Alice in Noseland

The smell of Chole fills up our home as mom deftly shows how its done. My mouth starts watering, not only because it smells incredible, but because, after more than two years, I can employ more than one of my sensory organs in the kitchen.


For two years, The Nose has just been a cosmetic organ. Frankly, it never seemed like a big loss. Of course, if you count out using spoiled peas (done it once), burning dishes (until the maid gently pointed it out) and the constant (and I do mean constant) sniffling. 


After a couple of operations, however, I realised that the then absence of smell is more prominent because of its presence now. I am wistful when I smell mint, perfumes, detergents, fresh rotis, and even a baby's pee-&-poo. A major part of me wishes I could go back to the odourless world (all my senses are on an overdrive now, and I get paranoid if I get a wiff of anything - "What was that??""), but a small (negligible) part of me finds it all very fascinating.


Anyway, there was a point to this post - A lesson learned if you will. It's the smaller things that matter. For example, there was (is) one thing I was most curious about - The smell of my son. He seems to have had a unique smell which everyone was fascinated with and I could only smile in response. I would gladly give away the rest of the smells just to know what that was like.

An award received is 9 awards given!

Archana KC generously awarded me the Versatile blogger award! It is very difficult to not sound very smug when I say (or type) that! So, after pasting a permanent grin on my face, here is a list of seven random facts about myself.


1. The Garbage Rage: This is a fairly well-known trait of mine - I hate anyone throwing waste on the road. The whole filmy-ishtyle dramatic tearing of paper and throwing it in the air will, in all probability, see me in the background collecting it and searching for a dustbin.


2. Wannabe: I want to be an editor. Ever since I was the college department magazine editor, I have been bit by the bug, and desperately want to make the risky leap.


3. Old-age homes: I saw a news report of a 90-plus year old lady being brutally beaten by a nurse when I was 15. The nurse was mentally ill, and no one believed the old lady, until they found the video footage. That, and multiple visits to other homes later, it is a long-term dream to either start an old-age home, or fund it. It is not a philanthropic thought. It is more of an attempt to forget that video.


4. The memory: I forgive easily, but I don't forget. To put it in perspective, I forget the details of a bad incident, but I make sure I don't forget how miserable I felt then. So, many of my friends are left wondering when I stop chatting mid-way through a very interesting conversation.


5. Shopping: I hate shopping, and when it becomes a necessary evil, I prefer doing it alone. I seldom walk slow and keep running from one shop to another on some unknown deadline. I hate second opinions since they confuse me and then I end up buying nothing.


6. The writing craze: I like to write, literally. One of my best birthday gifts was a Waterman ink pen by Ashwin about 4 years ago, which has a permanent place on my desk. The note-making habits die hard.


7. The SUPW preference: Ever since KV (bless KV - the best school ever, location notwithstanding) had an SUPW (Socially Useful Productive Work) class, I have been inclined towards the "best-out-of-waste" philosophy. From making greeting cards to decorating the shelf with colored paper, I keep dreaming about the next-home-project to undertake.


I am a blog-addict. If I don't control myself, I spend the whole day on Google reader or jumping from one blog list to another; which is why, I am miffed that some of my favourite bloggers are on a self-imposed break. So, I am passing on the versatile blogger award to the following, hoping that they will come out of it:


1. Nithya.S: The mother of an adorable one-year old, she manages to multi-task with her age-old charm and smile. I wish she finds time to write some things about herself!

2. Suba: My bestest friend, who introduced me to Famous Five and created make-believe adventures for our group, seems to have taken a long break from her primary talent and passion - writing! (Suba, did you just remove your blog???)


3. Nithya.C: The super-sexy and geeky woman is such an innocent kid at heart that you can't help but be charmed by her. She is a wonderful writer, and it is a pity she writes so less.


4. Mrudula: I find her writing style very interesting, and considering that she is a good story-weaver, keep wondering when she will update her post next. Meanwhile, knowing more about the story-teller won't hurt!


5. Shreya: Bubbly, geeky, dancer, writer - call her what you may, this girl is a surprise package! From book reviews to management lessons, she covers it all succintly. Hope she can add a personal "7-random-facts" to that list.


6. Ashwin: At the risk of showing PDA, there really cannot be anyone as amazing as him. The workaholic man, however, is finding little time to write nowadays.


7. Nitin: It should be a crime for such good writers to be on a long sabbatical.


8. Kunal: The writing style is interestingly casual and intimate, without revealing any of his personal details. He is larger than what he seems on the blog, and it would be interesting to see a part of that in a post.


9. Jiju: He is a mobile wikipedia, with knowledge on everything and with creativity to spare. I am eagerly awaiting his novel, and in the meanwhile, can contend myself with a post or two!


So, well, Congratulations to all of you! I look forward to posts on "7 random facts about you" pretty soon!

The Posing Lifecycle

There is something about a camera which brings out the extreme in us. For example, take my grandmother. Even at my unbiased best, she is the prettiest 80-year old I know. So, everyone likes taking photos of/with her. Except her that is.

At a recent wedding, when I asked her to pose for a group photo, she snapped:

Paati: Aama!! kovama varudhu. Elaarum velaya neeruthi “EEE” nu pose kudukara.
Me (ROFLing); Vera eppaddi Paati pose kudukardhu?
Paati: Yein Siriche aanuma? Pallu kaataadhe pose kudukka mudiyadha?!

Loosely translated, it means:

Paati Ya right! It makes me very angry – everyone going “EEE” while posing.
Me (ROFLing): How else can one pose?
Paati: Is it absolutely necessary to laugh? Can’t you give a pose without showing teeth?!

While we have the extremely camera-averse Paatis at one end, we have the photo obsessed ones on the other. You know who I am talking about. The 100-plus photos uploading, the self-shot taking, the photoshopping people. They can be broadly classified into:

- The Interesting-Wannabes/Jokers
Jokers are fascinating. They love to mime. Silent screams, pouts, frowns, anger – you name it, they have done it. They practise making faces in front of the mirror, making parents wonder where they went wrong.

- The scary-self-shots/Enhancers
Self-shots can be done in so many angles, and with such creativity. There are pouts, lazy eyes, different hairstyles, pets and quirky looks. In fact, at one time, one of Enhancer-girls started a poll. She would post a self-shot and ask “Which caption do you think suits the photo best? - Cute, Sexy, Naughty, sweet, beautiful”. And no, crazy and stupid were not listed. All my gag reflexes went on overdrive.

- The Wannabe Models/Stylistas
To give them some credit, these people don’t handle the camera much. They contend themselves by showing their chiselled profiles, ruffling their hair, jutting out their butt (or chest as the case may be), crossing their waxed legs and shopping with their designer sunglasses etc. Beautiful creatures that they are, they rarely photoshop, unless of course, its on instagram.

- The Memory-Keepers /Realists
Realists can be boring and easy to work with, depending on your perspective. They know precisely what they are doing – posing, and think they have too much dignity to make stupid faces. They practice one tilt and one grin (or the at-ease or ATTENTION pose with a severe face), and methodically go about distributing it to all the camera owners.

- The one-track-mind/Naturalists
You can go “Meh” looking at their photo-klutziness. They don’t care about the aesthetics, lighting, camera quality or the way the face is looking. Make no mistake, they do like taking photos. They take out their camera and start clicking, without breaking a stride or stopping to pose. The result is a set of blurred images, girls with cakey make-ups, pimple prominence, and usually, part of some one’s back. Somehow, it becomes a part of their charm and endears them further.

I have been through all these phases, but am glad that the enhancer and the joker phase were very short-lived (four years, to be precise). It makes me wonder, if everyone goes through a posing lifecycle:

I think the forces above and beyond us created these jokers, Enhancers and Stylistas just to provide a few much-needed laughs in the midst of scams, leaks, rapes and bribes. So, this post is a tribute to these people – who selflessly look ridiculous just to add some humor into our worlds. Thank you.


PS: Archana has tagged me, for the Versatile blogger award. Before you shout - WTHeyy, Arch, I will do kickass justice to that tag soon.

PPS: Unexpectedly, this post is one of the spicy saturday picks!

Dhoni is lucky.

Bullshit.

Like every other Indian cricket watcher, I am way more passionate about cricket than is healthy. But I am glad I haven’t, in a fit of passion, written stupid articles like Biswajit Jha

Until now that is.

I am a Dhoni fan. Make that a proud Dhoni fan. Before that, I was a Ganguly fan, and before that, Mohammad Azzharuddin’s. Now, I am ok with the Dhoni bashing – as long as it is just a whine and meant to be a release of all the bottled-up frustrations. We lose a match and we have to blame someone – who other than the one who has the unenviable task of speaking/defending/answering at the presentation ceremony?

But, based on a couple of series, we end up calling him selfish, biased and short-sighted. On the other hand, all the team’s victories are because of his “luck”. We worry about India’s performance overseas and start doubting whether we deserved the world cup.

Invariably, anti-Dhonis are also pro-Ganguly. Now that IPL is coming, and Dhoni (and his team) will, without doubt, perform well, all this frothing will only increase. That’ll make me see red, so I want to put my views out there.

Let us first compare Saurav and Dhoni’s records:

I see what the hue and cry is about – it is the 26% winning chances Dhoni has when playing a test match outside India, as compared to the 39% guaranteed when captained by Ganguly. We are looking at three years (2009-2012) of Dhoni’s captaincy versus five years of Ganguly’s (2000-2005). Fair comparison? I think not, especially looking at the rest of the data – even if if we let Dhoni go easily on his “luck” on the home ground (66.67% versus Ganguly’s 47.6% in tests, and 65% versus Ganguly’s 50% in One-day Internationals), Dhoni still has won more International One-day matches outside India, as compared to Ganguly.

Just because he had a poor run in overseas tests, we cannot call him “just lucky” or a bad captain. That is terribly short-sighted.

Let us look at the averages:

 

So, if all the blaming is going on about Dhoni’s average of 37.32 versus Ganguly’s 42.17, I hope it is offset by Dhoni’s one-day averages (with a more prominent difference).

Finally, if Ganguly was indeed a better captain, Kolkatta Knight Riders would have won the IPL. If you just retorted that the team or the coach are to blame for a team’s loss, I rest my case.

As for Dhoni’s bias (in choosing Ashwin and Raina over Pathan and Tiwary) for CSk team members, please. In the match against Pakistan couple of days back, Ashwin managed 1/56, while Pathan managed a 1/69. Shall we write that off as “Ashwin got lucky?” The new guy, Dinda, managed a 2 for 47 – wonder who put him there, considering he is not in CSK. Ganguly?

Ashwin has a bowling average of 28.16 and a batting average of 19.6, while Pathan has that of 29.90 and 22.8 respectively. If we are talking about terming Pathan as an “all-rounder”, we can give that prestigious title to Ashwin as well.

Raina, the one who seems to be getting a lot of flak lately, has a batting average of 35.21, and Manoj Tiwary, who is seriously contested as Raina’s replacement, had an average of 33.0. Does making a “Maiden century” make Tiwary an obvious replacement?


Finally, the writer says that the Sehwag and Gambhir are out of the team (or not made captains) because they “spoke against” Dhoni. That one statement managed to insult Kohli’s outstanding performances and ignored Sehwag’s really long out-of-form stretch in one go.


Frankly, at the end of the day, as a country, we have no hope. We managed to term Sachin Tendulkar, one of our most accomplished and unselfish players, as selfish and slow. We demanded his resignation, terming it as a dignified thing to do. We blamed him for our loss against Bangladesh. So, Dhoni shouldn’t worry about us – If we can talk against Tendulkar, we, with the goldfish memory, the hypocritical and the sorry bunch of cricket watchers can do anything.

She wanted to know everything..

My first cheesy romantic novel was by Danielle Steele. If you like going through breezy ones and haven't tried Steele yet, I am sure you would enjoy it. That is, if you stop with one or two.
About three novels later, you will realise almost all her novels have a set formula:

• The romance is always between thirty or forty-something young couples.
• Either or both of them have children in their teens.
• Needless to say, the-in-love couple have amazing bonds with their kids.
• They usually meet under unfortunate circumstances (like accidents or war), and when they take a break for coffee, they ask a simple-yet-loaded question. Like, "Did you always want to be a doctor?" or "Do you like what do you do?". 
• Invariably, this line is always followed by "She wanted to know everything about him". Or he about her, as the case may be.

Don't get me wrong. I am not anti-Steele at all - Her stories, sans the predictable background and romance, were worth reading. I particularly enjoyed "The Family Album" and "Mirror Image". But I digress. This is not meant to be a book or an author review (if it was, it would have been on my other blog).

Since I started reading her books at an impressionable age of 13, whenever I tried to make conversation with someone, my mind would go - "She wanted to know everything about him (or her)" - she being me of course. It took me a long time to let go of the thought that my life is parallely being written into a novel and that I didn't have to give live mental commentary for everything happening in and around me.

I digress again, Fifteen years later, I still want to know everything about everyone. Of course, I don't go - "Tell me everything!". But when i ask, "How was your trip?" or "How was your weekend?" or the desperate "Anything else?", I expect a mind-blowing and spicy reply. More importantly, I expect details. I do not expect, "It was good" or "It was relaxing".

A more subtle corollary is, when I ask that, I expect everyone to want to know everything about me too. So, when these amazing 1-line insights into the trip or a weekend is not followed by "how was yours?", I die a little inside.