First the leaves: I did my very first fall-colors weekend trip on Saturday. I’m a relative newbie to fall foliage. Foliage of any sort, really. North Texas has shrubs that alternate between two states in a year - green and leaf-less. Anantha and four of his friends were kind enough to take me along to go see Bushkill Falls.

Motion sickness is a malady that refuses to go away with age… As feared, breakfast was hurled - outside the car, thanks to some nifty breaking action from Anantha. That formality out of the way, we got on with the rest of the day. We had to walk for a little bit before we got to a spot from where we could see the Delaware Valley. Green, green, green, as far as eye could see, save a single tree with a few non-green leaves that probably felt like a little like those people who bought their i-phones the week it came out – just a little foolish. The rest of the damn trees probably waited for us to turn our backs to them before instantaneously turning into wondrous shades of brown and gold. The only thing that was brown and orange was the water. So I suppose I shouldn’t really complain.

While on the topic of scenic getaways, I don’t really get the point of these “hiking / trekking” outings. If the point is to admire nature, one doesn’t really get to do it - as you have to keep your eyes on the ground all the time, at least as long as you retain a wish to not tumble down some conveniently placed gorge or two. When you do look up from time to time, most of your focus is on catching your breath, trees and skies be damned. However, I will admit that as you get increasingly light headed, you start to see the light, in a way. As Anantha slowly walked up, pausing every now and then to take the millionth photo of some picturesque pebble or stream, I huffed and puffed beside him, and before I knew it, I’d realized who I wanted to be when I grew up. I want to be just like T, one of my team mates from work. T is about 55 years old, and knows exactly what he wants from life and gets just that - nothing more, nothing less. He doesn’t give a damn about what people think of him, but is unfailingly “kind and gentle” (his words) towards the fools he has to suffer. I tell myself that as soon as I get off this damn hill, I’ll learn to have the courage to stick to my own guns, whatever they are at a given point. I also realize that this moment of absolute clarity will have vanished once my circulation returns to its usual sluggish flow and I return to the real world. But these fleeting moments of faux epiphanies are precisely why you go risking life, or at the very least a limb or two on some Pennsylvanian hill. So yes, I got my money’s worth.

Potentially life altering epiphanies apart, it was also very instructive to observe our little group composed of one married couple and three single people. The single people, without exception, did the mandatory “photos for mom to distribute to other single people and their moms” thing. I wonder what purpose these photos serve, if any. Proof that you are not so big a loser that you have no friends at all and have had to resort to a professional photographer? That you possess motor skills enough to actually get yourself to the top of a hill or a waterfall or whatever spot you’re posing from? It’s lovely, the way we desis try to optimize the experience - the photo has to include some feature in the background and also portray you in a favorable light. This requirement invariable leads to shots of people in one corner of the frame with interesting rock / building / other natural or man-made artifacts also featured prominently. After all, the photo is for the people being photographed too! Proof that I too was young and traveled to all sorts of interesting places once.

Have you noticed how the people in these photographs (irrespective of gender or age) all look alike? They all have the same look in their eyes – the one that uniquely combines desperation, fear, and plain old fury - “please, let me look good enough for my mom to not bully me into another one of these for another 12 to 18 months… but not attractive enough to get a call back from that undekha unjaana dreamboat psychopath who will invariably look at this photo 2.4 months from now, by which time I will have lost these 10 pounds! So what the f*&# is the point of this photo anyway?”

Sometimes I worry these pictures will eventually come back to bite me in the ass - as so many things do in life. The ideal future, of course, has me sitting on a rocking chair (my hair’s greying at the temples, but is still all there, and I’ve lost 25 pounds - with all the diseases I’m bound to get, a little gratuitous weight loss is the least am owed), looking at these pictures and chuckling to myself. But considering I won’t remember the reason I photographed that block of wood because there was an icky aphid on it (which btw, you can’t see on the finished product) next week, imagine the amount of agitation that particular photo is going to cause, whenever I am jobless enough to actually look at it again. I will probably waste many minutes wondering why the hell I thought that piece of wood was important. The pictures before and after that shot have me smiling - I looked so happy then, was it that stupid piece of wood that made me smile so? Do those etchings stand for someone’s initials? Who was EBW? (at least I think that’s what it looks like…) E.B White? Yes, I did love the New Yorker in those days, but enough to go around carving E.B White’s initials into pieces of wood? And wasn’t he long dead in 2007? Maybe that crazy off focus shot five pictures ago was his ghost…I suspect this is how those crazy stories that old people always have get invented. Or was I simply high? I won’t remember shit, but do depend on myself to make something up.

But to return to the picture taking exercise. The married couple did not bother taking photos of each other. They have already crossed that bridge. R intermittently recorded stuff on a camcorder. We all waved at it a second or two after we realized that we were supposed to do stuff, and not just stand there. Desi’s have only caught on as far as posing for photographs, I think. The whole motion thing continues to surprise us. I wonder what people do with these recordings? These trips usually involve at least one or two people one isn’t really close friends with. Years from now, I can imagine R and his wife wondering who the devil that girl with the glasses is. They will accuse all their known friends of bringing me along. Then one of them will remember I was the chick who threw up on the way. If R is super anal about passing on his digital wealth to his progeny, I will go down in R family history as that unknown female who threw up on grandpa’s trip some where in the US, and why it is vital to always carry Dramamine on road trips. This is how you achieve immortality.

Of course, we weren’t the only people obsessed with taking pictures. At the end of the trail, there was a statue of a bear in what I assume is the mauling position. Practically every child and every third adult took a picture with this thing. One woman repeatedly instructed her daughter to hold the bear’s paw and look sad. She then asked the little girl to hug the bear. Don’t know what that was supposed to depict. That she was sad about being mauled by a concrete bear and then it actually mauled her? I wish I could hear whatever story this little girl will come up with when looking at that picture years from now.

Thanks to the evil device we call a digital camera, documentation of an experience has come to replace the experience itself. Not content with merely recording television shows and weddings, we’ve moved on to recording our entire lives for later perusal, whenever that may be. Every experience we’ve come to feel is “significant” (and remember the most boring things might become damn significant 50 years from now when you can no longer remember how to spell your own name) and hence worthy of documentation - every trip we ever take, every pebble or dead insect we were even remotely curious about on said travels… After all, if you have a picture where you’re smiling a lot, you must have had fun! Do this digital recording on a grander, helluva lot more expensive scale and you’ll have yourselves a wedding! Yaay! The first of many proofs that one’s done all one is supposed to’ve done.

The India trip was, well, the closest to the Spanish Inquisition, and not of the comfy chair sort either. There was a wedding in the family, which gives one an excellent opportunity to meet lots of folks without having to travel even more, but does also give these assorted folks the opportunity to make inquiries about one’s own manless, childless and in their minds life-less existence. I ticked off those members of the family I could afford to tick off, with anything ranging from offering to shack up with the first man I met after I landed in New York to remaining single for the rest of my life. But mostly, I nodded a lot and let them believe that am waiting for them to find me the perfect man, which a number of them believe they have ready. The question of marriage, I find, is a bit like non-vegetarianism. Meat-eaters and pro-marriage freaks both seem to think that it’s all a question of finding that perfect chicken, and once you’ve had it, you’ll never go back to your old ways - conveniently ignoring the fact that there are millions of people who lead perfectly content lives that are chicken-free in every possible way. But since I’ve already bored all my friends with this rant, I shan’t crib anymore.

Moving on to Ellis Island. The office threw a party there last Friday. A grand affair, I admit. But the one principle that all office parties must abide by was thrown to the wind, literally, in this case. The principle, of course, being that escape is to be made possible at multiple points during the evening - after cocktails, after dinner, after dessert, during boring speeches, etc. By fiendishly shipping us over to an island and by dismissing all ferries back to Manhattan, all 1200 odd people (spouses and significant others included - suckers!) were trapped there till at least 10:30 PM. Of course, the palliative of an open bar was available, and many took full advantage of it. But since one had to risk a trip back on potentially choppy waters, one didn’t want to complicate matters any further. The folks at work think badly of me already, puking all over them won’t help one bit, come review time.

As for the West Side - the New York Film Festival kicked off this weekend. I caught four movies - short reviews will be put up are up on the other blog (don’t want to bore you fine folks, who being in possession of a more balanced approach to life are not into silent German versions of Hamlet) at the festival, and caught two more because I was in the neighborhood. I’ll confine myself to audience reactions to Lust, Caution here. The audience at the show I was in was 99% Chinese / Chinese American. Considering that this is an Ang Lee movie and a non-English one at that, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.

Till yesterday, I’d wrongly assumed that watching movies with highly inappropriate companions was an exclusively desi habit. One of my cousins watched Boys, sandwiched between an aunt and said aunt’s mother in law. A friend watched Omkara with her aged mother in law. I’m hardly guilt-free - I remember watching Carry on up the Jungle with my parents - fortunately I was a kid, so they were more embarrassed than I was. But that was till I noticed (and was noticed) by a teacher from school in the row in front of me, and then we were all embarrassed - by the movie, by each others’ presence… But it was interesting to see that Chinese families seem to have the same approach to big name movies as Indian ones do, which is to treat it as a family affair, MPAA ratings and reviews be damned.

Lust Caution provided plenty of those unenviable “kill-me-now” moments to young Chinese folks, trapped as they were between grandparents, or people who looked old enough to be great-grandparents. The saving grace was that they didn’t have to also deal with 6 year olds (remember, this is an NC-17 movie) who might have asked questions rather than stoically sit through the movie or pretend to be mature and treat it as a scientific experiment in how bendy the human body can get.

It was also odd to watch a non-desi movie in the presence of an audience that mostly didn’t need the subtitles. Several times, it was obvious that 99% of the audience was watching one movie, while the “me no speak Chinese” suckers’ illusion that they too watching the same movie was subtly undermined. While the English-speaking audience was being told perfectly bland things such as some character’s need to get a job, or a wife being glad that a husband was late from work, the Chinese audience was laughing out loud. And it’s a bummer that reading subtitles at desi movies won’t work as revenge - it’s the opposite with our movies - the subtitles are where the humor is. My 15 seconds of cheap thrills came from a single scene in which someone speaks a line or two of Hindi / Urdu, and there were no subtitles for that bit! Ha! Take that you gigglers, you!

All said, it’s good to be back.

I’ve spent the last two days walking about town, popping in and out of trains, accumulating a growing pile of gifts in the process. As I’m stopped now and then and asked for directions, I realize with a start that I’ve lived here for over a year now, and can actually give directions.

When I give the matter further thought, there are plenty of other signs of my having made inroads into becoming a New Yorker. I now know instinctively in which direction a train’s doors will open, an event that used to fill me with anxiety and complete surprise before. Not only have I gotten over my initial frustration at having to shop at multiple places for all the things one needs – other Americans have malls to go to for their odds and ends; New York has a mall, but as far as I know, no native New Yorker actually shops there – I’ve actually come to like it. The knowledge of where to go for what was one I’d feared I’d never master. But now, I have my own little system, not necessarily the same as that of other New Yorkers, but it’s the fact that I have a system at all that counts. Where one buys Jasmine Tea is very different from where one buys Indian Chai, and one does not buy pants from store A and no one ever buys shirts from the store where you get the pants, and there’s an entirely different set of stores for coats and shoes (broken down by the type of coat or pair of shoes one’s in the market for), and there is a right side for every elevator ride depending on what one plans to do while riding said elevator. A grown man in full Superman costume, red cowboy boots and a white cowboy hat passed me on the road today. A sight that would’ve stopped me dead in my tracks a year ago doesn’t even make me pause now. I kept walking, with just a passing thought, wondering where a man would go to get red cowboy boots in the city. And of course, one avoids areas around Herald Sq. and Times Sq. at all costs during holiday weekends. They’re filled with tourists, you see.

All my life, I’ve moved to a new city roughly every three years, and adapting to a new life is something I should be used to by now. But I doubt that I’ll take to it. I was warned off about New York by plenty of friends, even the ones who liked me, and the city. It gets too cold, too windy, too dull and depressing when it rains, they said. You’ve to keep walking, and fast. No matter what romantic notions you have in your head about this city, you will eventually settle down to a boring routine – work, sleep, TV, laundry, and groceries. I’ve found all of this to be true.

But, and c’mon, you knew there was going to be a ‘but’, I’ve taken to it all with a rather cheerful enthusiasm, I think. I’m not sure when exactly a strange place starts feeling like home. When the local politics isn’t gibberish any more? When you learn to curse the “sick passenger in Grand Central” who’s holding up all trains in your direction rather than feel sorry for this poor sod? When you learn to be proud of your pairs of pretty but essentially un-wearable shoes, and slightly sheepish about those other infinitely more comfortable pairs of shoes (“they’re my walking shoes, you see”)? Not really.

I think the precise moment when a city feels like home is when you experience a minor panic attack at the prospect of leaving it for more than a couple of days. I leave next Saturday, and it’s already starting to impact my life in those tiny, but significantly annoying ways. I’ve film festival tickets to buy, and they go on sale Sunday – as always, everything happens exactly the day after you leave home on a long visit to anywhere. The Walter Reade Theater which’s been closed for renovations for the last few days is going to open this week, and will no doubt have fabulous movies when am gone (I refuse to check and have my heart broken), fall television season will have started, including a whole bunch of new shows that I will probably not understand a word of because I’d have missed vital pilots… Heck, for all I know, subway rides will have become more expensive and the effin’ leaves on trees will have changed color.

Yes, all of this sounds pathetic, even I realize that. And I know this because a few years ago, I felt exactly the same way about Madras. The city would get miraculously cooler, rare Oscar winning movies would be released in theaters that normally featured the latest Ramarajan oeuvre, friends who did absolutely nothing all year would decide to do fun things together – a thousand reinforcements of how crazy you were to ever dream of leaving the city, especially at that time!

And there’s the fear that someday, I’ll have to leave this city for good. Goodness knows I’ve a history for leaving places. The day I moved to New York, all “good Tamil boys” apparently up and left for California, at least according to my family. There’s been an overt and covert campaign at making me friendlier towards males in the West Coast. I’ve nothing against good Tamil boys, but do admit to a newly minted New Yorker’s instinctive lack of enthusiasm for a place where you need a car to survive. People from all sorts of cultures, when they decide to find a mate, usually start with people from the same geographic vicinity as themselves. Indian females, on the other hand, must be prepared to move to the ends of the world for a “good match”. Of course, all of these irrational fears might come to nothing – I might get fired, and then will have to move, just to put food on the table. Or the INS might decide to kick me out. I worry about all of that too, being an equal opportunity disaster neurotic.

But for now, I suppose I’m going to have to make the best of things. After all, there are some things to look forward to. Given my longer stay this time, I can do the idiot tourist act in Madras. I can insist on visiting the line of samadhis at the beach, and complain about noisy crowds at the theater, and ask for the rest of my coffee (have you seen the portion sizes in Madras? Are they kidding us?). And on my return I can boast of having eaten the best, most authentic South Indian food there is, and further solidify my already unchallenged Tamil authority (unchallenged of course, because the group is composed of one Eastern European, one Anglo-Sri Lankan, one Chinese American, one Argentinean and one Bengali).

Oh well, I’ll be back soon enough, back to this city filled with people who carry idealized images of mythical homelands, places in which they actually feel like tourists during their periodic pilgrimage. On September 22, I’ll be home, provided, of course, the gods of JFK are in the mood to be kind to a home-sick New Yorker.

What’s it like to be a member of an organized crime gang? Is it fun being a professional assassin? What’s it like to kill someone? Is the pay any good? Is there such a thing as a straight transsexual? What is it like to live on the footpath? To dance in a bar? To make a Bollywood movie? To get arrested and be “interrogated” by the bad cop? Or to be the cop doing the interrogation? To give all your money away and become a sadhu? If you’ve ever wondered about any of these things, Maximum City is a must read. Sukhetu Mehta’s answers to these questions and more are chilling, funny and devastatingly sad.

This wasn’t an easy book to read. The first hurdle was to get over the jealousy I felt over Mehta’s feelings for Bombay, his unshakeable conviction that the city of his childhood is “home”, irrespective of the fact that he’d spent more time out of it than in it. I’m afraid I can’t claim his roots. Although I’ve spent more time in Madras than in any other city, I’ve always been a bit of an outsider, no matter where I’ve lived. Every childhood memory Mehta associates with Bombay reminded me of my own lack of such associations.

Once I got over that challenge, then came the moral dilemma of what to think about disturbing truths: a killer’s calm account of his murder routine – he takes a bath, prays to Hanuman, eats a vegetarian meal (he isn’t one normally – just turns into one after taking a human life), and finally takes a long and peaceful nap; an ultra-religious father who makes his ill babies drink the urine of a cow twenty-ones times a day in lieu of taking them to an allopathic doctor; a young and beautiful girl who’s slashed her wrists so many times that she no longer has any sensation in some of her fingers; corporate greed so insatiable that an entire city may be irreparably damaged, affecting the lives of millions and millions of people; a graphic description of a cow being slaughtered, listing every last twitch, and spurt of blood… The list goes on and on and on. When I was younger, my faith in the belief that all knowledge is good for you was unwavering. I don’t know about that any more. This book is one more reminder that perhaps there are many things in the world I have no wish to know about. Mehta’s simultaneously fascinating and repulsive account steam-rolls on and I clung on for dear life, literally reduced to watching a Cary Grant movie a day to keep at least some of my illusions about life and my cheer intact.

But what a ride it is. From the systemic rot in our country’s urban planning policies to the existence of God, there’s nothing that Mehta’s colorful friends and acquaintances don’t touch upon. For any one who grew up in India, this book is incredibly tangible, filled with people you’ve heard about (much of Bollywood is featured, including Sanjay Dutt, Vidhu Vinod Chopra and guest appearances by Hritik Roshan and Preity Zinta), or can very easily imagine being. All of which makes it very easy to care about these people. And makes you reach surprising realizations about your own life. Personally, I’ve never felt more grateful for having had a plain vanilla life or over-protective parents than when reading this book. If I had a dime every time I felt “there, but for the grace of sheer fucking luck go I”, I’d have at least a month’s rent money, if not more.

Mehta’s writing isn’t fantastic. There are no big “so whats”, despite his rather desperate attempts to wring out a message or two every now and then. And one certainly doesn’t want to think about what writing this book must’ve done to Mehta himself. What this book is (once you’re well stocked on self-cures for possible nightmares and bouts of depression) is refreshing. To hear real versions of these stories, as opposed to the Bollywood version is worth every gasp. And for once, it appears that Bollywood actually tones things down. Reality is way more melodramatic.

Ironically, the book that Maximum City reminded me the most of was Bill Buford’s Heat (reviewed here). If Buford’s attempts at becoming a professional chef made me fantasize about quitting my day job and following my own dreams, Mehta makes me realize just how good that day job and my boring life are. Every one of us is curious about at least some of the topics that Mehta digs into. I’m ever so grateful that the spade is in Mehta’s hands and not mine.

From my considerable experience in these matters, I know that this question is one of those select few that automatically turn on subtitles inside the heads of inquirers, irrespective of the language in which the conversation is happening. If I say yes, it comes out as “wastrel” or “rich bitch” when translated, depending on who’s doing the translation. Since am not in a mood to feel defensive or offer justifications, I decide to play. I say no, I was visiting a friend. So where do I live? After a quick pause, I say “Newport.” He asks, “Where is that?” (Now this surprises me, and am glad I picked a place that I’ve actually been to) Before I start going into PATH schedules, he moves on. “So”, he asks, “going to watch a show, eh?” Since I’ve asked him to take me to the Lincoln Center, it makes sense to agree. He goes on, “Show first, phir dinner… maybe some drinks-shinks, eh?” I’m starting to get offended, but smile and shrug.

Maybe he is somewhat sensitive, for he changes tack, “You work in the city, yes?” I nod. “Wall Street?” I continue to nod. Then comes another seemingly innocent question, “Is your family here only?” I say no, the family is in India. I should have seen this coming, for god knows I’m asked it often enough. And am just cursing myself for stepping into that trap, when it predictably snaps, “So are you married?” But this time, I’m prepared. I say “No, but am going to be married.” There’s an imperceptible tremor as the world starts to right itself.

“Soon?”

“Very soon,” I reply.

“Marrying an Indian?”

A pause, as I wonder just how far I want to go with this. I’m tempted to be outrageous, but decide to take it slow, since this is my first time inventing a fiancé, “Yes.”

I appear to have made the right choice. “Ah good. Indian is always best. Some people, they marry these whites. No good. They don’t take anything seriously. So many divorces…”

I let him carry on, nodding along and offering further evidence of my new status as a “good Indian girl”. He continues to approve when I tell him that the wedding will be in India. He asks when I will go back to India, and I tell him the fiancé is going to move here. Oh, he asks, so the fiancé is not here? Another pause, I say “No. He goes to school in…. <mentally short list suitable American cities> Boston.”

“Ah Boston. I was there only last week. Harvard?”

Once again, I’m deeply tempted. But decide to play it safe. By now, I’ve started to actually enjoy this, so it’s easy to smile as I say, “No. Not Harvard. Boston University.”

“That is also a good university,” he consoles me. I agree, “Yes. He’s looking for a job here, and will hopefully find one by the time we get married.”

Before I have to make up other details (am short listing possible professions in my head now), we arrive at my destination. I get out, and he tells me “Get married. Soon.” I laugh, and hope he’ll mistake it for a bride-to-be’s blush, and promise him I will.

As he drives off smiling, I start to feel a twinge of guilt for lying to this nice man. But then, I remember the drinks-shinks comment. From a slut out on an evening of debauchery it took very little to turn myself into a nice Indian girl engaged no doubt to an equally nice Indian boy. Any guilt I might have felt is smothered by the satisfaction of finally conforming to someone’s idea of what I should be doing with my life, even if that someone is a rank stranger I will likely never meet again. And this way, no one loses. The stranger goes away with the satisfaction that there is one less freak in the world. I don’t feel angry or defensive. And the fiancé, well, he just got himself a Wall Street woman.

So much for strangers. If only I could come up with a suitable response for friends. These are the people who know that if I spent an evening in that part of town, it was probably spent watching some movie with subtitles (and they aren’t wrong. Danton was the object of this evening’s adventures). What these friends (with minor exceptions) don’t understand is why I choose to throw precious hours away on celluloid men with unpronounceable names (btw, if any one knows how to do this one “Wojciech Pszoniak”, please let me know), when I could have so easily spent those hours on the internet, “expressing interest” in nice boys who, for all we know, are about to graduate from Boston University. My response, “and trade Robespierre for that?” I know will not please them.

Perhaps, I’m being paranoid. Mr. Singh might have simply thought that chatting me up will lead to a better tip. But I can’t help thinking that men, desi or otherwise, don’t feel the same pressure, if at all they are subjected to this sort of grilling-by-strangers in the first place. Or perhaps 30-something men have their own demons to slay. But that’s another post, for someone else to write.

Later in the evening, I have dinner by myself, musing about my Boston hero. The introduction of a fiancé, even an imaginary one, can apparently work wonders with more than just cab drivers. The fortune from my cookie is more interesting than the usual drivel, “Look around yourself. Your answer is nearby.” At a table for one? You bet. The answer is very much around myself.

A book like this is difficult to review, especially for someone who has lived a life that is charmed, especially when compared with Ali’s. It feels churlish to disagree with her opinions. For it is well nigh impossible to establish any sense of authority in your disagreement, without having so much as encountered a fraction of the difficulties this woman’s survived. On the other hand, agreeing with her also doesn’t feel completely right – it feels in fact, like just the sort of thing a liberal westerner would do, fueled by equal parts of condescension and bewilderment at this alien world she hails from.

I shan’t go into the details – she has been in the news enough for most folks to have a general idea of her story. As for the book itself, Ali’s language is nothing to write home about, and there is at least one glaring typo (Enid Blyton becomes ‘Enid Blighton’, a mistake unnoticed by the book’s American publishers, but one that will be hard to miss for millions of ex-colonials like myself). It is her story that is so compelling, making the 350 pages go almost as fast as the latest Potter for what is essentially a biography-cum-political commentary. The first part, while horrific in parts, is the easiest to read. Apart from feeding your curiosity about a culture most of us haven’t been exposed to, this is the part that’s in black and white, and therefore easy to pick a side. In contrast, the second half of the book, where Ali talks of her escape to Holland and the persecution she later faced, is more difficult to deal with.

Ali has a keen mind that can strip away most situations to their basics. While much of her childhood memories is about the condition of women in Islamic countries, she also explains why Islam holds such appeal to African masses. Systemic rot of the political infrastructure has forced people to seek out order any place they can get it, and Islam, with its conservative approach could very well be the one thing that saves your life, literally – be it from AIDS or from something simpler (it is the Brotherhood that offers free healthcare, not the government). Of course, there is a price to pay. And this price, as is often the case, is paid the most by the weakest members of the club – the women.

The second half of her story is set in Holland and the United States, where she escapes to from war-torn Somalia. There are many admirable aspects to her story – for an immigrant who doesn’t so much as speak the language to rise to the position of a Member of the Dutch Parliament is a rollicking tale of the victorious underdog that should please anyone who’s ever enjoyed a Rajinikanth movie. Ali is enterprising, hard-working and courageous, and it’s immensely satisfying to see a live example of how playing by the book can lead to success, even in this cynical world. But whether she did play by the book is the crucial question. Yes, according to Infidel, but I’m not sure if there wouldn’t be a different version of the story were it Rita Verdonk (then Minister of Immigration) or Jan Balkenende (then Prime Minister) or the family of Theo van Gogh (the slain director), all of whom directly suffered as a result of their association with Ms. Ali, doing the telling. The case can definitely be made that if they suffered, it was because of their own actions, or because they became targets of terrorists, but I couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for these people, who’ve ended up as little more than collateral damage in Ali’s holy cause. The last few pages of Infidel feel too much like a justification for her actions and opinions, as opposed to a straight forward narration of facts that the first half of the book is.

And Ali’s cause is definitely holy. While she starts out questioning the status of women under Islam, ultimately, it expands to the problem of integration. Ali advocates tighter integration, a ceasing of government funding for faith-based education, a reduction in government dole-outs for unemployed immigrants, etc. As laudable as her ultimate goal is – to give disenfranchised women a shot at empowerment – it is difficult to imagine how much of this will be viable. Her stance explains the reason the European right wing finds her so appealing. And her being such a shining example of amnesty gone right also endears her to liberals. While I applaud her nimbleness in navigating these apparently opposing sets of supporters, I can’t help wondering if she also isn’t as shrewd as she is brave, and that she thrives at least a little bit on the controversies she creates.

Over the last year, she has quit Dutch politics, opting to take up a position with a conservative DC think tank. This decision was partly fueled by threats to her life from Islamic fundamentalists who objected to her outspoken opinions about Islam, and also by controversies over the status of her Dutch citizenship. It is a pity that someone who was apparently starting to get some long overdue traction on issues relating to female immigrants is now reduced to the position of being a darling of American late night talk shows. In this country, immigration is an entirely different ball game from what it is across the pond, and we equate Islam too easily with terrorism that I wonder how much importance the powers that be place on the plights of Muslim women. With two of her core competencies being more or less irrelevant in this new country, I wonder what Ali will do next. She certainly can’t run for President… Legal hurdles apart, it’s hard enough for a White non-atheist ex-first lady to so much as get a shot at being elected, can you imagine the election campaigns against a Black ex-Muslim woman who is an avowed atheist?

Yes, I’m Tamil. And oh yeah, I am single. It’s just me and my 15month old twins. And please, do give me your cell phone number. You see, my youngest did the cutest thing this morning. Well, I call her the youngest - but she’s only, you know, 3 minutes and 7 seconds younger (it did not feel like under 4 minutes, if you know what I mean). As I was saying, she did the cutest thing this morning - she stopped sucking her thumb! Can you imagine! My son hasn’t - but I realize that as a boy, he’ll be taking his time to mature - but let’s not go into that… I keep getting distracted - yes, your phone number - do give it to me. I have so many pictures I know you’d love. I even have before and after pictures of the thumb-sucking victory! You don’t have MMS? No worries - just give me your email ID instead. And as for lunch, do you want to do it Saturday? Can you pick us up at 10:30 on Saturday morning, or we can do dinner at 4:30 in the evening…yes it is a bit early, but when you wake up at 4:30 AM, trust me, it’s time for a meal. I know the twins will just love you!

And don’t you dare try me. I will find pictures of twins to send you. Perhaps even your own.

This weekend, I finally got down to my spring cleaning. Yes, we’re well on our way to summer now. Which is why I figured I probably won’t need my winter clothes for some time. I spent most of Sunday putting woolens away to make more space for cottons. That’s when the trouble started. Unfortunately, there is a side effect to my ‘clean mode’. Symptoms include ‘let’s clean everything we can’, ‘wash everything we can’, and the lethal ‘press everything we can’. Cleaning everything is easy when all you have are two shelves. Even the washing is fine – there’s a Laundromat not one block away. And I assiduously read labels before I buy clothes – anything with a ‘hand wash only’ label is not even considered.

I would prefer to wear no-press stuff, but somehow all the pretty clothes, especially the semi-formal stuff I need for work all need to be pressed. Wouldn’t it be awesome if society were to become OK with slightly crumpled work clothes? I’ve no wish to go to work in jeans and a T-shirt (having worked for a start up for over two years, I know it can be fun. But the practice completely wrecked my work-life separation). I like wearing formal clothes. I just don’t want to press them. Am also curious why when outside of work inside-out is not only right-side up, but perhaps even fashionable, we continue to remain so straight laced about what we wear in the workplace?

One solution to this, er, pressing problem might be to do this ironing thing in batches, as opposed to ironing everything garment in sight But yesterday I was in ‘let’s do this’ mode. That enthusiasm last for nine shirts, but that barely made a dent. The pile of ‘to be pressed’ continues to be larger than the ‘to be washed’, or the ‘ready to wear’ piles. What breaks my spirit is that this task is never ending! There is no such thing as an ‘all done’ status, and if one exists, it lasts for all of one evening, if that. For, even if, by some divine miracle, one gets through every freakkin’ piece of spineless garment, there will be an army of newly washed ones to take their place. It’s enough to make a girl seriously consider marriage. Fellows - seriously, why do you think marriage is referred to as the “X for laundry” deal among female circles? (replace X with whatever reason(s) you think you’re getting married for. FYI: you’re lucky if you end up with the X for laundry package. Other packages include X for laundry + dishes, and the one I’m personally on the look out for X for laundry + dishes + grocery shopping. Please make sure to read the fine print to understand what is permissible under ‘X’. Conditions apply.)

As I contemplate my pile of clean but crumpled clothes, I desperately miss the winter. You can wear anything under a sweater, and if you know you’re going to be outside all the time, your winter coat gives you even more leeway…

PS: Apologies for the earlier post - I was a bit trigger happy with the Publish button. All that ironing has clearly given me carpel tunnel syndrome.

To better cater to these mythical people, we’ve redesigned ourselves. Please check us out, and pay close attention to the Asides section, for that’s the culprit that has been flooding your feedreaders. Also, after checking it out, please let us know who you are. I’d like to make friendships with the morons that read such drivel.

PS: By the way, efforts are underway to split our feeds. Until then, bear with us.

PPS: Efforts have been underwent, and split feeds are now available. The default feed offers the Asides, but you are welcome to subscribe to the no asides feed  here . And yes, we do offer an asides only feed , but why mention that here, right?

In an effort to regain some of my street-cred, I did a very desi thing over the week end - attended an AR Rahman concert. I’d never been to one of these, and figured it’d serve as a litmus test for myself. If I had a good time, then clearly, I still had at least some of whatever it takes to be Tamil / desi these days. And I’d be able to tell people questioning my cultural identity to take a hike.

What I observed and experienced at the concert ranges from the mildly amusing to the vastly annoying: ubiquitous samosas and dhoklas that no desi gathering can go without; cell-phone waving during slow numbers; desi couples who can apparently afford $300+ for tickets, but not a fraction of that for a sitter (more than one kid was lugged around still strapped to the car seat, just in case it wanted to escape the noise. I feel an entire generation was scarred for life that night (somehow I don’t see these parents paying for therapy either)); much dancing and singing along; repeated requests for “mustafa mustafa”, etc. There were other things that were too bizarre for anger or amusement - the chief among them being the choreography. Why a musical concert needs random appearances by dancers sporting weird costumes (including transparent rain coats, and some sort of S&M thing, only everything was in white), and weirder accessories (golden flags and torch lights at one point) I don’t know. I admire the singers for not getting distracted, although Chitra did seem positively alarmed by the orange clad Bhangra group. And then there was the giant video screen in the background, sometimes playing scenes from the movie version of the song being played. At other times, it had a fish that looked like Nemo’s cousin swimming in what can only be described as an underwater field of dildos.

My biggest disappointment was with the proportion of Tamil songs to Hindi songs (roughly 1 Tamil song out of 5). Everytime a singer switched from Hindi to Tamil mid-song, I felt renewed excitement simply from the relief of familiarity. Our party of half a dozen Tamils was surrounded by dancing enthusiasts who visibly wilted whenever one Tamil song was performed immediately following another. Their lack of enthusiasm was understandable, given that the Tamil songs played were all quite new, and from nonmulti-lingual movies (Sivaji, Jillendu oru Kadhal). I couldn’t help smirking when a considerable perentage of the audience didn’t “get” New York Nagaram. I have to say that the band did an admirable job of not letting anyone get completely bored - bones of the right language were thrown out at regular intervals. At the opening strains of one of the last songs of the evening, everyone was up on their feet - we all knew it was Humma Humma. The music continued, Rahman walked to the mike, opened his mouth, and we heard what at that time felt like the sweetest words in the world “Antha arabi kadal orum“. I pumped my fists, and mentally said “Athu!!!” to myself as our man went on to complete the song in Tamil.

I returned home satisfied that I was as much of a Madras girl as ever. But it’s been a couple of days since. When I think back, I know that I won’t be going back for seconds. To me a concert is about live music of a quality you can’t get from the best equipment at home, and about watching musicians do their thing. Whatever quality there might have been was drowned out by the volume, which had to be high, simply to drown out the rest of the noise. And barring a few select musicians, no one else was even given the spotlight. For some reason, singers are superstars in our culture, never the orchestra. The point of attending a live musical performance - to be awed by a group of people who can produce the most beautiful sounds in the the world from devices I don’t even know the names of - is simply not there at such events. To be sure, it’s fun to be part of this high energy. But if I was truly into that, I’d also be watching oh, football or cricket. (There, I’ve said it - I don’t like cricket either.) Perhaps those debators can take a break now. Catch their breath a bit, before starting again.