Turning 30…
…is something I have dreaded ever since I turned 29 last year. So, when the day dawned with pouring rains and flashing lightning, it almost felt like nature was mirroring my state of mind. Not to say that I was completely depressed…a birthday is definitely something to cheer about and the number of calls and wishes I got today made the day worth my while. But somewhere in the back of my mind, there was this nagging thought that I am no longer a twenty-something as of today.
It was not so long ago that I thought 30 was old. When I turned 20, it was with great joy that I welcomed the start of the next decade. was with great joy that I realized that I was no longer a teen. That I was well and truly an adult. But turning 30 is altogether a different thing. This is when you realize that you are no longer a young adult. That you are well and truly in the adult world. Nobody excuses your mistakes anymore. Nobody tells you it’s ok because you are still very young. When you turn 30, you suddenly realize that you are growing older. No, scratch that…you are growing OLD!
As the day ended, I realized one thing. You can never stop growing older, but you can always keep feeling as young and energetic as you felt when you were 20. A friend summed it up quite well as I cribbed to her about turning 30. “Arey, chhod na? Age is just a number!” Now…that’s a fabulous attitude! Age is just a number. It’s how you live your life that truly matters! Happy birthday to me!
Baking…
…is a perfect science. I somehow never managed to get around to learning how to bake. I still wonder why. It’s not as if the yummy chocolate cakes, the tiramisus, the brownies and the biscuits have not caught my fancy. I love them all. But getting around to actually baking them myself? Nah! Too much effort!
Earlier this week, I launched into a reflection about why, despite my interest in cooking, I never went for classes of any kind, baking or cookery. After extensive introspection I arrived at a rather simple conclusion. I do not like to treat cooking like a set of instructions to be followed. Weighing and measuring ingredients reminds me, rather unpleasantly, of my (failed) experiments in the chemistry lab. For me, cooking is instinctive. It is liberating. Above all, it is a joy.
The only time I tried to take cooking classes was in school. Faced with a choice of gardening, needlework, electrical gadgets and cooking, I decided that cooking was perhaps the most interesting and the least troublesome of “work experience” lessons. What I didn’t bargain for was that I would be stuck with a roomful of 17-year olds who couldn’t cook rice in a pressure cooker without burning themselves or the rice, or both. The result was rather disastrous. I ended up spending an entire term learning to measure out rice and water, admittedly not the most interesting of tasks.
Twelve years later, I still find myself incapable of following instructions in a recipe book without having to compulsively make modifications to it. I can still not measure or weigh anything when I cook. For me, cooking is very ad-hoc, much like Remy in Ratatouille. I throw in whatever catches my fancy and in whatever measure I deem fit at the moment. The taste, the texture and the colour are all indicators that I am right in what I do. My eyes and my nose are my guides when I cook. My tongue tells me if I have gone wrong when I finally sit down to eat.
That said, I have always admired the patience and meticulousness of those who bake. When I ask for a recipe of a cake or a dessert, I often wish I had the patience to take the time off to actually try it. Maybe that’s why I am not that great at making sweets. I find myself wishing that I could add a souffle or a crepe or a cookie to my repertoire, but I somehow never seem to progress beyond pal payasam and rava kesari!
A mish-mash of thoughts…
Right now, my mind is a mish-mash of thoughts and emotions, so pardon me if I am not being too coherent. It’s been over 3 months since I last blogged, and that’s rather unusual for me. It seems as though the writer in me has quietly disappeared. It’s not as if I have nothing to say any more. I do. I have just found a way to verbalize it without having to write. Maybe that’s what comes of being happily married. I don’t know.
At a time when the nations (and the Twitter timeline) is outraging over the Guwahati incident, I have something similar to say. It doesn’t matter what the girl was doing, at what time of the day and what she was wearing. She is at much as risk as at any other place.
I have always been rather secure in my assumption that I was relatively safe in Chennai. Since last year, this sense of security has been enhanced by the fact that I was now a married woman, with at least one outwardly visible sign of marriage: a toe-ring that I find too pretty to remove. This sense of security was rudely broken yesterday, and along with it, my privacy and my composure.
It was a normal and busy workday. I was on my way to work on my trusted Activa around 9. I noticed that a bike was busy trying to catch up with me, not overtake, but match pace for almost 2 kilometres before the signal. I ignored it, knowing as I do that bikers often seem to think that a woman on a scooter is interesting to destabilize. About 5 minutes away from my workplace, the man stopped me and asked me something. I couldn’t hear a thing in the din of the traffic. I lifted the visor to hear better, only to realize he was commenting on my clothes and used words I’d rather not repeat. I snapped at him that I would call the police if he lingered one more minute, and he quickly sped away, either because of the threat, or because he figured his mission had been accomplished.
Inside, I was furious. I wished I knew martial arts so that I could kick him where it would hurt most. I was in tears because I felt violated. I was absolutely livid because at that instant, I knew that my clothes had nothing to do with the whole incident, attired as I was in a collared salwar suit with a dupatta firmly secured around my waist. After much raving and ranting that involved cursing him with a terribly painful and slow death, my mind cleared enough to reflect on the real issue at hand.
Even in the widespread outrage over the Guwahati incident, the media often stresses that the incident happened in the night outside a pub. It also stresses the age of the victim. As if it makes any difference. Look at what happened to me! I was dressed traditionally. I was on my way to work like any other normal human being and in broad daylight. I was wearing one dupatta secured around my waist and another around my head like a hijab to guard from the unforgiving sun. I was wearing a helmet with the visor down. I wasn’t drunk or partying. I was wearing a toe-ring that revealed my marital status. Yet, I was harassed. Had I been sixty years old with greying hair, I would still have been.
Why didn’t you complain, you might ask. I am ashamed to admit that I don’t trust the authorities. If I had raised my voice, tried to hit him or gone to the police, I would have been the showstopper of the morning. I am ashamed to admit that I felt that not one member of the public would have supported me. I would have been completely alone, I am pretty sure of that. I wasn’t, and am still not, willing to risk that.
We need to get one thing straight. Sexual harassment (Yes, please call it that. It’s NOT teasing) will happen if you happen to be female. No matter your age, your clothing, your habits or even your character. The perpetrator behaves so brazenly because he knows he will get away with it. He knows that if you try to complain, you will be victimized and hounded and not him. He know that society will subject you to scrutiny and not him. He will get away scot-free when you, simply because you are female, will be accused of provoking him.
This will stop only when we refuse to let our judgement of the situation be clouded by our judgement of the victim. It will happen only when we realized that no woman deserves to be blamed for harassment because no woman likes that kind of attention. The only question is, when will that happen.
Perpetuating myths…
There has been considerable outrage on the expose by NDTV and Tehelka on the attitude of policemen in and around the National Capital Region towards rape victims. While it is shocking that such comments come from those who are supposed to be protectors of the innocent, none of this is really surprising. The attitude is simply representative of the attitude of a large majority of Indian men who seem to think that a woman who is in a relationship with one person automatically grants privileges to 10 others because she is of “loose” character.
Nor is it surprising that the very act of forcing a woman is considered “normal” because she was drinking, or exchanged phone numbers, or dressed in “skimpy and provocative” clothing. I do not remember how many times women’s rights activists, women in general and several others have reiterated that provocation or “losing control” does not exonerate the rapist. Along with rapists, the police and other law-enforcement authorities, sometimes including our law courts are just perpetuating several myths regarding rape:
Myth: If a woman dresses provocatively, drinks or is in a relationship with someone, she “tempts” a man into raping her.
Fact: Rape is NOT a sex crime. Rapists rarely do so because they are unable to “resist temptation” or because they lose control. They do it because they are trying to establish their power over a woman by doing so. Rape is about power, not attraction. It happens because the perpetrator of the crime does not even consider what he is doing as a crime. It also happens because the rapist believes (and with good reason) that he will get away with it. As with most cases, shoddy investigation, unsympathetic police personnel and lack of DNA evidence results in an acquittal.
Myth: A woman who dresses modestly will not be raped.
Fact: Rape is the result of the twisted logic of a sick mind. What else could explain rape of 2-year old children and 85-year old grandmothers? A woman is at risk of being raped even if she were dressed in a burqa. Asking women to dress modestly and not “provoke” only puts the onus of security on the victim. It practically exonerates the actual criminal and victimizes the victim.
Myth: She is doing it for money. When someone uses force, she cries rape!
Fact: Even if a woman were a prostitute, she does not deserve to be raped. Her character has nothing to do with the whole affair. And in case our cops don’t realize, forcing a woman is indeed called rape.
Apart from all this, it is quite distressing that the Delhi government seems more inclined to impose restrictions on women rather than address the core issue of rape as a law and order problem. To top it all, the Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit has expressed concern at the state of women in NCR. We do not want to know if she is “worried”. In fact, she should be angry, not worried. She should be angry enough to do something about the current state of affairs in order to make a difference. She should, as the Chief Minister of a state, take action to ensure that Delhi’s streets are safe for women, and not pay lip service to the plight of women in the country’s capital!
To the women in my life…
Yet another Women’s Day rolls around the corner and the world runs around trying to make us feel special about being women. Special offers at gyms, a 50% off sale at the local mall, free makeovers at the cosmetic store…name it and it’s there! But, this blogpost goes out to all the women who have touched my life, one way or the other. I have learnt something from each of them. Some have taught me how to be, and others, how not to be!
From my mother, I learnt to be strong. Even when the world seems to be crashing around my ears, and everything seems to be going wrong, I learnt to smile. I learnt that happiness and sorrow are but two sides of a coin. I learnt that with the power of will, nothing is impossible. I learnt to trust, and I also learnt to recognize those who don’t deserve that trust. She has never yet been wrong about people, and I hope I get there some day.
From my grandmother, I learnt to love. I learnt that if you love unconditionally, you will get it back some day. I learnt never to question her unshakeable belief in God. I learnt to trust that gut feeling and do what I feel is right.
From my friends, I learnt to be there for others. I learnt that some friends are for life, no matter what. To every girl friend who was there to pick me up when I fell, who held my hand when I faltered, who offered words of encouragement, a girls’ night out or a link to my favourite song when I felt down in the dumps, here is a big thank you. Your video link, your words or just simply your presence made it all worthwhile.
From those who made snide comments about my age, my relationship status and everything else, I learnt to ignore. I learnt that for some people, the sole mission of their lives is to make someone feel guilty or bad. I learnt also to never be like them. All these people, especially the women, have showed me what exactly I do not want to be!
From my best teachers (female almost without exception), I learnt to believe in what I do. I learnt that if you strive for excellence, you will surely be successful. I learnt to ignore people who advise thinking they know best. I learnt to love the work I do.
There are many many more women out there from whom I have learnt something or the other. To all of you who are reading this, a big thank you for making me who I am.