OK so its been the statement of the day to write a reply to this blog post concerning all things Delhi and while the blog post was funny and I did agree on some points, I do not agree with a lot of things she put up, so here goes nothing...

For all of you who need to know, I was born in Calcutta and spent a good part of my life in Cochin, Chennai  Vishakapatnam, Mumbai and Delhi. So this is my take as a person whose been pretty much all over the country, oh and I'm a girl, just in case some people accuse me of sexism or whatever. So when talking about the topic of Delhi men, I have to be pretty straight forward and say, in my two years there I have actually met very few guys who don't own a sexist bone in their body. But I would like to point out that the rest of India has a pretty good population of said men as well, in fact the most sexist comment I ever got to my face was from a guy from  Mumbai and yeah for all my women readers out there I nearly cut his balls off... . I remember the dread of using public transport in that city, its not that they just stare at you but they actually try to touch you *cringes* and my fellow Delhi girls will agree with me on this point that a good proportion of the men there just don't know their boundaries. I guess one of the reasons could be that Delhi has never been as crowded as Mumbai, its pretty desolate in some areas, I mean when was the last time we found a desolate location in Mumbai? The city where people suddenly gain the ability to multiply like an amoeba, forget a desolate place, its difficult to find a desolate square metre here.
I'd also like to point out that in the North west they're also far more 'son' obsessed that many areas elsewhere, last time I checked Haryana and Punjab had the most fucked up sex ratios in this country and judging from what I've seen, boys out there are told since the day they were born that they were 'superior' somehow even if their brains may never become bigger than a molecule. So on the men, I'll more or less agree but I'll also say that I can take a punch at any guy from any state in this country and make fun of something that is unique to them.

My biggest objection was this blogger's take on the women, I'm sorry but the ones that I know are nothing like the ones she took a dig at. I've known them to be not only beautiful but also some of the most strong minded individuals I've ever managed to come across. Not to say that such women don't exist in the South, they do. Whether a person is strong minded or not depends totally on the individual and not what region they come from. Let's not forget our own Rani of Jhansi was a Northerner and she made the British men wet their beds at some point.

On the issue that the North is racist, ok this honestly made me laugh, I mean of course they're racist but so is the South. They're equally racist down there if not more. I remember when my family moved to Chennai, our new neighbour before evening saying a nice 'hello!', asked us what caste we were, when my dad said Brahmin, he was all smiles but the minute my father said Bengali, he turned the other way with a sour look on his face. So I don't think its fair to call the North wholly racist just cause some of them have the IQ of a goat.
And not only that, but the men in Chennai really ogle at you if you're a little lighter than what they're used to, this is followed by making sexy poses like Rajnikanth. Also need I go into how women are objectified in the film industry there? See its pretty much everywhere.

When it comes to intelligence, really you can't generalize and say only the south has contributed to the IITs or whatever, I know plenty of people from Delhi and elsewhere up there who got into not only the hallowed IITs but even Yale and Stanford. Just cause you're born in a particular region doesn't mean you'll be deemed intelligent.

Ok so I'm done with this reply, I hope I made myself clear in the fact even if I do agree on some points with her, I really wouldn't want to stereotype a whole half of this country just cause of a few morons who inhabit this earth.

Movie Review: Aarakshan

Ok, for the record, they took up a serious issue, well actually i think many serious issues, or maybe two serious issues.... so by now I guess you know that by the end of this movie you will be so confused as to what they're talking about that you'll doubt whether your name is really your name. So anyway back to this serious issue(s?) dealing movie, so basically it starts off in this really great college called STM- the full form of which is such a mouthfull that we'll just let that one slide- and then the news breaks that supreme court has just passed a law requiring every government college to have a 27% reservation for the OBCs now, and because of this the evil coaching institute place owner dude played by manoj bajpai goes- muahahahaha *evil laugh* I'm gonna go take over STM cuz of the corrupt morons who are on the trustee board who want a principal who isn't a shehensha and promote my evil coaching corporation! *more evil laugh*. The principal with the strong moral code in question is Amitabh Bachchan ( I mean cummon who else will Bollywood get to play the upright buddha roles?) who somehow loses his house to his friend's nitwit sons who give the house to the evil coaching people and wants to get his house back with the help of Saif Ali Khan who -get this!- plays a dalit! I mean seriously people Saif Ali Khan is the most blue blooded star out there. He's a Tagore on one side (a powerful BRAHMIN family) and the son of a nawab on the other. When will Bollywood get serious??? So then he starts devising how to get back at them and get his house back. I'll let the rest be cuz I think some people out there will actually wanna go and watch this movie and won't appreciate it if i spoil everything for them but you've been warned!

What I took back from this movie:

Ok to be honest if you go and watch it as a comedy flick then go ahead, I was laughing so hard by the end of it- they had Black Cat Commandos come in to break down a cow shed, ssly the US gets their top guns to get Osama and we break down cow sheds!- and you can go watch it for laughs cuz they make a joke out of the whole issue(s?).

Now dealing with the issue of quotas for the Sc/STs and OBCs, I will always support admission on merit. One message that stuck out to me from the movie and this was spoken by the lady who played Mr.Shehensha's wife was- if you really want to help them then build them schools, give them scholarships, prepare them for the competition ahead, don't shield them from it, not at the cost of our own children's futures. I was just entering 12th grade when they passed the 27% reservation for the OBCs bill, and I swear at that moment when the quota was driven up to 50% and over, I felt dread. For a lot of us we felt like we were being rejected by our own country and that sense of panic gave rise to a lot of clashes that happened right outside the gates of my home at India Gate in Delhi. I'm not saying that we shouldn't try to uplift the disadvantaged, I'm saying to do it the right way not by screwing over the rest of us who work our asses off to score seemingly unattainable cut-offs. By doing that the government just widens the gap between 'us' and 'them'.

Has anyone seen the state of public schools in this country? This is where our quota students study, and I've seen them first hand thanks to the social involvement program at my college. There are no proper teachers, no set syllabus, no proper books... everything is in this complete state of disarray, it makes me want to scream knowing that this is what kids who deserve better get at the end of the day. And believe me these kids are not dumb, they're as smart as us if given the right tools. So I'd only like to request our great scam tainted government out there, instead of pushing one Indian against the other and stealing our money behind our backs and siphoning them back to your swiss bank accounts, get some shame and build the children of India the schools they deserve!

Movie Review: The Help

This will be my first film review ever and I hope you all like it. So the movie in question is the 'The Help' that chronicles the lives of black maids working in white households in Jackson Miss. during the 1960s. For all the people out there who see this movie as another 'white person comes along to save the oppressed blacks' type of movie- it isn't. The young college graduate, a white woman by the name of Skeeter played brilliantly by Emma Stone (<3) simply acts as the means to the end. It is the black housemaids of Jackson that make the movie their own.

The movie portrays rather accurately the rich high society housewives who are the antagonists and for those of you who might get offended by this- don't watch the movie! go home, do whatever but this is how it was and no matter how much certain people out there will deny it, this is the gut wrenching truth. One story that particularly stuck out (this is just one spoiler I'll give out) was the death of Aibeleen's (played by Viola Davis!) son, how he was badly injured on the job and the white foreman simply dumped him on the back of his truck drove him to the black hospital and blew one honk and left him there, I was almost in tears after seeing that and felt sick. But what really gets to you, is the courage these women require to write a book that tell their side of the story because it was never written before. I want to tell everyone to go watch it, go back to the South of the 1960s, and relive what we put our fellow human beings through.

What I'm taking back with me from the movie:

The incident that drives the movie into motion, is Hilly Hollybrook's suggestion to pass a law that requires every white home to have a separate toilet built for the help. Now this was seen as something that touched a nerve for a lot of people but when I thought about it, this movie reflected a lot the kind of lives upper middle class children experience here in India. I had a maid who brought me up, my father was in the Navy and he and my mom were out almost everyday, either attending cocktail morning or brunches or some other formal events. I honestly remember very little of them from that time but I do remember my 'aama'- its what I called the woman who helped around my house and played a big role in my childhood. She took me to the park, made sure I ate my meals, told me stories, watched TV with me and put me to bed. And yes we had a separate toilet for her. Her family occupied the servants quarters adjacent to our house and I saw her everyday from when I was 3 till I was six. Watching this movie, reminded me of her so much and I started missing this person whom I hadn't seen or thought about in the longest time and it killed me that I couldn't remember her face or that I didn't know where she was or how she was doing. But I remember fleeting moments from back then, moments that I'll keep with me, like when I insisted that I wanted a particular flower and she got it for me and got into trouble with the owner of the garden- I still feel guilty about that- or how she always bought me gumballs after picking me up from school.

I want people to watch this movie and realize the kind of important roles these women play in your childhood and someday in your children's childhood. I know I'm gonna try and make my whole family watch it.

Attention fashion bloggers! Get Real! Real Quick!

I know I'm posting after what seems like forever! But I've been busy and am only posting after having a rather horrific experience out there in the blogging world. Has anyone lately noticed the explosion of fashion blogs lately? I'm not talking about people who do this professionally, I'm talking about the amateurs, the self styled 'style queens' who could do with a little exercise and a little less blatant display of their cellulite so that I for one do not have to barf my lunch up to the ceiling. FYI- whenever people say Scarlett Jo has a healthy body and how oh-so fabulous she looks compared to lets say nicole kidman at that age I'll say to them- Oh cummon you jealous bitches! Have u seen Nicole? She looked like a freaking elf queen out of some irish fairytale, Scarlett Jo gets her photos redone so her cellulite ridden thighs do not make people like me scream like I'm watching JuOn with my eyes open , at least I'll thank her for that. I am all for loving your body but there is a big difference between a healthy body and an artery clogged fat one. And to all ye amateur fashion bloggers, I get you're all about 'expressing my own individualistic style' and blah blah but really people get a mirror. Valentino, Jean Paul Gaultier etc did not have you in mind when they designed their clothes, so please no parading around in mini skirts and short shorts and making the rest of the more grounded public here wanna rip their eyes from their sockets. It doesn't matter how 'oh so cute' the shorts are or how 'oh so delicious' (am I the only one who notices how their vocabulary is limited to oh-this and oh-that?) that skirt is in 'bright pastel' whatever color, hit a gym first! Like really I've heard of confidence in your body but this is getting slightly ridiculous.

And another question, in this time of running around for a REAL job, who in the world gets the free time to do all of this? It kinda looks to me like all these 'style queens' do is run into stores sporting the craziest prices and buy like half the store, then go around parading themselves like they're the next heidi klum or giselle bunchen (God save those good women!). I am all for expressing your own unique style ( or lack of it at times) but seriously get a reality check, nobody cares if your bag is from Zara or your shoes sport an FCUK label, except for equally daft people out there.

I have nothing against people doing it on their fb (everyone loves a cute pic now and then), that stuff is for you and your friends only, whatever you put up here, its all public, pretty much anyone has access to your photographs (I'm not just talking about those sane people out there who were simply looking for something thought provoking across the blog world). So after you all are done expressing your own 'unique' style ( most of which is rather adeptly copied from gossip girl cast members), let the phrase 'public portal' ring in your head awhile and get your noodle working!

Take a Bow

I went to college sometime back, Third Year is over and we're all 'studying' now during our leave and the first thing that struck me was that I barely recognised any of the faces there. With that I got this weird feeling in my gut that those three years that I spent here, most of the time cribbing about how bored and monotonous life was becoming, I would do anything to be back in First Year, do over things that I should have done. It's times like these that you really wish a time machine was invented already. Most of us or at least some of us are faced with this black hole that represents our future, unpredictable, not so clear and scary. God knows I am scared to death and when I was back in college, staring at a surprisingly empty foyer, I was surprised to find out that I was missing faces that were familiar to me, even ones that I'm not too fond of but the feeling that you get knowing that those faces that you were so used to spotting every single morning for the last three years are suddenly gone is overwhelming and you most probably won't be seeing most of them in a very long time or ever for that matter. I guess its not the faces that have me worked up, its the fact that my comfort zone is no longer mine. I'm seeing my juniors go to their final year and God! I'm wondering where the hell did this last year go, it really wasn't so long ago that we were jumping over our majors, the relief that we got when we finally got them. I'm pretty sure some of us danced :P And we were gearing up for post grad exams, searching for jobs, graduation seemed light years away and now we're all preparing to leave. I have to admit- I'm not a huge fan of this feeling but I'm a little excited as well, its like you've written a story, reached the ending and then everything is wiped clean to start over with something brand new. I just hope that that brand new beginning spells good fortune for all of us.

So its Midnight, it's February the 10th and today is someone special's bday... now before you go off running to conclusions about some passionate romantic affair I'm having (I wish really...) I should let you know, its a really close friend's birthday, a girl's (although I've had a penchant for those too :P) but anyway this girl is a friend in a very non relationship kind of way and she's the nearest and dearest I have here. And so with this post I will make you walk through our journey together, from our days in First Year to her 20th birthday (yes i know, we all get old sometime...)

Our journey goes all the way back to three years from now, to around the end of the year 2008 (actually I think that's two years really... anyway) so the first time I met this very sexy now 20 yr old, I was fairly confident that we'd never ever get along, honest to god! We were in different groups, different cliques, and I honestly thought I wouldn't get her and vice versa. Things change for the best I guess, and we've lasted this long with our fair share of bumps along the way.

One of our most challenging times (and here I must talk about it) was when I had a particular objection to certain alliances that she had made, now I'm an extremely territorial person when it comes to my friends and well we stopped speaking. I can safely vouch that that period was terrible, I missed her awfully... and I don't remember who said we should call it a truce ( it was probably her cause I'm the most stubborn person on the planet most of the time) and we reached a compromise. And well things went from good to fantastic from then on. - I just realised that this entire post sounds like I'm dating this woman, but I'm not just to let you know that again but I wouldn't mind, she's that awesome and spectacular!

I think one of her greatest qualities is how accepting she can be of people, it makes her handle almost just about anything, I think its because she's an aquarian, its very difficult to shock these people but I will admit I might have been successful a few times in doing that :P She is the most single talented person I know too! She paints, she plays piano and she sings!!! I mean really, that makes me go in awe of her. And that's very difficult to do, considering that I do keep a very high standard when it comes to finding people impressive, but she's all THAT! :)

There's nothing more here that I can tell you that you don't already know about her, she really is one of the few close friends I have,she's part of my 'Inner Circle' and that's really hard to break into considering I never trust people enough. A true friend, a beautiful friend, she really is Aquarius- the sign of Genius, I am so grateful to have her, and all that is her.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU GORGEOUS!!!!
I hope today is wonderful even if you're shooting GD out fo your nose ;D

Fare thee well...

Its that time of your life again... LAST DAY OF 'WHATEVER PHASE OF STUDIES YOU'RE CURRENTLY IN'!!!! And with that, today's blog post will be all about how idiotically senti i'm getting and not at all about how stupid I've found some people in these last three years... much (I'll try.. really but sometimes it's like they want me to). So after three years (and here I'm gonna use that age old line) I have no idea where 1095 days of my life went. And yeah I admit I did complain how dull and monotonous the entire tone of it was getting, but now that the song's over and I can't rewind... it kinda sucks :( There are a lot of things I will miss, getting attendance for 8:00 am lecs that we'd show up for in the last minute (SY was killer that way... I think we all felt like it was the greatest achievement of our lives at some point :P) and not to mention all the proxi scheming... I think I'm speaking for some of us at least when I say we felt like James Bond/ Jason Bourne when we came just THAT close to being caught. And the canteen food!!! I think I only stuck to three things- idli, wada and the chat (sev puri).

First Year was a big step for us. Those first introductions, Shachi you'll always be my first friend here! And it really surprises me how many friends we've lost and gained along the way. Friends turned enemies, people whom we never thought we'd get along with became close friends. A lot can and has happened. That said all those college bitching matches and rivalries are gonna seem futile and silly some months form now.. but that doesn't mean we'll ever stop :P. SY was just a continuation of all that. What really changed everything for me was our Final Year. I lost friends whom I considered myself rather close to but that's ok. That's life in the end. I am thankful though that some of my truly cherished friendships stuck through and are still going strong. And in the end that's what we have- the one's who stay with us through the good and the bad. I have no regrets that way, and yeah I do really wish those who turned to be unfaithful and two faced the very worst of what life has to offer, I make no apologies. God knows they've gotten what they deserve so far, so here's to you! Especially cause it's so awesome at how some people are so awesome at making such a joke out of themselves and their lives. Cheers!

And with that I also wish my friends, the best of everything. I hope that they get whatever it is that they want from life and I am lucky enough to say that a lot of them have. Some will have promising careers, others fulfilling life goals, they're all so different in what they want out of life and it really helps me open up to things that I never knew about. I've have learned more from them than what any Booker award book could teach me And that way I'll miss that most about college, not the classes, not the bunking, not even the canteen food, but your faces. I'll miss seeing them every single day, like I have for the last three years that I've known you and God knows this will be hard. I've always prided myself in being a fiercely faithful friend and loyalty is everything to me. So here's to you! Here's to your successful and beautiful long lives! And here's to our futures! (no matter how foggy they might seem at the moment, mine especially :P)