Things you will relate to if you are married to a cricket fanatic

Just a note : I understand the game but I am just unaffected by all that frenzy around it. So don't kill me. Not that you can.




Here is the thing. Cricket is India's favourite religion. Love it/ hate it but you can't escape it. If you are married to a cricket fanatic, you will be able to relate to at least some of these things.

• Your best early morning sleep would be disturbed by "OOOOOOOO", "CATCH CATCH CATCH CATCH IT YOU IDIOT", "IT IS A SIX...YAYYYYYY". (See the effect caps lock has on writing? Yup, that is your keyword to understand the tone).  Even if the TV isnt in your bedroom.

• Your dinner table conversations would be dominated by information on which pitch in which part of the world gave benefit to what team in which point of history. You have been secretly hoping that he would never question you after that lecture.

• Your house will always sound of cricket commentary from the archives. You miss music.

• You never say Saurav Ganguly. You will always say 'Dada' and it has been established undisputed that he is India's best captain ever.

• You probably have been dragged to cricket matches in the most far end of the city/country. You sat through the entire match and convinced yourself that you will look forward to them the next time.

• The idea of a holiday that excites them the most is taking a trip to London and watching the Ashes test live at Lords.

• It was probably decided before you had your first child that it will a cricketer. Daughters are no exception, mind you.

• You have an unspoken understanding with other women who are married to cricket/sports fans. 

(To be continued...Right now I have to catch up on some sleep. For reference, see point 1)

Life of a Gulfi

Typical things in the life of a Gulf NRI aka Gulfi

“Gulfis- Those who can afford Prada and Gucci, only to flaunt them while buying milk and bread at Spinneys.” – Marriamma- Webster’s English dictionary

1.       The Gulfis step out in their best Gucci and MAC to go to LuLu supermarket and secretly wish they had got dhaniya, hari mirch free with veggies.

2.       The Gulfi is miffed when a relative says "Now you get everything here in India". And Gulfi knows it is true.

3.       Gulfi's worst nightmare - Relative from home buys a house on Burj Khalifa and waves to them from the top.

4.       A Gulfi’s favourite GK question – “What is the capital of the UAE”?

5.       The Gulfi secretly wishes that people would put them on the same pedestal as American NRIs.

6.       The Gulfi can't understand why the world is after Alia Bhatt. CM/PM... It is all the same na.

7.       Gulfi is secretly sad because the Rupee is stronger against the $. Poor exchange rate = delay in buying our 6th house in India.

8.       The Gulfi will observe 16 somvaar ka vrat to make SRK visit her nearby mall for shooting.

9.       Usual introductory conversation among Gulfis begin like “How much rent you pay? That much? I could have got you better for half.”

10.   A Gulfi’s idea of Indian politics is internal squabbles among members of the local Indian association.

Kind of people on Facebook

Facebook is like ..damn..let us cut the crap and get straight to the point. The following are broad categories of people who pretty much customize my Facebook experience...everyday..

The weatherman - This one gets active and emo on rainy days. Uploads a poorly-focused image of wet roads with status updates like

 Raining in Delhi *smiley* - feeling happy. 

We get it. Notice how you frequently lose your precious smartphn to rain water. That is karma.

The celeb-couple aspirants - Okay, this couple, or at least one of them, really believes in the "true power of love" and want to spread it around as quickly as possible. In their head, they are convinced that they are the most kick-ass couple on the entire World Wide Web and have taken upon themselves to enlighten the young generation about how cool it is for one to get hitched. Their characteristics are:

• Of the 1000 pictures they have on Facebook, 900+ would be about them. Yup, just the two of them from their courtship, engagement, wedding, honeymoon, other people's wedding, other people's birthday parties, funerals, picnics, festivals etc etc etc. They may be uploading an album about your wedding in their profile but you would be lucky if you were in any of the pictures.
• In person, they wouldn't hesitate before asking embarrassing questions about your personal life even at a funeral. 
• Most likely they had an arranged marriage and this has been their only romantic relationship ever.
• Their work-life and social life kinda sucks.
• They really believe the "Hey, nice couple", "Made for each other" "Rab ne banaa di jodi" comments friends make on their uploads.

The baby bloomers - From the same family of celeb-couple aspirants, come the baby bloomers. They probably are not familiar with debates on "child pornography on social media" and upload dozens of pictures featuring their baby/babies on social networking sites in all possible poses and clothes (or without, whatever). Some of their characteristics are :

• They are super-excited about parenthood and want to tell everyone about it, even to those who belong to the country of 1.28 billion population.
• They ask you why you still haven't had your first kid even after 10 months of marriage.
• The minute they know about your pregnancy, they will be the first to give you all sorts of tips and tricks. What works for them should work for everyone.
• Their kid is most likely to leave home to practice Reiki in Vietnam when he turns 18.

Even if you never met this child in person, you would still be able to identify him/her even after 25 years and have the feeling that you have seen this child grow everyday, quite literally, because the parent would be still uploading pictures of the "baby". Yes, even those of adulthood with captions like "Can't believe my baby is so grown up"/ "Can't believe my baby now goes to work"/ "Can't believe my baby still hasn't disowned me"

The seasonal sports enthusiast This person is probably too proud to admit that he has never played a sport all his/her life and was the one to find excuses to skip sports days at school. But now, he wants to be a part of the in-thing this season. He is partly amazed to know that women are as much into sports as his guy friends are so now he wants to be a part of the excitement, that is, whatever sports world cup is going on this season. So this is what they do:

• They share every update on the game that appears on popular sports news websites.
• If they know that India is playing, their update is most likely to be - "Go India Go"
• During football season, their updates are "GGOOOOAAALLLL"/ "Go Messi Go"/ "Go ManU Go"
• You will not be invited to his parties if you ever asked him "So who else do you like other than Messi, in football I mean"/ "Dude, do you know the difference between Soccer and Football"/ "Hey, but ManU isn't even playing" etc etc etc
• They don't a lot of players except Messi and now Suarez.

The airport master

Checks in at airports whether he goes there for travel or for receiving somebody. Another variation of this species is the hotel master. So-and-so is at Murthal ka dhaba - feeling hungry! (I hope the dhabewala over charges you)

The Quote Master

This person cannot find proper words for his feeling so voila, brainyquotes.com. His search engine history would be filled with links to webpages offering quotes on life, rain, sadness, love, friendship, betrayal etc. His friends just patronize him with comments like "Good one"/ "Well said yaar"/"Wow, you wrote it?"

At this point, I have realized that I have blabbered too much and would be losing a lot of friends in a short while. Thinking if I should write another post on "All the people I love on Facebook"

Quips from the classroom

One of the most challenging things that I have done for myself is taking up a job in a school and re-entering classrooms (it lists among places I passionately hate, like changing rooms, aquariums, Uttam Nagar bus terminal etc etc). I learn, unlearn simultaneously in a world which is so far away from my comfort zone.

Mass Comm schools should make their students work with adolescent students. It just changes your perspective on communication. They will carry impressions for a lifetime, I promise you.

I haven't known if I am good/bad at what I do. All I know is, I am a very different person than what I was, say, a year ago. I work with teachers who are exhausted at the end of a teaching day, yet passionate about their job. I work with students, who nonchalantly possess sacred powers to either make me feel like tearing my hair apart/ feel warm and fuzzy inside everyday. Either way, it depends on their mood, really. 

And then there are those who drag me to the lighter side of life. I am listing a few here:

Miss, I am going to give you gift

Aww...that's sweet H. But no, you shouldn't. Just focus on your work.

No, I bring you gift. You open. It have snake. It bite you, you dead, I happy that no one scold me now. (He wasn't laughing, trust me)

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Two kids were fighting and one of them was crying

What happened, you two? What is this all about?

Miss, he said bad word to me. He called me a geeerrrlll..

A what?

Geerrl, Miss..You. He called me you.(And he cried more)

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The class was instructed to write a letter, imagining themselves to be a character from the play that they were reading. The character has met with an accident and he is writing a letter to his girlfriend, hoping nothing has changed between them because of the accident and resulting change in his appearance. While most of the students wrote emotional and moving letters, a reluctant writer composed something like this.

Dear love,

What kind of girlfriend are you? You can't even visit me in the hospital when I am sick? Get lost then. Go back to your f***tard life and dont come back

Always awesome,

Me.

(That, my friend, is called a closure)

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A group of students were discussing food habits and cuisines. They discovered, much to their shock, that I m a vegetarian. One of them looks at me sympathetically and says "Miss, life very hard for vegetarians. I am so sorry for your loss"

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On a day when I was almost tearing my hair apart, a student comes to me and imparts wisdom

"Miss, why you so angry? My mom says girls happy when they have babies. Have baby. It make you happy then you don't put on report"

(I didn't open my mouth the whole day)

Needless to say, I accept defeated.

Parents and a KG fancy dress competition

I have always been bad at noticing little mundane events that, I admit, supply amusing content for fresh posts here everyday. Let us just say I helplessly underestimate their entertainment value and quite take them for granted. However, this poor appreciation of humour and insanity around seems to be just one of those countless things that received a jolt when I left my city and relocated to a non-descript emirate in the U.A.E.

I have had my share of travelling but never really lived anywhere except the city that I call my home- Dilli. Pretty much took most activities around me as universal in nature. Now each day gives me something new to think about and if I am lucky, articulate too. While there are some things that I find amusing and even breath-taking here in Ras al Khaimah, the rest are not so different than what I saw back home.  

The other day, my 5-year-old neighbour asked quite shyly if I could come to see his performance at the school fancy dress competition. His mother P is probably the only friend I have here and though we have not decided upon a language that commands mutual fluency, we talk a lot. I haven't really got a chance to interact with anyone outside my building because I don't know anyone. So, I decide that it would be a good idea to go to his school, meet some people and get a feel of the place. Who knows, I may have to stay here for pretty long.

On the appointed day, I reached the school with P, A and his sister B well ahead of the scheduled time for performance. We found a nice seating space at the backstage and since A's costume did not require too much time or fuss, we decided to watch on till his turn came.

So here was a motley crowd of kids with their parents, grandparents, siblings, nannies and teachers at the back stage and I was reminded of my own disastrous acts in school competitions when I didn't even understand the concept of make-up. I can successfully apply Kajal and lipgloss now.

My parents, who had then concluded that they would be too embarrassed to watch me behave like those this-is-cute-take-it-or-leave-it kids in advertisements and still bag prizes from bored housewives-turned-teachers, excused themselves from such performances. However, they never made any efforts to discourage me from taking part in these competitions or dampen my enthusiasm before my performance. Can't judge them. They were just regular parents who were putting up with an hyper-active Aries daughter and believed that her academic scores were enough to vex them.

The conclusion being I was the only one who would be super-excited for events as trivial as fancy dress competitions. My parents had the capacity for thought and reason to a high degree and limited their involvement in such affairs, leaving the learning part to me.

Enough of flashback now, cut to 2011 and some role reversal providing cheap amusement to yours truly. What I see before me at the backstageis an assortment of well-dressed young parents who spare no efforts (physical and mental) to push their kids to heights unfathomable.

Sample this:

A 4-year-old dressed up like Swami Vivekananda is parroting something that goes "Human beings are the manifestation of the divinity etc etc etc" under the stern gaze of his over-anxious  parents. Later, he stood on a chair (Maybe you could tell me the reason for it) and mouthed these lines without caring for some punctuation or pause (I don't blame him) while his parents were instructing the support staff at the stage to not bring down the curtains till he made his epic speech at the peak of his voice.

Then there was this cheerful woman with a friendly smile seated next to me. She really seemed more relaxed than others till her son - an LKG student costumed as mobile phone (and quite an adorable one, if you ask me) - failed to narrate the essay on utility of mobile phone as she had taught him.

All hell seemed to have broke loose and she looked as if she was facing betrayal, dishonour, shame and failure (all together) due to that single speech-forgetting act of her son, who in all probabilities must have been searching for his mother's face in the crowd.

Huh? Why the hell did he not say anything, she cried in disbelief.


Oh, was that kid your son?


Yeah, but that STUPID STUPID boy. Why didn't he say anything? That IDIOT he is.


Ummm..okay...I thought he was quite adorable. He is okay. Was he supposed to say something as well?


Ohh, yeah yeah yeah. I had taught him so much. He had to say - "I am a mobile phone. You need me all the time. I help you stay connected to your near and dear ones and am always with you wherever you go...(the recitation part was quite long and this lady even delivered it in a rhythmic tone best suited ONLY to a 3-year-old).....He was saying this all right before the performance. God knows why he didn't say it. Wait till I go and get him for this.


She stormed out of the seat rows towards the backstage. That moment, my heart went out to the kid. I am sorry for him.

It was clear that the stage wings were choked with parents carefully guarding their small manifestations of divinities from being trampled by other participants (and their parents) or worse, ignored by the teacher while calling them out to the stage. Talk of overwhelming support and supportive parents.

I mean seriously, what were you thinking, boss? You kid would mention this gratefully in an interview with the Time magazine when he goes on to win many more fancy dress competitions in the later part of his life? Ever heard Kamal Hassan linking his parents to performance in Dasavatharam and such disasterous movies?

What is the point in losing collective shit and being so pushy about something as useless as a fancy dress competition? Look at the kid carefully. It is scared and even jittery while facing a packed auditorium. Instead of teaching him to enjoy what he is doing or taking it lightly, you are making him mouth unpronounceable stuff. Have mercy on the poor kid, people!

The Husband returned from a 5-day trip to India at midnight that day.

"So how was that fancy dress competition? Anything friendly?"

"Whenever we have our kids Ash, we will never be overbearing or pushy on them"

"I get it. Say no more. Not at least now."

Yes, it took me close to eight months to post this one. What was I doing till then? I got married, silly. Good noe... Oh yeah, Thanks-wanks, lovely wishes and all... So, here I am. Shaadi-Shudaa and Settled. Waise, I must admit that changing my facebook relationship status to 'married' was a bit of a 'thee-hee-hee' moment.

And guess what else? I quit my job before the wedding, that too out of sheer impulse. I was not only to leave my city, but also my country after marriage. So resigned. It doesn't hurt. At least not till you are in your own city. Once you move out of the city, or the country as in my case, then it gets you. The very lack of activity and loneliness hits you real hard.

So here I am. In the land of bedouins and the northern most emirate in UAE - Ras al Khaimah. From Delhi to Ras al Khaimah. The Journey, meri zubaani. Me thinks that this could be a chapter's title in my autobiography. I could even use bombastic expressions in it and portray yours truly as holier-sensitive-smarter-than-thou.

So what else? Nothing much. Aur batao kya chal raha hai? Bas chal raha hai...

That's pretty much how most my conversations online have reduced to. There is another cringeworthy How is married life treating you? but we will discuss that fiddle-faddling some other day. So what all have I been doing these days? Scroll down.


- I set up my home. It looks quite comfortable and nice, actually. Here's just one picture of the living room.



- I am cooking. G.A.S.P! And doing a pretty good job at that, By the way.


- Trying to scrub some rust off my fingers. Matlab, one of the nicest things that can happen is that I may be able to update this blog everyday. On writing whatever I want to. A short story might just be on its way
- Complete reading a book. I have shamefully taken such a long time for it that I am wouldn't want to even name it.
- Looking for a job- Predictable naa
- Gossips over prolonged skype sessions.
- Learning to blow a whistle. Now, I really wanted to take out time for this fine art since childhood. I live at the 16th floor of a building and there is no one to even bother me. Want too use it while watching Thalaivar's movies.
- Reading blogs.

Thats all I can recall as of now. Frankly, I cant think much when I am hungry. Off to munch..taa-daaa coochiess.

P.S- So for those who want to know what is it like getting married? My answer is - I don't know. Ah, these pink shades 

Things I want to do in my lifetime

It is always important to dream. It makes you stronger. Being a compulsive day-dreamer, here is my brief list of what I want to do in this lifetime:

1) I want to go for a holiday to Venice, even alone.
2) be a connoisseur in cooking
3) own a house, well-ventilated, happy and with a study. Near the mountains.
4) become a writer. I think I have a lot to say.
5) Adopt a girl child.

Photo courtesy: pinklabel.wordpress.com

6) Heal people -(Magic???)
7) Learn a lot of languages.
8) Read, Read, Read, Read and Read.
9) Dance like no one is watching, everyday :D
10) Find new reasons to update this blog, like everyday...woooohhooo