Thursday, October 1, 2015

Our Displaced Sense of Reverence

The public is still getting over the Ganapti-hangover. 10 days of food and festivity, modaks and miravnooks, dancing and devotion.. all comes to an end with a bang. This year I had the great fortune of visiting the golden-boy of all Ganapatis, Lalbaugcha Raja. For you to understand his stature you need to know the facts: The idol is made on-site annually by Kambli Arts, it attracts roughly 2 crore visitors every year, the deity gathered 86 Lakhs worth of gold within the first 3 days of the festival, over 7 Crores in cash during 10 days, Border Security Force personnel are specially deployed to guard the deity, Bhakts stand in line anywhere between 12 to 90 hours in line to see the idol. 
Thanks to a close family-friend who had contacts with a certain state-minister, we got VIP entries and like the thousand others, I went there with my prayers in mind, hoping for a serene one-on-one with the Vinayaka. Afterall, I was a VIP, how bad could it be?! Well what I thought and what I saw is almost like the difference between client budget and client expectation. The police were openly accepting cash-for-entry so anyone could be a VIP , which means it was no longer going to be a select, peaceful viewing. The police escorted us into a 3000-odd sq ft area which eventually lead to the main hall where the deity is kept. This area was already packed with VIP worshippers, from hoity-toity CEO types to regular Joes of the world. There was no line, no particular order that they had to follow which means all hell broken loose. Children were being tossed around like luggage, barricades were being trampled up, women were being viciously and indecorously shoved and muscled over. Rough and uncouth men bulldozed their way in by mercilessly pulling clothes and hair, almost as if they owned the joint. Howling and panting babies were commonplace (not sure what kind of a mindless mother would bring a toddler to a place like this), local "dalals" who had an unholy alliance with the cops, broke-down whatever little order one could find by forcefully and almost threateningly inserting their clients ahead of everyone else. Twice, I found myself stiffly stuck and bruised, hair pulled & disheveled, senses disoriented and almost choked with breathlessness. All this chaos were right under the nose of the "management" who had taken up the uphill task of managing a crowd so wild and defiant and at times criminal that they couldn't give a damn but to watch helplessly. At any moment, one poor soul would trip and fall and a stampede would break-out. It was a lot like traveling in the local train, once you are a part of the crowd, you move with it, without having to move a muscle of your own. And before I knew, I was standing in front of the most mesmerizing idol I had ever seen. Standing at 20ft, this grandeur surpasses only his popularity and acclaim. However I found no peace there, as again I was very painfully shoved against a metal barricade that left me aching for the next several minutes. After I drifted downstream like a lone leaf in this sea of people, I wondered what does this enigma, this adulation, this glory all mean when people leave this place all choked-up and hurt? When we have come to god's abode to seek his blessings, where is our sense of kindness and tolerance? How can we behave like savages and seconds later join hands in reverence? How can one God be so overwhelming that allows us to lose our basic human manners ironically at the same alter where we ask for the ability to be and do better? As I pondered this on my way out, the incoming crowd didn't seem to end, while the majority non-VIPs kept standing still, some for more than 30 hours straight. Funny you need ministry connections to make your own divine connection, yet another inexplicable irony of our unique society.  Weird thing is, as I pen this down, I know I want to go back again next year, witness the same enigma, bow in humility and maybe walk out with a more pleasant experience .. I guess that's the magic of this King -- he makes you hopeful!

Tuesday, September 8, 2015

The Great Indian Dis-service

It's a known fact that we are moving from a capital to a consumer market. And as a marketer, I preach that on a day-on-day basis. Every brand, no matter how big or small needs to centre itself around its client. However it pains and at times disgusts me to see some national, trustful brands take this ideology and throw it in the trash. Like my personal experience with the country's largest retail bank, the State Bank of India , that works like the union of a plastic cookware factory. It's chaotic, clueless and contemptuous. Banking is probably as service-driven as a category can be.. and yet this bank, which boasts to be the banker of "every Indian" continues to function like its in the 17th Century servicing peddlers and merchants. I would ideally never bank with SBI, but out of sheer desperation and lack of choice, I had to open an account with a small and obscure little Personal Branch with the total manpower of 4 people. Although you never have to stand in line and the place doesn't smell like a public lavatory, the only hurdle is that with lack of people, comes lack of products and services. Although PPF is now made mandatory in all branches, my little princess doesn't have the hands and legs to service it. And there fore I had to dejectedly walk-into one of the more "experienced" and "wholesome" branches, where I was faced with annoyance and irk by the "general relationship manager". She wanted to have no relationship with me and she was very disgusted with the fact that I had come to the bank at all, leave alone seek her assistance (read : give her more work). She had the nerves to tell me she doesn't know how to do my job and that i should figure my life at some other branch since she doesn't intend to dispense any time or efforts on me. Basically she admitted to her own incompetence but I had already had it by then as I stormed out, huffing and puffing, feeling helpless. I now have to go begging at some other branch, where I know nobody, and hope someone has pity in me and helps me with my account. Yes, I pleading a bank to allow me to give them some business! Well, I am rolling with the punches!


Thursday, September 3, 2015

Marriage: the dark side of the moon

I, very recently met someone who had just gotten married  too, and moved to the States with her husband and she told me “I feel I have a live-in boyfriend”. WoW, now I want to know that feeling.
From a very young age, I was against this hallowed institution. Among everything, I don’t understand why a woman has to leave her life, her belongings, her life-choices and in some cases identity, to move into a stranger’s house and make it her own. She has to go through a sea of change in just about every respect while for the boy, it’s a few days of festivities and then getting on with his usual life. Marriage is a charm indeed , but that charm is only discovered in freedom and individuality. You need to be allowed to be who you are in order to feel the bliss. Otherwise it is a stifling rope around the neck, only getting tighter with every passing year.

I have had the good fortune of living with my in-laws from the initial months of the marriage. Although this is teaching me the sunny-side of happy housekeeping, it makes you enjoy marriage in moderation, within limits and with obvious & understandable restrictions. I sometimes feel like I still haven’t seen the “husband” side of my husband because he still living his “ghar ka baccha” role out.
People keep asking me “How does it feel to be married?” “Does it feel any different?” Although my answer to them is politically correct always, I still don’t know what the feeling is because there is so much more to be felt. 

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Family Is all we got!

My family on my parent's side is really small. It's small not because there aren't enough people, but because of the kind of people there are in it. From a very young age, we are taught that "family is everything", but how often are we taught to treat family like "everything"? I wasn't taught that, I learnt that with age, and when I did, there was already an unspoken distance between us all that couldn't be bridged. The fault is yours as much as it is theirs, because you know deep down that you never really gave a damn. 

As you grow up, you don't really need a lot of family support if you have strong parental support and if you yourself are a self-content person. But as you grow up, and you meet more and more people and eventually get married, the presence of a family, or the lack of thereof, becomes a prickly reality. Then you welcome, your new in-laws, like your own, like the one you wish you had and never really did. Because you have witnessed strained complicated kinship growing up, you know you want none of that in your new life, because this is your one last chance to start over. 

When I got married, I had 3 real family members attend the wedding, 2 of them being my parents. I usually mention this is a joke to people, but that truthfully is a veil of humor, trying to cover-up the tragedy, the loneliness, the detachment i feel almost everyday. At the end, I have learnt that having a dysfunctional family actually helps, because it teaches you how to not end up being like the older generations who actually knew lesser about compassion, and support and attachments. You learn that you better not screw this up, because this is the only thing that will see you through your bests and your worsts. If I can pass this much on to my kids, I'd say i'm successful. 


Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Love : Like no Other

So my marriage to my husband was quite extraordinary. Actually it's the love that is extraordinary. I fell in love with him when I was 22. I was in relationships before and somehow i could never make any of them last. Either the fault was mine or the other person's and before i knew, it would be over. But this one wasn't that. I started at zero-expectations, believing that if it is meant to be, it will be. We went strong for 3 years. For the world outside, we were the "golden couple", people would ask me "how we did it", and i would wonder what they are talking about, because I had to do nothing. My husband would make it easy, he was the calmer, the more level-headed one, and times flies when you are happy. Then, like the mid-section of any Bharjatiya Drama, complacence & unease set in, the worst wasn't far away. I moved to a big city and I moved away from him. Although he was out of sight, he was never out of my mind. Even when I had moved on, he was present, in my thoughts, and dreams, and intuitions and decisions and memories. In my mind, he lived like a living memory, something that wakes up with you, stays with you all day and sleeps with you too. At times of trouble I would ask "What would he  do", knowing that he is healthy and happy, gave me calm and peace. Knowing that I could run to him for help gave me a sense of assurance and belonging. And gradually i realized, there are many kinds of love, but this love was a grand one, something that will never leave you and will leave you with nothing but regret if you don't hold onto it ; because in the back of your mind you know he is THE one.

So in a very cheesy way, I had to lose myself, in doubt and loneliness and unsettling life-choices, to rediscover the shimmering glow of a love & hope that I had to win back.

And before it was too late, I had to make amends... I couldn't lose him again and just like that, I proposed the idea of marriage. And yes, he obliged, and I knew I was home, for me, he was my home! There is a thin line between ordinary and the extra-ordinary, and for me that was a 150km bus ride.

Maybe he could have been happier with someone else, maybe some one else is his soul-mate and maybe he deserves better. But for me, he was the best and I am going to selfishly hold on to that.




Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Bombs Away: My first post

For years I have deliberated over writing a blog. It could be as simple as penning down my thoughts, nothing fancy or heavy, just give my mind that clarity it so often needed. Time obviously flew by and there was always something more important to do. Marriage happened (which I will write about later) and for the first time in 5 years I was taking a break from work. A conscious & sure decision. A lot of close friends discouraged me from doing it, "it will run your career", "what will you do staying at home", "you'll become a naggy housewife" , "The husband will lose respect", were some of the many bullets used to gun down my idea. Did it anyway and now that I am living that "break" , I know how badly I needed it. Anyone out there getting married and reading this, TAKE A BREAK. Your career isn't going anywhere and You have all life to work. But this time, these precious months after the wedding aren't coming back.

I was a brat before moving to my husband's home - didn't know how to cook to save my neck, did bare-minimum housework to get past mom's taunts.. and this break has changed all that. Marriage changes you, well in my case, it enhanced my skill-sets. I am learning cooking and single-handedly managing a household.

A friend recently told me , "you didnt grow up at all 16 years on-wards and then overnight, you've turned 28". And in the middle of all this "growing-up" I started to write my very own blog.

Like they say, Bombs Away!