna wins people over by his numerous abilities in cooking, singing, dancing and mathematics, Govinda by his physical prowess in saving the daughter of the house from being raped and by the power vested in his father's money. Hero No 1 is a chronicle of our times, making us nostalgic about the purity of the value system depicted in Bawarchi, however romanticized that depiction might have been.
As the world becomes more monetized, and as our pleasures become more loaded with sensort excess, the nostalgia for yesterday's simplicity is likely to grow. A Chupke Chupke tells us that there is always a way to be happy and that the answer lies within our existing way of life. Change is gently neutered as we all chuckle at its foolishness....

Mom, Get Married!

This post is not about unwed mothers or love-child but about stereotypical thinking leading to emptiness and about my ex-maid Nalini.

Examples are strewn everywhere, of stereotypical thinking leading nowhere, but we go on… It’s easy to imagine where we get our stereotypes from - parents, friends, teachers, religion, books, TV, newspapers, movies…

Nalini might have got it from movies because from what she said her parents were keen on getting her educated but all she wanted was to get married as soon as possible being a girl, which she did get at the age of 16 to someone who grew up to become an unemployed drunkard who beat her regularly. Now that’s another stereotype, men from labor class are wife-beating drunkards. I don’t know of their personal lives but most people from lower strata that I’ve observed are very family-oriented, hardworking, weathering all other hardships like no other.

And we all know that wife-beating drunkards exist in all strata of the society.

For some time she bore the harassment and played the martyred woman, gave birth to a son thinking a child will make things right. But things only got worse. She left his house with her son, to her mother and brother and started working as a maid but still took karvachauth fasts in the first 2 years in separation. When I questioned it, especially since she took an off for the fast, she said a wife has to do her karvachauth duties whether her husband deserves it or not. However, it seems with time she started learning from experience and soon discontinued karvachauth.
Her in-laws were harassing her even from long distance by spreading rumors about her. With the help of an NGO, she applied for a divorce. So while her offs for karvachauth stopped, she started taking monthly leaves for court proceedings. As neither her husband nor in-laws participated in the proceedings, divorce was granted in their absence. She continued going to court demanding maintenance money for her son.
After getting her divorced, her family tried to get her married next. Nalini was defiant to this, she said one marriage was lesson enough and all men are the same. Her son was 8 by now. She said he knew who his father was and would refuse to accept a step-father.

Nalini is a descent looking woman if you overlook her slight squint eye. She got some proposals which she considered half-heartedly. Of course, she took a leave every time a prospective groom came to see her. And then she rejected them.
“Men from villages are backward and strange. I have grown up in the city. I’ll have problems adjusting with them. “Men who are marrying for the first time will treat it as a favor” was another of her opinions. All attempts and threats by her family to get her remarried thus went in vain until fate intervened.

Fate is great because it is unpredictable and cannot be stereotyped (Thank god for that!). It strikes good or bad, man or woman, young or old en masse, without discrimination.

And so it had struck Narayan, eldest of four siblings, at a very young age when he lost both his parents. The boy altruistically dedicated his life to bringing up his siblings and getting them settled. As he neared forty he realized that his brothers and sisters were now too busy with their own lives to take care of him. He was still looked up as a provider and not as someone who had needs to live his life too. There came a time when he was desperate for someone of his own, someone who would love him and take care of him.
He cried his heart out to a well-wisher who was a distant relative of Nalini. Sad state for someone who had treasured whatever was left of his family and worked for it. When I see young men, with hale and hearty doting parents, disregarding marriage and family values and queuing up girlfriends instead, I think of men like Narayan, orphaned but dutiful, yearning for a wife and a family.

You might imagine that Narayan’s proposal went to Nalini next. But no, it didn’t happen straight away. Had it happened one cannot be sure if Nalini with her fears and stereotypical view of the world would have agreed. Narayan’s proposal first went to a widow with three kids. Both were to marry but did not because a widower brother-in-law of the lady in question stepped in and said he should be the one to marry her.

Now the relative thought of Nalini and approached her with his proposal.
The fact that Narayan had accepted a woman with three kids put Nalini’s fears about her son’s acceptance to rest. She was still resistant to the idea of marriage but her brother and mother were threatening to move away from the city leaving her in the lurch. She had to choose between marital security and independence.
Near the marriage date, Nalini’s nervousness returned and in the heat of an argument with her mother she nearly called off the wedding. Her 10-year old son then stepped in. He begged, “Please amma, you must get married.” That was the last of the stumbling blocks.

I missed the wedding as it was held at the opposite end of the city. Narayan and Nalini were one of the 19 couples that tied the knot in the mass wedding. When she came to meet me in her newly-wed finery, looking radiant and beautiful, she said it was great fun. The food was great. All couples were given free gifts of furniture, jewelry, cloths etc., Whoever organizes these weddings definitely deserves a pat on the back.

There is a lot more drama to the story especially from her ex-in-laws, from threats for stopping the wedding and seizing custody of the boy. Although Narayan forbade Nalini from moving court for son’s maintenance, he was determined to fight tooth and nail in court to help Nalini get custody of the child. Now the trio lives happily together.
Think of what she would have missed had she been adamant about her opinions. Her new husband’s happiness is like that of someone who has hit the jackpot, treats her like a precious gift, buys her everything, forbids her from working anywhere as a maid…far cry from the time when she was willing to slave for her unemployed first husband provided he did not raise his hand on her.

I am not saying that there is no basis for stereotypical thinking. There is and probably it helped her avoid wrong choices. On the face of evidence to the contrary, she dropped her stubbornness and gave life a chance. She deserves a good life....


On a final note, here are some stereotypes to mull about:

o Heaven is fluffy clouds.
o God looks like an old man, white hair, white robe.
o Beautiful girls are unattainable.
o Old women all wear polyester and have blue hair.
o Big boys don't cry.
o Its OK for women to cry, since women are weak.
o Plain-looking women are more faithful than beautiful women.
o Men will cheat because...well, they're men.
o Boys are expected to sow their wild oats, but women are supposed to remain chaste.
o Blonde women are dumb.
o Redheads are hot tempered.
o Black men have large genitals.
o Blacks are lazy.
o Asians are good at math and science.
o Girls aren't good at math.
o Smart girls are geeky.

Never mine but i felt the loss!

I remember the times as a toddler when I used to play with my doll and have tea parties with my friend. The doll was mine and the tea set was hers. We used to make lovely pink juice by smushing bougainvilla flowers and green juice with leaves from the garden and serving it out in the small cups and saucers. We would then fake as though we were drinking it and make more. So many giggles, dirty fingers and fun. And then my friend's family decided to move to a new neighbourhood. I watched her leave. The tea set went with her and I did not make bougainvilla juice for a long time. It was never mine but I felt the loss.


I remember watching the boy in the house across ours from my window. They had just moved in recently. I was in my teens and he must have just joined college. I had this huge crush over him and would make appearances outside just in time to catch his eye. He would barely acknowlege me but that did not deter me. One day, I was returning home from school in my bi-cycle, when I saw him on his motorbike. He had a girl in his pillion seat, clinging to him affectionately. He was never mine but I felt the loss.


The above accounts are true and I can perhaps smile at how I grew through my losses of things not mine!




Today, I watch news about children being abused. Be it a boy who is waiting to be executed in Iran because he killed a man trying to molest him, be it a toddler who has been maimed so that he can be a beggar, be it a girl who dies in childbirth because her body is just 13 years old, be it a child who is abandoned by parents who cannot afford to feed her... These children are not mine, but I feel the loss.

An Awesome song!

कागज़ के फूल

वक़्त ने किया,
क्या हसीन सितम,
तुम रहे न तुम,
हम रहे न हम,
वक़्त ने किया....

बेक़रार दिल इस तरह मिले
जिस तरह कभी हम जुदा न थे
तुम भी खो गए
हम भी खो गए
एक राह पर
चलके दो कदम
वक़्त ने किया .....

जायेंगे कहाँ
सूझता नहीं
चल पड़े मगर
रास्ता नहीं
क्या तलाश है
कुछ पता नहीं
बुन्न रहे है दिल
ख्वाब दम बा दम

वक़्त ने  किया........

Maine dil se kaha dhoondh lana khushi.......

Sometimes you just tend to forgive people because their presence means life to you, because u still want them in your life. So forgive and forget.....
i did :) :)