THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING SEXY

Let me begin by saying that I am not apologetic about the title of this post. It might sound a trifle decadent, but read on. This post comes after some newspaper reading and televiewing this November. I am referring to an article in ‘Grazia’, two articles in ‘The Telegraph’ supplementaries and last Sunday’s ‘Ghosh and Co.’ on Star Jalshaa. All of them have compelled me to embark on this agenda — to speak up for women who are more than a sum of the trite and stereotypical notions that men have of them. And why the need for such an agenda? Nothing more than to put up a small albeit desperately required fight against popular ideas that are basically a lot of hogwash.

I have nothing against the articles or the television programme in question because finally all of them have raised pertinent questions. Well, no more beating about the bush.

The October issue of ‘Grazia’ informed me about something I have observed for quite some time now. Men do not ‘fancy’ funny women. According to the results of a research led by Dr. Rod Martin, a psychologist at the University of Western Ontario, along with several academics from the University of Massachusetts and McMaster University, Ontario, while men like the odd joke coming from a woman, the do not ‘fancy’ women who are proficient at tickling their ribs (literal meaning to be ignored). They’d rather that the women they date or wed form an adoring audience when the men choose to be humorous. But women delivering clever witticisms and impromptu punch lines are a big no. Men think of comedy as a male prerogative. So, while there are stand-up comediennes who are quite popular, they are often perceived as ‘mannish’ and therefore, not sexually desirable. The research revealed that some men even perceive such women to be lesbians. Ellen DeGeneres has conclusively solved the problem for herself (of course, assuming that she faced any) by being an out-of-the-closet lesbian. I wonder whether, in turn, her being gay and in the media glare have not aided such perceptions to take root in the minds of many. And I cannot help but feel sorry for all those comediennes who are funny and straight. If finding Mr. Right is anywhere on their to-do list, they could be rueing the day they chose their profession.

Speaking of lesbians leads me to refer to an article in yesterday’s ‘The Telegraph’(7 Days). Supposedly mainstream Hindi cinema has finally had the guts to portray a gay relationship—in ‘Dostana’. Let us not forget that it is a sham one portrayed by two ‘macho’ men from filmdom who are confirmed heterosexuals in real life. Good for them. Precisely because, therefore, I do not see brickbats flying towards them from our moral and cultural police. However, while gay relationships could be gaining acceptance on the big screen in India, portrayal of women in same-sex relationships in mainstram Hindi films have more to do with sleaze and titillation than with reality. ‘Girlfriend’ and ‘Men Not Allowed’ are case in points and ‘Fire’, released in 1998, had to die an untimely death after protests from anti-gay activists. Lesson to be learnt—a majority of the women in India are still sexually oppressed and so, doubly marginalized lesbians cannot suddenly find their place under the sun. Can they? They are at best—not to be spoken of, and at worst—hussies.

What about men who are androgynous, who flutter eyelids and move their hands in the air while talking as only women are expected to do? They are the butts of incessant ridicule and objects of ‘tamasha’—all stemming from years of social conditioning and a deep-seated belief that boys just don’t cry. And hence Rituparno Ghosh’s OTT lashing out at the mimic in radio jockey Mir. A learned colleague I have is given the same treatment behind his back by his own co-workers. No wonder he refuses to share the same lounge with them. A point to be noted is that when it comes to tomboyish girls and ‘mannish’ women, they are not so much the objects of laughter as they are women who need to be taught to get in touch with their feminine side in order to become more acceptable and thus sexually desirable to men. Real life abounds with many such cases and so can literature or reel life be far behind? Think Aparna Sen’s character in Ray’s ‘Shamaapti’(adapted from Tagore), think Konkona Sen Sharma’s character in ‘Aaja Nachle’, think Amrita Arora’s character in ‘Main Hoon Na’(way more recent examples)—all reminiscent of girl novels of yore that harped on the importance of femininity in women as a means to their success in domestic and social life.It is still about pandering to men and their idea of the ideal wife, mother and whore. And yet we say, the times…they are a changing!

Finally, coming to the article that was published in ‘The Telegraph’(T2) sometime early this month, I realize that the idea it had tried to put forth reflects India today and the way the country has reawakened to sex. The article was about how impressionable children and adolescents in India, because of easy access to television programmes like ‘Splitsvilla’ and ‘The Big Boss’ with quite an undeniable amount of sexual content in them, are no longer children in the true sense. I could not have agreed more. My experience as a teacher reinforces this view day in and day out. I do not just deal with raging hormones, I deal with youngsters, especially girls, who have not yet learned to quell a spasm of nerves before an insignificant class assessment and yet who won’t bat an eyelid before unbuttoning a button or two in class or on their way to tuitions to grab the attention of older boys because, if you are not sexually attractive and wily from twelve or thirteen, you are very likely to grow up into undesirable ‘behenjis’ and then wouldn’t life become quite meaningless?

In the day and age where youth and physical beauty are celebrated more than merit and intellect, where the Priyanka Chopras and Lindsay Lohans are regarded as role models for girls rather than the Marie Curies and Margaret Thatchers, girls in a largely patriarchal world learn at quite a tender age the importance of being sexy.

AD-LIB

Recently overheard during lunchtime at an academic seminar:
Getting a PhD these days is like wearing a pair of trousers. If you don’t wear/get one, you are noticed and if you wear/get one, you are not.

A FEW OF MY FAVOURITES

I have been alone for more than half the week and I did not for once feel lonely. I made every use of the opportunity—reconnecting with a few of my favourites.

Playing some cherished music early in the morning and believing that the day ahead will be great.

Buying flowers for myself, arranging them all over the house and leaving one carnation on a window sill for the mottled sunshine to play with.

Rearranging books in my study and feeling the years gone by wash over me…all over again.

Reading fiction and obstinately imagining that in each case I am the one the authors chose to write about.

While reading, laughing, smirking, snorting, sobbing, crying—whatever the occasion demanded—all of it (un)selfconsciously.

Going out each day for that much-needed walk, wrapping a stole around myself, enjoying the ever-so-slight nip in the evening air and congratulating myself on a hard day’s work done well.

Lighting scented candles and in the flickering light dreaming of opening a children’s bookstore someday.

Thanking God and Bocelli’s genes for his magical voice.

Waiting every evening for a certain phone call from someone far away.

Burning incense, contemplating, giving free rein to inchoate ideas and letting them flourish.

Catching up on eight hours of sleep every night and while feeling cosy, tucked up in bed, looking forward to all my tomorrows.

Reading myself some more to sleep.

Basically, ‘living each day from the crack of dawn until I closed my eyes’. (James Patterson)

Discovered two things today. Watching the gritty, gut-wrenching ‘Requiem for a Dream’ (Aronofsky) is an emotionally draining way to begin a weekend. After a hectic overnighter, listening to Paco De Lucia, Al Di Meola and John McLaughlin is a divine way to begin a morning. Here’s to getting wiser!

THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES

Don’t be deceived into imagining that this post has anything to do with Charles Lamb’s poem of the same name or with nostalgia as such. In fact, I do not intend to romanticize the ‘characters’ I met on 10th November—members of the audience at the Second Nobel Laureates’ Lecture, delivered by the South African writer Nadine Gordimer at Town Hall. The event was organised by the Union Ministry for External Affairs (scope for enough entertainment there—what with Pranab Mukherjee’s done-to-death English accent). Gordimer was to deliver a talk on Witness Literature—‘Witness: The Inward Journey’.

I will not dwell on the lecture, because that is not my intention in the first place and because Gordimer’s lecture was thought-provoking only in the lamest way possible, if at all. It did not move or provoke a thought in me and I will type the reason soon enough. It was not even insightful. She spoke on the social responsibility of the writer and although relevant, it was hackneyed to my ears (YAWN!). Three years of preparing for the dreaded ‘essay’ at the undergrads (English) will do that to anyone. From Czeslaw Milosz to Sartre and Heidegger, she mentioned all kinds of writers and philosophers but the lecture was not, I am sorry to say, Nobel Laureate material.

Having said this, I have to concede that public lectures are not designed to be too cerebral or obscure and why should they be? They are meant for even the average man and not just hard-nosed, armchair intellectuals. In this case, a lecture by a nobel laureate did ensure the presence of the usual bespectacled academics, students, bureaucrats and the ‘halo-ed’, enthusiastic, ‘aantel’ Calcuttans, those self-imposed and self-appointed denizens of ‘Intelligentsia’ who always manage to gatecrash at all such public lectures and gatherings.

In fact, they do a good job of hopping from such lectures and seminars to film and theatre festivals. Their happy hunting grounds include The Academy of Fine Arts, Nandan, Rabindra Sadan and the Kolkata Book Fair. (I am sure there are other such hallowed grounds that I cannot think of at this point.). They are vocal—nay, vociferous. God help us! Give them a microphone and they will be heard. They are chronic sufferers of ‘mike-itis’—a psychosomatic disorder they share with both small-time and big-time politicians and self-important Malvolios of the society. Speaking of Malvolio, I feel compelled to think that ‘mike-itis’ stems from a poor sense of self, from years of knowledge the sufferer has that perhaps he will never quite make the cut. Numerous such specimens graced the occasion I have mentioned and as usual provided me with ample entertainment.

At the end of the lecture Gordimer took five questions, three of them coming from the ‘specimens’ whom I have described. Predictably, all three questions from them left the more discerning audience speechless or annoyed or in various stages of trying to suppress laughter. One had chosen to ask Gordimer whether the 31-year domination of the ruling party in West Bengal was not similar to apartheid? There was a not-so-veiled reference to the Singur-Nandigram issue and ‘atrocities in the name of development'. Gordimer’s quip, only apparently nonchalant: ‘That is your problem’. Isn’t it just a bit too much to expect someone from South Africa, albeit a well-read and much-travelled nobel laureate to know about the political cacophony of a state in India, let alone give pat answers?

And it was not just for the questions that were out of context, it was in the manner of grabbing the microphone, in not letting go of an opportunity to speak aloud and in shouting ‘Madam, Madam, Madam…’ incessantly until heard that the Calcutta ‘aantel’ cut a sorry figure. The ‘cultural capital’ of India must have made a dismal impression on the State guest. I want to make my stand clear. I have nothing against ‘aantels’ but an elitist at heart, I have a problem with anyone who tries too hard to prove what one can never be. ‘Aantlami’ is an art that the French and the Bengalis have had quite a reputation for. But what now goes by the name of ‘aantlami’ in Bengal today does not have that touch of class, that refinement which most intellectuals of yore cared for. Counter culture attacks shock me and I do not care for them any longer for 1) I am way past my rebellious teens and 2) I am too opinionated at 32.

I seem to have repeatedly digressed—in fact, I have rambled on in this post. Perhaps I am still reeling under the effect of that evening which has left me at a loss for precision. I will make two more observations before I conclude. The discerning audience choose never to ask questions in any public lecture. I really do not know why but it is a safer stance than asking foolish questions, I suppose. And as for their faces being familiar, I’ll say that is was the nth number of time that I bumped into them and vice versa—at such places and for such reasons. The same goes for the poor ‘aantels’.

I have seen all these people—the ‘old familiar faces’—as many times as they have seen me. That leaves me wondering—if they have given me as much thought as I have given them, how do they categorize me? Ugh!

A NICE MAN TO KNOW

I have not been keeping well for the past four days - what with a temperature and a running nose. My body is my antagonist even as I am typing this. Last evening (in particular) I felt like a fire dragon. Oh yes, I could do with some serious fire-spitting if only to bring down the fever. There is hardly anything that delights me at such a time. But I’ll admit that yesterday I had some serious fun with two of my favourite people in the world. This post is dedicated to one of them.

S.D. has multiple identities—like we all do. He has spent a major part of his life teaching at a university and bringing up his daughter, A.D., reining her back when required, more significantly letting her go when she grew up and for the most part letting her be her bright and independent self. He is one of the biggest bibliophiles I know, and like me, absolutely paranoid about lending books, one of the two tendencies both of us share. He is a great cook. His soups, sandwiches and dips are culinary wonders. Sumit and I have tasted these thundering triumphs on numerous occasions and even the sight of them has left us salivating. Were I to have half his gastronomic skills, I would be on the way to salvation.

He can keep us entertained with his mammoth collection of anecdotes involving people famous, infamous and not so famous but most certainly personally known and cherished by him. His ideas about morality are far from antediluvian. In fact, he is quite a maverick, leaving even us, half his age, quite gobsmacked at times.

I share a very special bond with him and here I’ll mention the other shared tendency. We tease each other to ‘destruction’. On one occasion poet Joy Goswami (an old friend of S.D.’s) seeing us getting on each other’s nerves, couldn’t help but quip—‘Wee ar indurer dekho byabohar’.

Jokes apart, S.D. is a man Sumit and I love and respect a lot. We love him because he is the best friend one can have—someone you can discuss politics, history, anthropology, literature, booze, drugs and sexuality with—all in the same breath and without his sitting in judgement on you. He is like a priest in a confessional but with a difference—you can tell him your not-so-nice views about pesky relatives and annoying colleagues and he’ll listen without making you feel guilty or recite the rosary a couple of hundred times a day. We respect him because he respects us, values our opinions, and understands our sense of privacy. In fact, he’ll never ask you a question that might make you feel uncomfortable. He’ll never show any inclination to probe into your personal matters like all the 'kakimas' and 'mashimas' I know, and even a few 'kakus' and 'meshomoshais' perhaps. He’ll only listen with just the right amount of interest to the information you are willing to volunteer. Most of all, we respect him because he is the only man we know who has the ability to befriend without prejudice people from various backgrounds and age groups—teens and octogenarians, poets and plebeians, cats, cat-lovers, cat-haters, employed, unemployed, superannuated, loved, unloved, misunderstood, gay, straight, polygamous, monogamous, conventional and unconventional. To everyone on whom he bestows the honour of ‘friend’, he is dearest ‘S….da’ whose first floor 'thek' at his house evokes images of adda and merry-making.

S.D. will always find a willing audience in us (now that he has retired Sumit and I are among his new students) and I hope and pray that we continue to enjoy fun-filled evenings of whiskey, chicken rolls and adda with our dear S.D.

p.s. and if he ever discovers my blog, he will find the adjectives a tad too many.

POSTCARDS...COURTESY BHUTAN

Perhaps this is coming rather late in the day or perhaps this could not have come at a more appropriate time. The coronation of Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck as Bhutan’s fifth king on November 6, has prompted me to reminisce about my visit to Bhutan in May this year. The recollections will obviously prompt certain observations about the land and its people. Some could be contradictory or/and confusing but then which nation at the crossroads is without its fair share of binaries and contradictions?

On the morning after our reaching Thimphu, my more-than-eager-for-some-exercise friend, Kajari, decided to explore the hillside on foot. And so while I slept till 7.30, Kajari went on a walking tour of the winding roads. The Jambayang Resort at which we had put up is situated almost atop a hill and below it—about 10 minutes down the hill—she stumbled upon a timber factory. Kajari was more than happy to be interrupted by a friendly 18-year old, a worker at the factory, with whom she promptly struck up a conversation. The boy it seemed worked at the factory to assist his mother and support his family. But he had other plans. A Bhutanese friend who had landed a job at a call centre in New Delhi was urging him endlessly to try his luck in India. When Kajari asked him why he was not eager to try someplace closer home—maybe in Thimphu itself—he came up with an answer that might have orbited her off the planet! ‘Thimphu is phar(far) phrom(from) here’ (only a fifteen minute walk down the hill!!!). Thimphu—phasth(fast) life.’ Kajari stood stumped. For a teenager who was aspiring for a comparatively ‘good life’, his destination was far-off Delhi. This was not surprising but what was pretty inexplicable was his referring to the Bhutanese capital as fast and far-away. We had to check that out! We concluded that he must be a lazybone, a lackadaisical and worthless dud who will continue to daydream (Delhi is not far,eh?) and lazily chat up tourists while his mother will slog through 12-hour schedules at the factory.

But lo and behold! Most ‘enterprising’ young men we observed at Thimphu were laidback and apparently unambitious, looking after small businesses. Even our driver-cum-tour guide showed similar traits. Mind you, they can work very efficiently if need be. These youths want to earn money and keep pace with the world but cannot quite seem to do much about it. Funnily enough, they do not seem to regret much either (pardon me- I admit that exceptions do prove the rule). So was this phenomenon typical of Bhutan which has just one college/university, a lack of employment opportunities and extreme weather conditions? Not so really. Recalling an earlier post I will say that Bhutan is a proven classic example of a country that thrives on Gross Domestic Happiness rather than Gross Domestic Product. They are a happy people who love their benevolent king and would rather have a monarchy than a democracy (I was given two postcards featuring the then king-elect for free at a roadside shop in Paro because I had shown some touristy curiosity about him). Thimphu is ‘phasth’ enough for them and honestly I cannot imagine many of them in big metropolises around the globe, calling the shots. (Don’t get me wrong) Not that it would undermine their value in the scheme of life or that they deserve to remain where they are. I will give concession to the fact that the modern world is still new to Bhutan which works at a pace all its own. Therein lies the charm of this nation. Perhaps its people have an instinctive wisdom or an innate knack for being happy with little which mortals like me can only crave for and envy in a cut-throat world.

Going back to the question of monarchy, the new king’s father, Jigme Singye Wangchuck has been loved and obeyed since 1972 when he ascended the throne. And he has shown a rare wisdom which has stood his country in good stead. He, along with his Oxford-educated son, has introduced democracy to a country that just adores its monarch. So while two political parties—the ruling Druk Phuensum Tshogpa (DPT) and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP)—have contested in elections in April-May this year, they have time and again pledged their undying support to Bhutan’s royal family. I can safely presume that in my lifetime there will not be a bloodbath in the Wangchuck dynasty—like that which rocked the foundation of Nepal a few years back. For they know an easy way out. Slowly but surely, cautiously and seamlessly transfer power to the people of the land and their cup of love for you will brimmeth over. Of course, there have been rumours of underlying differences as to the choice of the new king (Jigme Singye Wangchuck has many wives and more than one son) but the people seem unaffected by this. To them their king is their God. And hell…why not? Over the last 10 years Singye Wangchuck has wisely and gradually led his country to modernization. Bhutan is just waking up to globalisation. Television viewing was unheard of until a few years back. In fact, for the use of television and the internet, official permission still needs to be sought and they are still seen in use in commercial and public spaces in Thimphu than in the privacy of homes. I recall a Saturday evening that we spent at Paro’s local shopping enclave. Kajari was busy shopping and, as usual, I was busy photographing. I chanced upon a tiny diner filled with amused lamas, checking out some bogus Ekta Kapoor serial on the telly. The moment they discovered that an intruder was clicking away gleefully to capture this unique scene, they just got up and left the diner after paying, giving me a scowl that I still recall with a shudder. Today’s Kolkata edition of ‘The Telegraph’ informs me that mobile phones and internet is catching on in Bhutan and youths wearing Nike footwear ‘are not an uncommon sight’. I cannot help but feel a tinge of sadness.

One of the things that I could not help notice and admire during my visit was the sight of men, women and children wearing their national costumes—men in ‘gho’ and women in ‘kira’. They have to wear these as a rule for all official purposes (no moral policing this, mind you!) I found them wearing the ‘gho’ and ‘kira’ both for work and for pleasure. I concluded that they comply with a law not for fear of penalty but because they do not know how to be any different. If Nike and denim are becoming popular in Bhutan, the day is not far when Thimphu will look like any other city in the world—a willing victim of a synthetic American culture, of US imperialism and softpower (as international relations expert Joseph Nye might have put it).

Bhutan, you are gracious, hospitable, simple, pristine and distinctive. Don’t change. Not so soon. Not now. The rest of the world needs to learn from you.