Trials and Tribulations by Fire

  “No Rohit! Not now, please understand na . This is not good. The guy is seeing.” She untangled herself from Rohit’s embrace and wriggled to one side of the crampy auto. Shalini and Rohit, classmates at AJ College of Engineering, were dating each other. They were both seventeen and in the first year. They stayed in the hostel and had gone for a late night movie in Nagpur, around 40 kms, from their residential campus at Ramtek. Shalini was five feet seven, dusky, had large eyes, medium hair cut in waves, and a gorgeous figure. Rohit on the other hand was quite handsome, some would call him delectable, could sing like Kishore Kumar (atleast he thought so), and had a way with women. He had had many affairs and Shalini was his nth, well he considered her a contest, whereas she considered him her true lover. They knew each other since class XII, where Rohit had eyed the Maths teacher’s only daughter with a lot of lust and some love. Shalini had been quite amused with the attenti

Bang Bang Bang went the shovel I heard it but ignored it 'coz I was reading a novel My mind conjured up images when the hero dropped the towel What the hell am I writing, who am I, Tony Powell!

I had a providential opportunity to eat the proverbial shaadi ka laddu. Well here is a rundown on the experience. For all you single women out there waiting for your prince charming, please do not wait for happiness to knock on your doors. Trust me, you guys are the happiest on the planet. Yes, yes. I am not joking. Actually, at this juncture, I would be glad to go back to my single days. Of dreaming about my prince and day dreaming of romantic outings. Real life bites hard. I am bitten by the reality bug so many times, there is no place left on my body for other bites. Well, sarcasm aside, I was one of those women who wanted to join the Mrs. gang very soon. I gave up so many things dear to me to attain this. Well, I reached this peak. And I am all alone. I can see other Mrs' who are standing all alone on their peaks. The problem lies in our societal mentality. What we as women perceive as a way of attaining social status gives us just that. A status symbol. Instead, it takes a

“Hurry up, we are already late.” “Yeah, coming, why don’t you take the car out and wait for me near the gate?”  “Ok.” Sandhya aka Sandy locked the front door of the flat and checked the door. It held. She then locked the grill door and checked the huge padlock. She did that out of habit. A habit steeped in her middle class upbringing. That was then, before, she had tasted stupendous success and became the face of the largest cosmetics company. Sandy took the lift and hurried out into the front porch of the building with her small hand luggage. Louis Vuitton. Always. She was going away to participate in a fashion show in Paris. Sandhya Roy D’Costa, a Bengali by birth, world citizen by choice, had married Sam D’Costa when she was nineteen. Sam was a racer. He had now retired from the sport and managed an Audi showroom. He was a car enthusiast and had powerful friends in the city. Due to his celebrity status, he also had a lot of clout. Sandy was going to Paris for a fashion show. A

“Moti bhains!” A shrill voice pierced the evening stillness making Navneet jump out of her skin and reverie. A dull ache started from behind her left ear and threatened to spread throughout her head.   She turned her head sharply to locate the source of the shrill tone and found a fast receding thin frame clad in track pants and t-shirt running in the opposite direction. It was Shruti Yadav, her neighbor, her classmate and a constant source of irritation. Navneet continued walking towards her house. She also decided not to take the shortcut through the park anymore from college to reach home. Shaking her head to clear the jarring echo, Navneet aka Navi, started walking faster. When she reached the wrought iron gate of her house, she opened it and let it bang against the wall till it rattled, making, Koyla Ram, the dog, jump and hide behind the rose bush. Navi looked up at the sky and said, “I just wish one day she grows so fat that she can’t get inside her house. Then sh

The rains lashed the city and there was hardly any visibility. She drove the car carefully through muddy and deep waters and made it to her street. As soon as she was about to turn into her driveway she realized that there was a small obstacle in her path. A scooty was parked in the middle of the road in such a way that neither could she get inside the gate without toppling it over nor could she get down to remove the irritating piece of metal from her path. She honked lightly and the sparse crowd dispersed and a man jumped out of the way of the menacing looking black metal piece. He also hurled a choicest piece of abuse he could think of at the woman and clutching his umbrella, walked away towards the bus. She now looked out for the old watchman who was expected to cater to such emergencies. In this case, the watchman was happily guzzling some brownish or was it light brownish liquid out of an equally brown bottle. She thought for a second and then waved madly to get his at

The flight landed at 23:50 IST, Indian Standard Time. The tires screeched to a halt and we tumbled out of the jet, ready to be jet-lagged. The actual jet lag thing didn't hit me till I reached home and dozed off. The next few days were hazy, I could not understand what was happening to me. My friends were in the same boat, I believed. Or atleast I thought so, 'coz I did not turn back and check. I went to office, said the right things, returned and life continued. But the drowsiness remained. It slowly became a part of me. I was seriously jet lagged! Wow. Is this how people lag behind jets. Aah. I am now sleeping intermittently, between naps. Sleeping has become an integral part of my routine. Previously I would sleep when my routine allowed me. Now I have changed my routine to accomodate more zzzz time. Life has certainly changed, for me.  

A close girl friend and I were having this conversation last evening. We usually end up talking about such issues, passionately, such as behaviour of young women vis a vis their mothers in law (MILs). She said, when we retort back to our MILs, we are actually behaving the way they want us to behave, like daughters in law (DILs). If we keep our sanity intact, curb the urge to murder them, and behave in a rational way, the MILs wont know how to react. This, is easier said than done. She continued, MILs as a group are a very insecure lot. They are scared that the young hot woman in their son's life is out to rob them of the unbridled freedom and hold they had on the men's lives. The young women take away the most important possession from the MILs, their darling sons! They show no remorse, no pity to the older women. The DILs take away the sons physically away sometimes as well. The MILs find themselves completely cloistered with their husbands, again! This causes a lot

Recently, I was reading a friend's blog and thinking about what could probably affect her so much. She has been always a fiery woman, lashing out at unruly bums and treat them like poo. Poo, these bums are worth, surely, but I sometimes wonder what moves me. What is that one thing that makes me cry or ponder? Now, that would certainly be human intelligence. Be it humor or a witty conversation. Intelligence makes me take note of people. Warm and dumb people also make an impact. I forget them very easily and quickly. Of late, I have behaved in an abysmal manner and ridiculed a person a lot. Of course, I am feeling bad about it. I think I have reached a stage where  I do not make fun of anybody. But baser instincts do kick in sometimes and take hold of, rather possess me, to go ahead and ridicule. I love churning out words, I like the feel of the words on my tongue. To be able to speak correctly and well means a lot to me. Hence, I ridicule, people who care less or are less car

Navratri had no significance to me till I got married. For that matter, none of the Hindu festivals did. Of late, I have begun to appreciate and learn the customs and rituals followed by my ancestors for hundreds of years. Though I was a sceptic at first, I began my journey of belief to rekindle the Hindu in me. Be it lighting the diya or drawing a kolam in front of the house, I try to follow whatever my elders expect a married Hindu woman to do.