Feeling Silly

As I reload the Mumbai news web pages minute after minute,
And watch people getting shattered,
Some shattered for being out of their homeland
Some shattered because this is their home land (there is no escaping it).

Just as I watch, people’s lives are changing-
Some lives have come to a pointless, ridiculous end,
Some lives will carry nightmares till the last
Some lives will never feel safe again.

I feel silly.
To be studying for a test,
To snuggle under the cosy blanket,
To wonder what to wear tomorrow,
To decide if I like Pista flavour more or Vanilla,
To dream about who will employ me for how much.

For all I know,
The boy with the AK-47 – For his age and costume –
Might as well have been my little brother.

My Hairy Fairy Story

I would like to ask a few questions to men in general:

1. Do you think my ridiculous hair style is more ridiculous than the hair in your arm pit that I can see through your t shirt sleeves?
2. What makes you think that long, thick haired women are hotter - doesn’t it strike you that they might as well be Jehadi militants hiding nuclear weapons beneath their long tresses and you might never know it? (At least everyone can see what's on my scalp.)
3. If you can be OK with me wearing denim jeans like you, why cant you be OK with me having hair as lengthy as yours?
4. Or are you the saddest of the sad kind that joins communities in Orkut called "We Love Women Who Wear Chudidhar"?
5. Will you get scared if I tell you that your ass is cute?

I have been trying to not refer to this subject - but the circumstances are so. I am hereby sharing with general populace the story of what has been my constant source of embarrassment and entertainment for the past 6 months - viz. my latest, really short hair cut. Here are a few snippets of public reaction for the same:

W.T.F.Iceman was sitting a row ahead of me. He said "I need to get a haircut; my hair's starting to look like Chethana's". (I know you are reading this, you meano.)

A few days ago, PJ told me that with my latest hair-do, I look like I could play for the Brazilian (soccer) Team. Not-subtly-hinting at Ronaldinho.

A year junior smart ass asked me "It seems you had normal hair last year?"

The worst, of course, has to come from a mother. She watched a clipping of me talking on the local Namma TV and asked with sincere concern if I combed my hair every day.

Flashback:

I got my hair cut in that god forsaken place called Bounce in Bengaluru for a ridiculously high amount. After the lady pronounced that she was done, I gingerly opened one of my eyes and looked into the hundred mirrors surrounding me. I looked like someone right out of the sketches in NCERT text books about pre-historic cave people. I just stared at myself in disbelief.

She asked me : "so, you like it?" [ :-) :-) ]

I said: "I, urm , look like a .... boy." [ :-/ ]

She: "Hehe. Of course not, you look awesome."

I: "Er, dont you think it's been cut too short? I mean, there is no hair on my head."

Other people in the Salon including one gay hair designer: “OH look at you - Soooooo pretty!"

I think people in the salon are professionally trained to act thrilled-by-beauty, especially when one among them has royally screwed up a customer's head. This particular set, may I add, acted brilliantly well on that count.

Present:

6 months past and my hair has grown really long now. Compared to before. Now I can use 4 hair clips and one elastic band and achieve a ponytail that is 1 inch in length.

I am not a newbie to having really short hair, but men around me apparently are. Which means that not only have I enjoyed being butt of many hair jokes for the past few months, I have also intimidated some poor people into thinking that I am some :

a) super-intellectual Arundhathi Roy type or

b) power yielding Indira Gandhi type.

All the kicks of being a short-haired carefree woman apart, I have been feeling nauseated ever since I lost almost all my hair to some freak medical thing. That sensation just hasn’t left me. And I still look into the mirror only for the necessary stuff. I otherwise avoid that process altogether.

I am leaving you with something from Maloose. The first time I saw it, it shook something deep within me. As though I was mourning afresh for the loss of something so superficial, yet deeply precious. It’s called Once upon a Hair Cut.

Now What?

Somebody has stolen my florescent green-colored pencil sharpener. What I want to ask is - Why? I know I am loser enough to carry a pencil sharpener at 23. I don't understand why anybody else would want to touch it, though. It was like one of those things that by their very own nature wont get stolen. For example, when people send batch mails saying someone's flicked their black umbrella, I feel very smug. I know no one would steal mine. No one would want to be even found dead with my pastel bright pink umbrella.

Very rarely do I look for a hindi song. I am suddenly overcome with the desire to hear and watch that kahi door jab din dhal jaaye song. All the 7 copies of that song on Youtube say - "We're sorry, this video is no longer available." What are the chances that Youtube doesn't have a popular hindi song?

I don't know if Pulao is pronounced as pu-la-oh or pa-la-oh. For that matter, I don't know if pudding is pah-ding or pu-ding.

As I type on my lappie, I glance down at my bare arms. I see it covered with dark, unhealthy skin. Fair, unhealthy skin is OK. Dark, healthy skin is OK too (not according to aunt T, but i choose to ignore her). I realize I have neither.

I have lost the ability to differentiate between coffee and tea. At least the coffee and tea that they make in our college canteen.

I have eagerly started downloading Avatar - The Last Airbender (yes, you read it right) on Vuze. There are 0 seeds online out of 112 seeds whenever I am online. Which mathematically means that, from past 5 days, I have downloaded a total of 0%.

I am happy that there are no classes today for me. But I have come to college anyway. I am annoyed with myself for coming when there was to pressing necessity to come and then getting annoyed that if I have come anyway, I shouldn't be getting annoyed with myself in the first place. Because it is I who has turned up and getting annoyed. Conflict of interests of sort, you see.

I don't know why my shoulders hurt so badly sometimes. I am hoping that its not old age. But I am also hoping its not something worse.

I think the 3 month old puppy stomping around in our campus is a flirt.