KAHIHI

My friend sent me a text message last week asking me to list my favourite moment, my sad moment, my happiest moment etc of the year 2010. It then dawned on me that countdown for the New Year has begun. I have been waiting for the clock to tick to twelve.

I quickly spiraled down the memory lane to ponder over the year that went by. There were moments that gave me extreme joy. However, there were times when I regret the oysters I threw away from my life when I forgot to see the pearls inside them.

The beginning was scary, life had taken a tumultuous turn and I am still on the recovery path; matters have improved a lot though. The year was a roller coaster ride.

Now, I have began to look at the previous year not only from my perspective and the effects it had had one me but also taking under purview the people who matter to me. For some of my friends their life changed drastically when stork visited them delivering to them the new meaning of life. To a few, life taught painful lessons at the cost of their beloved ones.

Changes were influencing not only personal lives but professional lives as well. The tidal wave of recession made situations worrisome, every step needed a cautious attention, and career roadmap needed a meticulous approach.

Now again the clock is ticking fast. Everyone is preparing for the New Year, to welcome it in their own way. While the younger generation is busy planning to make their evening a happening experience, our parents and grandparents will be seen in front of the TV sets either watching the programs or volleying between channels where lot of astrologers will give away detailed horoscope of the year to come. This happens every year.

However, apart from changing the date in the calendar I wonder what is so new about this New Year. I have no idea how it will be. But just like all you wonderful people, I too will be preparing a list full of hopes, dreams, some resolutions (which will be forgotten come February), new desires, excuses to do more shopping, some expectations, new movies. Apart from all these, I plan to come up with a new list. Something I never did previous year, something I plan to do now every year. I will have that list hung somewhere in my room where I can glance through it every time I pass by it. The list will indeed be very special to me – “The Gratitude List”.

“Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow”, words of a elderly wise person.

So, in between those happening parties, lavish dinners, exchanging texts, calls, shopping, celebrations, steal sometime of solitude. A time that is only yours and only for you. Sit back and relax. Express your thankfulness to everyone who made you smile, who made you feel stronger, who inspired you. Reflect upon those moments of adversity and pain when life taught you some lessons without which you wouldn't be what you are today.

Like Eileen Caddy writes, “Gratitude helps you to grow and expand; gratitude brings joy and laughter into your life and into the lives of all those around you.” Gratitude helps you to express from the heart and invite the best in the future. So forget those moments that broke you and let us say our heartfelt gratitude to life and welcome a new beginning, a new you and me.

I am not sure how long my Gratitude List would be but here are few things that I can quickly gather:

• Thank you for bringing me into this beautiful world.
• Thank you for giving me the best parents.
• Thank you for this beautiful place I call My Home.
• Thank you for those lovely friends.
• Thank you for this soft, supple and beautiful skin.
• Thank you for making me reliable, honest and trust worthy.
• Thank you for bestowing me with creativity. I feel so special and unique.
• Thank you for all those second looks I got. :)
• Thank you for bringing those wrong people, without whom I could never appreciate and realise, recognize, admire and preserve those wonderful ones who care for me.
• Thank you for those adversities and also the strength without which I would never have been this wise.
• Thank you for all the love.
• Thank you for making me a Woman.
• Thank you for the feminity.
• Thank you for making me, ME.

And thank you to all the wonderful readers of KAHIHI for taking time to read and appreciate our efforts. A huge motivation for us.

With a promise to come out with more on KAHIHI, wishing you all a very HAPPY NEW YEAR 2011!

I decided never to get into a relationship. I have devoutly consorted to this resolution for over a decade now. Every year I just renew this resolution. And with every passing year my confidence in my New Year resolution has deepened. Till date I don’t have a concrete rationale why I should fall in love or have a companion or get into a relationship.

For me getting into a relationship is farce where nothing is true. Even the words “I love you” or “tum mujhe acche lagte ho” are perfunctory. Those words look and sound beautiful only in the start, only to fade away eventually. The words are good to strike off the chord, begin the communication, however, later the communication lines get jammed up, and later things are directly taken for granted without a thought to other person’s intentions. Where does the essence of getting into relationship ooze off?

Most often, relationships make one sacrifice on self respect and dignity. I know many people who had literally begged to a girl to get her nod to accept their proposal. I am still confused about what is there so much to die for. Girls brutally exploited those boys to get free bike rides, watch movies, and eat at the Taj, Marriott. The megalomaniac boys showered their hard money on their stupid girlfriends. Not that I don’t have that kind of money but I find it foolish to spend it in return for holding a hand along the sea shore or getting a kiss in return.

I ask many what makes them so desperate to get into a relationship. Answers range from Mercury to Pluto, with our without logic, sensual to emotional but none to convince me.

I have been observing an imprudent friend of mine lately. He has been smitten by the “I-need-you : you-are-my-life : you-make-me-smile : you-are-the-one” bug. This insanely-in-love friend of mine just doesn’t understand the logic of ‘shut it-fuck it-forget it’. The girl smartly plays “ringa-ringa-roses” of words with him and he stays amused by all that. I wonder what makes him stay so optimistic about the entire episode. He falls to the every excuse she gives him – ‘what’s the hurry’, ‘time will tell’, ‘we still don’t know each other well’, and so on. My silly friend takes all that and sleeps off with sweet dreams in his head and smile on his lips. Idiot!

I don’t understand how time will tell anything. Aren’t we supposed to plan our time, schedule things, and make our plans work in accordance? I understand there is no hurry unless you don’t mind holding shivering hands or kisses with hollow toothless mouth or don’t expect children at the age when only function the reproductive organ can do is micturate. And when does one plan to know each other well enough? Most of the time my friend doesn’t even get to talk to the one whom he admires so much. All calls go unattended, SMS unreplied, there are only specific time windows when calls can be made. It is all so conditional and unrealistic. Well such a case, most certainly the time when you would have actually got to know each other is during the old age. And I thought true relationships are unconditional and beyond any time factor.

I see break offs, divorces, on-time-weddings all around me. There is zero patience in relationships today. There was a time when I read about foreign celebrity divorces in newspapers, see divorces in movies, then saw my own parents going through it, and then seeing it among my friends. My belief in relationships has shattered with each passing day and my belief in not getting into one has strengthened exponentially in the rising ratio. I hate it when relationships are sought desperately turning a blind eye to the fact that you lay at the mercy of other person’s wish and will.

There are people who pity me, laugh at my misanthropic (which I am not, people have assumed it to be so) life. I just smile back with a thought, ‘let’s see whose smile lasts longer’.

In cricket, it is said that the hook shot, though most marvelous, is the most dangerous to play. Slight misjudgment and the delivery can hit you like an uppercut, enough to bruise you for rest of your life.

Quite similarly, Ms. Arundhati Roy, our very own, who gave India its first Booker, has been smartly facing the deliveries and surviving at the benevolence of many benefit of doubts.

However, this time, she seems to have missed it. She tried a hook at the Kashmir issue, which unfortunately didn’t go well off the boundary. The timing was wrong perchance. Or maybe the tact; one shouldn’t be playing every delivery between mid-wicket and backward square-leg on the leg side. Some other shot could have possibly made Ms. Roy win praise akin Tendulkar – “pride of the nation”. However, that did not happen so and instead Arundhati had to derogate herself with a taint of “traitor of the nation”.

While her Booker might make us feel proud about the zeal, Ms. Roy’s subsequent acts have only made us feel sour about her ubiquitous performances. For no rhyme or reason, she has been pouncing on every opportunity that she thought could get her publicity and media attention, possible smitten by the honour and reputation that her cousin enjoys.

Arundhati Roy has many times critiqued on the right things. However, more than that, she opined about something that made her image and intellect spiral down. Whether she does it for publicity or to flaunt her astuteness, is something only she can answer or the media can speculate. However, parachuting between issues, like Narmada Andolan, Maoism, Kashmir, and similar, does give a sense of chasing media attention. Given that she has the caliber of winning a Booker, it doesn’t require any super intelligence about how to diplomatically tackle sensitive issues like that of Kashmir and Naxals-Maoists; she can be superbly imaginative about how to conjure up things.

The Guardian, New York Times, TIME, may all praise for the analytical views she has given on Afghanistan, Israel, Sri Lanka, Nuclear Policy but her words in India are certainly taken in a bitter tone, which if continues, can turn out to be a debacle for the pride & prestige that she once enjoyed in India.

It is unarguable that a writer like Arundhati will have myopic and distant imaginative about everything that is happening around and that she is born in a democratic-republic gives her right to expression. However, why do so through petty things that invoke more of blasphemy than eulogy. Ms. Roy has been and is a good writer – a story teller, which one of the most respected literary awards (Man Booker) also has testified. It is then surprising that her quest stalls at winning just one. Her research work too seems to be good, given the fact that she dig up issues that appeal to the masses. However, why not make use of those same research skills to come up with an unthinkable narrative that can fetch her a “Pulitzer”, may be. Or simply be like Hilary Mantel of Wolf Hall (2009 Booker Prize Winner), whose ultimate piquancy is to write, write, and write; keeping all other transient issues at bay.

It would rather be appreciated that Ms. Arundhati Roy gets evolved from and not involved in these issues of national unrest. Taking cues from these issues, glorifying them, building up characters, brewing up a fictional tale, and marching your way to the next the “Booker” or a “Nobel for Literature”, possibly looks more sensible at this time.

Your fans and book lovers surely don’t want to look at you as a “single book surprise”.

- Amol Redij

She is the apple of daddy's eyes, mommy is her close friend, an adorable pampered little sissy at times. A Barbie doll for all at home. She is the most beautiful girl they have ever seen. She is adamant, she is caring, she is bossy. No one ever raise a voice at her. No one dare demean her. She lives in her own cocoon. She lives life the way she wants.. She is always a priority. She is confident. She feels protected. She believes she has the control. Where she is taught never to compromise on things less worthy of her. Her fears are soothed when not sure. Probably I can add millions of many beautiful lines which a daughter experiences in her home.

But the transition she feels when she marries is very different from what she would have ever imagined. She is a wife, a mother, a daughter-in-law, a co-sister, a sister-in-law.......many caps on a single head. Amazing she plays many roles at a single time. she cooks, she manages, she bonds, she gives. Life definitely changes for a girl once she is married. First of all, she abandons her cocoon to adjust to a different environment. Share herself and her things with a stranger. She learns to adjust, she learns patience. She learns the true meaning of compromise. A girl who always demanded her space now learns to give away her privacy to her husband, who might still be a stranger. He suddenly becomes her confidante and is expected her to share every chapter of her life lived so far. Where she has to do sweet talks to those whom she dislikes.Where responsibilities are thrown on her and she is expected to be perfect in everything. Of course, there isn’t any crash course offered to learn how to handle miscommunications, how to behave like a good girl and keep her senses shut when she has to put up with constant nagging. Sounds like a Saas-bahu saga?. Trust me, sometimes life is much more than those sagas. The scenario may not be the same for all. But at times I wonder where does she learn all these things to manage people. How would it be for a girl to make decisions when two families are in question. Whose side should she stand? One end is the family where she was born, where she is still a princess of that house, where she learnt the culture, where she learnt to be responsible, where she dreamt of a perfect husband and loving in-laws. The other end is her soul mate and his family. No, mistake does not exist at all. Its either she knows to do it, or she has not learnt anything. In her not so perfect house, she tailors her tastes and needs to suit the family. She is expected to do so. You see, that’s what women are meant to be. When she pronounces dependency she is quoted to be unaccomplished. When she displays individuality, she is tagged as arrogant and full of attitude. Sometimes, I feel every woman before getting into the wedlock must be given a complete port folio of her new house. So that she can at least tailor her dreams accordingly. Star Plus had come with a show called “Star Vivaah”. The prospective grooms will introduce their parents, show you their house, their tastes and things. I was wondering will they also show the temperament of their mom? Will they show what responsibilities she has to bear? Will they give her a list the things she needs to learn from spices to needles. But again on second thoughts maybe women are just meant to give. No wonder she is looked after like a princess in her mom’s house and every mother fears her daughter’s welfare when she is married.

No matter how handsome, dynamic is the groom.